Factory Farming's Not the Problem -- It's Animal Farming

Last Friday, there was a great article by Lee Hall on www.dissidentvoice.org. The article, "Sustainable, Free-Range Farms and Other Tall Tales", challenges the myth the animal-based farming can be "healthful" or "sustainable." Check it out!

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Nov05/Hall1118.htm

That was a pretty good article. But I guess it is pretty Utopian to think that animal consumption will end in our lifetimes. And it also reinforces the reasons why we don't have a whole lot of humane farming, and why there won't be any more.

But I guess it is pretty Utopian to think that animal consumption will end in our lifetimes.

Maybe you missed something. The article states, "But it can end in their own lifetime, and that's what it takes."

Joining their energies and educating relentlessly, the environmentalist and the animal advocate could effectively shield what little pristine environment is left in the world, and what freedom is still possible for animals who call it home. Thinking and working together, they could replace the fantasy of sustainable and humane animal farming with a plain-speaking movement that gets to the point: We just don’t need to buy what animal agribusiness is selling.

 

If we’re agreed on this point, good. Expect a whole lot of people (especially the ones with a penchant for goat cheese) to try to argue you out of it. It’s unreasonable to believe that the consumption of animals will end in their lifetimes, they’ll say — you utopian, you.

 

But it can end in their own lifetimes, and that’s what it takes. If we put our energy where our vision is, reasonable people can consider the message and act accordingly. Each one who does makes a revolutionary change, and it’s a matter of plain and simple sanity to start a revolution that arrives at respect for other beings and our global commons.

It ends in the lifetime of each and every person who goes vegan. That is why veganism, and not the so-called "horrors of factory farming," needs to be our focus. It is not utopian for people to go vegan. It happens every day. And promoting veganism -- real veganism is based on the exclusion of animal exploitation -- is productive and progressive. A focus on factory farming is reactive and reactionary.

And it also reinforces the reasons why we don't have a whole lot of humane farming, and why there won't be any more.

Why would we want any kind of animal agriculture? Again, the point is to end animal exploitation in our own lives. The folly of "humane farming" verses "factory farming" thinking is that it limits our vision so we can't see the larger picture. Animals shouldn't be bred, or used. Unless we are promoting vegan organic farming, we have missed the point.

We can end animal-based farming in our lifetime, and the lifetimes of those around us, by promoting and living a vegan lifestyle. Not flesh reduction, nor cage-free or free-range; those are NOT steps in the right direction. It is veganism, as in the exclusion of commodities derived wholly or in part from animals, that should be our vision. No form of animal agriculture, no matter the reforms, can fit into that vision.

No farming >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>'humane' farming>>factory farming