Hatefulness is Devine

The work of Miranda Devine, a conservative columnist for the Sydney Morning Herald and Sun-Herald, has generally enraged and entertained me in equal measure. Her writing tends to combine specious reasoning and vindictiveness, which she then flings at "establishment feminists", cyclists (and vegan cyclists), "those glory-seeking civil rights lawyers" who worked on the David Hicks case in the USA, the "liberal luvvies" of Hollywood... you get the drift.

But with today's column she has reached a new level of vitriol with respect to vegetarians and vegans. There's some evidence here that she's trying to be funny — or at least wry — and were it from another writer, I might give her that benefit of the doubt. But this is Miranda, and I'm not laughing.

Not content with raising the cost of everything, terrifying small children and ruining the fun of driving, the gloom merchants of global warming now want us to stop eating meat to save the planet.

Oh dear. That doesn't sound good.

On Tuesday, Rajendra Pachauri, the head of the IPCC (the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), who just happens to be a vegetarian, declared meat-eating a grave carbon sin, and one which ought to be taxed. "Please eat less meat - meat is a very carbon-intensive commodity," he told an animal rights conference in London, Compassion in World Farming.

"Give up meat for one day [per week] at least initially, and decrease it from there," said the 68-year-old Indian economist who is beginning his second six-year term as the world's most influential global warming guru.

That filthy vegetarian! Incidentally, though, Pachauri is also Hindu, and his vegetarianism would seem to be partly connected to that. Care to take a swipe at the religious practices and worldview of around 220 million Indians, Miranda?

Having attacked our wool so unscrupulously and so successfully, PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, is going for broke, claiming that meat is the "Number one cause of Global Warming".

Ah, I see. Once again, a non-veg*n raises the spectre of PETA to condemn all vegetarians and vegans.

In other words, action on climate change means turning into a nation of scrawny, lank-haired, dull-eyed vegans with wan babies who cry. Thanks but no thanks.

Man, it's like she knows me. I mean, I'm about ten kilos overweight, with hair that my hairdresser praises every time I'm there and a general look of being very much alive... but in essence, this is me. Certainly I'd never suggest that Miranda is being deeply offensive.

Not that I'm a big meat eater. In fact, family and friends will laugh at my attempted defence of meat, since I am mocked as a quasi-vegetarian, squeamish about any bone, skin, fat or gristle that hint at the true origins of a meal.

I have been a flesh philistine since childhood, and one of the most delicious meals I have ever eaten was a vegan feast at the Paddington home of Brian Sherman, the founder of the animal rights charity Voiceless.

Ah, you see? She's practically one of us. I totally want to invite her over for some chickpea cutlets and vegan cupcakes.

My meat aversion caused such anaemia during pregnancy I had to take iron tablets. I understand it is unsustainable and self-indulgent, and what's more, that a population which refuses to face the dirty truths about life and death becomes impossibly effete.

So true. Let's all stop our whining, get some balls, and chow down on a delicious bit of cow. Come on, for the sake of the planet. Or maybe try one of these (thanks to Boing Boing):