June 26, 2012

"What makes an American eat ten or twelve times more meat than the average person in Mozambique or Bangladesh?"

Ask NPR. Really.

101 comments:

Patrick said...

Bacon.

prairie wind said...

What makes an editor pass over a sentence like that without a second thought?

edutcher said...

It really is an American thing.

The mountain men lived almost exclusively on meat and the cowboys were a close second.

Tom Spaulding said...

Meat's Back On The Menu, Boys

MadisonMan said...

Mmmmm. Bacon.

Bratwurst.

Lamb Chops.

Pork BBQ.

Tenderloin.

So many good reasons to eat meat!

wyo sis said...

Hunter gatherer vs farmer culture?

prairie wind said...

What makes Americans wear shoes more often than the average person in Mozambique or Bangladesh?

What makes Americans go to the movies more often than the average person in Mozambique or Bangladesh?

What makes Americans eat anything at all more often than the average person in Mozambique or Bangladesh?

BarryD said...

Americans eat ten or twelve times more FOOD than the average person in Mozambique or Bangladesh.

tim maguire said...

Because we can. Next question.

Tom Spaulding said...


"What makes an American eat ten or twelve times more meat than the average person in Mozambique or Bangladesh?""


Courage!

David said...

Ronald McDonald.

SGT Ted said...

Why?

Because we CAN.

They would eat that much in those other places too, if they could afford it.

Tom Spaulding said...

"What makes liberals donate money to NPR instead of buying meat for Africans?

I'm Full of Soup said...

Because we are stupid & evil of course.

Anonymous said...

Eat fatty meat, less carbs, yeah there I go again.

TWM said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
TWM said...

Muslims don't eat pork and even beef has to be prepared in a specific fashion. Bangladesh also has a lot of Hindus who do not eat beef.

Mostly I imagine it is because quality meat is plentiful here and inexpensive enough so that even our so-called poor can afford it.

BarryD said...

What makes liberals donate money to NPR instead of buying meat for Africans?

Without NPR, where would they hear three hours of uninterrupted Depression-era Ozark mouth-harp music, brought to you by the good folks at Monsanto?

Dust Bunny Queen said...

Because we CAN.

Sorun said...

Food stamps.

BigFire said...

Well, I consumed infinite more meat than the Prime Minister of India (he's vegetarian), and what does that prove?

rehajm said...

Yay NPR for getting it correct on the first try- economics drives consumption (to a point). Also interesting- based on the NPR meat map, highest meat consumption occurs in places with climate and geography most hospitable to growing grasses meat likes to consume.

John said...

What makes us is that human being prefer meat. The only reason they don't eat meat is generally because they are too poor to buy meat. The famous Mediterranean diet is no longer practiced in the Italian villages where it was discovered during World War II. Why? The people there got richer and started eating meat. God NPR is stupid.

Tibore said...

I guess the obvious question to the NPR editors is: What other Mozambiquan or Bangladeshi traits should we follow? Because obviously we Americans are doing "it" wrong. (*rolls eyes*).

-----

Perhaps the choice of those countries doesn't fit the narrative of "America is the epitome of excess" that the press loves to force down our throats. After all, telling everyone that the US comes in second to Luxembourg (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/03/world-meat-consumption_n_1475760.html) doesn't make for a good NPR story, does it? Nor does the point that Uruguay's beef consumption is nearly half-again that of the US's. But then again, properly contextualizing "the point" has never really been the dominant news media's strength, has it?

Dust Bunny Queen said...

God NPR is stupid.

And they think that you are too. Hence their shallow content free propagandized programing.

KCFleming said...

Why?

Because it's delicious!

BarryD said...

"the Prime Minister of India (he's vegetarian)"

He's a POLITICIAN, though.

I'll bet he loves his porterhouse, when nobody's looking.

William said...

Why can't cassava roots taste like steak?

exhelodrvr1 said...

