WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.339 Hello everyone, my name is Ryan and you are listening 00:00:03.339 --> 00:00:07.559 to The Vegan Report. Today we lift the veil on 00:00:07.559 --> 00:00:11.960 a world of lies, confusion, spying, corruption 00:00:11.960 --> 00:00:16.519 and hypocrisy. We expose the meat, dairy and 00:00:16.519 --> 00:00:20.820 egg social media war strategy unleashed against 00:00:20.820 --> 00:00:26.219 vegans. A real conspiracy of PR firms, scientists, 00:00:26.519 --> 00:00:29.140 health experts, environmental organizations. 00:00:29.370 --> 00:00:32.829 and more. To tackle this issue, I have with me 00:00:32.829 --> 00:00:36.409 Maddie Houghton -Bokes, a senior campaigner at 00:00:36.409 --> 00:00:39.770 Changing Markets Foundation. Changing Markets 00:00:39.770 --> 00:00:42.770 has been doing amazing work in investigating, 00:00:43.509 --> 00:00:46.670 documenting, and reporting on the current Miss 00:00:46.670 --> 00:00:50.270 and Disinformation campaign about food systems. 00:00:51.429 --> 00:00:55.109 The reports are fascinating. Visit the episode 00:00:55.109 --> 00:00:59.219 notes to access them. And for more conversations 00:00:59.219 --> 00:01:02.899 like this, follow and subscribe to the show, 00:01:03.299 --> 00:01:06.579 please consider leaving a good review, and share 00:01:06.579 --> 00:01:09.459 this episode with the vegans you know. We need 00:01:09.459 --> 00:01:13.079 to alert our movement of these cowardly tactics. 00:01:25.890 --> 00:01:31.150 confessing of, you know, being part of this misinformation 00:01:31.150 --> 00:01:36.150 campaign. I think he was paid about $17 an hour 00:01:36.150 --> 00:01:42.650 to create multiple accounts in order to disparage 00:01:42.650 --> 00:01:47.230 people from going vegan or spread lies about 00:01:47.230 --> 00:01:51.750 plant -based veganism. So I guess my first question 00:01:51.750 --> 00:01:56.489 for you is, are you surprised by that? No, not 00:01:56.489 --> 00:01:59.650 surprised. I'm not surprised by it. Our research 00:01:59.650 --> 00:02:03.629 at Changing Markets has shown that this kind 00:02:03.629 --> 00:02:08.710 of attacks on vegan products is, it's a classic 00:02:08.710 --> 00:02:11.949 tool used by the meat and dairy industry. And 00:02:11.949 --> 00:02:15.550 they have a number of different avenues for doing 00:02:15.550 --> 00:02:20.039 this, including paying and training people to 00:02:20.039 --> 00:02:22.979 attack these products online. There's a whole 00:02:22.979 --> 00:02:25.599 program called the Masters of Beef Advocacy run 00:02:25.599 --> 00:02:28.280 by the National Cattleman Beef Association in 00:02:28.280 --> 00:02:32.159 the US. And it's basically like a training program 00:02:32.159 --> 00:02:35.719 for kind of promoting meat products online, but 00:02:35.719 --> 00:02:40.229 also in how to attack. Yeah. vegan products as 00:02:40.229 --> 00:02:44.310 well. So we're not surprised by it. And we see 00:02:44.310 --> 00:02:47.710 a huge amount of funding and attention going 00:02:47.710 --> 00:02:51.370 towards influencers to attack vegan products 00:02:51.370 --> 00:02:54.909 as well as promote meat products and dairy products 00:02:54.909 --> 00:02:58.449 as well. So it's all just part of this kind of, 00:02:58.449 --> 00:03:02.590 yeah, online battleground, I think. Before getting 00:03:02.590 --> 00:03:06.150 into what's happening, you know, on the platform, 00:03:06.449 --> 00:03:09.330 I want to just spend a moment talking about the 00:03:09.330 --> 00:03:13.550 platforms themselves. So when I think of, for 00:03:13.550 --> 00:03:17.590 instance, Facebook or Instagram, I think of the 00:03:17.590 --> 00:03:20.849 owner of those platforms who is, you know, Mark 00:03:20.849 --> 00:03:25.189 Zuckerberg, and how he is absolutely not, you 00:03:25.189 --> 00:03:28.909 know, sympathetic to the vegan or plant based 00:03:28.909 --> 00:03:33.159 cause. He actually is a rancher, he's raising 00:03:33.159 --> 00:03:37.819 cattle on a Hawaiian island where, you know, 00:03:38.000 --> 00:03:41.979 ecosystems are really fragile. And so do you 00:03:41.979 --> 00:03:43.819 think you know, those platforms do you think 00:03:43.819 --> 00:03:47.860 the game is rigged against, you know, this kind 00:03:47.860 --> 00:03:52.360 of discourse in the first place? Is there any 00:03:52.360 --> 00:03:58.110 evidence of, you know, post getting not as much 00:03:58.110 --> 00:04:02.590 attention as they're supposed to get because 00:04:02.590 --> 00:04:05.909 of the platform itself that does not want to 00:04:05.909 --> 00:04:09.509 support that kind of discourse. And how should 00:04:09.509 --> 00:04:14.110 we think about the fact that the owners of those 00:04:14.110 --> 00:04:18.069 platforms are against the very causes that we 00:04:18.069 --> 00:04:20.470 represent? Yeah, I think it's a really interesting 00:04:20.470 --> 00:04:24.930 question. I mean, I think there's a huge amount 00:04:24.930 --> 00:04:29.889 of research out there about the algorithms of 00:04:29.889 --> 00:04:34.610 these platforms and how they promote kind of 00:04:34.610 --> 00:04:39.649 sensationalist far right leaning climate conspiracy 00:04:39.649 --> 00:04:43.870 information. And I think for a lot of people 00:04:43.870 --> 00:04:48.029 talking about vegan diets or high plant -based 00:04:48.029 --> 00:04:52.720 diets, they fall into this. category of often 00:04:52.720 --> 00:04:54.879 being aligned with like environmental causes 00:04:54.879 --> 00:04:56.980 and stuff and so they definitely suffer from 00:04:56.980 --> 00:05:00.060 the algorithms in that way. I'm not aware of 00:05:00.060 --> 00:05:02.680 any research and our research hasn't hasn't specifically 00:05:02.680 --> 00:05:05.319 looked into this that really kind of shows a 00:05:05.319 --> 00:05:10.379 direct anti -vegan kind of setup but I think 00:05:10.379 --> 00:05:14.139 it's part of how these platforms are geared towards 00:05:14.139 --> 00:05:18.639 that more extremist content and we see what our 00:05:18.639 --> 00:05:22.500 research has shown is that We see a lot of far 00:05:22.500 --> 00:05:25.519 -right ideologies aligning themselves with carnivore 00:05:25.519 --> 00:05:28.680 diets and other very heavy meat diets. And we 00:05:28.680 --> 00:05:34.040 know that those types of discussions are definitely 00:05:34.040 --> 00:05:36.879 favored by the algorithms. And Elon Musk with 00:05:36.879 --> 00:05:40.420 X is... I'm not sure if he's a carnivore diet 00:05:40.420 --> 00:05:42.360 himself, but he's definitely friends with a lot 00:05:42.360 --> 00:05:45.519 of the carnivore bros. Like they are, yeah, they're 00:05:45.519 --> 00:05:48.300 very much in that world of kind of meat is masculine 00:05:48.300 --> 00:05:52.980 and that's part of their identity. So it's, even 00:05:52.980 --> 00:05:56.000 if it's not explicit, it's kind of part of the 00:05:56.000 --> 00:06:03.769 broader bias that they have there. You don't 00:06:03.769 --> 00:06:06.230 think you don't need to research that in order 00:06:06.230 --> 00:06:11.589 to observe that it's quite evident. What is the 00:06:11.589 --> 00:06:15.149 scale of this whole campaign of disinformation 00:06:15.149 --> 00:06:20.699 and in seeding confusion? Yeah, it's vast, definitely. 00:06:21.259 --> 00:06:23.839 So our first piece of research that we did on 00:06:23.839 --> 00:06:27.220 disinformation and food systems was for a report 00:06:27.220 --> 00:06:30.000 called Truth Flies Culture Wars, which we put 00:06:30.000 --> 00:06:33.060 out a couple of years ago. And we started this 00:06:33.060 --> 00:06:36.240 because we at Change Your Markets have been campaigning 00:06:36.240 --> 00:06:41.480 on methane from meat and dairy as a major climate 00:06:41.480 --> 00:06:46.139 source of climate heating emissions. for several 00:06:46.139 --> 00:06:48.660 years now and we were really coming up against 00:06:48.660 --> 00:06:52.279 this like a lot of misinformation online around 00:06:52.279 --> 00:06:57.480 supposedly sustainable credentials of meat like 00:06:57.480 --> 00:07:00.279 that that methane from cows and methane is a 00:07:00.279 --> 00:07:02.459 very potent for people that don't know is a very 00:07:02.459 --> 00:07:04.980 potent greenhouse gases 80 times more warming 00:07:04.980 --> 00:07:09.459 than carbon dioxide over 20 year period and is 00:07:09.459 --> 00:07:12.810 a key source of emissions to tackle. right now 00:07:12.810 --> 00:07:15.970 if we're going to have any chance of kind of 00:07:15.970 --> 00:07:19.410 keeping the 1 .5 degrees Celsius global temperature 00:07:19.410 --> 00:07:23.670 increases within reach. And we were coming up 00:07:23.670 --> 00:07:25.250 against all this kind of greenwashing trying 00:07:25.250 --> 00:07:28.350 to suggest that cows are part of a natural cycle 00:07:28.350 --> 00:07:31.670 and absorb carbon and all of this. And so we 00:07:31.670 --> 00:07:33.529 wanted to look into this misinformation. And 00:07:33.529 --> 00:07:36.730 actually what we discovered was that obviously 00:07:36.730 --> 00:07:39.550 that's the stuff we were seeing because our algorithms 00:07:39.550 --> 00:07:42.279 are geared towards the topic of methane, but 00:07:42.279 --> 00:07:45.259 actually what we discovered was that there's 00:07:45.259 --> 00:07:48.259 the vast majority of food system misinformation 00:07:48.259 --> 00:07:51.899 out there around meat and dairy is kind of attacks 00:07:51.899 --> 00:07:55.079 on alternative diets and alternative products, 00:07:55.379 --> 00:07:57.959 vegan diets, vegan products, and undermining 00:07:57.959 --> 00:08:01.800 the science and conspiracy theories. It was the 00:08:01.800 --> 00:08:04.240 vast majority, vast amount of this misinformation 00:08:04.240 --> 00:08:06.720 and it was quite a large data set as well that 00:08:06.720 --> 00:08:09.649 we looked at. And the scale was quite shocking 00:08:09.649 --> 00:08:12.310 to us. We hadn't really kind of tapped into that 00:08:12.310 --> 