Posted on 02/08/2009 12:39:11 PM PST by jazusamo
When an animal rights group sneaks a hidden camera into a livestock operation, it won't capture images of Stacy McLintock bringing nine calves into her kitchen to rub their legs and warm them during a winter storm.
But that's exactly what she did this past winter.
"They're our big kids," McLintock said Saturday of the calves born to her 100-head herd near Holton. "They're a lot of work but a lot of fun."
McLintock was among the audience of cattle producers listening to Dr. Daniel U. Thomson, Jones professor of production medicine at Kansas State University's College of Veterinary Medicine, speak about the industry's growing image problem at the Kansas Cattlemen's Association Convention at the Salina Holiday Inn and Convention Center.
McLintock, who had a booth in the hallway with items from her Bar S Tack western wear store, came to the convention without her husband. Just like all the other producers in the audience, she had to leave someone back home to take care of the herd. Currently, it is calving season, so the McLintocks have been taking turns getting up every two hours all night to check their pregnant heifers.
The care and feeding that ranchers provide day in and day out is much more representative of the industry than isolated cases of animal abuse, Thomson said.
"Nobody in our industry wants to see an animal abused," he said. "That's one of the things that's represented by the media that's nonrepresentative of the whole."
Images that are abusive -- and some that just appear so -- are successfully being used by "educated but ignorant" animal rights groups to paint an unrepresentative portrait of the cattle industry, he said. As fewer and fewer people live and work in rural areas, the public has less understanding of what it takes to "grow a hamburger," he said.
Cattle production can be and is being done humanely, Thomson said.
"I will put our industry up against anybody in the world," Thomson said. "We want what's best for our cattle. We don't have anything we're not proud of in our industry."
Education can be used to disarm critics by opening operations up for consumers to observe because "they need to know how well their food is being raised," he said. Agriculture remains among the top five most trusted professions in the United States, he said, adding "we still work with a handshake."
"We need to challenge activists about their knowledge of the industry," he said. "I don't think you could fill a thimble with what they know."
Children used to start their day with the friendly image of a farmer by watching Mr. Greenjeans on Captain Kangaroo, he said. Now young people are forming their beliefs about agricultural animal practices based on YouTube films produced by the Humane Society of the United States and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, he said.
The videos often portray abuse that would be condemned by any reputable cattle producer and play on the human-animal bond in an attempt to abolish animal agriculture, he said.
An audience member asked if there was anything to be gained through a dialog with animal rights groups, but Thomson was skeptical.
"I don't think there's any way to reason with them," he said. "They will sit there and nod their head, and when you turn around, they'll shoot you in the back."
Cattlemen are likely to be outspent by the more than 20 animal rights groups that raise about $300 million in donations annually and have budgets big enough to hire celebrity endorsements, he said.
"Nobody cares about cattle more than the people who get up every day and feed them," Thomson said. "We're all for the ethical treatment of animals. We're for the animals. We're raising animals. The animals are our life."
Cattlemen must work together on a marketing strategy to fight misconceptions and develop a generally accepted list of best management practices before laws written by people who know nothing about livestock production are forced upon the industry, he said. More ranchers need to step outside their comfort zone and run for elected office to have a say in laws as they are written, he said.
"Our industry and agriculture in total, we serve humanity," he said. "Every morning when we get up and do chores, we feed the world."
An increasing number of veterinary students going into large animal husbandry will be needed to regulate the industry, he said, adding that at K-State, 45 percent of last year's graduating class of veterinary students indicated they were pursuing large and small animal or food animal practices. Thomson said he does not advocate self-regulation or government regulation.
"What if we told the highway patrol we were going to give them the day off and we're just going to self-regulate our speed?" he said. "People understand that doesn't work."
Brandy Carter, executive director and chief executive officer of the Junction City-based Kansas Cattlemen's Association, said agriculture is a vital part of the community, economy and the nation.
"Only 2 percent of the population is involved in agriculture," she said. "There are only a few of us left. We have to keep it growing, or this country will be relying on foreign food like we do fuel if we don't keep the industry alive."
We need more articles like this to counter the propaganda of HSUS and PETA.
Glad to see this article.
The most characteristic attitude of animal-rights groups is snobbery.
Only living a thin little life in an apartment in semi-suburbia is “corret”.
People who actually produce stuff are low-class. Workers, you know. Out there in the cold and the manure.
Snobbery is the most characteristic trait of all these groups.
corret=correct.
The average American is now 4 generations from the farm. Thanks to the Nixon Administrations moto of “Get Big or Get Out” in regards to farming this gap will only grow. People really have no idea what goes on at a farm anymore.
Almost all of our meat now comes from four meat processing companies, most of whom hire illegal labor. The pictures PITA gets are from these huge operations, not from your small local processor or someone who does farm slaughter.
City liberals think that food only comes from a box or a can.
But even back in the 70s, the farmers felt they were being unfairly attacked by the elitist political classes of the city. This bumper sticker was very popular in my little ag town:
BOYCOTT FARMERS. DON'T EAT.
Thanks for the ping!
Well said! Those people out there working in the cold and muck are some of the finest in the country, the kind that do the right thing even when they know they’re not being watched.
I have no problem whatsoever with big farms or “corporate farming”.
“What if we told the highway patrol we were going to give them the day off and we’re just going to self-regulate our speed?” he said. “People understand that doesn’t work.”
I don’t understand that at all.
All good points, Colvin. I would guess many of our younger generations have never seen a farm or ranch other than on TV.
“I have no problem whatsoever with big farms or “corporate farming”.”
Then you probably don’t know much about it or obtain your income from it. People who know about the reality of corporate farming don’t generally like it.
I mean whats to like about a chicken that grows in a cage too small for it to stand up. For a calf to do the same because theres not enough veal. Or for turning dead animals back into feed for the live ones.
In the 60’s CBS produced a show called “Guns of Autumn” to show what hunting was like in America. It was almost all shot on hunting ranches and depicted a lot of nitwits passing themselves off as hunters. There were multiple scenes of animal abuse. This was what CBS thought hunting was about.
Nor do I. I stopped and reread that and the previous paragraph and it still didn’t make sense to me.
We could give the HI Po a week off and I don’t expect we would see much difference. Hell a year wouldn’t work cause every now and again they do something useful for society.
It’s a beautiful day in Maryland. After weeks of numbing cold, we are having a rare few days of temps in the 60s. People are out riding their bikes, strolling hand in hand, and playing games with the kids. Convertibles speed by on joyrides, and our neighbors have fired up their grill.
My husband and I are shoveling and moving carts full of muck since the manure finally thawed out.
We break our backs to keep things clean, safe and healthy for our animals. The house may not be as tidy as I’d like but the barns are clean and swept. The other livestock breeders and owners that we know are the same way.
We also know a few “animal rights activists.” Our animals are cleaner, better fed, better trained, and have more attention paid to them than the activists’ kids.
They really frost my cookies.
Thanks for you post, I don’t doubt a word of it and it frosts me too when they start spewing their propaganda.
Cheers!
Thanks for linking your thread, g_w. I wonder how many million animal rights activists use products made from parts of cattle and have no idea from where they came, how ironic for the PETA and other nutjobs. :)
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