"telling everyone that the US comes in second to Luxembourg "

Come on, people, we're not trying hard enough!

Tibore said...

I know! I mean... freakin' Luxembourg?? NO ONE SHOULD BE ABLE TO OUTCONSUME AMERICANS, DAMMIT!!

;)

rehajm said...

On Luxembourg: Meat production exceeds 15,000 tons annually. Because the nation produces 40 percent more beef than it consumes, meat is one of the few agricultural products in which Luxembourg is self-sufficient.

Better?...Better get a bucket.

dreams said...

What made the hunters and gatherers eat so much meat? Why can't we all be good vegans. Not me, I'm trying to eat low carb which is more like the hunter gatherers.

cubanbob said...

Next on the so obvious list NPR will tell us water is wet and fire is hot and that American's use to much of both.

Comanche Voter said...

What makes progressives pay $70 a pound for Niman Ranch lamb?

DADvocate said...

A1 sauce. If we didn't have A1 sauce we wouldn't eat so much meat.

X said...

since our per person GDP is about 100 times theirs, I'd say we are underconsuming in relation.

Rusty said...

dreams said...
What made the hunters and gatherers eat so much meat? Why can't we all be good vegans. Not me, I'm trying to eat low carb which is more like the hunter gatherers.



It wasn't unusual, after a Buffalo hunt, for plains Indians to consume up to 30 pounds of bison meat at one sitting.
It's a cultural thing.

traditionalguy said...

What NPR will not say is that the American success story is base upon rational use of technology plus massive cheap carbon based energy.

The ranchers efficiencies, the shippers and the refridgerator cars and trucks are a system that Deming would tell you is the answer.

All of that is oil, coal and gas based. None of it is Windmill and solar panel based.

Feeding a happy and health population IS our raison d'etre.

How any smuck can be made to hang his head in shame over that is the mystery of mysteries. When did that silly nonsense start?

It's Yoga! The Cow God is just not being honored correctly.

X said...

Enough beef to feed the whole country. Good beef for hungry people. Beef to make them strong, to make them grow. It takes work, it takes sweat, it takes time, lots of time. It takes years.

DADvocate said...

Average life span in Mozambique: 39.2 years
Average life span in Bangladesh: 60.37 years
Average life span in U.S.: 78.2 years
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expectancy)

Nuff said.

caplight45 said...

Capitalism.

Anonymous said...

How much meat are they eating in Camden NJ

CJinPA said...

"Why do Americans ________?"

Because we can.

bagoh20 said...

The U.S. runs on chicken now. What someone needs to invent is a chicken born without a head that grows to eating size.

~ I don't know! It has a feeding tube or some shit. I'm not inventing it right now, I'm just brainstorming here.

But if it never knew it was alive, had no eyes or brain, couldn't we just eat them nuggets guilt free?

This can't be that hard to do with modern technology. I mean a chicken barely has a head now, and I've seen them get around just fine without one, so could someone get on that right away. I love chicken, but I feel bad about it.

Seriously!

ndspinelli said...

Instead of reading this tripe, just watch the diner scene in Pulp Fiction w/ Samuel L Jackson and Travolta as they discuss bacon.

Tarantino is a cokehead but the motherfucker can write dialogue that is intelligent, down to earth, and funny. NPR is 0 for 3 in those categories.

Henry said...

The people of Bangladesh doesn't even eat much meat compared to Sri Lanka. What makes Sri Lankans eat so much meat?

Calypso Facto said...

Join the crowd, Bagoh.

Mary Beth said...

Costco's meat department. That's why I eat so much meat.

bagoh20 said...

"Join the crowd, Bagoh."

I know, but they are doing it the hard way: starting from scatch.

I say the chicken is already perfect. It just has a vestigial head that we don't want - like an appendix, or half the federal budget. If you get rid of it, everyone would be much happier.

Calypso Facto said...

If you get rid of it, everyone would be much happier.

