Economic Non-viability of KRSNA's Devotee Milk Production

[krsna]

Economic Nonviability of Devotee Milk Production

 

by Madhava Ghosh

Posted May 1, 2007

 

 

I was recently forwarded the following email:

 

"With all of this talk about cows, it sure would be nice to walk into a supermarket and buy a half gallon of milk, or butter, yogurt, cheese, etc. with Lord Krsna's face on the packaging. Why is it, other farmers can produce milk and market it in the stores for millions of people to see and buy, but the cowherd devotees can not do this. What is the problem? Even when Lord Krsna was on the planet, the gopis and cowherd boys had to milk the cows and sell the milk at the market place. What gives?"

 

Short answer:

 

Devotees cow herders don't slaughter cows so milk costs 4 times as much to produce in order to protect the cow, and the calf that was needed to be born to start milk production, for their lifetimes. Devotees aren't willing to pay the price.

 

Long answer:

 

In order to have a cow produce milk she needs to be bred and have a calf. Due to religious considerations, devotees do not slaughter cows or send cows to situations where slaughter is inevitable. Therefore the cow and calf need to be protected for a potential lifetime of 20 years. While milk may pay for costs for the first two or three years at best, for the balance of the lifetime of the calf and cow they are economically, not spiritually, a liability.

Commercial operations bred cows while they are essential still teenagers, then continue to bred them yearly until they no longer produce at a peak economic rate, then ship them off to slaughter. Calves are separated at birth, and fed cheaper milk replacer so all the cow's milk can be sold.

Even amongst commercial dairies economic pressures dictate ever increasing exploitive practices in order to maintain viability. See any animal rights site for what the reality of how commercial milk is produced.

Where once it was possible to make a living with 50 cows, according to some it now requires 500. Overall nationally, dairy farm numbers have been declining for decades and continue to do so. One example is "At last count, there were 393 dairy farms left in Maine, down from 1,100 about 20 years ago."

Devotee dairy farms are not operating on a level field because they lack economies of scale and can't compete with farms that ruthlessly cull and slaughter nonproductive cows. What happened in a previous yuga is not relevant because no one slaughtered cows then and devotees did have a level playing field.

Back in the 1970s, so many ISKCON farms set out to produce milk and have the milk cover the cost of caring for the cows, They all failed. Kirtanananda tried it in New Vrindaban. After he fled his responsibility for the cows he bred in the early 1990s, breeding was stopped, but there are still 80 cows being cared for left over from that era.

When devotees start seeing milk as an opulence, and are willing to pay the premium price necessary to produce it AND protect the cows, instead of treating it like a commodity to which they are entitled to have at supermarket prices, it is possible to have Krishna milk instead of Putana milk.

It is largely a matter of personal responsibility. Not that 'they " are some specialists who somehow make it available to me competitively. When the devotees and the devotee leadership step up and demonstrate commitment to cow protection and its true costs, then milk, which is a byproduct of cow protection, not the purpose of it, will be available. Cow protection is a spiritual duty, not a economic opportunity.

[theist]

Great observations. Devotees demand milk at supermarket prices and therefore compromise their own teachings against cow slaughter.

 

What will be the ramifications for such hypocrisy?

[Guest guest]

 

Great observations. Devotees demand milk at supermarket prices and therefore compromise their own teachings against cow slaughter.

 

What will be the ramifications for such hypocrisy?

 

Agreed. And the ramification of this and other hypocrisies is the failure of our movement to gain wider recognition. We are lacking the intellectual honesty to admit such failures and people know it. How far can you go on promises alone? After 40 years people want to see some concrete results and practical examples of this "simple living, high thinking" formula we are selling.

[Guest guest]

It is vital we have the guts to face and accept hard facts.

 

Can anyone define simple living? Throw out your computers, your television, your phones and avoid manufactured food like cereals and flaxseed oil. No pills for headaches, no relief from tooth decay through modern dentistry...the list goes on.

 

Stop for a moment and try to visualize life this way. Then ask yourself how practical this sounds...to try to adopt the lifestyle of a bygone culture in today's world...and for no obvious benefit.

[Guest guest]

There will be no ramifications for those devotees

 

Mahak prabhu wrote a great post on being practical. Wish I remembered which thread it was.

 

 

Great observations. Devotees demand milk at supermarket prices and therefore compromise their own teachings against cow slaughter.

 

What will be the ramifications for such hypocrisy?

[theist]

 

There will be no ramifications for those devotees

 

Mahak prabhu wrote a great post on being practical. Wish I remembered which thread it was.

Practical!!!! Calf slaughter is never "practical". You need your blood milk so bad that the very calves for who that cows milk is intended are stolen from their mothers at birth, stuffed into veal crates so small they can't even turn around (keeps the meat tender that way) and then sold as veal for the blood thirsty meat enthusiasts.

