Acknowledge Each Other {Project Poster}

My Poster! (Cow stories on each side, poem in the middle.)

Compassion isn't Just for People (Artist Statement)

              Take a glance at my poster, what will first catch your eye? There is a cow and a girl who are looking at each other with a sort of tenderness in their eyes. They know each other. This is to signify the relationship people can have with animals, even animals we eat, and that these animals have emotions and attachments, just like people do. It creates an emotion of tenderness and compassion. In the background, there are sections of writing on both sides and a poem going down the middle. One story on the poster is from the perspective of a cow who loves her life in the green fields. It may remind you of the cow in the main picture who is looking at the girl, and it is meant to be a comparison to the other story and poem. The poem is about the conditions of the animals in CAFOs, or Confined Animal Feeding Operations, and the second story is from the point of view of a different cow who lives in a CAFO. The idea behind the last two are to give details about the conditions of the animals’ lives in CAFOs and to help the reader be empathetic toward the animals from whose perspective you are reading from. The overall idea behind this piece is to stir up emotions about treating animals, even if they are to be our food, humanely and with compassion.

In a study conducted by the Harvard School of Public Health, results say that about 34% of people eat red meat 2-3 times a week, and about 16% eat red meat almost daily. That is a lot of meat, therefore a lot of animals that are raised to be our food. According to Farm Animal Rights Movement, more than 25 billion animals are killed by the meat industry each year, and that the “average American meat-eater is responsible for the abuse and death of about 90 animals per year.” On the other hand, Vegetarian Times has reported that about 3.2% of people in America are vegetarians and 0.5% are vegans. The fact that these statistics have been growing proves that more and more people are becoming conscious about what they are eating and about where there food comes from. It’s time people start realizing that there is a cost to what they are eating. The cost is 55 square feet of rainforest, 4 pounds of grain, 600 gallons of water, some paper and plastic, 640 quarts of methane a day the cow is alive, and the cost and fuel to get the burger where it is and to get you to where the burger is… all that for one hamburger. It is obvious to me that it is not worth it for the animal or the planet. Now it’s up to you to make the decision to get your meat from a local, humane farm, or to stop eating meat, or even to stop consuming animal products, period.

Both people and animals are beings. We are living, breathing, feeling beings. When you put animals into feedlots, you are not allowing them to just be animals. They are going from the beautiful beings they were meant to be into a machine. The machine works and thumps and gags and billows smoke and waste. It pumps in cows, fattens and sickens and slaughters them in the smallest amount of time possible. This inhumane of treating animals is not just. It is not right. Gandhi said, “The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” Yet we live with the knowledge that it is being done by the hour. We ignore it so we don’t have to deal with it. Enough is enough. The brutality against animals needs to stop now.

 

Sources:

sodahead.com/living/public-opinion-most-people-eat-red-meat-two-to-three-times-a-week/question-2516873/       

happycow.net/why_vegetarian.html

vegetariantimes.com/article/vegetarianism-in-america/

epa.gov/oecaagct/ag101/demographics.html

smallfamilycsa.com/about

cfra.org/ruralmonitor/2010/04/29/growing-number-small-farms-living-land

newcommunityproject.org/fastfood.shtml

A Poem for Animal Conditions in CAFOs (Contained Animal Feeding Operations)

The industrial way for raising

and processing animals is wrong.

Animals are lined up in feedlots,

rump-to-rump,

standing in mud and waste.

This is not how animals were meant to live.

Cows rush to the stream of corn

and hormones

and antibiotics

do they know they weren’t meant

to eat those things?

Yet it is all they are given

so they eat it anyways.

This is not how animals were meant to live.

Chickens, confined six to a few feet of cage,

are going crazy

rubbing themselves on the cages

until they are raw and bleeding.

Pecking at each other until a worker

cuts their beaks right off.

“That’ll take care of the problem.”

This is not how animals were meant to live.

The pigs, too, are going wild

with their living conditions.

They bite each other on the tails

until someone snips the tail off—

leaving a stub to make the next bite

all the more painful

to teach them not to be bitten.

This is not how animals were meant to live.

Animals are hit

beaten

brutally murdered

slammed

bloodied up

by workers in the slaughterhouses

on videos filmed secretly on a phone.

This is not how animals were meant to live.

This is not how animals were meant to live.

This is not how animals were meant to live.

Imagine yourself there, now.

Imagine that as your life.

What if you were in their place?

From the Perspective of a Cow in a Feedlot

Hello. I am… whoever I am. I don’t know. All I know is that once, it used to be better. I have a vague remembrance of it. It was wonderful. I got to be in a place where I could eat everything on the ground, all the time. It was… I don’t remember what it was. But if anything, it tasted delicious. It tasted like the sun and the earth it grew from. Some of it was sweet, some of it wasn’t as sweet. But we would curl our tongues around it and pull and it would come up in our mouths by the mouthful. I was always with my mother, until the Ones separated us. And all I could feel was hurt. I don’t remember much of that time any more. All I know now is what is in front of me: Many other of my kind, everywhere. Very close to each other. Too close. But there is no other space. What I eat now is given. It tastes different than the sunshine and earth I used to taste, but I eat it. It is food. But now I am sick. I feel it. I don’t feel right. I know something is wrong, but it is food. There is a sweetness in it that I enjoy. So I eat it. I seem to be healthy enough. I don’t understand it, but I am. Others are not so lucky. They are very sick. They fall. They fall and lay in the mixture of earth and our waste. I smell the earth and it is similar to the earth from where I first was. But it is not so good. It does not produce the things that grew from the ground for me to eat. I am dizzy. There are too many of my kind, we are too sick. I rumble and I hurt. There is now more food that is brought to us. I am hungry, and so I eat. And so I eat. And eat. And eat. Every day of my life. Until one day… we are brought together into something else, some dark space. There is a rumbling and a shaking of the ground and a wisp of coolness from the spaces that separates us from outside. And I hope it will be better for us, wherever we are going. 

