Denounce the government and embrace the flag. Hope to live in the free republic for which it stands.

My good friend Eden has a wonderful post on her blog highlighting some devastatingly unfair government restrictions of small family farms, and the value of protest.  If you are a reader of this blog, you know that food is a justice issue for me, one that I feel very passionate about.  There is a groundswell of interest right now in safe, healthy food that does not destroy the environment in it's production and distribution, thanks in part to books like Animal, Vegetable, Miracle and Michael Pollen's The Omnivore's Dilemma.  And yet our government, in the form of The Farm Bill and other means, actively works to restrict small, diversified farms, choosing instead to subsidize corn, soy, rice, wheat and cotton, all highly extractive and grown mainly by huge agribusinesses.  I can't go into it all here, now.  Check out the Sustainable Table web site for more information.  The New York Times article that Eden links to is a short introduction to the lunacy of our nation's farm policy.  I'm also including a short letter to the editor from our local paper that concludes with a powerful quote (emphasis mine):

Do You Know Where Your Meat Comes From?
Letter to the Editor, Concord Monitor, February 28, 2008

Last week an undercover video taken by the Humane Society at a California slaughterhouse received a lot of attention. I hope those who saw it will give some thought to the real cost of the inexpensive meat we buy in supermarkets.

In the video, a live, conscious cow that was too sick to walk was dropped headfirst from a forklift from a height of 5 or 6 feet. The rest of the video can be viewed on the Humane Society website, hsus.org. According to the Humane Society, it shows workers "kicking cows, ramming them with the blades of a forklift, jabbing them in the eyes, applying painful electrical shocks and even torturing them with a hose and water in attempts to force sick or injured animals to walk to slaughter."

We would be naive to accept the beef industry's claim that this sort of abuse is an isolated incident in an industry that is more or less un-policed.

It is painful to learn about this kind of misery and feel powerless to stop it, and to see New Hampshire lawmakers reject bills such as HB 1522, which would prohibit the confinement of animals so that they cannot move freely.

But there are a few things we can do, like visiting factoryfarming.com to find out what's going on in factory farms and buying our meat at stores like the Concord Co-op, where meat from local farms is sold. As Matthew Scully, a former speech writer for President Bush points out, while none of us wants to know how our meat gets to the dinner table, if we consider ourselves moral beings we have a responsibility to find out.

KAY McCALLION

It is a falsehood that there is nothing we can do.  Our dollars are our vote.  We can send a powerful message to the government about where we want our food to come from, though we might not be able to change policy.  But we need to continue to resist in any way we can, for the most important thing is to maintain our own integrity, our own physical and spiritual health.  Success is not our goal as much as sanity is.  Eden's post quotes a powerful passage from Wendell Berry along these lines:

Much protest is naive; it expects quick, visible improvement and despairs and gives up when such improvement does not come. Protesters who hold out longer have perhaps understood that success is not the proper goal. If protest depended on success, there would be little protest of any durability or significance. History simply affords too little evidence that anyone's individual protest is of any use. Protest that endures, I think, is moved by a hope far more modest than that of public success: namely, the hope of preserving qualities in one's own heart and spirit that would be destroyed by acquiescence...

So here's to not acquiescing.  I'd love to hear about your own acts of resistance, whatever they may be...

 

Comments

[lara]

thank you for your thoughts on this issue. I just finished In Defense of Food by Pollan and am totally rocked by it. In response to your post, yes I believe we have a voice and we need to use it. Americans are too quiet, but mostly (I believe) because we enjoy our quick, cheap and easy food too much. What would it mean for our society if we were to completely change the way we farm?? We would fist have to pay more, second eat less meat (and less all together), and third spend more time in the kitchen. In a society where there is such a gap between the rich and the poor, this is just not possible for all of us. Take away mcdonalds from some families, and they wouldn't know how to feed their families. Sad, but true. So, we need to educate and we need to raise the minimum wage so that people know how to cook and can afford to do so. And for those of us who can afford it, we choose convenience over our health far too much. It is a much more complex situation than we know. The government and corporations are arm in arm making sure that food is super accessible and easy and cheap so that we buy more, eat more, thus having more disease, leading to higher healthcare costs. Oh, did I mention that the government is also arm in arm with the health industry. We live in a FOR PROFIT society, and thus our health is not important. So do you really think that the health of a cow is important to the government. So, what's the answer. Yep, use your voice, spread the word. Protest. All that. But not just for animal rights. Protest for affordable housing, increased minimum wage, a health care system that actually cares about the health of the people, and education that teaches people that good is not a packaged meal that can be microwaved in 30 seconds and then consumed in the car on the way to work. Thanks for getting me all fired up Caren. I love this blog:)

[Doda]

People should read this.