Tag Archives: California

THE NEW YORK TIMES ON ANIMAL AG AND WATER

Nicholas Kristof

By Leslie Goldberg

In an amazing example of the difference between “talking the talk” and “walking the walk,” Nicholas Kristof, a New York Times columnist who has wrung his hands about the animal cruelty inherent in factory farming, turned his sights on the California drought and… and… and… can you believe it? Animal agriculture!

YAY! Finally somebody at the Gray Lady is going to tell the truth about water use in our state!

On your marks, get set, go, Nicholas!

He starts off strong with a quiz:

Which consumes the most water?

A) a 10-minute shower.

B) a handful of 10 almonds.

C) a quarterpound hamburger patty.

D) a washing machine load.

Yup, it’s the burger!! Ding, ding, ding.

The columnist explains carefully that the shower might use 25 gallons. The almonds? A gallon each. The washing machine uses 35 gallons per load. And the burger uses around 450 gallons.

He goes on to talk about the California drought and what a freaking bummer it is, especially when he and his daughter are out hiking and see how the streams and lakes are all dried up.

He even explains how meat, dairy and egg production stack up against plant foods in terms of water. He writes, “A mandarin orange consumes 14 gallons of water. A head of lettuce, 12 gallons. A bunch of grapes, 24 gallons. One single walnut, 2 gallons.”

In an impressive burst of truth-telling, he goes on to write: “… a single egg takes 53 gallons of water to produce. A pound of chicken, 468 gallons. A gallon of milk, 880 gallons. And a pound of beef, 1,800 gallons of water.”

Woo hoo! Go Nick, go. Tell it! Tell us all if we want to save the habitability of the planet we need to go vegan, now. Save the animals! Save the water! Strike a blow against climate change!

But as he comes into the home stretch, our hero Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times stumbles:

“Like most Americans, I eat meat, but it’s worth thinking hard about the inefficiency in that hamburger patty — and the small lake that has dried up to make it possible. Maybe our industrial agriculture system is beginning to change, for we’re seeing some signs of a food revolution in America, with greater emphasis on organic food and animal rights.”

Buy organic and give Walmart a big pat on the back as well for joining the “humane meat” bullshit brigade.
Think, baby, think.

Umm. I’m thinking if I should still keep reading the Times.

– A Vicious Vegan blog post –

MOTHER’S DAY

Animal rights protest at Safeway, Berkeley, CA. Photo by Michael Goldberg

By Leslie Goldberg

My impulse was to run when the security guard started grabbing our signs and knocked to the floor my husband’s iPhone he’d been using take pictures of our animal rights protest at a Berkeley Safeway.
She hit my hand in an attempt to rip my sign which read, “THE DAIRY INDUSTRY EXPLOITS COWS FOR THEIR BREAST MILK” and tried to push one of the demonstrators standing next to me.

“Don’t touch me,” the protestor said.

All I could think of was, “I’m going to hang on to my goddamn sign, no matter what this security guard tries to do.”

It was Mother’s Day, a day when the animal rights groups Berkeley Organization for Animal Advocacy (BOAA) and Direct Action Everywhere (DXE) try to remind the public of the millions and millions of forgotten mothers – the dairy cows who are forced to stand in one spot indoors and be milked and milked and milked for fucking months on end until their udders are bleeding, swollen to the point of dragging on the floor and infected with mastitis. Mothers who frantically search in vain for their newborns who are stolen by humans shortly after birth. Mothers who cry and moan for days and days for their lost babies.

You see, all that violence is so we can have our milk, our yoghurt, our ice cream, our milk shakes and our butter.

But the violence doesn’t stop with the mother. The calf, if he is male, is whisked away to either a veal farm or a veal auction, sometimes still covered in afterbirth and blinking in confusion under the harsh lights. Then the baby is either killed immediately or is ushered into a darkened stall and tied at the neck so he can’t move, until he too, is killed at 18 weeks for his flesh, or, if you will, “veal.”

The female is usually forced into a small plastic crate which is not unlike a dog crate where in her bewilderment she’ll be left alone without her mother, without anyone. Eventually she’ll be given a mixture of whey (a byproduct of the cheese-making process), high fructose corn syrup and even sometimes cow’s blood.

These babies don’t experience the comforting nuzzle of their mother or the warmth of her milk, milk that was intended by God for them, not us.

At Safeway I managed to hang on to my sign and hear the brave BOAA and DXE members explain to the grocery shoppers and employees the heinous crime against nature and animals which is the dairy industry. We screamed and yelled:

Their lives!

NOT OURS!

Their babies!

NOT OURS!

Their families!

NOT OURS!

Their milk!

NOT OURS!

Their lives!

NOT OURS!

It was quite a Mother’s Day for me.

The first part of the day was spent in the loving embrace of my family – my husband, our son, our daughter-in-law and our little grandkids, Norah and Sam.

I thought about the hours after our son was born. It was shortly after midnight. Because he’d been born with a mole on the side of his head, he’d been taken to the hospital nursery and I was rolled into my room. Unlike dairy cattle, I knew my baby was safe. Still, despite the fact I’d been in labor since early that morning and was completely exhausted I couldn’t sleep.

I don’t know how many times I buzzed the nurses asking to see my baby but they wouldn’t let me. I had to wait until the day shift nursing staff came on. I was so frustrated and upset, my body was shaking uncontrollably. When I was finally able to hold him in my arms I wept with joy. I was completely overwhelmed by the love I felt. I had the knowledge that I’d give up my life for this child.

Maybe dairy cow mothers don’t feel the earth-shaking passion that human mothers feel for their young, but I’ve read that the wail of a mother cow who has lost her baby is one of the saddest sounds in the world.

– A Vicious Vegan blog post –