To Know

I recently made the choice to become a vegetarian. After realizing that the folks in Toronto who I surveyed for my grad thesis, and whose decision to take serious ownership of their energy footprint I hugely respect, were spending $15,000-$30,000 to reduce their GHG emissions by the approximately the same amount as I'm responsible for by being a meat-eater, I decided it was something I had to do. I'm a bit apprehensive about the switch - I've relied on meat as my primary source of protein, and being a very active person (preparing for a mini-triathlon in June) it may be a challenge to figure out how remove meat from my diet without it having some effect on my physical abilities. The decision fits with a much larger issue though, which is understanding the up- and downstream consequences of my purchase decisions. My resource management prof showed this picture of a piece of tar sands extraction equipment in class on Friday, and commented that "If oil sand developers were really about job creation, why wouldn't they use a lower impact form of extraction that employs more people?" Being educated about the sort of a world we're creating through our economic decisions is an important part of being a responsible citizen, and for me personally, part of being a Christian with some degree of integrity.