00:08:16.850 before. And that's just one piece of the puzzle 00:08:16.850 --> 00:08:19.470 as well. Our research since then has kind of 00:08:19.470 --> 00:08:22.250 taken us into looking a lot at the meat and dairy 00:08:22.250 --> 00:08:26.509 industry lobby tactics. And we know that the 00:08:26.509 --> 00:08:29.870 narratives that we see online, like attacking 00:08:29.870 --> 00:08:32.659 vegan diets and vegan products, are one piece 00:08:32.659 --> 00:08:35.679 of the puzzle and they're doing this in their 00:08:35.679 --> 00:08:39.059 lobbying efforts in parliament, the EU parliament, 00:08:39.500 --> 00:08:41.799 and in lobbying efforts in the US as well and 00:08:41.799 --> 00:08:44.799 in the UK. Those are the main places where we've 00:08:44.799 --> 00:08:48.279 looked but also recently looked in research in 00:08:48.279 --> 00:08:53.100 Brazil as well. Yeah, they're attacking all of 00:08:53.100 --> 00:08:54.759 these alternatives, they're trying to undermine 00:08:54.759 --> 00:08:57.059 the science and it's just part of this kind of 00:08:57.059 --> 00:09:01.559 vast wheelhouse of trying to maintain the high 00:09:01.559 --> 00:09:03.799 meat and dairy consumption status quo that there 00:09:03.799 --> 00:09:06.500 is at the moment, at the same time as portraying 00:09:06.500 --> 00:09:09.639 themselves as the victim. We often see this narrative 00:09:09.639 --> 00:09:13.860 that like they're the underdogs and that, you 00:09:13.860 --> 00:09:16.500 know, they're trying to go back to some time 00:09:16.500 --> 00:09:20.840 when meat was viewed positively. Whereas actually, 00:09:20.840 --> 00:09:24.120 if you look at dietary patterns in North America 00:09:24.120 --> 00:09:27.279 and, you know, many places in the global north 00:09:27.279 --> 00:09:30.179 in general, meat consumption and dairy consumption 00:09:30.179 --> 00:09:32.299 is still really high. They're not the underdogs, 00:09:32.440 --> 00:09:34.759 the people who are advocating for dietary shifts 00:09:34.759 --> 00:09:37.139 and food system transformation and more plant 00:09:37.139 --> 00:09:40.399 -based diets. That's actually like the minority 00:09:40.399 --> 00:09:44.679 and trying to, yeah, to kind of shift the system. 00:09:46.660 --> 00:09:51.759 An incredible statistic I read on one of your 00:09:51.759 --> 00:09:55.700 reports, excellent reports, I recommend people 00:09:55.700 --> 00:10:01.360 to read them, link in the episode notes, was 00:10:01.360 --> 00:10:05.320 about the money that those companies spend on 00:10:05.320 --> 00:10:10.580 marketing and PR, which is more than product 00:10:10.580 --> 00:10:15.649 development. Now that shocked me. Can you comment 00:10:15.649 --> 00:10:21.570 on that? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, yeah, these companies 00:10:21.570 --> 00:10:26.909 know that the reality is that, you know, a lot 00:10:26.909 --> 00:10:30.350 of the kind of the battleground is played out 00:10:30.350 --> 00:10:34.470 in a kind of comms war these days. And again, 00:10:34.490 --> 00:10:37.250 this was another one where we were kind of maybe 00:10:37.250 --> 00:10:40.549 not surprised, but still shocked that yet, like 00:10:40.700 --> 00:10:44.179 more money is spent on advertising and that includes 00:10:44.179 --> 00:10:48.080 greenwashing advertising. Most adverts these 00:10:48.080 --> 00:10:51.639 days have or often adverts have a really strong 00:10:51.639 --> 00:10:54.620 kind of green focus within them and more money 00:10:54.620 --> 00:10:56.940 is spent on that than actually developing products 00:10:56.940 --> 00:11:00.899 that have got genuine solutions. So an example 00:11:00.899 --> 00:11:06.720 of that might be like Nestle had a they produced 00:11:07.049 --> 00:11:09.129 a KitKat that they claimed was going to be carbon 00:11:09.129 --> 00:11:11.730 neutral by 2025 or they claimed that KitKats 00:11:11.730 --> 00:11:14.450 were going to be carbon neutral by 2025 and there 00:11:14.450 --> 00:11:17.029 was this big song and dance about it and then 00:11:17.029 --> 00:11:19.769 it's just kind of quietly disappeared. There's 00:11:19.769 --> 00:11:22.909 no update on whether that is now carbon neutral 00:11:22.909 --> 00:11:25.269 and you know what have they actually been doing 00:11:25.269 --> 00:11:27.269 in the meantime? I think it's just insetting 00:11:27.269 --> 00:11:30.110 and which is a form of kind of buying offset 00:11:30.110 --> 00:11:32.529 credits but within their own supply chains and 00:11:33.549 --> 00:11:36.149 you know it's these really kind of shocking contradictions 00:11:36.149 --> 00:11:38.590 between what they're saying out there and then 00:11:38.590 --> 00:11:42.330 and then the reality of it and we saw this really 00:11:42.330 --> 00:11:47.289 starkly last month when we were at COP 30 in 00:11:47.289 --> 00:11:52.169 Brazil and there was so at COPs you have the 00:11:52.169 --> 00:11:54.690 the climate conferences you have the official 00:11:54.690 --> 00:11:56.649 blue zone then you have a green zone which is 00:11:56.649 --> 00:11:59.529 for the public and at this one you also have 00:11:59.529 --> 00:12:03.320 the agri zone which was this whole space kind 00:12:03.320 --> 00:12:07.080 of dedicated to supposedly solutions from the 00:12:07.080 --> 00:12:09.360 agricultural sector and what it was really is 00:12:09.360 --> 00:12:11.879 just like a roadshow for the big agribusiness 00:12:11.879 --> 00:12:15.480 giants and it had sponsorship from Nestle, from 00:12:15.480 --> 00:12:20.899 Bayer, the major pesticides company. We also 00:12:20.899 --> 00:12:23.799 saw JBS, the world's biggest meat company, sponsored 00:12:23.799 --> 00:12:27.240 the media center in there. Like it was just really 00:12:27.240 --> 00:12:31.590 their chance to showcase themselves and you know, 00:12:31.710 --> 00:12:33.929 these weren't small sponsorships that they were 00:12:33.929 --> 00:12:36.710 doing, and they put a lot of money and time into 00:12:36.710 --> 00:12:39.950 kind of how they were presenting themselves as 00:12:39.950 --> 00:12:44.509 having the solution, rather than actually investing 00:12:44.509 --> 00:12:47.769 in genuine solutions to shift their supply chains. 00:12:48.570 --> 00:12:53.669 And we see this So one of the solutions that 00:12:53.669 --> 00:12:55.710 the industry pushes quite often, particularly 00:12:55.710 --> 00:12:59.409 around the methane issue, is feed additives for 00:12:59.409 --> 00:13:02.309 cows that essentially reduce the amount of methane 00:13:02.309 --> 00:13:06.720 that cows burp out. And often companies... will 00:13:06.720 --> 00:13:10.100 invest in trials of these, and then when it comes 00:13:10.100 --> 00:13:12.059 to actually scaling that up within their supply 00:13:12.059 --> 00:13:14.039 chains, and they'll make a big song and dance 00:13:14.039 --> 00:13:17.320 about what an amazing solution this is, and then 00:13:17.320 --> 00:13:19.159 when it comes to actually scaling it up in their 00:13:19.159 --> 00:13:21.159 supply chains, they'll say that it's too expensive 00:13:21.159 --> 00:13:22.940 and they can't invest in it enough and they want 00:13:22.940 --> 00:13:25.759 public subsidies for it. And yet they've invested 00:13:25.759 --> 00:13:27.860 all this in the marketing and then, and they'll 00:13:27.860 --> 00:13:29.720 present themselves as having the solutions that 00:13:29.720 --> 00:13:32.980 these kind of road shows at cop. Um, so the money 00:13:32.980 --> 00:13:35.879 is being diverted into this kind of fanfare around. 00:13:36.899 --> 00:13:39.940 Yeah. How great they are rather than actually 00:13:39.940 --> 00:13:42.419 any kind of lasting solutions to the problem. 00:13:43.340 --> 00:13:48.720 Here's a bit of a touchy question. Um, what is 00:13:48.720 --> 00:13:53.100 the role that environmental nonprofits play in? 00:13:53.240 --> 00:13:57.720 this game because, you know, I, I can't imagine 00:13:57.720 --> 00:14:00.600 a nonprofit, you know, spending lots of money 00:14:00.600 --> 00:14:04.759 to convince one of those big corporations to 00:14:04.759 --> 00:14:09.399 make some positive efforts. And then what they 00:14:09.399 --> 00:14:15.240 do is release all of that marketing content and 00:14:15.240 --> 00:14:17.980 the nonprofits turns to their donors and say, 00:14:18.159 --> 00:14:21.740 Hey, look at all the good work we've done. Um, 00:14:21.740 --> 00:14:28.950 and then No accountability or you know an example 00:14:28.950 --> 00:14:32.750 that is closer to home here you know i live in 00:14:32.750 --> 00:14:36.210 quebec canada here the government decided to 00:14:36.210 --> 00:14:40.870 give subsidies to different corporations that 00:14:40.870 --> 00:14:45.070 were doing lots of harm to the environment with 00:14:45.070 --> 00:14:48.970 the idea of them you know using that money to 00:14:48.970 --> 00:14:54.679 offset their environmental negative impact. And 00:14:54.679 --> 00:14:57.600 instead of developing, you know, technologies 00:14:57.600 --> 00:15:02.919 or anything of the sort, they spent that money 00:15:02.919 --> 00:15:08.840 on sponsorship and donations for local environmental 00:15:08.840 --> 00:15:12.179 organizations. So that's something I witnessed. 