From the Perspective of a Cow in a Lovely Place

Hello. I am . . . me. I don’t have a name, really, that I am called by. Well, I have been given a name by the Ones. It is repeated as the Ones speak to me while milking or when walking up to me with a soft hand out, sometimes with grass or something sweet. Or I am called that by a young One who finds me and rubs my back and speaks. I do not know what that One says, but it is a quiet sound. I like it and I like the rub of the small hand and the pressure of the small body leaning on me. But still, it is not my true name. It’s not who I am. It’s not me. We have our own way of identifying our kind. I don’t know what it’s called, or how to describe it. Perhaps it’s the scent, or the size, or the eyes. Or just knowing who they are. Being with them. That’s how we tell one from the other.

I am so content here. I just feel… well. I enjoy the bright light from the sky. It warms me and I can see all around when it is up. The flicker of coolness makes me shiver with delight. It runs through my hair and through the grass at my feet. It makes the smells come alive. I can smell the earthiness. I hear the crickets and the soft steps of my companions and the machines the Ones are on. They go back and forth on a path I can’t see. Not often. But when they do, we listen to the hums. They are a part of here, and so we have accepted them as another sound.

We are in an area of grass and are moved by the Ones, with deep, gentle voices, when the air is cooler, after a long, long time of warmth from above. We trust them. They touch us softly. They make noises to us. We don’t know what they mean, but we listen anyways. We move to new, fresh grasses and legumes, and are quick to pick out our favorite—a legume that is low to the ground and sweet, with soft, delicate petals that fold into each other. Clover. From there, we take to our own delights. We all have our own favorites, after the soft-petalled one called Clover. There are different tastes. Some like the taller grasses, some the broader, some the sweeter, some the more filling grasses. We eat it all, wrapping our tongues around it and pulling it into our mouths. I can just taste the light and the earth that it grows on. I feel like I could be here forever.

Rhetoric of Food Project Description and Reflection

For the second half of this semester, we learned all about food. We read the book An Omnivore's Dilemma, by Michael Pollan and consumed other forms of rhetoric along with it, such as watching the movie Supersize Me, parts of The Botany of Desire, and various other articles and video clips of about CAFO (Contained Animal Feeding Operation) conditions, slaughterhouses, industrial farms, small family farms, packaging operations, and food in general.
During this unit, we learned several big truths: 1) Almost all processed food we eat, from cereals, to dried fruit, to bread, to chicken nuggets, to... well, just about anything you can think of that isn't absolutely raw, contains corn and/or soybeans. It comes in forms that make it difficult to recognize it as what it started out as, corn and soybeans. Some examples are high fructose corn syrup, citric acid, soybean oil, and a ton of those ingredients with names so long you can't pronounce them.
2) Even if you buy organic food, it doesn't necessarily mean the conditions of the cows who produce the organic milk are going to be much better than the conditions of the cows who live in regular industrial feedlots. And if you buy organic spinach, don't assume that what you are eating was grown by a nice little farm. Unless you buy your products at the farmer's market, you can assume that all your organic food comes from industrial organic farms.The same goes for all organic eggs, meat, fruits, and vegetables. Many times, the only difference between organic industrial food and industrial food is the word organic. Yes, it means that you aren't consuming harmful pesticides and herbicides, which helps the earth and you, but don't assume that the animals you are eating are getting a better deal. And DON'T buy the wonderful stories and pictures about cows grazing in open fields or happy chickens wandering around in their roomy yards. Don't buy the rhetoric of the grocery store poets.
3) Animal conditions in CAFOs are horrible. Animals are not treated well. They are so sick. Cow are fed corn and molasses and antibiotics. They weren't meant to eat corn and so they get very, very sick. The only way they are kept alive is by the antibiotics. There is a high mortality rate for chicks and chickens because they are so packed together. Chicks' beaks are burned or cut off so they won't peck at eachother because they are so close together. Pigs bite eachother on the tails, so the tails are chopped off. Workers are cruel to the animals. I couldn't stand knowing this and still eat the meat from these places. So now, I eat meat very minimally. I don't understand how you can know this and still be a carnivore. Maybe it's too engrained into their lives to change.

I have already read The Omnivore's Dilemma, as well as various other books about feeding operations, animal rights, slaughterhouses, vegetariansim, and food in general. (I particularly enjoyed Skinny Bitch and In Defense of Food, the latter by Michael Pollan.) Don't forget various cookbooks! Health and food in general are very interesting to me. Pouring over cookbooks and dreaming up meals is something I like to do if I have the time. Learning how to make food, too. (I am accomplished in the art of making minestroni, lemon bars, and various other yummies.) 

1 Week Until Internships!!

Hi, Katrina! (If you're reading this.)


Welcome to my digital portfolio. (It's like a blog for school.) As you can see, there is a lot going on on here, but there are two pages that I think you might particularly want to look at: the page labeled LINK Overview is about my internship at Turtle Lake. There's nothing new on there, but I thought you may be interested. Second, the page labeled LINK Project Proposal is the project proposal (obviously) for the children's microgreens book. That I think you may want to take a look at. But just a suggestion. 


Cool!


I'll see you in 1 week! 


~ Carly