On the one hand it is perfectly known, and no one dares to doubt it, that it is the man who most disturbs the Planet’s existence. It is pointless to dispute, the Planet would be happier it wasn’t for the man’s existence. Therefore, those most eager to help the Planet are not reproducing. It’s clear, elegant, intellectual, and honest at that. If they succeed in convincing everyone of this idea, we could hope that in a few dozen years the Planet will be relieved. Humans will die out and everyone’s gonna be happy.

There are animals, though. We are being increasingly assured of their equality with human beings. Until now, such an octopus has been a mere side dish and served dishonorable politico-culinary purposes (who still remembers the famous octopi gorged on by the previous government’s elite that the people chased away because it didn’t want to share the octopi?!) and for several years now, if you serve an octopus salad, you can be 100% sure that someone at the table will tell that touching story of a scuba diver and… oh I forgot her name! And that’s not so bad if they order another helping but what if they demand that the contents of the platter be given a decent burial?

SIGN UP TO OUR PAGE Party hosts who wish to avoid such confusion are moving in the direction of safely serving locust dishes (Salad à la John the Baptist, voilà!), but here, too, they may be in for a stern disappointment, as scientific research is ruthlessly moving in the direction of proving that insects suffer, too. Not like humans (or octopuses), but the research has just begun, so let’s not be of little hope.

As the world of animals is inevitably coming to resemble that of humans, and the latter is to be annihilated because it threatens the Planet, it seems logical that the animals should follow humans and let themselves be annihilated. To begin with pets, since they are most closely related to humans. Namely cats and dogs.

This can be easily deduced from an article, recently published by the nice Peter Alexander, senior lecturer at the University of Edinburgh where he lectures on the Global Food Security. His research interests include the impact of human diets on the climate – a deadly one, as we all know.

However, the nice mister Alexander has decided to broaden the scope of his research to include the nutrition of pets. He writes about dogs and cats in the headline, but since he focuses on dogs in his article, I suspect that he is a cat owner himself (it’s a bold thesis, I know, because it may be that cats eat less, but if so, it means that the researcher hasn’t seen the cat I have). The data quoted by the Scottish scientist are terrifying. It turns out that more than half of the Planet’s population has a dog or cat at home! In the United States alone, 66% of households have a pet. And that percentage is growing. And let’s not be afraid to say it out loud: these animals eat! They mercilessly demand food and this craving is satisfied every day by billions of people. And the production of food for them is, of course, linked to carbon dioxide emissions.

The average ten-kilo dachshund (for simplicity’s sake let’s call it a conversion dachshund), consumes wet dog food, it is responsible for the annual emission of 6,541 kg CO₂, which is almost as much as the average Brazilian is – states mister Alexander. Specifically, 98% of the emissions of the Brazilian, as the researcher meticulously states. But if it eats only dry food, its carbon footprint rises to 828 kg of carbon dioxide per year. That equals 127 Brazilians!

Mr. Alexander realizes that giving up dog ownership altogether could be met with a negative reaction from uninformed citizens, especially those living outside of Scotland, so he advises replacing larger breeds with smaller ones to start with. Such a Chihuahua is 30 times smaller than a mastiff – entices the scientist.

But I think it’s much better to get yourself a Brazilian. And to feed him with wet food, absolutely. Nice people, they will eat the same as the host, and you can also have a drop of caipirinha together...

– Robert Bogdański
– Translated by Dominik Szczęsny-Kostanecki

TVP WEEKLY. Editorial team and jornalists

PS. If one wishes to check out if the Scottish researcher to express the dachshund generated by dachshunds against the number of Brazilians, I recommend: read the full story.