00:15:13.899 --> 00:15:18.379 Have you, you know, looked at this closely or? 00:15:18.720 --> 00:15:21.580 Yeah. We haven't gone into a huge amount of detail 00:15:21.580 --> 00:15:25.019 on this specific problem, but in our big report 00:15:25.019 --> 00:15:26.879 that came out last year, The New Merchants of 00:15:26.879 --> 00:15:29.059 Doubt, we definitely highlight some of these 00:15:29.059 --> 00:15:32.019 kind of collaborations between some environmental 00:15:32.019 --> 00:15:37.000 groups and more likely kind of industry trade 00:15:37.000 --> 00:15:40.440 groups than specific industry companies. But 00:15:40.440 --> 00:15:45.830 there was also a really brilliant report by Dismog, 00:15:45.950 --> 00:15:50.450 I think it was recently that shared examples, 00:15:50.970 --> 00:15:53.389 specific examples around global roundtable for 00:15:53.389 --> 00:15:56.750 sustainable beef. And, and they had access to 00:15:56.750 --> 00:15:59.110 documents that showed that they were kind of 00:15:59.110 --> 00:16:01.730 strategically partnering with environmental groups 00:16:01.730 --> 00:16:05.049 to present themselves as having more of a green 00:16:05.049 --> 00:16:09.429 facade and, you know, we're changing markets 00:16:09.429 --> 00:16:11.950 as an environmental organization and we regularly 00:16:11.950 --> 00:16:13.769 work in partnership with a lot of these kind 00:16:13.769 --> 00:16:18.929 of environmental groups and in the kind of broad 00:16:18.929 --> 00:16:23.830 food system campaigning world there are a lot 00:16:23.830 --> 00:16:26.889 of different angles that have to be used you 00:16:26.889 --> 00:16:29.950 know and there's the kind of campaign as we often 00:16:29.950 --> 00:16:32.690 talk about inside and outside voices and you 00:16:32.690 --> 00:16:36.309 do need both often to push for change, you need 00:16:36.309 --> 00:16:38.809 the people working in partnership and sitting 00:16:38.809 --> 00:16:40.990 in those meetings after meetings with a company 00:16:40.990 --> 00:16:42.649 talking them through how they can actually make 00:16:42.649 --> 00:16:44.710 a change. And you know, we in changing markets, 00:16:44.750 --> 00:16:48.710 we also engage directly with companies. But yeah, 00:16:48.789 --> 00:16:50.730 I think where it becomes a real problem is when 00:16:50.730 --> 00:16:56.450 it's used as a greenwashing tool and as a kind 00:16:56.450 --> 00:16:59.429 of maybe even a get out of jail free card and 00:17:00.070 --> 00:17:02.529 We always talk about how we have no permanent 00:17:02.529 --> 00:17:05.410 allies and no permanent adversaries, because 00:17:05.410 --> 00:17:09.029 if a company is willing to change and to have 00:17:09.029 --> 00:17:11.490 open, honest conversations with us, we will absolutely 00:17:11.490 --> 00:17:13.970 sit down and talk to them about it and look at 00:17:13.970 --> 00:17:16.970 how they can make improvements. If they start 00:17:16.970 --> 00:17:18.970 reneging on that, we've got no loyalty. We're 00:17:18.970 --> 00:17:21.250 not paid by them. We're not going to kind of 00:17:21.250 --> 00:17:23.170 be friendly to them because they've been good 00:17:23.170 --> 00:17:24.990 in the past. We'll absolutely call them out. 00:17:25.289 --> 00:17:28.880 And I think that's one of the Sometimes that 00:17:28.880 --> 00:17:31.819 doesn't always happen with environmental groups. 00:17:31.819 --> 00:17:33.920 And that's where they run the risk of, yeah, 00:17:34.059 --> 00:17:38.059 further kind of endorsing this green facade. 00:17:40.119 --> 00:17:42.619 And, you know, we need both. We need the inside 00:17:42.619 --> 00:17:45.640 and the outside. But we also need to to call 00:17:45.640 --> 00:17:50.660 it out where we see, yeah, abuse of that. That's 00:17:50.660 --> 00:17:53.539 an excellent policy that everyone should adopt, 00:17:54.579 --> 00:17:59.509 including, you know, media platforms. um and 00:17:59.509 --> 00:18:03.769 you know about that i think for someone listening 00:18:03.769 --> 00:18:05.930 to this for the first time you know learning 00:18:05.930 --> 00:18:09.930 of those facts for the first time um what's shocking 00:18:09.930 --> 00:18:13.890 is that there's no law regulating this kind of 00:18:13.890 --> 00:18:18.170 you know speech um you know i'm all for free 00:18:18.170 --> 00:18:22.630 speech but this is this is you know seeding lies 00:18:22.630 --> 00:18:27.190 and confusion and you know there should be some 00:18:27.190 --> 00:18:31.049 kind of law to hold them accountable. Why aren't 00:18:31.049 --> 00:18:35.349 there any? Yeah, there have been attempts, definitely. 00:18:35.950 --> 00:18:41.069 So in the EU, there has been the Green Claims 00:18:41.069 --> 00:18:44.910 Directive has been in progress. And that was 00:18:44.910 --> 00:18:47.910 and a couple of other pieces of regulation as 00:18:47.910 --> 00:18:53.210 well, which kind of combined were going to hold 00:18:53.210 --> 00:18:55.829 companies accountable for any green claims that 00:18:55.829 --> 00:19:01.549 they do make. And this policy has basically been 00:19:01.549 --> 00:19:04.589 derailed through more or less, it kind of looks 00:19:04.589 --> 00:19:06.589 like the wheels have almost fully come off now. 00:19:06.670 --> 00:19:10.269 It's, it's really upsetting. It was a really 00:19:10.269 --> 00:19:12.430 promising piece of regulation combined with other 00:19:12.430 --> 00:19:15.369 different policies. And there've been a number 00:19:15.369 --> 00:19:18.690 of studies showing links to lobby groups, including 00:19:18.690 --> 00:19:24.119 from the oil industry and Yeah, no doubt, lots 00:19:24.119 --> 00:19:27.119 of agribusiness companies were concerned about 00:19:27.119 --> 00:19:29.559 this as well, because we see greenwashing claims, 00:19:30.059 --> 00:19:32.460 we've done a number of investigations into greenwashing 00:19:32.460 --> 00:19:35.759 claims from food companies. And yeah, this would 00:19:35.759 --> 00:19:37.319 have held them accountable, you know, they wouldn't 00:19:37.319 --> 00:19:39.500 have been able to use kind of general claims 00:19:39.500 --> 00:19:44.680 like carbon neutral anymore. And so yeah, there 00:19:44.680 --> 00:19:48.720 was a chance with this regulation and it's dying. 00:19:49.039 --> 00:19:54.380 a death in the policy realm. We do see some optimism 00:19:54.380 --> 00:19:57.880 in like small case, not small, but like individual 00:19:57.880 --> 00:20:02.539 cases in different places. So JBS recently settled 00:20:02.539 --> 00:20:06.279 a lawsuit in New York for greenwashing with it. 00:20:06.579 --> 00:20:09.960 It had its net zero by I think it was 2050 claim 00:20:09.960 --> 00:20:13.880 that was backed up by absolutely no evidence. 00:20:14.480 --> 00:20:16.759 And no clear plan of how they were going to achieve 00:20:16.759 --> 00:20:19.079 that, you know, this is the world's biggest meat 00:20:19.079 --> 00:20:21.799 company, it's emissions rival, big fossil fuel 00:20:21.799 --> 00:20:24.680 companies. And yet they just were like, yeah, 00:20:24.700 --> 00:20:26.740 we can just go out and say net zero, whatever. 00:20:27.339 --> 00:20:29.680 And they did, they did settle this, this lawsuit. 00:20:30.279 --> 00:20:34.940 So there's these instances where the truth is 00:20:34.940 --> 00:20:39.779 held up. And hopefully what, you know, we're 00:20:39.759 --> 00:20:42.460 as an organization we're focused on kind of market 00:20:42.460 --> 00:20:45.779 campaigns and a lot of that does involve because 00:20:45.779 --> 00:20:47.759 we know that policy and regulation takes a really 00:20:47.759 --> 00:20:50.519 long time so a lot of that does involve trying 00:20:50.519 --> 00:20:53.140 to signal to other companies that if you do this 00:20:53.140 --> 00:20:56.099 you're going to be held accountable and you know 00:20:56.099 --> 00:20:59.400 this is going to impact your bottom line so it's 00:20:59.400 --> 00:21:01.720 little signals like this that we hope kind of 00:21:01.720 --> 00:21:04.400 reduce the impact, reduce the prevalence of these 00:21:04.400 --> 00:21:07.160 kinds of of greenwashing. But you're right, there 00:21:07.160 --> 00:21:09.740 is it's it's kind of crazy that companies can 00:21:09.740 --> 00:21:12.440 just in the first place even go out and say this 00:21:12.440 --> 00:21:17.099 with nothing to back it up. It's mad. Yeah, it's 00:21:17.099 --> 00:21:20.799 must be, you know, very frustrating for plant 00:21:20.799 --> 00:21:23.660 based companies that get sued because they use 00:21:23.660 --> 00:21:29.559 the label milk on your package. yet those companies 00:21:29.559 --> 00:21:33.059 can say whatever they want, and they have armies 00:21:33.059 --> 00:21:38.599 of lawyers to protect them. And the lobbies, 00:21:38.599 --> 00:21:42.640 of course. Yeah, yes, I would just on that, actually, 00:21:42.720 --> 00:21:45.420 it's a really good point. And you know, we in 00:21:45.420 --> 00:21:47.480 contrast to that. what I said about the Green 00:21:47.480 --> 00:21:50.819 Claims Directive and kind of being derailed recently, 00:21:50.900 --> 00:21:53.579 at the same time, you've got MEPs, members of 00:21:53.579 --> 00:21:57.339 the European Parliament, voting to ban meat based 00:21:57.339 --> 00:22:02.079 terms for vegan and plant based products recently, 00:22:02.420 --> 00:22:06.519 saying that it confuses consumers. And yet, a 00:22:06.519 --> 00:22:09.180 completely empty carbon neutral or green claim, 00:22:09.980 --> 00:22:13.000 equally, it well is actually genuinely and there's 00:22:13.000 --> 00:22:15.519 evidence to show that it does confuse consumers. 00:22:16.000 --> 00:22:18.180 And yet there's no evidence really to show that 00:22:18.180 --> 00:22:21.119 consumers are confused by like a vegan sausage. 00:22:21.220 --> 00:22:23.039 People know that that's vegan. They're not going 00:22:23.039 --> 00:22:26.140 to think they're eating a pork product. Um, and 00:22:26.140 --> 00:22:28.980 yet that's where the, the politicians time and 00:22:28.980 --> 00:22:31.799 focus has been recently. It's, it's a really 00:22:31.799 --> 00:22:35.039 frustrating contradiction. Um, and you know, 00:22:35.059 --> 00:22:38.099 it's got, it's got kind of lobby hands and imprints 00:22:38.099 --> 00:22:41.420 written all over it. The double standard is just 00:22:41.420 --> 00:22:47.950 incredible. Um, Okay, so we discussed the scale 00:22:47.950 --> 00:22:52.630 of this whole operation and we touched on some 00:22:52.630 --> 00:22:56.430 of the actors What about you know, the social 00:22:56.430 --> 00:22:59.230 media space what I love is that in your reports 00:22:59.230 --> 00:23:04.730 you actually name, you know those agents of Misinformation 00:23:04.730 --> 00:23:07.930 you call them Miss influencers, which you know, 00:23:07.930 --> 00:23:13.269 I love this term So who are those people active 00:23:13.269 --> 00:23:18.529 on social media, on the payroll of a big ag and 00:23:18.529 --> 00:23:23.390 spreading those lies? Yeah. Yeah. Misinfluences 00:23:23.390 --> 00:23:26.670 is a great term. It was actually, you know, we're 00:23:26.670 --> 00:23:29.910 using on our reports. It was the research organization, 00:23:30.130 --> 00:23:32.190 Ripple Research, that came up with that term 00:23:32.190 --> 00:23:33.829 and absolutely have to credit them for that because 00:23:33.829 --> 00:23:38.759 that was fun. It was, yeah, we love it. Yeah, 00:23:38.759 --> 00:23:41.119 it's we kind of forget in the work that we do 00:23:41.119 --> 00:23:43.019 that sometimes that is really bold to actually 00:23:43.019 --> 00:23:44.759 name the people. But you know, we're getting 00:23:44.759 --> 00:23:47.819 the we're putting the information out there. 