NEWS: Unhappy Cows.com - unhappycows.com July 2005

[Guest guest]

Here's a brewing story regarding public relations for the dairy

industry. It's a little confusing. Dairy Herd Management claims that

PETA is running an "unhappy cow" campaign. But when you follow the link,

it's not PETA. Naturally the whole beef and dairy industry is upset.

 

From our perspective, we should probably look over the Unhappy Cow

story. On one hand, many of their allegations are true. Practically all

bull calves are raised for slaughter, and the conditions of many or

possibly most cows is not very good. Here, in New England, dairy farms

are much smaller, and cows are grazed but in California, they are quite

large, thus there is less grazing and more feed-lot type production. So

cows are not treated well.

 

But, on the other hand, it is not true that cow's milk is only for cows.

For people who don't believe in Krsna, this point is pretty hard to

understand. They believe that cows evolved from fish, and there is no

hand of God in the design of the cow. But Krsna has designed the cow so

that it provides enough milk for both the calf and extra for humans. And

of course, modern cows are bred to produce a lot of milk. If the calf

drank all the cow's milk, it would probably die of scours (diarrhea).

 

Anyway, this is an interesting debate, and we should be aware that it is

going on.

 

ys

 

hkdd

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(Dairy Alert - from Dairy Herd Management)

 

PETA to run "unhappy cows" ad blitz

Just a few months after losing the battle in the California Supreme

Court to stop the Happy cows advertising by the California Milk

Advisory Board, the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals has

decided to start doing some advertising of its own, starting this week

in Sacramento, San Diego and other cities. Ads for the group will carry

the tagline Happy cows? You decide. To learn more about PETAs plans

or to cast your own vote, follow this link.

 

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(Here's the linked article:)

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Unhappy Cows.com July 2005

 

http://www.unhappycows.com/dairycows.asp

 

The Real Life of Dairy Cows

 

The 9 million cows living on dairy farms in the United States will spend

most of their lives either in a large shed or on a feces-caked mud lot

where disease is rampant. A dairy cow will be repeatedly impregnated,

her babies will be taken from her, and humans will drink the milk

intended for her babies. When her exhausted body can no longer give

milk, she will be sent to slaughter and ground up for hamburgers.

 

Stolen Babies, Stolen Milk

 

 

Cows produce milk for the same reason that humans doto feed their

babies. To keep giving milk, cows must be forcibly impregnated through

artificial insemination every year. The cows babies are generally taken

away within a day of being bornmale calves are destined for veal

crates, while females are sentenced to the same fate as their mothers.

 

Mother cows on dairy farms can often be seen searching and calling for

their babies after they have been taken away. Author Oliver Sacks, M.D.,

wrote of a visit that he and cattle expert Dr. Temple Grandin made to a

dairy farm and of the great tumult of bellowing that they heard when

they arrived: They must have separated the calves from the cows this

morning, Temple said, and, indeed, this was what had happened. We saw

one cow outside the stockade, roaming, looking for her calf, and

bellowing. Thats not a happy cow, Temple said. Thats one sad,

unhappy, upset cow. She wants her baby. Bellowing for it, hunting for

it. Shell forget for a while, then start again. Its like grieving,

mourningnot much written about it. People dont like to allow them

thoughts or feelings.

 

 

 

Read more about cow intelligence and emotion.

 

 

 

The mother cow will be hooked up several times a day to machines that

take the milk intended for her calf. Through genetic manipulation,

powerful hormones, and intensive milking, she will produce about three

times as much milk as she would naturally. She may be pumped full of

bovine growth hormone (BGH), which contributes to painful inflammation

of the udder, known as mastitis. (BGH is used throughout the U.S. but

has been banned in Europe and Canada because of concerns for human

health and animal welfare.) According to the industrys own figures,

between 30 and 50 percent of dairy cows suffer from mastitis, which is

an extremely painful condition.

 

A cows natural lifespan is 25 years, but a cow used by the dairy

industry is killed after only four or five years. By the time they are

killed, an industry study reports that nearly 40 percent of dairy cows

are lame because of the filth, intensive confinement, and the strain of

constantly being pregnant and giving milk. Dairy cows are turned into

soup, companion animal food, or low-grade hamburger meat, their bodies

too spent to be used for anything else.

 

Veal Calves

 

Male calvesbyproducts of the dairy industryare generally taken away

from their mothers when they are less than 1 day old. The calves are

then placed in dark, tiny crates, where they are kept almost completely

immobilized so that their flesh stays tender. The calves are fed a

liquid diet that is low in iron and has little nutritive value in order

to make their flesh white. This heinous treatment makes the calves ill,

and they frequently suffer from anemia, diarrhea and pneumonia.

Frightened, sick, and alone, these calves are killed after only a few

months of life. Veal is the flesh of a tortured, sick baby cow and a

byproduct of the milk industry.

 

All adult and baby cows, whether raised for their flesh or their milk,

are eventually shipped to a slaughterhouse and killed.