https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/16/us/colorado-river-water-cuts-lake-mead-negotiations-climate/index.html

  • jack [he/him, comrade/them]
    ·
    2 years ago

    there would not be water shortages if we ended large-scale animal agriculture (or even just meat agriculture)

    • footfaults [none/use name]
      ·
      2 years ago

      Just outlaw almond farming, grass lawns, and golf courses. The level of "sacrifice" to stop this being an issue is so small.

      • grey_wolf_whenever [he/him]
        ·
        2 years ago

        if you banned golf courses the capitalists would have their chud dogs murdering people in 24hrs

        • Tormato [none/use name]
          ·
          2 years ago

          Symbolically and realistically I’d like the think that even the zombie chud contingent could be brought to their senses about the “elite “ assholes who play golf and their crony capitalist culture being the real enemy.

          Seems more than a few would be reachable, no?

          Keep that picture of Trump, Clinton and Bloomberg together on the fairway handy.

            • jack [he/him, comrade/them]
              ·
              2 years ago

              If you don't believe we can ever convince people to get rid of (most) golf courses, what do you think the chances of a communist revolution are? Buck up!

              • grey_wolf_whenever [he/him]
                ·
                2 years ago

                I think we can convince most people! I just think you'd see violence from some dedicated lone wolf right wing weirdos.

      • sooper_dooper_roofer [none/use name]
        ·
        edit-2
        2 years ago

        Just outlaw grass lawns

        Boomers seem to love mowing down their grass twice a week every time it reaches 2 inches high anyway, revealing all the white spots/dead thatch

        Seems like getting rid of the lawn altogether would be more efficient

      • AncomCosmonaut [he/him,any]
        ·
        2 years ago

        I think that's misleading because although livestock don't directly use a lot of water...

        Irrigation of crops is the largest offstream use of water in the CRB, averaging 85% of total offstream use

        And a lot of those crops are no doubt food for livestock.

        • Diogenes_Barrel [love/loves]
          ·
          2 years ago

          reducing irrigation is absolute. it doesnt matter if it was 100% for human consumption, it must go down.

          • Frank [he/him, he/him]
            ·
            2 years ago

            Damn if only we had a centrally planned economy that could mobilize industry to build out water-efficient irrigation systems across the entire effected area. Alas, that would be communism!

            Capitalism is the dumbest economic system.

          • AncomCosmonaut [he/him,any]
            ·
            2 years ago

            Agreed, but making it go down by eliminating the large part of it used for livestock feed would no doubt drastically help, which was jack's original (and valid) point.

      • jack [he/him, comrade/them]
        ·
        2 years ago

        That's not accounting for cattle feed, which is an enormous land and water use, and drives the concentration of human-destined crops into places like California

        • Shinji_Ikari [he/him]
          ·
          2 years ago

          Is cattle feed typically grown locally? I'd think corn/grains at least would be shipped in. I don't know if its economically viable to ship bales of hay in.

          • jack [he/him, comrade/them]
            ·
            2 years ago

            The midwest farmland being used to grow cattle feed could be reoriented towards human-destined food. Those places receive way, way more rain than California. I'm looking at the whole US food system: animal agriculture has caused our most critical farmland to be concentrated in a region of the country extremely vulnerable to climate change.

    • Kuori [she/her]
      ·
      2 years ago

      there would probably be large-scale treat riots within the day, though

      • TerminalEncounter [she/her]
        ·
        2 years ago

        It's amazing some of these chuds want to kill fbi agents or overthrow the government in favor of their flavor christian nationalism, but giving up steak and watering their lawns so they don't lose their hydroelectricity or just die of thirst is a step too far. Peoples sense of what constitutes a sacrifice is completely out of whack.

        • sooper_dooper_roofer [none/use name]
          ·
          edit-2
          2 years ago

          but giving up steak

          they don't even have to give up steak, they just have to not gorge on it like subhuman fucking fatasses

          average amerishart eats 55 lbs of beef a year

          I tracked my own consumption and it came to 15 lbs a year

          Chinese consumption is about 15 lbs a year
          Europena consumption is 30 lbs a year

          How the fuck do you even crave a pound of beef every week? Like, in addition to the other meat/fish/poultry that you eat? What the fuck?

            • sooper_dooper_roofer [none/use name]
              ·
              edit-2
              2 years ago

              the funniest part is that 55 lbs figure is not at all equally distributed, so it's more like half of us eat 20 lbs a year and the other half eats 90 lbs

              people really be out here eating 2 pounds of beef every week, which is equivalent to 1.1 burgers a day--every single day

        • Frank [he/him, he/him]
          ·
          2 years ago

          I don't think most of them can really imagine and internalize the reality of consequences. They're still locked in to just world fantasies where nothing bad will happen to them and they'll always come out on top somehow. Just not having water is too big in scale for them to cope with.

        • Kuori [she/her]
          ·
          2 years ago

          pretty sure they just flatly don't believe that's going to happen, despite all available evidence.

          my guess would be they internalize it as "evil commie democrats trying to destroy [their] way of life"

    • Frank [he/him, he/him]
      ·
      2 years ago

      You would have to genocide the ranchers to get them to stop raising cattle. Like you'd literally have to go to war and hunt them down all across the west.