The products themselves are telling you there are a variety of production standards and it is almost willful blindness to say you believe there is nothing going on because there ought to be nothing going on.

You could make an analogous argument about gasoline “Look if this was harming the atmosphere why would governments allow it to be sold? I refuse to feel guilty”

The reason people argue the meat is more nutritious is because the cows are healthier via eating their natural diet.

Corn diets cause health problems and bacterial infections requiring antibiotics.

Some of this will literally be on the websites of farms selling pastured beef. It’s not a big secret and if you seek out pastured beef it’s likely familiar.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/05/010511074623.h...

"As a consumer I have no responsibility in what products I choose to buy" is equally ridiculous.

Occasionally I find myself in some gastronomy setting were nothing in the menu appeals to me other than the dishes containing tuna and then I eat it, and enjoy it a lot. It happens less than once a year.

(I do actually share your position wrt farmed meat, those farms are infinitely more regulateable than international fishing and I think we should regulate it hard, hard enough to solve big parts of the inherent inefficiency of putting nutrients though animals before they reach a human mouth by price)

Whaling wasn't stopped (mostly stopped) thanks to people insisting on buying whale products until regulation happens.

Why do you expect this, when there is evidence to the contrary?

> regular customer shouldn't be worried about that

Nobody is asking you to single-handedly save the oceans. Start by installing Seafood Watch and do your best to select a sustainable option any time you're eating seafood.

> If it wasn't then it's the fault of our government and regulation

This is why crony capitalism is forever bound to a love affair with the state; it relieves us of any responsibility for building real communities.

Governments have never - and I believe will never - regulate society into behavior befitting the respect due to the Earth. We have given profiteers and their lobbyists access to a single point of failure; we can't be surprised when they utilize it.

> there's an issue in the system.

But everyone else is just as apathetic as you, so there's no incentive to ever change anything.

You say, "The government should ban this!" and the government says, "People are buying and eating this, so in a Democratic system we can't ban this!"

You slough off responsibility on them - they slough it off on you - you all convince yourselves you have no possibility at all.

Also - I'm curious - have you ever contacted your representatives? Asked them to do anything about it?

I'm sure when the tuna finally goes, you'll say, "Yes, I ate tuna all my life, but I bear no responsibility - it's everyone else's fault."

Wait, are you replying to the right comment?

>>Also - I'm curious - have you ever contacted your representatives? Asked them to do anything about it?

Yes, I have. Have you?

>>But everyone else is just as apathetic as you, so there's no incentive to ever change anything.

Again, I feel like you're replying to the wrong comment. I feel like I live in a country with a very strong regulatory framework and things like fishing are treated very seriously with strong quotas on what can be caught not to overfish, and canned fish has to be clearly labeled where it came from and how it was caught. So I'm not sure which part of what I said comes across as apathetic to you.

>>I'm sure when the tuna finally goes, you'll say, "Yes, I ate tuna all my life, but I bear no responsibility - it's everyone else's fault."

I'll definitely say that it's the fault of the agencies tasked with protecting the flora and fauna that they are responsible for, not the consumers for eating tuna.

Nobody’s going to step in and change things if it’s easy money and people will keep buying it and shifting blame. It doesn’t work that way.

Then you're not sorry.

> When I go to the store and buy some tuna I expect that it was responsibly fished. If it wasn't then it's the fault of our government and regulation, regular customer shouldn't be worried about that.

How do you think regulations come to be?

If a consumer wants a product, a company finds a way to provide it. The company will poison the land, sea and sky in order to provide it to you, they don't give a shit. The government allows it until the people demand regulations to stop it. But you are the people - if you don't want it stopped, it won't be. And so there are no regulations made.

There is no parental overlord making sure that what you purchase is sustainable or cruelty-free. Sitting around saying "somebody should stop me from ruining the earth" doesn't actually make it happen. I know you don't want to have any personal responsibility or culpability for the shitty way the world works, but you do.

Ultimately, you, and everyone like you, are the reason we can't have nice things.

Because I expect to live in a country with a strong regulatory framework where if I buy something in a store I don't have to worry whether it was produced in an ethical way?

You're right, I'm the problem. Thanks mate.

The government does not sit around reading your mind and then make regulations to match it. Even if it could, it wouldn't. The government only creates a regulation when either a corporation or a very vocal coalition of people demand it. And those two parties are working against each other anyway, making it even less likely.

I really don't know how to explain it in simple enough terms. If you don't care, then neither does the society, and thus the government. Ergo, people like you are the reason the regulations don't exist and aren't enforced when they do.

Obviously, I do care. I do care on the level of having strong regulation, having institutions and governments which regulate this, so that at the end as a customer when I walk into a store I don't need to Google whether a particular brand is fishing tuna in a particular way or not. I expect that the entire structure that exists for regulating and allowing these products to reach the shelves will prevent products which are made in an insustainable way. Maybe I'm a fool for expecting it to work this. But that was why I replied how I did - that I refuse to feel bad because I expect my government to prevent this in the first place. Just like I said elsewhere - I don't worry whether a phone I'm buying was made with child labour because I believe all governments involved in the production of the device enforce laws against child labour.

That doesn't mean that I don't care. But if I find out that phones made by kids or tuna fished to extinction is on store shelves I'll complain.....to the regulatory bodies. Not decide "well, I guess I'll never eat tuna ever again".

I eat canned tuna also, but that logic doesn’t work generally.

By the same logic you could say that if you could buy a BB gun, it’s ok to shoot people with it, because it must not be harmful.

Come to think of it, that’s what kids did to each other when I was growing up.

To maybe give another example - as a consumer I shouldn't care if a phone I'm buying was made using child labour or not - I expect the authorities in every country involved in its production to enforce laws against child labour.