00:23:47.980 --> 00:23:49.660 We're looking at the data and their names are 00:23:49.660 --> 00:23:53.220 there. And because of the way that most of our 00:23:53.220 --> 00:23:55.819 social media misinformation analysis has been 00:23:55.819 --> 00:23:59.529 focused on X, because it is kind of open source 00:23:59.529 --> 00:24:01.930 content. Whereas if we were looking at meta, 00:24:02.109 --> 00:24:05.089 we would have various rules around like not being 00:24:05.089 --> 00:24:08.329 able to disclose that, but it's X is, is yeah, 00:24:08.549 --> 00:24:10.549 how we've done it means that we can directly 00:24:10.549 --> 00:24:13.990 name them. So our mis -influencers across the 00:24:13.990 --> 00:24:15.890 different reports have definitely varied, but 00:24:15.890 --> 00:24:18.869 there's a few kind of characters that pop up 00:24:18.869 --> 00:24:23.089 fairly regularly. And they fall into kind of 00:24:23.089 --> 00:24:26.920 different categories. So our top misinfluencer 00:24:26.920 --> 00:24:30.279 in our most recent report Meet versus Eat Lancet, 00:24:30.339 --> 00:24:34.640 which looked at the backlash to the Eat Lancet 00:24:34.640 --> 00:24:37.119 planetary health diet report that came out in 00:24:37.119 --> 00:24:40.079 2019. And then there was an update this year. 00:24:40.819 --> 00:24:43.660 And we were kind of trying to preempt a backlash 00:24:43.660 --> 00:24:46.319 this time, and because there was a huge one last 00:24:46.319 --> 00:24:49.559 time. The top misinfluencer in that piece of 00:24:49.559 --> 00:24:52.740 research was a carnivore diet advocate called 00:24:52.740 --> 00:24:57.900 Sean Baker, who's this kind of like, almost caricature 00:24:57.900 --> 00:25:00.160 of what you'd expect a carnivore diet advocate 00:25:00.160 --> 00:25:03.500 to be really. And he has publicly claimed his 00:25:03.500 --> 00:25:06.000 spot as a top misinfluencer. We've seen pictures 00:25:06.000 --> 00:25:09.859 of him wearing a t -shirt saying number one misinfluencer 00:25:09.859 --> 00:25:12.420 and things like that. So he's clearly very proud 00:25:12.420 --> 00:25:15.700 of his position in our research. I'm curious 00:25:15.700 --> 00:25:17.539 to know whether that's a real t -shirt or some 00:25:17.539 --> 00:25:22.619 kind of Photoshop or AI or something in the photo. 00:25:23.529 --> 00:25:25.450 Yeah, it's people like him, but then you also 00:25:25.450 --> 00:25:31.849 have the slightly more kind of maybe palatable 00:25:31.849 --> 00:25:34.470 to policymakers and journalists people or kind 00:25:34.470 --> 00:25:38.609 of slightly more considered a bit more expert 00:25:38.609 --> 00:25:41.789 is so there's Frederick Leroy, who is a researcher 00:25:41.789 --> 00:25:46.990 based in Brussels. And he he's come up several 00:25:46.990 --> 00:25:49.730 times in lots of our research. He's very focused 00:25:49.730 --> 00:25:53.230 on the nutritional benefits of meat products. 00:25:53.890 --> 00:25:58.410 And we don't directly dispute what he's saying 00:25:58.410 --> 00:26:02.069 about the bioavailability of certain nutrients 00:26:02.069 --> 00:26:04.490 within a steak and within beef and things like 00:26:04.490 --> 00:26:07.630 that. But where he falls into becoming a misinfluencer 00:26:07.630 --> 00:26:11.369 is because he is then attacking things like the 00:26:11.369 --> 00:26:14.750 eat lancet planetary health diet on various grounds 00:26:14.750 --> 00:26:18.190 and trying to undermine these things and kind 00:26:18.190 --> 00:26:22.869 of suggesting that actually we need to health 00:26:22.869 --> 00:26:26.690 implications like obesity are because of a reduction 00:26:26.690 --> 00:26:29.009 in meat consumption. And the answer is more meat 00:26:29.009 --> 00:26:31.710 consumption seems to always be his answer, despite 00:26:31.710 --> 00:26:35.549 the fact that, yeah, it's, you know, conventional 00:26:35.549 --> 00:26:39.170 and adopted kind of standardly recognized science 00:26:39.170 --> 00:26:42.609 shows that there is an over consumption of meat 00:26:42.609 --> 00:26:46.269 products in Europe where he is based. So these 00:26:46.269 --> 00:26:48.069 are kind of two of the biggest names that come 00:26:48.069 --> 00:26:49.829 up but there's like a whole host of them who 00:26:49.829 --> 00:26:53.450 are very some are more focused on attacking vegan 00:26:53.450 --> 00:26:56.970 products because of being supposedly ultra processed 00:26:56.970 --> 00:26:59.289 and saying that that that like ultra processed 00:26:59.289 --> 00:27:02.250 food is is the worst thing to ever happen to 00:27:02.250 --> 00:27:07.069 to human diets and and you know all these kinds 00:27:07.069 --> 00:27:10.130 of lenses and then you've got others there's 00:27:10.130 --> 00:27:13.380 another one that came up is another scientist 00:27:13.380 --> 00:27:16.200 called Frank Mitlohner, who is very tied to industry. 00:27:16.339 --> 00:27:18.720 And there's been tons of investigation showing 00:27:18.720 --> 00:27:24.619 his links to meat industry. And he's very focused 00:27:24.619 --> 00:27:27.140 on the kind of greenwashing of meat products 00:27:27.140 --> 00:27:30.700 and suggesting that there's ways of looking at 00:27:30.700 --> 00:27:32.799 methane that aren't mean that it's not a problem 00:27:32.799 --> 00:27:37.000 in reality. So there's kind of like a there's 00:27:37.000 --> 00:27:40.240 a spectrum of these people and Some of them have 00:27:40.240 --> 00:27:42.140 got very clear links to industry, some of them 00:27:42.140 --> 00:27:43.779 we don't have any evidence that they are tied 00:27:43.779 --> 00:27:46.359 to industry. But what we say is that their line, 00:27:46.480 --> 00:27:50.160 their narratives are, they benefit the meat industry 00:27:50.160 --> 00:27:53.079 and the dairy industry status quo and dominance, 00:27:53.220 --> 00:27:55.200 you know, they're advocating for in the case 00:27:55.200 --> 00:27:57.319 of Sean Baker and other carnival people, really 00:27:57.319 --> 00:28:00.500 extreme levels of meat consumption. And others 00:28:00.500 --> 00:28:04.039 are just trying to kind of overly defend as I 00:28:04.039 --> 00:28:06.440 said at the beginning, overly defend meat and 00:28:06.440 --> 00:28:09.220 dairy as if it's suddenly the underdog and no 00:28:09.220 --> 00:28:12.059 one's touching it. When in reality, we know that 00:28:12.059 --> 00:28:14.039 there's still, you know, super high levels of 00:28:14.039 --> 00:28:18.759 consumption of both. Here's a weird question. 00:28:19.200 --> 00:28:23.119 Could some of those misinfluencers be the victim, 00:28:23.759 --> 00:28:26.599 be also a victim of big acts of, you know, you 00:28:26.599 --> 00:28:29.940 mentioned that school of misinfluencers, people 00:28:29.940 --> 00:28:33.700 who create multiple fake accounts. maybe they 00:28:33.700 --> 00:28:38.759 can, you know, um, surround those people and 00:28:38.759 --> 00:28:41.980 create the, um, a certain narrative, you know, 00:28:42.079 --> 00:28:46.880 on their algorithm feed or on their comment section, 00:28:46.960 --> 00:28:50.819 um, to, you know, support some of their claims, 00:28:50.819 --> 00:28:54.279 uh, show that other claims are popular when they're 00:28:54.279 --> 00:28:59.579 not, um, just a way to, you know, slowly, um, 00:28:59.779 --> 00:29:03.690 you know, push them into the big ag. a friendly 00:29:03.690 --> 00:29:07.630 narrative. Yeah, I mean it's entirely possible. 00:29:08.329 --> 00:29:10.470 We haven't specifically looked into it and we 00:29:10.470 --> 00:29:13.710 haven't seen any obvious suggestions of this, 00:29:13.750 --> 00:29:17.130 but one thing we've been trying to keep our eyes 00:29:17.130 --> 00:29:21.430 out for is this kind of inauthentic account activity 00:29:21.430 --> 00:29:26.589 and that may be bot accounts or it may be just 00:29:26.589 --> 00:29:29.069 like this Reddit example of these fake accounts 00:29:29.069 --> 00:29:32.930 that pop up every so often and There in our data 00:29:32.930 --> 00:29:35.150 set, there definitely are a lot of accounts that 00:29:35.150 --> 00:29:38.170 are kind of what we call background noise. So 00:29:38.170 --> 00:29:41.470 they're not the most engaged with people like 00:29:41.470 --> 00:29:44.930 Sean Baker and others, but they kind of regularly 00:29:44.930 --> 00:29:47.730 post on this and will like and boost and retweet 00:29:47.730 --> 00:29:52.069 and other people's posts. But and lots of them 00:29:52.069 --> 00:29:54.609 are kind of anonymous accounts and they could 00:29:54.609 --> 00:29:58.609 well be fake, but it's really hard to to be certain 00:29:58.609 --> 00:30:01.329 about that, and they could be tied to industry. 00:30:02.309 --> 00:30:04.990 We haven't yet seen, but it doesn't mean it doesn't 00:30:04.990 --> 00:30:09.549 exist, kind of mass bot activity on any posts. 