Free From Harm
July 2012
No matter how “humane” the marketers want to spin the truth, the modern dairy industry’s business model is built upon the exploitation of pregnant females, birthing lots of unwanted babies in the process.
Everybody says they want to know where their food comes from these days. But we won’t get it from product marketing. What we see here on this Whole Foods 365 Organic milk carton is a happy, healthy looking cow, beautiful blue sky and puffy white clouds, an idyllic Old McDonald farm scene. But the gulf between this facade and the reality could not be greater in this case.
Whole Foods Market 365 brand organic milk depicts the image of a healthy,
happy calf on its cover but the gulf between this facade and the reality
behind it could not be greater.
Below is a photo from an organization in England called Animal Aid that does undercover investigations, this one at a typical, small scale slaughterhouse in England.
Photo courtesy of Animal Aid, captured from video of an undercover
investigation at a slaughterhouse in England
What you’re looking at is a “spent” dairy cow who has been stunned with a stun gun to allegedly render her unconscious (though her eyes are still wide open) in preparation for slaughter. Stunning is not a perfect science and some animals are still fully or semi conscious when slaughtered.(1)
Here are 10 important points to consider:
So you’re back in the market and you see the fancy Chobani Greek yogurt here or the aged French cheese over there and then the gourmet gelato in the freezer section. In all of these cases you can rest assured that they all resulted from the same circumstances I’ve just outlined.
No matter how “humane” the marketers want to spin the truth, the modern dairy industry’s business model is built upon the exploitation of pregnant females, birthing lots of unwanted babies in the process. Fortunately there are so many great alternatives today and new products coming out all the time that can be equally satisfying as well as cruelty free. Look for them and ask for them. And from nutritional standpoint, we don’t need to go through an animal for the nutrients we get from dairy either.
So I’d like to leave you with a positive image. This happy mother dairy cow was spared a violent slaughterhouse end and is now reunited with one of her calves that she was separated from at a sanctuary in California. At sanctuaries like these, motherhood is honored and respected across the animal kingdom. As informed consumers, it becomes clear to us that she is really the happy cow, not the one promoted to us on the organic milk carton. She is a happy cow because she is free to live according to her own interests, free to create a family and free to raise and nurture her young as she so deeply desires and as mother nature herself so clearly intends.
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