It'd be too tough, cuz everyone knows a chicken with it's head off will just run around all day!

AllenS said...

Two American inventions: the Weber grill and Joe Foreman's grill.

exhelodrvr1 said...

Just come up with a process to turn chicken heads into biofuel before next January, and apply for a green energy grant.

DADvocate said...

Two American inventions: the Weber grill and Joe Foreman's grill.

Joe Foreman? What happened to George Foreman?

Sigivald said...

... wealth?

Stupid, stupid NPR.

geokstr said...

CNN should assign Candy Crowley to cover this issue exclusively.

Quaestor said...

Doing a little research (evidently NOT done by NPR) I've learned that Americans earn $28.60 to every dollar earned by a Bangladeshi, and $83.10 to every dollar earned by a citizen Mozambique. By that standard our 12-fold meat consumption looks positively vegan.

I agree unreservedly with the overwhelming sentiment here: NPR is stupid. The reason for this is the editors, producers, on-air personalities, and reports are the most left-wing of any large media organization in this country, which is saying a lot. ABC, the most balanced over-the-air news bureau is still at least 85% hard-core "progressive" in outlook.

Projecting the trend to NPR suggests the proportion of level-headed objective prosencephalon thinkers (i.e. conservatives) to amygdalae-dominate emoters (progressives, liberals, Democrats) is vanishingly small, it amounts to the shifting mood of one NPR staffer (Each morning said staffer has a refreshing shower followed by a good cup o' joe, which arouses her forebrain for about 20 minutes.) What they need is a housecleaning of the more knee-jerk liberal types -- those paleomammalians like Nina Totenberg in whom stimulae in the form of meaningless statistics go no further than the spinal cord -- and replace them with newly-retired Marine officers. They also need to hire more men. In non-technical fields NPR is 91% female. The estrogen vapors in their newsroom forms a pea-souper fog which is deadly to neurons.

Paul said...

"What makes an American eat ten or twelve times more meat than the average person in Mozambique or Bangladesh?"

Mozambique and Bangladesh don't have the FOOD, that is why. They are so backwards, corrupt, poor, ignorant, etc.. to get themselves out of their own poverty.

They are at where Obama wants us to go.

lemondog said...

As a long time vegetarian my share is donated to OTHERS.

According to this Demark seems to be top dog (so to speak) in meat consumptiom.

lemondog said...

others not OTHERS.

Caps accidental.

caplight45 said...

I haven't been to Mozambique but the infrastructure of their country was pretty much reduced to stone age levels during the reign of the communists in the 80's. Mozambique remains dependent upon foreign assistance for more than half of its annual budget, and in 2008 54% of the population remained below the poverty line. Subsistence agriculture continues to employ the vast majority of the country's work force and smallholder agricultural productivity and productivity growth is weak. Only 5% of the land is used for agriculture.

I was in Ethiopia a few years ago and while there I dined on goat, camel, chicken, lamb and mystery meat (who knows but the sauce it was in tasted good). It was all tough and stringy for the most part. What cattle I saw were scrawny (think Pharaoh's dream in Genesis) and probably did cook up to tender.

One wonders if the folks at NPR ever get out of the their Beltway bubble or if the travel if they ever go outside of the capitals, resorts and university towns.

If they had asked me I could have told them. Sheesh.

Portia said...

I was at my cardiologists office yesterday afternoon getting a report on my echo cardiogram I had last week. While waiting for the Dr. I spied a chart put out by some 'health' group. The only flesh they recommended was fish, turkey or chicken. Beef, lamb or pork were not on their menu.

Revenant said...

Meat is delicious.

Alex said...

Because consuming triple bacon bbq cheeseburgers with a fried egg on top is a privilege of being an Uh-Merican!

Quaestor said...