00:30:10.829 --> 00:30:13.170 And the indications of this would be like really 00:30:13.170 --> 00:30:15.309 big surges, but it doesn't mean that it's not 00:30:15.309 --> 00:30:17.789 possible because there's, you know, growing amount 00:30:17.789 --> 00:30:21.509 of evidence and research showing how feasible 00:30:21.509 --> 00:30:27.410 it is to kind of mobilize these bot armies as 00:30:27.410 --> 00:30:31.009 they're often called on particular topics and 00:30:31.009 --> 00:30:35.710 it's actually fairly cheap and would work quite 00:30:35.710 --> 00:30:39.670 well for the industry to sway around these kind 00:30:39.670 --> 00:30:41.789 of critical moments. We've not seen evidence 00:30:41.789 --> 00:30:44.589 of it but it's not out of the realm of possibility 00:30:44.589 --> 00:30:49.299 that this is happening. Yes, because, you know, 00:30:49.539 --> 00:30:53.160 audience capture is a thing. And if like 10 % 00:30:53.160 --> 00:30:57.119 of your audience is made up of bots and misinfluencers, 00:30:57.420 --> 00:31:00.400 then you know, it's easy to, you know, change 00:31:00.400 --> 00:31:05.420 your opinions or, you know, make you cover a 00:31:05.420 --> 00:31:11.299 certain topic under a certain light. Yeah. Yeah, 00:31:11.700 --> 00:31:16.650 yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And it's Yeah, it's just 00:31:16.650 --> 00:31:18.769 another tool that can be in the wheelhouse of 00:31:18.769 --> 00:31:20.950 people. And then, you know, they know that this 00:31:20.950 --> 00:31:23.869 kind of social media battleground is really key. 00:31:23.970 --> 00:31:27.069 And we also know from our research that Gen Z 00:31:27.069 --> 00:31:30.490 audiences are like a really target audience for 00:31:30.490 --> 00:31:32.829 meat and dairy companies. They've been quite 00:31:32.829 --> 00:31:36.690 explicit on that with several campaigns. And 00:31:36.690 --> 00:31:41.000 there is full likelihood that you can sway Gen 00:31:41.000 --> 00:31:44.920 Z audiences by using, yeah, bot and fake account 00:31:44.920 --> 00:31:47.079 activity across multiple different social media 00:31:47.079 --> 00:31:49.180 accounts to kind of create that noise and that 00:31:49.180 --> 00:31:54.700 kind of consensus online. Another actor are the 00:31:54.700 --> 00:32:01.019 PR firms. Can you talk about them? Yeah, they 00:32:01.019 --> 00:32:05.769 are. Yeah. So the PR firms as there's Several 00:32:05.769 --> 00:32:08.589 examples in our big report, New Merchants of 00:32:08.589 --> 00:32:11.130 Doubt, that really draws out kind of key PR firms 00:32:11.130 --> 00:32:14.369 that have been involved in some of these pro 00:32:14.369 --> 00:32:17.009 meat and dairy campaigns. So one is Edelman, 00:32:17.069 --> 00:32:20.829 which is a big PR firm that's got ties to the 00:32:20.829 --> 00:32:23.410 oil industry and also tobacco industry. They're 00:32:23.410 --> 00:32:27.569 kind of your real like textbook bad guy PR firms 00:32:27.569 --> 00:32:32.089 and they Yeah, have been involved in in kind 00:32:32.089 --> 00:32:35.490 of very pro meat campaigns. Another one that 00:32:35.490 --> 00:32:41.049 was pushed attacking vegan products was by a 00:32:41.049 --> 00:32:44.490 guy who apparently is quite proud of his name. 00:32:44.890 --> 00:32:49.130 Dr. Evil is how he's called. His actual name 00:32:49.130 --> 00:32:54.089 is Richard Berman. And he yeah, he was part of 00:32:54.089 --> 00:32:58.190 this campaign to focus on the ingredients in 00:32:58.190 --> 00:33:01.059 vegan products. basically using this idea of 00:33:01.059 --> 00:33:03.779 like a children's spelling bee and if you can't 00:33:03.779 --> 00:33:06.240 spell the name of an ingredient uh in a product 00:33:06.240 --> 00:33:09.980 then maybe you shouldn't be eating it um and 00:33:09.980 --> 00:33:14.220 he again has been tied to oil industry and tobacco 00:33:14.220 --> 00:33:17.119 which is why he's got this nickname dr evil um 00:33:17.119 --> 00:33:20.339 like he's he's one of these only seems to work 00:33:20.339 --> 00:33:22.980 for dark actors type figures that you see about 00:33:22.980 --> 00:33:28.200 in the in the pr world um And then what we really 00:33:28.200 --> 00:33:30.180 wanted to show with our report, The New Merchants 00:33:30.180 --> 00:33:35.220 of Doubt, is that this kind of textbook and the 00:33:35.220 --> 00:33:38.599 use of PR firms like these as part of it is being 00:33:38.599 --> 00:33:40.720 used by the meat and dairy industry. And it's 00:33:40.720 --> 00:33:44.859 the same playbook used by oil and tobacco before 00:33:44.859 --> 00:33:49.660 them. And it's being used to distract, delay, 00:33:49.799 --> 00:33:54.670 and derail climate action. the attacks on vegan 00:33:54.670 --> 00:33:57.829 products and on vegan diets is part of that and 00:33:57.829 --> 00:34:00.950 the use of PR firms to kind of muddy the water, 00:34:01.210 --> 00:34:03.250 greenwash products and part of these attacks 00:34:03.250 --> 00:34:08.710 is a tool that has been used by multiple industries 00:34:08.710 --> 00:34:12.929 before. LR Yeah, very interesting. Dr. Evil, 00:34:13.050 --> 00:34:25.059 my gosh. It's more impressive than Bob. Um, okay. 00:34:25.739 --> 00:34:30.260 Are they successful at, you know, spreading those 00:34:30.260 --> 00:34:33.340 lies and misinformation? And of course I'm asking 00:34:33.340 --> 00:34:36.820 that and I know the answer is yes. Um, because, 00:34:37.119 --> 00:34:40.059 you know, prior to this conversation, um, actually 00:34:40.059 --> 00:34:44.179 yesterday I had dinner with my parents and I 00:34:44.179 --> 00:34:46.659 mentioned that I was going to record this podcast 00:34:46.659 --> 00:34:50.440 and that, you know, there was a campaign of misinformation 00:34:50.440 --> 00:34:54.659 from Big Ag on social media. And their answer 00:34:54.659 --> 00:35:00.039 was, oh, do you mean artificial meat? Like they 00:35:00.039 --> 00:35:03.880 were confused. And I started, you know, asking 00:35:03.880 --> 00:35:08.119 some follow up questions and they had that opinion 00:35:08.119 --> 00:35:11.219 that, you know, I was not aware of that, you 00:35:11.219 --> 00:35:14.519 know, artificial meat was horrible for your health 00:35:14.519 --> 00:35:19.099 and that they're trying to impose that on us. 00:35:19.679 --> 00:35:22.000 And, you know, it's something clone, something 00:35:22.000 --> 00:35:25.139 like grown in the lab, but it's horrible. And 00:35:25.139 --> 00:35:27.980 I was just shocked by that, you know, to discover 00:35:27.980 --> 00:35:30.639 that my parents, you know, who should know better 00:35:30.639 --> 00:35:35.159 since I'm present that they had developed that 00:35:35.159 --> 00:35:38.380 opinion from, you know, their social media consumption. 00:35:39.159 --> 00:35:43.170 Yeah. Yeah. It's, um, I mean, I think there's 00:35:43.170 --> 00:35:48.889 multiple strands to that. There's like the power 00:35:48.889 --> 00:35:52.769 imbalance that we are pushing back against the 00:35:52.769 --> 00:35:59.530 dominant perspective and also generations of 00:35:59.530 --> 00:36:01.909 marketing around the meat and dairy industry 00:36:01.909 --> 00:36:06.050 that suggests that meat and dairy is some kind 00:36:06.050 --> 00:36:12.469 of natural, fluffy industry. I became a mum last 00:36:12.469 --> 00:36:14.610 year and it's been super stark to me how that 00:36:14.610 --> 00:36:18.849 kind of idea that farming is lovely is really 00:36:18.849 --> 00:36:22.809 ingrained in children from so early on. I think 00:36:22.809 --> 00:36:26.130 I knew it, but it's really shocking reading all 00:36:26.130 --> 00:36:28.769 these books to my daughter and just realising 00:36:28.769 --> 00:36:32.230 that the farmer is always this lovely... you 00:36:32.230 --> 00:36:34.510 know, I'm not saying anything about farmers, 00:36:34.769 --> 00:36:36.670 like, but you know, it's this idea that the meat 00:36:36.670 --> 00:36:39.469 and dairy industry is, is just one happy farmer 00:36:39.469 --> 00:36:42.230 in a field with his animals and, and it is often 00:36:42.230 --> 00:36:47.469 a he and so we're kind of fighting against this 00:36:47.469 --> 00:36:52.210 dominant idea with these new developments. And, 00:36:52.489 --> 00:36:54.489 you know, some of them aren't new, some of them 00:36:54.489 --> 00:36:56.329 are more new, some of them are like been around 00:36:56.329 --> 00:37:01.440 for generations, but So there's that power imbalance, 00:37:02.139 --> 00:37:06.539 but I think in many ways, they are winning in 00:37:06.539 --> 00:37:09.539 lots of areas. They've got a lot of resources 00:37:09.539 --> 00:37:13.840 because they are the dominant industry. But at 00:37:13.840 --> 00:37:16.320 the same time, I think there is, you know, there's 00:37:16.320 --> 00:37:19.039 growing evidence and growing consensus around 00:37:19.039 --> 00:37:22.159 the health impacts of an over consumption of 00:37:22.159 --> 00:37:26.000 meat and dairy, despite the efforts to suggest 00:37:26.190 --> 00:37:28.590 otherwise by lots of the misinfluencers that 00:37:28.590 --> 00:37:33.829 we've identified and various other spaces. There's 00:37:33.829 --> 00:37:36.590 the kind of the evidence and the scientific kind 00:37:36.590 --> 00:37:40.269 of backing of this is becoming more and more 00:37:40.269 --> 00:37:47.909 robust, which, you know, often, not always, but 00:37:47.909 --> 00:37:50.170 often the science and the evidence does win out, 00:37:50.170 --> 00:37:53.789 particularly in relation to policy. And we see 00:37:53.789 --> 00:37:57.000 journalists and others becoming I think more 00:37:57.000 --> 00:37:58.940 clued up on this as well, which is obviously 00:37:58.940 --> 00:38:01.360 a really crucial area where you can communicate 00:38:01.360 --> 00:38:05.679 to the public the reality of the situation. So 00:38:05.679 --> 00:38:10.159 I think they're winning in some areas, but maybe 00:38:10.159 --> 00:38:12.000 they're also going into it a little bit more 00:38:12.000 --> 00:38:14.099 guns blazing at the moment because they see a 00:38:14.099 --> 00:38:17.159 real risk. There is a decline in meat consumption 00:38:17.159 --> 00:38:20.960 among younger generations and that terrifies 00:38:20.960 --> 00:38:23.519 them and it terrifies their shareholders because 00:38:23.519 --> 00:38:27.119 that's Yeah, a big drop off in demand for their 00:38:27.119 --> 00:38:30.260 products. And at the same time, they're increasingly 00:38:30.260 --> 00:38:32.500 being held accountable for their climate impacts, 00:38:32.539 --> 00:38:35.960 not enough yet. But we're seeing the emissions 00:38:35.960 --> 00:38:38.420 of the meat and dairy industry and agriculture 00:38:38.420 --> 00:38:41.380 sector, big ag and kind of industrial agriculture, 00:38:41.960 --> 00:38:45.400 rising up the agenda steadily. Again, not enough. 