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Barnyard Buddies:  How to Help End Abuse/Leapfrog from other post  |
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Alee
True Blue Farmgirl
22941 Posts
Alee
Worland
Wy
USA
22941 Posts |
 Posted - Feb 18 2008 : 10:27:08 PM
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Hi Ladies! To keep advice about how to help stop slaughter abuse, I thought maybe a new thread would be nice. Please feel free to jump in with any hints, tips or ideas.
1) Contact your government. Let them know that the USDA and the animal industry MUST be held accountable for their actions. Let them know that heafty fines to big corporations for animal abuse would make it worth the government's time and make it NOT worth the slaughterhouse's money to abuse.
2) Use your cash to speak loud and clear. If we boycott factory farm animal products (meat, eggs, milk etc) then our voices will be heard. Once their bottom line gets hurt, they will listen.
3) Try going vegitarian or vegan, or maybe just reduce animal product consumption by a meal or two a week.
4) Buy from family farms where you _know_ the animal was slaughtered humanely. If you aren't sure, call your local private butcher/ meat locker. They usually process the meat themselves.
Alee
Farmgirl Sister #8
Please come visit Nora and I our our new blog:
www.farmgirlalee.blogspot.com |
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Annika
True Blue Farmgirl
5602 Posts
Annika
USA
5602 Posts |
Posted - Feb 19 2008 : 07:13:36 AM
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Avoid fast food joints and big chain restaurants
encourage your local restaurants to buy locally
Eat at home more often and eat food that you know where it came from
Find out how your local butchers treat animals brought to them for slaughter
Write a letter to your local paper encouraging others to buy locally and humanely treated animal products
if you cannot go vegan, go vegetarian , at least part of the time, Drew and I have been doing it a couple nights a week, which is pretty good for a hard core carnivore mate. I'm proud of him
Grow/raise it yourself or work towards that goal
Annika
Farmgirl sister #13
Mud Hen Queen
http://innermountainmudhens.wordpress.com/
http://panzymoon.wordpress.com/
http://panzymoonsgarden.blogspot.com/ |
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MaryJane
Queen Bee
16374 Posts
MaryJane
Moscow
Idaho
USA
16374 Posts |
Posted - Feb 19 2008 : 07:32:56 AM
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Annika, what you and Drew are doing is truly the solution! Here's what I posted early this morning over in the other thread.
Our right to cheap food and meat in particular, has created disastrous results not only for animals and eaters but also for the workers who process meat. Here's a story about a mysterious human neurological disease showing up in workers in a plant in Minnesota that kills and butchers 19,000 hogs a day. The Hormel plant is in a small town and employs 1,300 people.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/05/health/05pork.html?_r=1&scp=4&sq=february+5%2C+2008&st=nyt&oref=slogin
(If you get a pop-up ad, just click your back button and the story should appear.)
If you eat meat and can't find a local source from someone you trust and you don't have access to a co-op or health food store that carries organic or grass-fed beef, etc. and you can't grow your own (best option!), you can always eat less meat and order it online for special meals.
If there's another place to squeeze your budget--movies, lattes, soda pop, booze, travel, entertainment, etc.--it's probably doable online. Families now spend "less" (almost half as much) than they used to spend for food sixty to seventy years ago, not in dollars but percent-wise--the amount of a family's overall budget vs. the amount earmarked for food. Our priorities have shifted away from wholesome food. The volume pricing thing has been a disaster for the people who sign up to feed people. Aunt Jenny, if you paid yourself a decent wage for a gallon of Mona's milk (to include ALL your costs and labor) how much do you think you'd have to charge? I think my organic eggs would cost around $12 a dozen!!!! An egg a day would then cost $1 but that's less than a daily latte...
Love more. Buy less. Eat better.
http://www.organicprairie.com/who_we_are.html
http://www.diamondorganics.com/prod_detail_list/56
MaryJane, Proud Farmgirl #1
~Recession is capitalism's way of getting you to grow a garden~ |
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Annika
True Blue Farmgirl
5602 Posts
Annika
USA
5602 Posts |
Posted - Feb 19 2008 : 08:28:14 AM
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That is just awful! The poor pigs and the poor people. I gave up eating pork long ago. I like pigs too much and couldn't eat one. Well, MJ, you have just helped me make a greater jump towards my eat-local-and-less-meat goal in my household. Thank you
We need to respect what we eat and treat the animals that provide food for us humanely and eat less of those products. Even thinking of an animal that gave it's life to us for food as a "product" is wrong thinking, but we are so cozied from the reality of the meat and dairy processing system that we are not informed enough to be offended. Thank you for the information and encouragement!
Annika
Farmgirl sister #13
Mud Hen Queen
http://innermountainmudhens.wordpress.com/
http://panzymoon.wordpress.com/
http://panzymoonsgarden.blogspot.com/ |
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La Patite Ferme
True Blue Farmgirl
623 Posts
Jenn
CA
USA
623 Posts |
Posted - Feb 19 2008 : 2:22:50 PM
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As sad as this story is for the animals I hope it will bring to light the wide array of other problems created by mass producing our food - like MJ said earlier.