I haven't been to Mozambique

I too have not visited Mozambique. However, a chap who worked for me occasionally was a Peace Corp volunteer in that benighted land in the 1990s (I assume after the Soviet influence had waned somewhat) He worked on a project aimed to establish aquaculture (tilapia farms) in the hilly inland regions where the people are very protein-deprived. He supervised the construction of the ponds and the diversion of a stream to supply fresh water, which Mozambican peasants dutifully performed. After the infrastructure was built USAID delivered several tons of fingerlings to stock the breeder ponds, fingerlings the peasants promptly ate. 'nuf said.

Chip S. said...

"What makes an American eat ten or twelve times more meat than the average person in Mozambique or Bangladesh?"

Is NPR kidding? Do they not know how little meat there is on the average person in Mozambique or Bangladesh?

That's not that much meat.

traditionalguy said...

Ribeye steaks or a standing rib roast is the best tasting meat on earth. A Jewish friend told me those are the Kosher cuts of beef.

Jehovah wants his people to enjoy the fat of the land.

Anonymous said...

Tradguy, so right on the ribeye and standing rib roasts, my Christmas dinner menu always includes a standing rib roast.

Rusty said...

Alex said...
Because consuming triple bacon bbq cheeseburgers with a fried egg on top is a privilege of being an Uh-Merican!





God-damned right it is.

caplight45 said...

Quaestor

Ya cain't eat the seed corn!

X said...

The only flesh they recommended was fish, turkey or chicken.

fish is for sport only. it's practically a vegetable.

coketown said...

To the writer's credit, he did offer a no-shit answer to his no-shit question: Americans eat more meat because we can afford to. I was expecting some odd answer like, "the military-meat complex subversively manipulates the American people into eating more meat than is healthy or rational or tolerant."

Speaking of animals, I just heard this joke which I thought was tremendously funny: Why does a milking stool only have three legs? Because the cow has the udder. Hahahahaha!

Michael K said...

My daughter was a vegan until she lived in Spain for a year. She said a vegan would starve to death in Spain. Why do the Spanish eat more meat than...

Dust Bunny Queen said...

"What MAKES an American eat ten or twelve times more meat than the average person in Mozambique or Bangladesh?"

Your mothers telling you to clean your plate because there are starving children in Bangladesh...or was that India....I don't remember. Anyway... CLEAN YOUR PLATE or no dessert.

Sez ur mom.

caplight45 said...

It would have been nice if they had mentioned that meat is a relatively expensive from of protein to raise and produce.

DBQ, I thought it was the starving children in China.

I'm Full of Soup said...

DBQ:

When I was in grade school, we had to clean our plates because there were hungry, pagan babies in other countries. I am 60 and I don't think there was a Bangladesh back then.

Anonymous said...

I think they're working up to advocating for a tax on meat. Like a tax on gasoline, a bigger tax, that is, it will discourage bad behavior. And eating meat is BAD!

Unless it's a dog.

virgil xenophon said...

@PatCA/

OF COURSE they are--or to quote that famous philosopher Lilly Tomlin: "I try to be cynical--but I can't keep up."

Synova said...

"Without NPR, where would they hear three hours of uninterrupted Depression-era Ozark mouth-harp music, brought to you by the good folks at Monsanto?"

A point.

(And a far more intriguing statement than the one about meat and Bangladesh.)

Synova said...

"It wasn't unusual, after a Buffalo hunt, for plains Indians to consume up to 30 pounds of bison meat at one sitting.
It's a cultural thing.
"

I think it's a lack of refrigeration thing.

Synova said...

Speaking of a chicken brain being optional.

My theory: Any thing that doesn't know it's dead when you cut off the head, is a vegetable.

Thus: Chickens.

And Fish.

Synova said...

"I too have not visited Mozambique. However, a chap who worked for me occasionally was a Peace Corp volunteer in that benighted land in the 1990s (I assume after the Soviet influence had waned somewhat) He worked on a project aimed to establish aquaculture (tilapia farms) in the hilly inland regions where the people are very protein-deprived. He supervised the construction of the ponds and the diversion of a stream to supply fresh water, which Mozambican peasants dutifully performed. After the infrastructure was built USAID delivered several tons of fingerlings to stock the breeder ponds, fingerlings the peasants promptly ate. 'nuf said."