 

Something about singing "Jaya Govinda Jaya Gopala" while slaughtering the calves that I find distasteful myself.

[Guest guest]

Prabhu,

 

PAMHO. Please don't get me wrong. I'm not advocating commercial milk consumption nor am I being indifferent to teh suffering of those innocent animals. Certainly, my compassion is insignificant and very limited but intelligence developed enough to appreciate the horrors behind that industry.

 

The money that you pay to buy vegetables pay go into sponsoring demoniac acts as well. So are you going to stop eating? I hope you see my point.

 

 

Practical!!!! Calve slaughter is never "practical". You need your blood milk so bad that the very calves for who that cows milk is intended are stolen from their mothers at birth, stuffed into veal crates so small they can't even turn around (keeps the meat tender that way) and then sold as veal for the blood thirsty meat enthusiasts.

 

Something about singing "Jaya Govinda Jaya Gopala" while slaughtering the calves that I find distasteful myself.

[theist]

 

Prabhu,

 

PAMHO. Please don't get me wrong. I'm not advocating commercial milk consumption nor am I being indifferent to teh suffering of those innocent animals. Certainly, my compassion is insignificant and very limited but intelligence developed enough to appreciate the horrors behind that industry.

 

The money that you pay to buy vegetables pay go into sponsoring demoniac acts as well. So are you going to stop eating? I hope you see my point.

 

Deborah, PAMHO also. I find the comparison between buying vegetables and directly supporting cow torture and murder to be less then sound.

 

I bought my computer from Dell. Now I am sure that most of dell's employees and stockholders are meat eaters. I am also sure that most vegetable farmers are meat eaters. So what is the difference between buying a computer and vegetables compared to buying commercial milk?

 

When I buy vegetables ( or any commodity for that matter) my purchase is recorded as a demand for more vegetables to be produced to meet the demand. Same when you buy milk. You are simultaneously putting in a demand for another calf to be yanked away from it's mother and turned into veal. The males anyway the female cows are kept as milk machines when they get older and then as Madhava Ghosh says slaughtered when their milk production falls off.

 

Do you not see a difference between putting in an order for more vegetables to be grown and another calf to be slaughtered? Honestly do they seem equal to you?

[Murali_Mohan_das]

 

Can anyone define simple living? Throw out your computers, your television, your phones and avoid manufactured food like cereals and flaxseed oil. No pills for headaches, no relief from tooth decay through modern dentistry...the list goes on.

 

The term "simple living" is it's own definition. It means: don't add unnecessary complexity.

 

No need to throw anything out. It's been said that anything and everything can be used in service to the Lord. Of course, when we are acting in a mood of service, our actions may be vastly different from how we act when we are seeking our own aggrandizement.

 

As for television, phones, and processed food. The trade-offs involved in employing them as they are currently being employed are pretty clear. It can certainly be argued that TV has led to the "dumbing down" of the people who are addicted to it.

 

As for modern dentistry (don't even get me started here), it arose to solve a mostly modern problem--tooth decay. Before folks ate diets high in processed sugars, and white flour, tooth decay was not nearly as prevalent as it is today (kinda like autism).

 

 

Stop for a moment and try to visualize life this way. Then ask yourself how practical this sounds...to try to adopt the lifestyle of a bygone culture in today's world...and for no obvious benefit.

 

No one is necessarily advocating adopting the lifestyle of a bygone culture (though, one can convincingly argue that many of those "bygone cultures" had higher standards of living than folks living in Westernized countries do today). What's being advocated is a timeless spiritual principle that, in order to make room for spiritual endeavors, our material lives ought to be structured in the simplest way that is practical.

[Guest guest]

Yes, I certainly see a big difference in the 2 scenarios you just described. I am in agreement with your post.

 

What I'm getting at is that it's a compromise in either scnario. In the vegetable buying scenario, the compromise is much less but compromise it is! I will admit though, that if it is possible, commercial milk must be avoided.

 

 

Deborah, PAMHO also. I find the comparison between buying vegetables and directly supporting cow torture and murder to be less then sound.

 

I bought my computer from Dell. Now I am sure that most of dell's employees and stockholders are meat eaters. I am also sure that most vegetable farmers are meat eaters. So what is the difference between buying a computer and vegetables compared to buying commercial milk?

 

When I buy vegetables ( or any commodity for that matter) my purchase is recorded as a demand for more vegetables to be produced to meet the demand. Same when you buy milk. You are simultaneously putting in a demand for another calf to be yanked away from it's mother and turned into veal. The males anyway the female cows are kept as milk machines when they get older and then as Madhava Ghosh says slaughtered when their milk production falls off.

 

Do you not see a difference between putting in an order for more vegetables to be grown and another calf to be slaughtered? Honestly do they seem equal to you?

[theist]

 

Yes, I certainly see a big difference in the 2 scenarios you just described. I am in agreement with your post.

