Mother and Son: The Way It Should Be But Hardly Ever Is

categories: Animal Emotions, Dairy and Eggs, Farm Animals, Sanctuaries, Videos

Published January 21, 2009 @ 01:05PM PT

I wanted to embed a video for you here, but technical difficulties prevented it, so I'm going to supply you with links instead. Follow this link to have the video open in Windows Media Player on a large screen, or follow this link to see the smaller video embedded in the related news article. (Really, watch the video. The rest of this post will make more sense, and there are adorable sights that I just can't describe.)

Now for the less adorable part. If Hillside Animal Sanctuary hadn't rescued Clover, a dairy cow, one of two things would have happened, as noted by the sanctuary worker in the video:

1. Because there was too much pus in her milk (and yes, a fair amount of pus is legally allowed and is present in all the cow's milk consumed by humans), and no farmer businessman is going to keep around an animal a machine from whom which he can't profit, she would have been killed, and the calf she was carrying would have died along with her. (I don't know enough about this particular story to know with certainty whether Clover then would have been turned into hamburger, which does come mostly from "spent" dairy cows.)

2. Or she would have given birth before being killed, and her sweet calf would have been taken away almost immediately to be turned into veal.

Luckily, neither of these things happened in this case. But as we watch the news story on Clover and her unexpected (unexpected by the sanctuary, that is) calf, we have to take note of that playful, sweet-faced calf. He very easily could have been yet another victim of the dairy/veal industry. Clover and her son Bramble will live out natural lives now, together, but most are not so lucky.

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(Thanks to Alison of the heart2heart list for providing the alert to this story.)

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Comments (3)

If stories of cows and calfs in our society bother you and you cannnot stomach the idea of young calfs being slaughtered for veal or full grown cows being slauttered for hamburgers then you should stop eating, veal or hamburgers, stop wearing any form of leather, stop using glue, stop drinking milk, or eating cheese and stop using the millions of products that come from this industry.

It amazes me how supposedly "caring" humans can get and all teary eyed over a story like this when they know full well (or should know) that millions of cows and calfs are shot in the head then slaughtered every day for their mass consumption. Imagine the pile of guts this leaves behind. It would be hundreds of feet high.

We are a nation of consumers but we don't want to know the story of how that hamburger got on the bun, or how the veal got on our plate. We just want it there when we want it. We pay the price, in cash, then leave without another thought of the living organism that died, (or was killed or humanely slaughtered, however you want it) for your eating pleasure.

Get used to it folks, it is a fact of life here in America and over all other parts of the world. Cattle are bred for our consumption and our use. So are sheep, chickens, fish, turkey, pigs, horses (yes horses) and the list goes on and on. Imagine the deaths that occur every day and the wholesale slaughter of all kinds of animals so you can have shoes, coats, leather furniture, hamburgers, hot dogs, beef jerky, etc, etc.

Well, these two are saved, until the owner thinks it is time to get rid of them and then they are usually sent to the butcher. It is a shame to allow a cow to die a natural death because the owner looses all the money he would get from slaughtering the animal. And, no, it isn't just worn out milk cows that provide hamburger. Cattle are bred to do just that and nothing else. They are born, fed then slaughtered, cut up, packaged and sent to your grocery store. Then the meat doesn't look anything like a cow then does it? But it was.

Get used to it, because these tear jerker stories are just that, tear jerkers and not in full touch with reality.

But that is just my opinion.

Kilted.

Posted by W H on 01/21/2009 @ 07:47PM PT
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I'm not really sure what your point is here, Wes. And I say that not critically, but sincerely. That is, I can't tell whether you're agreeing that we need to stop consuming animals and animal products (which is a major point of this blog--not just this post, but this whole blog) or saying that people shouldn't change their habits and diets, and we just need to "get used to it"--to the cruelties and injustices inherently involved.

Also, please note that these two animals are not living with an "owner" who will someday send them to a butcher. They are in a sanctuary. Sanctuaries do not slaughter their animals; they allow them to live out their natural lives.

Posted by Stephanie Ernst on 01/22/2009 @ 08:29AM PT
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Wes, I'm not quite sure what your position is on this story, either. The point of the story is to open people's eyes a little to what the meat and dairy industries don't want you to see and to promote a compassionate side: to let live! We have that choice. If it matters to you, it doesn’t have to be this way! The more people get on board, the faster we are to progressive change. I don't know if you're an animal lover who is throwing in the towel or if you're a meat eater who simply accepts it as an "inconvenient truth" but it's a rather cowardly position to take! Humans have been murdering each other for centuries. It's certainly not right but we don’t throw in our towels either! Too many people go through life with blinders on and shield themselves from the truth, esp. from the unspeakable cruelties of factory farms and slaughterhouses. Some of us have this high and mighty, self centered "attitude" that animals are simply here for our pleasure. Unfortunately, the animal agriculture industry is no exception but they take it a heck of a lot further. In their view, animals are profitable commodities beneath compassion. Some people just have no clue what they do to these animals to save some money! It's despicable the way we continue to treat living, breathing creatures and a step back for humanity. Sir Paul McCartney once said: "If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be a vegetarian." Nothing could be further from the truth!

Posted by Christopher Pearson on 01/22/2009 @ 12:16PM PT
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Stephanie is an independent animal rights advocate, a vegan, a tree-hugging environmentalist, and a freelance editor and writer. She lives in St. Louis with an aging corgi-lab and an adolescent rescued pit bull.