I can see why. Beef production is pretty damaging to the environment.
Yes, very much so. And I think that, for your average person, stopping the consumption of commercially raised beef (and meat in general) is probably the single most positive thing you could do for Mother Earth.
"The average annual greenhouse gas and reactive N emissions associated with beef cattle production over the past five years were determined to be 243 ± 26 Tg carbon dioxide equivalents (CO2e) and 1760 ± 136 Gg N, respectively. Total fossil energy use was found to be 569 ± 53 PJ and blue water consumption was 23.2 ± 3.5 TL. Environmental intensities expressed per kg of carcass weight produced were 21.3 ± 2.3 kg CO2e, 155 ± 12 g N, 50.0 ± 4.7 MJ, and 2034 ± 309 L, respectively. These farm-gate values are being combined with post farm-gate sources of packing, processing, distribution, retail, consumption and waste handling to produce a full life cycle assessment of U.S. beef. This study is the most detailed, yet comprehensive, study conducted to date to provide baseline measures for the sustainability of U.S. beef."
Of course, any alternative will have an impact too but not as much as beef.
Data from: Environmental footprints of beef cattle production in the United States | Ag Data Commons