00:38:46.000 --> 00:38:47.980 Having just been a cop, it's like not enough. 00:38:48.139 --> 00:38:50.500 It's not on the table firmly yet, but it's it's 00:38:50.500 --> 00:38:55.369 getting close. So Yeah, maybe like two steps 00:38:55.369 --> 00:38:59.630 forwards and one step back is happening. Well, 00:38:59.630 --> 00:39:04.949 we should say a few words about the recent COP 00:39:04.949 --> 00:39:10.829 conference. What kind of experience did you have? 00:39:11.769 --> 00:39:15.309 And, you know, did you at the end of the conference, 00:39:15.369 --> 00:39:18.150 did you feel more optimistic or, you know, more 00:39:18.150 --> 00:39:22.409 negative about our future prospect in terms of, 00:39:22.409 --> 00:39:26.440 you know, creating an environmentally friendly 00:39:26.440 --> 00:39:30.679 world. Yeah, it's really difficult. I've been 00:39:30.679 --> 00:39:32.260 trying to figure this out since getting back. 00:39:32.340 --> 00:39:34.420 I think I've been back like two, three weeks 00:39:34.420 --> 00:39:36.539 now or something like that. I've been trying 00:39:36.539 --> 00:39:39.440 to figure out how I feel about it and I'm unsure. 00:39:40.000 --> 00:39:43.760 But I think, so we went into it with quite a 00:39:43.760 --> 00:39:47.980 clear focus. So we, before COP, we launched a 00:39:47.980 --> 00:39:50.679 report called The Meet Agenda that looked at 00:39:51.269 --> 00:39:54.869 So I mentioned the agri zone earlier, and this 00:39:54.869 --> 00:39:56.730 really looked at the kind of the run up to the 00:39:56.730 --> 00:40:00.630 agri zone and how Brazilian big ag companies, 00:40:01.289 --> 00:40:03.750 particularly the likes of JBS, the world's biggest 00:40:03.750 --> 00:40:07.710 meat company, how they were kind of preparing 00:40:07.710 --> 00:40:12.369 themselves for COP. And we saw that there was 00:40:12.369 --> 00:40:14.949 like a year -long series of events where time 00:40:14.949 --> 00:40:17.210 and again this narrative that we have the solutions 00:40:17.210 --> 00:40:19.630 and we're kind of coming to the table to be part 00:40:19.630 --> 00:40:24.889 of changing the climate game was the primary 00:40:24.889 --> 00:40:27.630 message and the primary focus and it's all just 00:40:27.630 --> 00:40:30.110 these big kind of conferences and chances to 00:40:30.110 --> 00:40:33.389 really refine their communication strategy collectively 00:40:33.389 --> 00:40:37.719 essentially it looks like. culminating in the 00:40:37.719 --> 00:40:39.760 agri zone where they had events and policymakers 00:40:39.760 --> 00:40:41.780 and journalists coming along and hearing all 00:40:41.780 --> 00:40:45.760 of this stuff and these kind of trade show examples 00:40:45.760 --> 00:40:51.519 of their so -called solutions which yeah, they're 00:40:51.519 --> 00:40:57.800 massively over inflating the impacts of. So that 00:40:57.800 --> 00:41:01.480 kind of element of it was very much on our radar 00:41:01.480 --> 00:41:05.059 and we went into it with quite a strong focus 00:41:05.880 --> 00:41:10.380 of seeing how it played out in reality and we 00:41:10.380 --> 00:41:14.380 did see a lot of industry narratives and they 00:41:14.380 --> 00:41:17.619 were firmly in kind of crucial conversations 00:41:17.619 --> 00:41:20.800 around food system transformation where you would 00:41:20.800 --> 00:41:23.780 hope that the discussion is much more on the 00:41:23.780 --> 00:41:25.699 evidence -based side and time and again it kept 00:41:25.699 --> 00:41:29.679 coming back to a need to kind of preserve livestock 00:41:29.679 --> 00:41:32.519 in very certain situations but that almost being 00:41:32.519 --> 00:41:37.179 used as a reason to to not have the conversation 00:41:37.179 --> 00:41:39.199 about reducing meat and dairy consumption in 00:41:39.199 --> 00:41:43.619 some places. So that's a kind of worrying trend, 00:41:43.619 --> 00:41:47.639 but at the same time, it was really heartening 00:41:47.639 --> 00:41:52.519 to connect with so many activists and organizations, 00:41:52.739 --> 00:41:55.440 particularly with it being in Brazil, where there 00:41:55.440 --> 00:41:57.960 is a really strong, amazing grassroots movement, 00:41:58.059 --> 00:42:00.860 and to connect with so many of them that are 00:42:00.860 --> 00:42:04.159 fighting industrial agriculture companies on 00:42:04.159 --> 00:42:07.380 the ground and running amazing investigations 00:42:07.380 --> 00:42:09.980 into deforestation and human rights abuses that 00:42:09.980 --> 00:42:14.139 take place in Brazil. So I think that's why I 00:42:14.139 --> 00:42:16.119 started with that uncertainty of not knowing 00:42:16.119 --> 00:42:18.019 how to answer it, because on the one hand, we 00:42:18.019 --> 00:42:23.719 saw this industry PR machine working really effectively. 00:42:24.360 --> 00:42:28.800 But at the same time, an increasingly well connected 00:42:28.800 --> 00:42:33.760 and grassroots connected Yeah, kind of alternative 00:42:33.760 --> 00:42:39.920 voice that is making some good progress. And 00:42:39.920 --> 00:42:42.099 all of that is obviously, you know, that we've 00:42:42.099 --> 00:42:44.719 got the backdrop of escalating climate emergency. 00:42:44.960 --> 00:42:49.280 And we heard from a minister from Tuvalu, one 00:42:49.280 --> 00:42:52.880 of the Pacific islands, talking about the urgency 00:42:52.880 --> 00:42:57.619 of tackling methane emissions. And it was, you 00:42:57.619 --> 00:43:00.369 know, I've been working on methane for three 00:43:00.369 --> 00:43:03.909 and a half years now and even to me someone who 00:43:03.909 --> 00:43:06.329 talks about the urgency of tackling methane time 00:43:06.329 --> 00:43:09.369 and again to hear him talk about the fact that 00:43:09.369 --> 00:43:11.510 methane really is an emergency break like if 00:43:11.510 --> 00:43:15.769 we cut methane emissions because it's such a 00:43:15.769 --> 00:43:18.329 potent greenhouse gas and it is also a short 00:43:18.329 --> 00:43:21.070 -lived gas so it disappears from the atmosphere 00:43:21.070 --> 00:43:24.269 between 12 and 20 years after 12 and 20 years 00:43:24.269 --> 00:43:27.030 whereas carbon lives basically forever or over 00:43:27.030 --> 00:43:30.219 a hundred years. If we cut methane emissions 00:43:30.219 --> 00:43:34.840 this decade, then we can really slow the rate 00:43:34.840 --> 00:43:38.059 of warming. And that for someone living in Tuvalu 00:43:38.059 --> 00:43:41.519 is the difference between their planet, their 00:43:41.519 --> 00:43:44.960 country being livable and being underwater. Like 00:43:44.960 --> 00:43:49.000 it's huge for them. And it was, yeah, I think 00:43:49.000 --> 00:43:54.420 really like stark to hear that reality. you know, 00:43:54.519 --> 00:43:56.380 voices like that maybe weren't cutting through 00:43:56.380 --> 00:43:58.639 on the methane issue before and they're rising 00:43:58.639 --> 00:44:02.960 up the agenda as well. So it's, yeah, this is 00:44:02.960 --> 00:44:05.659 a very long winded way of saying lots of conflicting 00:44:05.659 --> 00:44:07.940 feelings about it, which I think anyone working 00:44:07.940 --> 00:44:10.659 on climate, you have to maintain the hope. But 00:44:10.659 --> 00:44:13.119 at the same time, you're like starkly aware of 00:44:13.119 --> 00:44:17.940 the real horrific reality. You raised the point 00:44:17.940 --> 00:44:22.360 about, you know, big agents visiting those events 00:44:22.360 --> 00:44:26.880 to get a better understanding on how to counteract 00:44:26.880 --> 00:44:29.840 the points and all of that. And this has been 00:44:29.840 --> 00:44:35.619 on my mind for a while now. It reminds me of 00:44:35.619 --> 00:44:41.239 that book, Siri, the tree body problem, you know, 00:44:41.239 --> 00:44:44.260 you have aliens and they can read your mind and 00:44:44.260 --> 00:44:47.280 they're coming to conquer you. And so they need 00:44:47.280 --> 00:44:52.780 to think of a way to protect the earth. without, 00:44:52.780 --> 00:44:56.119 you know, making it explicit to those aliens 00:44:56.119 --> 00:44:59.099 and their technology that is amazing and can 00:44:59.099 --> 00:45:04.280 read your mind. And, you know, I have this podcast 00:45:04.280 --> 00:45:06.920 and I have those conversations and it's public. 00:45:06.920 --> 00:45:11.280 And I'm sure that some agent of big ag, you know, 00:45:11.360 --> 00:45:16.860 would listen to that for, you know, to counteract 00:45:16.860 --> 00:45:18.840 those arguments to get a better understanding 00:45:18.840 --> 00:45:23.889 of who the enemy is. who the target is to use 00:45:23.889 --> 00:45:28.869 a less loaded word. So what do you make of that? 00:45:29.070 --> 00:45:32.510 Should we, you know, limit the things we say 00:45:32.510 --> 00:45:36.789 in public because of that? Yeah, interesting. 00:45:38.019 --> 00:45:40.900 I think no, like, you know, I've been quite open 00:45:40.900 --> 00:45:42.719 about the fact that at Changing Markets we have 00:45:42.719 --> 00:45:45.039 no permanent allies and no permanent adversaries. 