so the other day i was thinking to
myself how when we're children
we believe in really nonsensical things
like santa claus the easter bunny
the tooth fairy and then i was thinking
about how strange and weird it would be
if
when we became adults we continue to
believe in really nonsensical things
anyway today's video is all about the
ethical butcher so who exactly are the
ethical butcher well
the ethical butcher are a company here
in the uk who in vignery this year
shared a post across their social media
that said that we shouldn't be doing
the january we should be doing
re-january and in the post they shared
they made claims such as eating avocados
and nuts
is worse for the environment than eating
well-raised animals in 2021
we're still going to be regurgitating
this misinformation that has been
debunked
so many times and you'd think with such
a bold claim such a claim that
contradicts the mainstream scientific
consensus
that there would at least be one
scientific study or
one source to support that claim but you
would be mistaken
because of course as we know the claims
they're making are as fictitious
as the concept of an ethical butcher and
so when i saw this post
i decided to make a response and so i
made a response and shared it to my
instagram and in my response was
a whole bunch of different scientific
evidence and different studies
that supported the claims that i was
making and so what do you think the
ethical butcher did in return
do you think that maybe they put up
another post addressing the things that
i'd said providing
evidence to support their claims well no
you would be wrong if you presumed that
because actually what they did
is they blocked me and then when someone
asked them why they blocked me
they said it's because i was being
dogmatic yes that's right everyone
welcome to
2021 we're providing scientific evidence
to support your claims makes you
dogmatic but if we look at what being
dogmatic
means it means treating your opinion as
if it was
fact i suppose a bit like making
unsubstantiated claims on a social media
post
and providing no sources or references
for those unsubstantiated claims
but anyway i'm not going to focus on
their post or my response in this video
because i'm more interested in talking
about the
ethical idea of an ethical butcher but
just before we move on to that i do want
to reference
one study called grazed and confused
because the study looks specifically at
the claims being made
by advocates of regenerative animal
agriculture and holistic management the
study is a meta-analysis that identified
300
sources and was conducted by an
international team of researchers
including those from the university of
oxford the university of cambridge
and two of the highest ranked
agricultural universities and
institutions
in the world the study looked
specifically at the claims that those
like the ethical butcher make when it
comes to sequestering carbon
through the grazing of animals now the
ethical butcher like to say that grazing
animals can be carbon neutral
and what that means is that the
emissions being produced by the animals
are offset by the carbon that's been
sequestered through the grazing
management systems
that they have been farmed within
however this study showed that that is
complete
nonsense because at best you could only
sequester 20
to 60 of the total emissions being
produced by the animals
in the first place in essence grazing
animals
and net contributors to the problem and
even if you could graze animals in a
carbon neutral way
the study shows that over time soil
reaches something called soil
carbon equilibrium which means at that
point you're not sequestering or
offsetting
any of the emissions produced by the
animals in the first place
it really just laid to rest the nonsense
that's been propagated
by the people that talk about the system
of farming but anyway let's move the
conversation on now to the
ethical idea behind the ethical butcher
because of course
by using the word ethical they're
implying there's something different
about what they do we think oh an
ethical butcher
what could they possibly be doing that's
so radical to make the process of
killing animals
ethical i wonder what it could be well i
was sent an article
written by someone called florence
wildblood and in the article florence
interviews glenn burrows and glenn
is one of the co-founders of the ethical
butcher
florence asked glenn well what about the
slaughtering of the animals
and this is what he had to say in return
it's the one part of the business
that i freely admit we do not have much
control over
or enough control over that's the best
that you have to say
about the killing of animals you know
the animals that are killed for your
business
and so you can profit off of their death
and that's what you have to say
that you freely admit that you don't
have much control over the process
what you mean to say is you have no
control over the process
the process of killing animals the
slaughter you know that bit in the in
the process where a sentient being
is taken against their will to a
slaughterhouse and has a blade pulled
across their throat or they're thrown
into gas chambers
just that little bit of the process
where a sentient being
has their life taken from them
needlessly well actually gotta hand it
to glenn because
he admits that he doesn't want the
animals being killed in slaughterhouses
so glenn actually has another
alternative for how we should kill these
animals this is what glenn believes
will make his business really ethical in
the future
what i would like which is only just
become legally available
is to have a mobile unit that visits the
farms and does the kill
in field some of the farmers who've
trialled this have said this is
absolutely the most humane way
so glenn's idea of a perfect world an
ethical world
is a world where there are
slaughterhouses on wheels
that drive around the country going to
different farms and killing the animals
