The Producers

1189: 

Edited by CJ Tointon

                      

Our society admires people who get ahead, people who 'squeeze' the land and the animals.  These people know a good 'resource' when they see one.  The public never gets to see the actual 'squeezing', but they are grateful for the results.   In the West, the consumer is well resourced in every imaginable way and indulges in recreational shopping for everything from white goods to beef steak.   We appreciate our privileged position in this land-of-plenty.  Back to the 'admired ones'.  They often make loving friends and kind parents, but they can be ruthless, especially when it comes to their income.  We may all be guilty of taking what we shouldn’t take, but these are the mega advantage-takers.  They are society’s success stories and they did it by discarding sentimentality.  They numb their feelings and just get on and 'do it'.  

The farmers say, "We just eke a living from the land.  We aren't wealthy".  In truth,  although perhaps not rich,  much of their income is derived from animals. They make a living by 'keeping' (enslaving) animals.  When we use the 'slave' word, they get cranky.  We touch a raw nerve.  We challenge the priorities of the farmer and thousands of other wage-dependant people in the Animal Industry.  For them, a 'living-wage' trumps 'ideals'.  Their pragmatic attitude is at one end of the spectrum, ethical idealism is at the other.

There’s no such thing as non-cruel or non-abusive animal farming, even with the apiarist!   The beekeeper might be kindness itself to the bees, human and insect in symbiotic relationship, no captivity, bees free to fly from the hive, etc.  I’m not splitting hairs.  Just saying that humans are famous for harming animals.  Which is why vegans say that keeping any animal is fundamentally unethical.  It’s not all freedom and symbiosis down on the bee farm.  The beekeeper will inadvertently crush many bees when inspecting hives for disease each day (being crushed-to-death or dying slowly from being half-crushed is a nasty death!) and the queen bee is discarded when a younger queen will be more productive. 

My rule?  Don’t get mixed up with anyone in the 'Animal Cruelty' business.  Don’t sponsor them. 

My avoidance isn’t personal, even if boycotting their produce may put them out of business.   It’s just that the whole industry needs to go, and that includes all farmers and retailers of animal products.  My aim, joined with the aims of other vegans, would be to draw the financial lifeblood from any business where animals are involved.  By boycotting the lot, we are acknowledging that there’s no such thing as non-cruel or non-abusive animal farming.   Animal farming works against the laws of Nature.  Nature is the supreme exemplar of how we can all live sustainably on this planet.  In Nature there is no large scale theft and certainly not the systematic slavery humans have devised for farm animals.