AND! To go off on a libertarian-ish rant --

This is a property rights problem.

People need to know what belongs to whom and that their property will be respected and *protected* by the community.

A nice, productive, communal fish pond that even an entirely illiterate villagers understands could produce a great deal of yummy talapia in a relatively short time is useless if the sure result of waiting will be that everyone else eats the fish.

People aren't STUPID, and they know very well that the choice is between eating a bunch of minnows now, or getting nothing.

And this is because, and only because, there is no expectation of respecting individual property rights. Either the culture doesn't support it or else the do-gooders set up the project on purpose to be a community/communal enterprise.

Profit might be unseemly and the people might be poor, but there would *be* fish. (And likely a few on-going jobs, too.)

Same goes for the person who has a goat and decides not to eat it. Or who has a field. Or who is trying to save money to buy a fruit scale.

People have to know that their property will be respected and protected rather than looted, be it by their neighbors or by the government itself.

Mark said...

I bet we eat thousands of time more Certified Organic arugula, quinoa, portabello mushrooms, toro sushi, etc.

Blue@9 said...

Surprised. I thought the Argentinians would have us beat.


Shoot, if you want to see how meat consumption follows economics, just look at my home country of Korea. You don't even need statistics--just look at the people. Everyone used to think Koreans were just small people, but you see the kids there now and they are tall and built out. Capitalism = Quality Protein (= Better Bodies).

Astro said...

Reason #1: Dollars and cents.

That's it? What the hell happened to Reasons #2, #3, #4...?

Wouldn't any normal writer re-reading this notice the illogic here? Or an editor? Did my browser fail to show a link to another page where the counting of reasons continued?

caplight45 said...

And the Milton Friedman Award for working sound economic theory into a blog post goes to...

May I have the envelop please?

SYANOVA!!!!!!

Eric said...

Meat is very inefficient from a calorie perspective, at least the way it's raised in the US. We're feeding grains to animals instead of just eating the grains ourselves. If you live in a place where it's not uncommon for people to go hungry there's not going to be a lot of meat eating because grains will be going to people instead of animals, and the animals will be eating grass or leftovers.

If the peak oil people are right food prices will rise sharply in the US over the next few decades, and we'll be eating less meat as well.

Quaestor said...

Synova wrote:
People aren't STUPID, and they know very well that the choice is between eating a bunch of minnows now, or getting nothing.

I don't know why the project failed in Mozambique, though failure seems to be a big part of the local culture (reduced expectations helps socialist regimes survive) My friend also worked a similar project in Sierra Leon (another former Portuguese colony, btw) which worked out well enough. What I took away from the story was that the Mozambicans didn't mentally connect the pond construction with the delivered fish. Being under a Marxist dictatorship since independence the peasants were used to being dragooned into pointless public works projects -- cut these trees down -- dig a ditch from here to there -- in the 80s every adult over 14 was required to give 30 hours a month free labor to the state doing stuff that wasted time and energy and accomplished exactly zero -- they evidently saw the ponds as just another useless exercise.

Rusty said...

Synova said...
"It wasn't unusual, after a Buffalo hunt, for plains Indians to consume up to 30 pounds of bison meat at one sitting.
It's a cultural thing."

I think it's a lack of refrigeration thing



Babe. Thirty pounds of meat in your belly is a lot of meat refrigeration or no. And they would do it for days.

mariner said...

"It's what's for dinner."

mariner said...

Bagoh20,
What someone needs to invent is a chicken born without a head ...

They're running around all over America like their heads were cut off.

They're called Democrats.

mariner said...

exhelodrvr,
Just come up with a process to turn chicken heads into biofuel before next January, and apply for a green energy grant.