In college I toured a Foster Farms plant. And in spite of the fact that it was a processing facility (slaughterhouse) I was impressed by the attention and concern toward the employees on the processing floor. This was back in the mid-80's and studies had already proven that people on the kill floor become de-sensitized when they spent too long slaughtering animals, and that was long before we were bombarded by the daily horrors on TV. At that time workers were rotated off every 60 - 90 days and no one person worked more that 6 months total a year. They were moved to other areas of the processing plant.
I hope they still attend to their employees well being. But, like most things, over time, management gets lazy, being employee minded gets too expensive, etc. I wonder what those men on the video would say about their behavior? Didn't it bother them to move a cow with a forklift? Don't they have any concern toward the animals at all? How do they live with themselves knowing that they may have put tainted meat into the food chain?
I totally agree that the only way to get good wholesome food nowadays is to grow/raise your own or buy from local organic farms. Now that DD and I raised and butchered our own chickens it will be easier for us to transition to eating our own meat. Lamb is our primary red meat and I rarely buy beef anymore.
But, even with that said, after 40+ years of butchering my own lambs I can't say it ever gets easier or becomes second nature. You just become more efficient at doing it as quickly as possible and with as little trauma as possible.
If those men are any indication of how callous people have become, we are completely doomed as a society.
Maybe our new motto should be "Grow Your Own and Eat At Home" |
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Tracey
True Blue Farmgirl
766 Posts
Tracey
State of Confusion
USA
766 Posts |
Posted - Feb 19 2008 : 3:57:59 PM
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I like that motto  A friend of mine's two children have adopted that, and we would, too, if I could get the City Boy a little more into raising our own. He's getting closer, though, as we raised Pig last year for freezer camp and now he's wanting beef. We've not got room for beef, but maybe someone will swap lamb for beef? I'm going to give it a a try. I'd also like to do chickens.
Be warned, however, that if they push NAIS through, raising your own will become more and more difficult.
Desperate Horsewife, raising funds for the Mustang Makeover!
http://desperate-horsewife.blogspot.com |
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La Patite Ferme
True Blue Farmgirl
623 Posts
Jenn
CA
USA
623 Posts |
Posted - Feb 19 2008 : 9:26:35 PM
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Tracey,
As a test run I raised meat chickens in a cardboard pumpkin shipping box, from Smart & Final, in my garage. I didn't want to mess around with re-configuring my coop. It worked really well and was so easy to clean afterwards. Maybe "City Boy" would be willing to try that. The only suggestion I would make is raise a larger batch of chicks even if you have to get more boxes, because the amount of electricity is the same whether you raise 6 chickens or 25.
If you're interested in lamb or beef I would suggest asking around the 4-H Clubs or FFA chapters. Sometimes the kids raise more than one animal, as a back up. If FFA has a farm someone might be willing to raise it for you if you pay the expenses. Just a thought.
The NAIS really worries me. I sometimes think the govt is trying to make it more and more difficult for us to move away from corp farm products. They (govt) dosen't seem to care that we're being poisioned on a daily basis, and being feed produce with little nutritional value just as long as the corp food chain stays in tact. |
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Annab
True Blue Farmgirl
2900 Posts
Anna
Seagrove
NC
USA
2900 Posts |
Posted - Feb 21 2008 : 03:55:38 AM
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End of March we'll FINALLY be getting our share of beef from our farm friend.
We also saw another buddy who raises hogs. We'll be splitting the meat w/ this guy and only pay for the processing/packing.
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Farmtopia
True Blue Farmgirl
1465 Posts
Zan
New York
New York
USA
1465 Posts |
Posted - Feb 23 2008 : 6:06:21 PM
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Hey Alee...well, it's been a minute, but I thought of a plan that us farm girls were interested, in case we wanted to step it up a bit, and write our elected officials. I thought I might call it a "project" that we could all do little bit on.
Basically, it involves those of us who are interested, in writing (or typing) up a letter of concern/upset at the situation. Then, basically, each of you could send me your letters. I'll photocopy them several times. Each section of letters will be STAPLED together, for dramatic affect into a LARGE roll and sent to various representatives. What do you think?
Actually, I have this and several other ideas on my blog. For the full details, please see:
http://bigtownfarmer.blogspot.com/2008/02/ok-so-i-went-there-now-im-gonna-go-here.html
If you are interested, please email me to sign up and thanks in advance!
Hmm, I wonder if it makes sense to start another thread about this entirely. I do not want to hijack Alee's great thread
~*~Dream all you dreamers~*~
View my work:
www.bigtownfarmer.com
www.pumpkinpatchparlor.etsy.com
And Blogs:
agriculture: www.bigtownfarmer.blogspot.com
art: www.queenofcrows.blogspot.com
animals: www.big-luv.blogspot.com |
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Alee
True Blue Farmgirl
22941 Posts
Alee
Worland
Wy
USA
22941 Posts |
Posted - Feb 24 2008 : 11:14:28 AM
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Zan-
What a great idea. Don't worry about hijacking the thread- this thread is all about information, right? :D Let me finish up a few things that are requiring my time right now and I will be happy to join in a letter writing campaign!
Alee
Farmgirl Sister #8
Please come visit Nora and I our our new blog:
www.farmgirlalee.blogspot.com |
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Farmtopia
True Blue Farmgirl
1465 Posts
Zan
New York
New York
USA
1465 Posts |
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Barnyard Buddies: How to Help End Abuse/Leapfrog from other post |
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How to Help End Abuse/Leapfrog from other post