 

What I'm getting at is that it's a compromise in either scnario. In the vegetable buying scenario, the compromise is much less but compromise it is! I will admit though, that if it is possible, commercial milk must be avoided.

 

Thank you Deborah. Yes every endeavor is covered by some kind of fault. Even the fruitarian who is so strict he does not even kill plants for his food, steps on insects as he approaches the tree to harvest his fruits. We can practice ahimsa only so far in the masterial world.

 

Krsna will carry what the devotee lacks but the devotee must make all attempts to minimize the suffering he causes to others.

[Guest guest]

Most people don't want simple living- other wise they would live simply! I know that the simple living/cow protection that Srila Prabhupada envisioned actually works, because I've done it. It's a wonderful life. Get some like-minded people together and give it a try.....or just work like an ass and go to the supermarket.

[krsna]

 

Most people don't want simple living- other wise they would live simply! I know that the simple living/cow protection that Srila Prabhupada envisioned actually works, because I've done it. It's a wonderful life. Get some like-minded people together and give it a try.....or just work like an ass and go to the supermarket.

 

 

Kurma dasa, AU : Dairy Life: A Vegan View, and My Response

 

S.B. writes:

"Hello Kurma,

I know this is unsolicited, but after reading your interview in the Abolitionist-Online, I felt compelled to address some of your statements. Please consider what I have to say, I'm sure you are a busy man, but I would not take the time to write this email if I did not think it was important.

Kurma, the dairy industry, from the biggest factory farms to the smallest family run boutique operations, relies on rape, mutilation and death in order to profit from the milk of cows.

There is no way around it. In order for cows to produce milk they must be made pregnant, after they give birth their calves are removed from them and they are milked twice a day every day. When they reach the end of their lactation period, they are made pregnant again, this cycle continues until they are 'spent', typically 5 years or so, and they are then discarded, to be processed into petfood or hamburgers.

Veal is a byproduct of the dairy industry, male calves obviously do not produce milk and are taken from their mothers in the first few days after being born. It costs too much to raise them for beef as they grow to slowly, for about 4 months they will be fed on a high protein milk replacement, some in veal crates, until it is time to go to the slaughterhouse.

Mother dairy cows do not get the chance to be mothers, their calves, be they male or female are taken away so they do not take the milk which we humans will steal from them. This is not nature's arrangement, cows have been bred to produce ever larger quantities of milk, to be consumed by the only species on the planet which deems it necessary to drink and eat the lactic secretions of another species, which is intended for calves, not fully grown humans.

Think about all the other animals in the wild. There is no residual milk, they produce what is necessary to feed their babies, the only way to get dairy is through interference and exploitation.

Cows, and all other "food" animals are treated like machines, and they are considered the property of their owners. No animal, human or non-human should be the property of another, this is a fundamental right that is ignored when we take that which is not freely given, be it bodies of animals, their lives, labour or bodily secretions. Kurma, I hope you will consider what I have written and feel free to write back to me, I am happy to provide evidence of all of my claims in this email."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My response:

Hello S.,

Thanks for your letter. Much appreciated.

Yes, I am aware of all you have described, and have discussed these matters in depth for decades with passionate vegans like yourself. I do totally respect and appreciate your views, and while we agree on many things, we cannot totally ignore the very special benefits of a respectful and sacred symbiosis between cows and humans.

Despite the plethora of bovine mistreatment, there are in fact farms where cows are treated with affection and love, and some of these I have visited. A number of my fellow Hare Krishna farmer friends to my views on cows, and in many cases have been able to put into practice a very special mutual affectionate relationship with these very unique creatures, based on service.

You say 'No animal, human or non-human should be the property of another', but what about our pets? Do we not serve them dutifully, feeding them daily, giving them a place to sleep, taking them to the vet when they are sick. We love to serve our pets, and they love to be served by us. So it is the same with cows. Just as we would not dream of slaughtering and eating our pets, we would not harm our cows. Dogs reciprocate to their human masters with dutiful affection and service, so why not cows?

 

Service is the actual occupation of the soul. Service is how we share love with others. We love to serve the ones we love. In a loving exchange, partners exchange service. The same is there with cows.

We serve the cows, look after them, and treat them with love and affection until the day they die of natural causes, like we would our mother.

In return they happily give bountifully their excess milk for use by us. With these dairy products we prepare offerings of sacred food for God, and those who prepare these dishes, those who partake of these foods, as well as the cows themselves, are all spiritually elevated.

These ideas are far, far beyond the ken of the materialistc vision, what to speak of mundane dairy industrialists.

Cows are unique amongst all animal species and there is a very sacred and deep bond that spiritual adherents based on traditional Vedic lifestyle can appreciate.

Here's a nice essay by a Krishna devotee farmer friend (scroll down).

So thank you for sharing your views with me. For those ideas of ours that do not completely run parallel, I say 'vive la difference'. With respect, Kurma.