1. Just promise you WILL do it.
2. Donate to the Democrat Party.
3. Apply for "Green" grant.
4. Riches!!!

rehajm said...

If the peak oil people are right

The peak oil people are wrong

Clyde said...

Eating more meat means eating more protein, which means taller, stronger people. Compare the map from the NPR site showing the amount of meat eaten by South Korea and North Korea, for instance. Same ethnic stock, but the South Koreans eat four times as much meat as their cousins to the North, and are a few inches taller because of it.

Locally, we have a lot of Guatemalans in the Hispanic community, and they are very short; most of the men are probably about 5'3", the women even shorter. But their kids are about the same height as American kids, so I'm guessing the adults growth may have been stunted by low protein consumption as children.

traditionalguy said...

@ Eric...Have you been asleep? The Peak Oil People were always dead wrong.

It was not a rational thought anyway. The amount of discovered oil says NOTHING about the amount of undiscovered oil.

Peak Oil was a grade B scare tactic like CO2 is a green house gas and images of species going extinct. Lies, lies and damn lies was all that has ever been. Scarcity rumors were only a tool to drive up prices.

After the past 5 years another 600+ years of oil reserves has appeared and the rest of the unexplored 98% is awaiting the man who uses the technology the best.

NotWhoIUsedtoBe said...

Peak oil was wrong because what is true for the US isn't true of the world. Oil production peaked in the US when imports became cheaper (and now that imports became more expensive domestic production is rising). The same reason can't be true for the entire planet unless we find oil on Mars.

Natural resource production is a function of technology more than anything else. If we need it bad enough, we find new ways of producing it.

fernstalbert said...

Because they can!!! Cheers.

TMink said...

What Allie Oop said.

Trey

Charlie Martin said...

We can.

DJ HaKa said...

A better question is "What makes an American eat ten or twelve times more meat than the average person in Mozambique or Bangladesh & subsequently die of cancer and heart disesae over 50x's more (average!) often than an average person from mozambique, bangladesh, or any country outside of australia and usa "" and the answer is brain washing. Advertisements embedded in the brain (that fastfood, processed food, and meat & dairy are good to eat, although the nutritional value says otherwise). The fact that 99% of americans are sheeple (and 1% rich and controls those sheeple) . The fact that people will do whatever to fit in and not care about the health or nutrition.

it was proven to try and have an intelligent conversation with a cowboy at a steak house. it's impossible. the high fat meat (& eating meat in general) clouds your arteries, brain functioning making you stupid. Alzheimers, diabetes, cancer, stroke, and many other dis-ease only comes from eating dead abused commercialized hormonal gmo meat that all amerikkkans eat to make sure stockholders get the most of their money back (ROI) noo ne cares about you dumb sheeple who eat meat and are tooo dumb and fluoridated pineal to grow your own veggies and become vegan.

the center of disease control and prevention says over 80% of amerikkkans will die of preventable disease caused by their diets of meat and dairy. but DONT STOP EATING cuz we need you to die. think if 80% of people didnt die just because of the unhealthy food they ate. then we'd have a problem like china (where they eat healthy) and are running out of food and can only have 1 baby. so keep eating to your death sheeple!!

DJ HaKa said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
DJ HaKa said...

DID YOU KNOW EATING MEAT MAKES YOUR PENIS SMALLER? WHY DO U THINK MEN NEED VIAGRA? EATING TOO MUCH MEAT!! GO VEGAN WE HAVE THE BEST SEX (ur girl knows it). listening to the answers here i can already see the meat has clouded most of your brain normal functioning. so keep eating meat. if anyone really wonders why meat is bad, here is 1 of many videos where a PHD doctor explains how the fat clogs the arteries (why men who eat meat need viagra to get it up, get stroke, heart attack, bone and joint pain and that feeling of getting old. a vegan feels good at 20, 40, 80, or 100) "FOODS THAT KILL" (full documentary) : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNCGkprGW_o&noredirect=1