on the farms instead
because yes of course the killing isn't
the ethical problem when it comes to
what we do to animals
it's the fact that we drive them to
slaughterhouses if we could just kill
them in the fields with these
mobile vehicles of death then all of a
sudden the process would be so humane
and so ethical and the phrase more
humane
well when you're comparing what you do
against the slaughterhouse
it's almost impossible to think of
something that wouldn't be
more humane than what happens in a
slaughterhouse but at the end of the day
what you're doing is exactly the same as
what happens in a slaughterhouse
it's now just in the field where the
animals have lived their life
and the question isn't what is more
humane the question is
is it objectively humane now of course
shooting a dog in the head is more
humane
than dismembering that dog while they're
still alive of course it is
but that doesn't mean that shooting the
dog in the head is objectively
humane and likewise having mobile
slaughter houses
does not make the act of taking the life
of a sentient being
objectively humane i'm just so disturbed
and sickened
that we live in a society where
butchering sentient beings
can be described as being ethical and
not only that but we're so
desperate so desperate to justify that
act
of killing that we make appeals to
pseudoscience
and then claim that having
slaughterhouses on wheels makes the
process so justifiable
and ethical i mean what are we doing at
some point we have to just take a step
back
and reflect and say what the hell are we
doing to these sentient beings
these poor defenseless creatures that we
exploit with such an
arbitrary justification that is so
insane
at some point we have to recognize the
absurdity of what it is that we are
doing and another thing about glenn as
well is on the ethical butcher website
glenn says that he was plant-based for
25 years
but in every single interview i've seen
with him it always says that he was
vegetarian for 25 years
i was 25 years vegetarian and so that
means one of
two things of course the first is that
glenn doesn't know the difference
between
being vegetarian and being on a
plant-based diet and
if that's the case that's awfully
worrying because glenn's making a lot of
claims
about a plant-based diet so we'd hope he
knows the difference but i think that
there's something else going on here
which is that glenn there's a reason why
you are saying this
on your crowdfunding page where you are
trying to entice people
to invest into your company you weren't
plant-based for 25 years
you just weren't but it's a nice selling
point to say to people isn't it to go
you know i was plant-based for over two
decades so i really get it and so i
really know about being ethical because
it's something i care about and then
i found out about this style of farming
and so you can trust me because
i know what you guys want because i was
plant-based for over two decades
it's a nice selling point glenn but
ultimately it's
misinformation just like the
pseudoscience that accompanies it
so look here's a top tip if someone is
making claims that don't sound
like they make sense and then they're
supporting those claims
with anecdotal evidence and can't
provide any peer-reviewed
metro analyses to support those claims
and not only that but the actual
peer-reviewed
meta-analyses that exist contradicts
those claims
then it's probably safe to assume that
whatever that person is saying
should not be taken seriously i just
think it's hilarious that we're supposed
to go
boy this is a tough decision isn't it i
mean on the one hand i've got
the scientific literature that says we
have to stop eating animals
and i've got my morals and values that
say that killing animals
is wrong but then on the other hand
there's a butcher a guy that profits off
killing animals
who says that he's ethical and provides
anecdotes to support that claim i mean
who do i trust the science the
peer-reviewed meta-analyses
my values and ethics are a guy who
profits off killing animals and so i
just want to end the video here but
before i do
i wanted to say that as veganism
continues to grow
and as the number of vegans continues to
increase
what we're going to see is individuals
businesses and organizations
looking to capitalize off the changing
attitudes
of society as society looks to be more
ethical
and more sustainable people from within
the animal agriculture industries
are going to try and pander to the
changing attitudes
of society they're going to sell us
ridiculous ideas
like that of the ethical butcher the
idea that killing animals can be
compassionate
humane and ethical and also sustainable
as well but we have to see this
for what it really is misleading
marketing propaganda
something that is trying to capitalize
and profit off the changing attitudes
of society and as vegans it is so
important
that we reject this because even though
these organizations and individuals
will say things like we're against
factory farming we want to be more
ethical
we want to create sustainable forms of
farming what we have to recognize
is these industries are still profiting
off and condoning the slaughter and
torture
of sentient beings do not fall into the
trap of saying
well it could be worse at least they're
not condoning
factory farming because what they are
condoning is the slaughter
and the denigration of sentient beings
bodies
and for that reason we have to
objectively take a stand
against all of this rhetoric and all of
this misinformation and recognize
that the concept of an ethical butcher
is as nonsensical
is as outrageous as the concept of santa
claus
the easter bunny and the tooth fairy
alright guys thank you so much for
watching this video
i really do appreciate it let me know
down below in the comments what you
thought of my response
what you think about the ethical butcher
and as always i look forward to seeing
you all in the next video
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