Yea the land is better off when pigs are free range and able to spread their fertilizer a bit better, but the pigs produced per square foot of land is much less and thus increases the prices, as well as additional labor to care for those pigs versus a factory farmed setting. If every pig on earth was raised that way at current demand we would need a significant amount of more deforestation to allow grazing room and prices would increase significantly as well.
Edit: ill also add that just visiting the farm doesnt pain the full picture. The pigs may still be fed some feed, which is cropland that could have been growing planta for direct human consumption. You also don’t see other impacts such as pig shit liquifiying and flowing into a local creek during periods of high rainfall.
But that’s the point. People will actively fight pollution from lots of sources. But when it come to bacon, all of a sudden pollution doesn’t matter and we just want cheap bacon.
In my experience this is false. Most people will share a Facebook post or news article then proceed to continue living their life without making personal changes because “big oil pollutes anyway” and then they also don’t go to any protests or take other actions. They won’t change the way they vote for more environmentally friendly candidates.
I think “most” is doing a lot of lifting here. I think most people are eco conscious if you ask them about the details. But either don’t have the means or are actively brainwashed into not doing the right thing.
Or to put another way, I think almost everyone will say that they don’t want pig shit in a river. But half of them are brainwashed to believe that it’s environmental regulation that’s causing companies to do that, or that it’s literally impossible to do better.
Yea the land is better off when pigs are free range and able to spread their fertilizer a bit better, but the pigs produced per square foot of land is much less and thus increases the prices, as well as additional labor to care for those pigs versus a factory farmed setting. If every pig on earth was raised that way at current demand we would need a significant amount of more deforestation to allow grazing room and prices would increase significantly as well.
Edit: ill also add that just visiting the farm doesnt pain the full picture. The pigs may still be fed some feed, which is cropland that could have been growing planta for direct human consumption. You also don’t see other impacts such as pig shit liquifiying and flowing into a local creek during periods of high rainfall.
But that’s the point. People will actively fight pollution from lots of sources. But when it come to bacon, all of a sudden pollution doesn’t matter and we just want cheap bacon.
In my experience this is false. Most people will share a Facebook post or news article then proceed to continue living their life without making personal changes because “big oil pollutes anyway” and then they also don’t go to any protests or take other actions. They won’t change the way they vote for more environmentally friendly candidates.
I think “most” is doing a lot of lifting here. I think most people are eco conscious if you ask them about the details. But either don’t have the means or are actively brainwashed into not doing the right thing.
Or to put another way, I think almost everyone will say that they don’t want pig shit in a river. But half of them are brainwashed to believe that it’s environmental regulation that’s causing companies to do that, or that it’s literally impossible to do better.