00:45:45.059 --> 00:45:47.340 Like we haven't got anything to hide because 00:45:47.340 --> 00:45:49.920 we, and I'm sure you as well, like, you know, 00:45:50.000 --> 00:45:56.320 we're coming from a place of real focus on evidence 00:45:56.320 --> 00:46:01.380 base and issues that are important to us. And 00:46:01.380 --> 00:46:05.179 we, you know, we're not gonna put our strategies 00:46:05.179 --> 00:46:08.349 up for like public consumption but we're also 00:46:08.349 --> 00:46:11.130 like fairly open about where our focus is and 00:46:11.130 --> 00:46:13.030 what we're looking at and what we're trying to 00:46:13.030 --> 00:46:17.489 achieve and I think that's important because 00:46:17.489 --> 00:46:21.230 you have to build trust and yeah and also like 00:46:21.230 --> 00:46:22.809 I said we you know we haven't got anything to 00:46:22.809 --> 00:46:26.349 hide in that sense I think where you know we 00:46:26.349 --> 00:46:30.829 do a lot of investigations and trying to um unpick 00:46:31.819 --> 00:46:34.800 coordination and plans and strategy of the meat 00:46:34.800 --> 00:46:38.079 and dairy industry and some of theirs will be 00:46:38.079 --> 00:46:40.400 very public and very open and out there and I 00:46:40.400 --> 00:46:42.019 think that's because they also believe they don't 00:46:42.019 --> 00:46:44.420 have anything to hide, they really believe what 00:46:44.420 --> 00:46:47.480 they're putting forwards and our argument is 00:46:47.480 --> 00:46:49.179 that they're often only looking at a very small 00:46:49.179 --> 00:46:51.699 piece of the puzzle and not the broader kind 00:46:51.699 --> 00:46:55.760 of evidence base and picture and the things that 00:46:55.760 --> 00:46:58.460 they will you know, is maybe a little bit harder 00:46:58.460 --> 00:47:01.139 to obtain. And some people have amazing abilities 00:47:01.139 --> 00:47:03.739 in getting leaked documents and things like that. 00:47:03.760 --> 00:47:06.440 That's often the stuff where you hit on a real 00:47:06.440 --> 00:47:08.039 nugget because they don't want people to see 00:47:08.039 --> 00:47:09.440 that because they know they're doing something 00:47:09.440 --> 00:47:14.099 wrong. So, yeah, no, I don't, I think we, I think 00:47:14.099 --> 00:47:16.079 it's good that we keep the conversations open. 00:47:16.159 --> 00:47:19.519 And in fact, you know, when we, one of the panels 00:47:19.519 --> 00:47:24.280 I saw was included someone from Alltech, a big 00:47:24.639 --> 00:47:27.760 feed company in the US who have just funded this 00:47:27.760 --> 00:47:31.099 film called A World Without Cows, which is, I 00:47:31.099 --> 00:47:33.679 haven't seen it, but it's kind of supposedly, 00:47:33.679 --> 00:47:37.179 you know, sensationalizing this idea that we're 00:47:37.179 --> 00:47:39.519 all calling for any of us talking about food 00:47:39.519 --> 00:47:42.219 system transformation and plant based diets are 00:47:42.219 --> 00:47:44.099 calling for a world without cows, which, you 00:47:44.099 --> 00:47:50.360 know, I'm sure none of us are doing. And Yeah, 00:47:50.500 --> 00:47:52.699 so it's kind of sensationalizing and fueling 00:47:52.699 --> 00:47:54.860 that. And on the panel, they were saying, we 00:47:54.860 --> 00:47:56.840 really want to open the discussion. We want to 00:47:56.840 --> 00:47:58.900 engage with people and broaden the debate. And 00:47:58.900 --> 00:48:01.280 so we were like, OK, we'll go along to this screening 00:48:01.280 --> 00:48:04.280 of this documentary. That'll be great. And we 00:48:04.280 --> 00:48:07.019 registered online. And we got an email back saying, 00:48:07.099 --> 00:48:09.960 I'm sorry, we have to consider each registration 00:48:09.960 --> 00:48:12.519 because of demand. And we got an email back saying, 00:48:12.800 --> 00:48:15.480 due to too much demand, there isn't space for 00:48:15.480 --> 00:48:19.599 you to come along to. The screening and then 00:48:19.599 --> 00:48:21.579 we know someone that went along and sent us a 00:48:21.579 --> 00:48:23.119 picture and actually it was really empty and 00:48:23.119 --> 00:48:25.119 there was like tons of space So I don't think 00:48:25.119 --> 00:48:26.699 they wanted us in the room. I don't think they 00:48:26.699 --> 00:48:29.599 wanted to broaden the conversation And again, 00:48:29.599 --> 00:48:31.239 it just makes you wonder like what are you trying 00:48:31.239 --> 00:48:33.880 to hide? If you if you really don't want us there 00:48:33.880 --> 00:48:36.380 and you don't want to talk to us face to face 00:48:36.380 --> 00:48:40.500 again the double standard they have access to 00:48:40.500 --> 00:48:43.480 our spaces, but we don't have access to their 00:48:43.480 --> 00:48:47.409 spaces, you know the There's an organization 00:48:47.409 --> 00:48:51.449 I love. I'm blanking on their name, but they 00:48:51.449 --> 00:48:56.909 infiltrate meetings of lobbyists in Washington 00:48:56.909 --> 00:49:03.829 and in also state meetings. And of course, they're 00:49:03.829 --> 00:49:07.150 not welcome to those meetings. They have to use 00:49:07.150 --> 00:49:12.030 all sorts of deep strategies to get in. But ah, 00:49:12.070 --> 00:49:15.059 the double standard. Yeah, yeah, completely. 00:49:15.280 --> 00:49:18.260 I mean, you know, often money and resources buys 00:49:18.260 --> 00:49:22.280 people entry into these spaces, right. And definitely 00:49:22.280 --> 00:49:26.980 in the case of cop like the it's not cheap to 00:49:26.980 --> 00:49:29.960 have a what you call a pavilion that which is 00:49:29.960 --> 00:49:32.820 basically the stands that take up the official 00:49:32.820 --> 00:49:35.039 blue zone and where you have the various events, 00:49:35.039 --> 00:49:38.159 it's not cheap and industry has the resources 00:49:38.159 --> 00:49:40.019 because despite what some people say, they're 00:49:40.019 --> 00:49:44.050 not the underdogs. It is a very very wealthy 00:49:44.050 --> 00:49:47.750 industry. And, you know, they'll talk about the 00:49:47.750 --> 00:49:50.389 kind of vegan elite being this incredibly well 00:49:50.389 --> 00:49:55.630 funded machine and all of that. But yeah, it's 00:49:55.630 --> 00:49:58.610 it's a again, it's a double standard. But yeah, 00:49:58.610 --> 00:50:01.849 there is there's some really exciting and there 00:50:01.849 --> 00:50:04.269 always has been people who have got ability to 00:50:04.269 --> 00:50:06.469 find a way into these spaces and these rooms. 00:50:06.469 --> 00:50:11.250 And it's great. Thank God. Yeah, I joke a lot 00:50:11.250 --> 00:50:14.170 about that, that I'm part of the global elite. 00:50:14.409 --> 00:50:19.289 I guess I did not know that. Yeah, we were told 00:50:19.289 --> 00:50:23.730 that we were part of Big Pharma because of our 00:50:23.730 --> 00:50:26.949 recent report on the meat versus eat Lancet. 00:50:27.190 --> 00:50:29.170 I'm not sure how they got that because we've 00:50:29.170 --> 00:50:31.769 done campaigns into the pharmaceuticals industry 00:50:31.769 --> 00:50:33.570 before, so I'm not really sure how we're Big 00:50:33.570 --> 00:50:36.679 Pharma. And apparently we're like incredibly 00:50:36.679 --> 00:50:39.280 well resourced in that and then i'm like well 00:50:39.280 --> 00:50:44.340 i'm yet to see the evidence so thanks. Yeah that's 00:50:44.340 --> 00:50:48.599 amazing um we should laugh about it you know 00:50:48.599 --> 00:50:51.340 instead of crying that's the healthy response 00:50:51.340 --> 00:50:57.219 um what what did i want to bring up oh yeah there's 00:50:57.219 --> 00:51:00.519 another layer of frustration on top of all of 00:51:00.519 --> 00:51:03.920 this which is that they're getting subsidies 00:51:03.920 --> 00:51:06.539 from the government. So they're basically using 00:51:06.539 --> 00:51:11.559 our taxpayer money to fight our interest to fight 00:51:11.559 --> 00:51:16.840 against our interests. And people are not aware 00:51:16.840 --> 00:51:20.159 of those subsidies. That's, you know, another 00:51:20.159 --> 00:51:24.199 frustration. Yeah, yeah, there's, there's, again, 00:51:24.260 --> 00:51:26.260 this is something we've looked into, and others 00:51:26.260 --> 00:51:29.059 have looked into that the level of subsidies 00:51:29.059 --> 00:51:34.460 that goes towards industrial agriculture in general 00:51:34.460 --> 00:51:39.820 but yeah also meat and dairy and it does it massively 00:51:39.820 --> 00:51:42.420 skews the system and it makes it really hard 00:51:42.420 --> 00:51:47.579 for competing products and companies to have 00:51:47.579 --> 00:51:51.099 a chance at kind of shifting the game in any 00:51:51.099 --> 00:51:55.780 way and you know in Europe and North America 00:51:55.780 --> 00:51:58.139 and many places in the world, actually, there's 00:51:58.139 --> 00:52:01.239 this talk about wanting a fair and free market. 00:52:01.880 --> 00:52:04.019 And the reality is that the market is massively 00:52:04.019 --> 00:52:07.760 skewed because of these kinds of subsidies. There 00:52:07.760 --> 00:52:10.039 was a recent investigation in Europe that showed 00:52:10.039 --> 00:52:15.679 that subsidies and taxpayer money is going towards 00:52:15.679 --> 00:52:21.539 funding campaigns that are basically meat industry 00:52:21.539 --> 00:52:24.019 greenwashing and talking about like the sustainability 00:52:24.019 --> 00:52:26.920 credentials of meat and dairy products in Europe. 