I think this is a bit of a misnoma. Firstly, 80% of the Amazon deforestation has occurred due to increased cattle ranch - this has a massive effect on the ability of the planet to absorb carbon emissions. Secondly, the increase in methane correlates with the increase in the number of animals we are basing modern diets on. We kill 60 billion animals a year - as I said, twice the number we did 40 years ago - and the soy diet most cattle are fed on also increases methane, again a necessity in the industrial farming of animals.

Also your last point really is worth tackling as I think it's a view dictated to us from childhood. You can get every single nutrient your body needs to live healthily from a non-animal-product based diet, except for vitamin B12. Veganism is less likely to lead to high blood pressure, cancer, heart disease and may many other illnesses, and you only have to walk around the streets to see the damaging effect a modern Western diet is having on our population. You may use B12 to argue your case, but for me taking supplements is a small price to pay if it means that we are not slaughtering innocent living beings for our own comfort and efficiency. Ultimately, I believe that if there is anything superior in human beings to animals, it is our ability to show love and empathy in a position of power over a weaker being. This is true whether in the case of rejecting human slavery, in political governance, or in terms of how we treat the animals that we share this planet with.

Since Blair resigned Labour, electorate wise, have been in a tailspin. None of the polls suggest that having a proper left-winger in charge in Corbyn has led to even less support. The big question now is can the levelling out be transformed into an upward curve?

People can be scared of change. I get that. But i think both sides of the political divide are hungry for it. It's just finding that middle ground.

Something like saving tens of billions and doing away with our nuclear arsenal could be a start and he's talking about that today. We don't really need the weapons anymore.

The state of European peace is more fragile now that for the last 20 years - Russia in Ukraine in particular - these things have a deterrent value just by having them, and to unilaterally disarm is not defending the realm, which should be any Governments priority.

You are, if I may say so, doing exactly what Labour is doing in deflecting the real concerns that the majority of voters have and talking about what you want to talk about. That is to say, talking to yourself. This is exactly my point, Labour hasn't listened to the electorate at all, its reaction to the election defeat has been to go into its comfort zone and into its shell, talking about issues we all know lefty Labour types love, but the electorate don't.

I'll definitely get shot down for saying this, but Blair was far more brave in trying to drag all of his membership into the centre ground to make himself electable. Actually listening to people's opinions and adapting your principles to them is far braver than what Corbyn is doing, and is actually is what democracy is meant to be there for.

I'm pretty sure you can get B12 from Bran and from Tofu (admittedly the levels are pretty low in the later). Unless you're eating liver, then most meats and fish aren't great sources of B12 anyhow.

Although I'm not so sure about veganism, as an ethical choice, given that the survival of chickens, cows etc would kind of require a purposeful function, such as milk provision and eggs (its not like most livestock could probably survive in the wild). I think along the same lines, admittedly more weakly because I can't quite bring myself to cut out some meat (chicken, fish primarily and occasionally bacon and an occasional steak).

That may well be true. But do we need more options? The original question was, do we not have enough options already to do sufficient damage to have a deterrent effect? And if we don't now, at what point will be? Do we just renew our nuclear spend ad infinitum? Does there come a time when we have enough? If we buy the submarines, would we say "we've done it now. We don't need anything else for 15 years?" I doubt it. How do we or you weigh nuclear weapon spend against other societal investments when financial resources are finite? Does military spending come first because there's no country to build hospitals in if it's not properly defended? Or does military spend come last because a country without hospitals isn't worth defending? It seems to me that with the weapons we have and the collective will of our existing allies, uncertain that we need to spend even more at a time when we have huge infrastructure needs that require investment.

Edited by sydtheeagle (30 Sep 2015 4.18pm)