00:52:27.119 --> 00:52:29.239 And it's, it's part of a campaign to promote 00:52:29.239 --> 00:52:32.780 European products, but it's because of this, 00:52:32.920 --> 00:52:36.239 the farming system and the food system in Europe, 00:52:36.239 --> 00:52:39.619 it massively favors these big companies and industrial 00:52:39.619 --> 00:52:43.840 animal farming. And yeah, people aren't aware 00:52:43.840 --> 00:52:45.380 of that. People aren't aware that their money 00:52:45.380 --> 00:52:48.760 is going towards this and We're also hear this 00:52:48.760 --> 00:52:50.860 thing about not telling people what to eat all 00:52:50.860 --> 00:52:54.460 the time. And we hear this being reiterated by 00:52:54.460 --> 00:52:57.619 policymakers who absolutely should know better 00:52:57.619 --> 00:53:01.519 and should be evidence -based. And you mentioned 00:53:01.519 --> 00:53:04.099 like, you know, we'll bring up needing to shift 00:53:04.099 --> 00:53:06.059 food systems and encourage more plant -based 00:53:06.059 --> 00:53:08.480 diets or even just diets in line with healthy 00:53:08.480 --> 00:53:10.800 eating guidelines. And we're told, yeah, but 00:53:10.800 --> 00:53:13.019 we can't tell people what to eat. But the reality 00:53:13.019 --> 00:53:15.219 is that people are always being told what to 00:53:15.219 --> 00:53:20.059 eat through these subsidies that show more marketing 00:53:20.059 --> 00:53:22.900 for meat and dairy products, also through like 00:53:22.900 --> 00:53:25.159 school education programs that are funded by 00:53:25.159 --> 00:53:27.880 meat companies and dairy companies saying that 00:53:27.880 --> 00:53:30.920 milk is like essential for your development throughout 00:53:30.920 --> 00:53:33.480 life and is this core part of a healthy diet. 00:53:34.559 --> 00:53:37.590 And And even when you go into a supermarket, 00:53:37.670 --> 00:53:39.989 the products that you're faced with and the pricing 00:53:39.989 --> 00:53:43.869 of those and the deals and offers, this all kind 00:53:43.869 --> 00:53:45.650 of tells people what you should be eating and 00:53:45.650 --> 00:53:49.670 the advertising and all of it is, yeah, people 00:53:49.670 --> 00:53:51.289 are always told what they need, what they should 00:53:51.289 --> 00:53:55.230 be eating. It's part of a food environment. And 00:53:55.230 --> 00:53:57.690 yeah, I think that even comes down to the kind 00:53:57.690 --> 00:54:00.730 of consumer level and people have these ideas 00:54:00.730 --> 00:54:05.219 about Being at being eating a vegan diet or more 00:54:05.219 --> 00:54:07.500 plant based products is kind of scary to them. 00:54:07.739 --> 00:54:12.139 And yeah, it's part of this this kind of advertising 00:54:12.139 --> 00:54:15.519 wheelhouse. Yeah, and the food guides, which 00:54:15.519 --> 00:54:20.019 is so you know, explicit invitation to eat more 00:54:20.019 --> 00:54:25.360 dairy meat products. There was a whole scandal 00:54:25.360 --> 00:54:29.480 about that in Canada a few years ago that at 00:54:29.480 --> 00:54:32.300 the current, you know, food guide, although the 00:54:32.300 --> 00:54:36.940 old one was the product of lobbyists and not 00:54:36.940 --> 00:54:41.340 nutritionists that, you know, yeah, who, but 00:54:41.340 --> 00:54:43.860 no one is held accountable for that. You know, 00:54:43.980 --> 00:54:48.360 the harm is done and then people forget. Yeah. 00:54:48.719 --> 00:54:51.389 And, you know, the really kind of bizarre thing 00:54:51.389 --> 00:54:54.510 is that we hear particularly from someone I mentioned 00:54:54.510 --> 00:54:57.269 earlier, Frederick Leroy, one of these kind of 00:54:57.269 --> 00:55:00.829 pro -meat scientists, often talks about the fact 00:55:00.829 --> 00:55:06.769 that national food guidelines are, he says, like 00:55:06.769 --> 00:55:08.889 skewing it the other way, away from meat and 00:55:08.889 --> 00:55:11.590 dairy and encouraging too many grains and too 00:55:11.590 --> 00:55:14.949 many plant -based products, and that that is 00:55:14.949 --> 00:55:18.190 causing like obesity and other health problems. 00:55:19.829 --> 00:55:23.309 Yeah, it's like this bizarre world where you 00:55:23.309 --> 00:55:26.070 look at the evidence of which industries have 00:55:26.070 --> 00:55:28.170 lobbied for guidelines to be put in place in 00:55:28.170 --> 00:55:30.190 a certain way. And then you hear someone saying 00:55:30.190 --> 00:55:32.670 that they're doing the opposite. And it's, it's, 00:55:32.670 --> 00:55:37.989 it's confusing. Yes, I think, you know, people 00:55:37.989 --> 00:55:41.690 don't realize the how much you can manipulate 00:55:41.690 --> 00:55:47.150 opinions, true, you know, crafting a message 00:55:47.150 --> 00:55:53.289 or uh, you know, storytelling, um, as an example, 00:55:53.289 --> 00:55:57.210 you could say something like, um, Hey, I'm a 00:55:57.210 --> 00:55:59.849 vegan. I've been vegan for five years. Not true. 00:56:00.210 --> 00:56:04.170 Um, and you know, I like being vegan, but it 00:56:04.170 --> 00:56:06.610 causes me lots of problems in my health. And 00:56:06.610 --> 00:56:09.690 then you go into the list of problems. Like, 00:56:10.150 --> 00:56:12.269 first of all, you don't know if this is coming 00:56:12.269 --> 00:56:16.170 from a genuine person, you know, and then you 00:56:16.170 --> 00:56:20.619 think, This is not helping. Is the person realizing 00:56:20.619 --> 00:56:23.760 that this is not helping and doing it on purpose? 00:56:24.539 --> 00:56:28.360 It's maddening. Yeah, and it's this, I think 00:56:28.360 --> 00:56:31.000 as well, this is a symptom of social media, right, 00:56:31.019 --> 00:56:34.960 more broadly, but it's this idea that a person's 00:56:34.960 --> 00:56:38.139 personal story can be taken as evidence. And 00:56:38.139 --> 00:56:41.500 like you said, you have no idea if that story 00:56:41.500 --> 00:56:44.599 is genuine, if that person is genuine. And we 00:56:44.599 --> 00:56:47.679 started by talking about that Reddit post. And 00:56:47.679 --> 00:56:51.719 when I read it, I was curious about whether this 00:56:51.719 --> 00:56:55.280 person was real. saying this story, like it's 00:56:55.280 --> 00:56:58.159 very likely, but you have no way of knowing like 00:56:58.159 --> 00:57:03.099 who are they and all of this. And but yet someone's 00:57:03.099 --> 00:57:06.099 individual story is taken as evidence when that 00:57:06.099 --> 00:57:08.940 won't even necessarily be based on any kind of 00:57:08.940 --> 00:57:10.480 research of what's actually going on with their 00:57:10.480 --> 00:57:13.800 bodies or kind of evidence is built up with you'll 00:57:13.800 --> 00:57:17.219 have like control variables and science is really 00:57:17.219 --> 00:57:21.530 detailed and complex and nuance and Yeah, instead, 00:57:21.670 --> 00:57:24.570 we're fed this, like, my story is the truth. 00:57:26.590 --> 00:57:30.269 And it just, yeah, it creates such a minefield 00:57:30.269 --> 00:57:34.090 for people in trying to determine any information 00:57:34.090 --> 00:57:36.570 and social media is often the main source of 00:57:36.570 --> 00:57:39.389 information for most people now for news stories, 00:57:39.389 --> 00:57:44.150 but also for dietary trends and interests. And 00:57:44.150 --> 00:57:48.449 there's got to be a lot more stringent content 00:57:48.449 --> 00:57:52.179 moderation where these are health claims. And 00:57:52.179 --> 00:57:54.539 when it comes to food, they are often health 00:57:54.539 --> 00:57:57.000 claims, and it's going to have a real damaging 00:57:57.000 --> 00:58:01.760 impact on people. And you can't, you know, say, 00:58:01.980 --> 00:58:06.860 let's teach people critical thinking. No, it's 00:58:06.860 --> 00:58:09.880 deeply, you know, psychological, it's, you know, 00:58:09.980 --> 00:58:12.320 some of that messaging is sometimes, you know, 00:58:12.440 --> 00:58:15.409 speaks to your subconscious, you know, mind. 00:58:15.769 --> 00:58:18.550 It's, you don't understand how much you're getting 00:58:18.550 --> 00:58:22.369 manipulated by those algorithms. It's about feelings. 00:58:22.730 --> 00:58:25.329 And so you can learn all about, you know, critical 00:58:25.329 --> 00:58:28.289 thinking and even major in philosophy or whatever, 00:58:28.989 --> 00:58:31.969 but you'll never, you know, protect yourself 00:58:31.969 --> 00:58:35.789 against that. No, no, exactly. And that's why 00:58:35.789 --> 00:58:38.150 we need this kind of like evidence based science 00:58:38.150 --> 00:58:42.199 that really looks at Yeah, it looks at the bigger 00:58:42.199 --> 00:58:45.679 picture, it's evidence -based, rather than these 00:58:45.679 --> 00:58:49.340 kind of, yeah, select stories as being the ideas 00:58:49.340 --> 00:58:52.320 because we can't, it's not down to us as individuals 00:58:52.320 --> 00:58:54.679 and it's not down to us as consumers even to 00:58:54.679 --> 00:58:57.420 make these proper decisions. There's got to be 00:58:57.420 --> 00:58:59.659 kind of policies and regulation in place that 00:58:59.659 --> 00:59:03.820 ensure that we're navigating, yeah, we're navigating 00:59:03.820 --> 00:59:08.659 evidence. Well, I'm so thankful that your organization 00:59:08.659 --> 00:59:13.219 exists. Truly, I mean, you have so much work 00:59:13.219 --> 00:59:20.820 to do. It's been a long year. And, you know, 00:59:20.940 --> 00:59:23.260 what if we want to support changing markets? 00:59:24.260 --> 00:59:28.130 How should we do so? Yeah, please just kind of 00:59:28.130 --> 00:59:31.909 follow along. We're on most social media platforms. 00:59:32.449 --> 00:59:34.710 We have a newsletter that people can subscribe 00:59:34.710 --> 00:59:39.690 to on our website. We are on LinkedIn and Instagram. 00:59:41.110 --> 00:59:43.809 And yeah, please just kind of follow along and 00:59:43.809 --> 00:59:48.349 engage with what we're doing and talk about our 00:59:48.349 --> 00:59:51.579 work. We really love hearing about instances 00:59:51.579 --> 00:59:54.639 of where our reports pop up and conversations 00:59:54.639 --> 00:59:57.960 and kind of seeing the information being used 00:59:57.960 --> 01:00:00.219 out there in the wild and prompting these discussions, 01:00:00.219 --> 01:00:02.539 because that's really what we're trying to do 01:00:02.539 --> 01:00:05.739 when we put out quite a lot of reports. And they're 01:00:05.739 --> 01:00:07.699 always about increasing the evidence base and 01:00:07.699 --> 01:00:09.659 the knowledge and prompting conversations in 01:00:09.659 --> 01:00:15.199 these spaces. So yeah, just keep engaging. Amazing. 01:00:15.559 --> 01:00:17.840 Thank you so much, Maddie. Did you want to add 01:00:17.840 --> 01:00:34.289 something before we stop the recording? Thank 01:00:34.289 --> 01:00:37.670 you everyone for listening. I kindly invite you 01:00:37.670 --> 01:00:40.250 to share this podcast with the vegans you know. 01:00:40.550 --> 01:00:44.670 Let's encourage more people to take action. Again, 01:00:44.710 --> 01:00:47.550 thank you so much for caring and I will see you 01:00:47.550 --> 01:00:49.750 next Tuesday for a new episode.