COW

[Suzi888]

chooseveg.com/blog/documentary-cow/

Anyone watched this… I can’t bring myself to watch it, but it’ll be coming to cinemas shortly.

What is the best milk substitute you have tried? Specifically when added to tea, I don’t mind the substitutes in cereal but my tea tastes grim without milk.

But hey, you keep on enjoy drinking that pus, and screw the cows, eh?
It's not 'pus', though, is it?
As you well know.

@myowndevices

You can sell them though to pet food companies!

Really? i don't think so

Of course you can that's where the unsuitable for human consumption meat goes

@myowndevices

Of course you can that's where the unsuitable for human consumption meat goes

www.pfma.org.uk/legislation The animal has to be fit for human consumption in order for it to be fed to pets. It's the parts of the animal that humans don't want to eat, especially in this country. There is legislation covering this.

I'm in the US but glad that there are some regulations in the UK

@derxa If we're saying that the farmers care about cows because they want to make money out of them, I would agree with that.

Do they care about them as animals in their own right? No.

[quote Fr0thandBubble]@derxa If we're saying that the farmers care about cows because they want to make money out of them, I would agree with that.

Do they care about them as animals in their own right? No.[/quote]
I don't have any cows. I do have sheep and I care about them as if they were my children. I know you can't understand this at all. They have the best of food, conditions and medical care. Better than many humans.

You sound like a 'good shepherd' Drexa, thank you for caring for your animals.

sorry Derxa

@myowndevices

I'm in the US but glad that there are some regulations in the UK

If you're in the US then "suitable for human consumption" will have its own meaning.

[quote Fr0thandBubble]@derxa If we're saying that the farmers care about cows because they want to make money out of them, I would agree with that.

Do they care about them as animals in their own right? No.[/quote]
If a lamb cannot be fed by its mother and a surrogate cannot be used then the 'profitable' thing to do would be to let it die, as a wild animal would have done. No sheep farmer I know would do that, instead they bottle feed the lamb in spite of the fact that it costs more to do so than it would to simply write off the value.

You have clearly never met a farmer.

@derxa Do you send them off to a slaughterhouse? Do you kill them for money? If so, just don't even talk to me about "caring for them as if they were your children", because you and I know that that would just be absolutely ridiculous.

@ddraiggoch

"You have clearly never met a farmer."

I have actually - in fact, I used to go out with the son of a dairy farmer in Somerset.

I wouldn't describe them as at all warm, caring or sentimental about the animals. The animals were just "their property" - they couldn't give two hoots if the animal were happy or not. They are incredibly cynical about animals' lives - I don't think they could do the job if they weren't.

Yes but I am British and grew up in Hampshire so not a city slicker.

@EdithStourton

Slaughtering animals to eat is an old fashioned concept. Like, dunno, breathing? We've eaten meat for as long as we've been human, and before. There's a pretty strong argument that the protein in meat was what allowed us to become human. We now know it makes people ill. It's not as clear-cut as all that. Meat is a part of our ancestral diet, and hunter-gatherers who don't get enough of it have a higher rate of infant mortality and poorer overall health. We know now that vegetarians (or maybe it was vegans, can't recall) have lower bone density and are more prone to fractures. A vegan diet requires careful balancing and supplements. If meat eaters thought as hard about their diets as careful vegans do (and therefore ate less sugar and fewer refined carbs), we'd then have a fair comparison between diets with meat and diets without. Less careful vegans are prone to deficiency diseases. There are no established human cultures that are vegan (someone on a one of these threads did once try to convince us that Sri Lankans were vegan, but I've been there, and I know this is bollocks).

Saying it is what we have always done just proves it is a dated concept.

We might have eaten meat for thousands of years when the availability and choice of food, healthcare and life expectancy was limited but now there is choice and we can move on.

There might not be whole countries that have an entirely vegan population but there are communities within countries that are vegan and they are the ones that have older and healthier citizens

Referring to the infant mortality of hunter gatherers is quite a strange reference in 2022 U.K.
Where are these hunter gatherers and shouldn’t SS step in to stop them putting their children at risk from their insistence to only eat animals they have personally hunted.
Or again are you referring to people from a bygone era or a few tribes that are isolated from the world without modern medical care and no choice of fruit, vegetables and pulses

Also mil was a trained chef who thought a lot about the quality of food she fed her family.
Dh spends the same amount on his meat each week as I spend on the weekly food shop for 3 of us.

His dad and recently found out his gf both died from bowel cancer, Dh has had a terminal diagnosis because of his bowel cancer. His brother I can see going the same way.
They are all meat eaters who only eat good quality meat and don’t believe you should go a single day without meat otherwise you would get ill
The irony seems lost on Dh.

Saying it is what we have always done just proves it is a dated concept
I don't know where to begin with this...
So we should also avoid:
Having sex
Having offspring
Eating fruit and vegetables
Walking on the ground
Communicating
And many other 'dated concepts'.

As for life expectancy, you have to sift out so many other factors - marriage rates, exercise levels and so on - before you can be certain of anything.

The hunter gatherers I was referring to had access to very broad diet (nuts, fruit, leaves, roots, eggs). The reason I brought them into the discussion was to point out that high-quality protein made a positive difference to their overall health.

As for farmers... IME they are very pragmatic, but it doesn't stop them caring for their animals. Maybe go and read someone like James Rebanks.

Froth I've also spent a lot of time with several farmers and they are the same. They do what they must to keep the animals healthy so they can make money from them but no more than that. I think people like to think of farmers as patrons of the countryside who care deeply about animals. But the ones I've have met are the complete opposite. Their vehicles are barely road worthy, their hedge ditches and drains are not maintained. They are obsessed with money and make their immediate neighbours lives unpleasant with their sense of entitlement of the surrounding lanes and land. Their livestock are a means to an end and that's it. Of course there are some small farm that have animal welfare at the core of their operations but imo most do not.

@cushioncovers

Froth I've also spent a lot of time with several farmers and they are the same. They do what they must to keep the animals healthy so they can make money from them but no more than that. I think people like to think of farmers as patrons of the countryside who care deeply about animals. But the ones I've have met are the complete opposite. Their vehicles are barely road worthy, their hedge ditches and drains are not maintained. They are obsessed with money and make their immediate neighbours lives unpleasant with their sense of entitlement of the surrounding lanes and land. Their livestock are a means to an end and that's it. Of course there are some small farm that have animal welfare at the core of their operations but imo most do not.

In what capacity do you meet and talk to these farmers? Are they identikit clones? Of course some people will lap up these comments. They're so generic and non specific to be meaningless.

@cushioncovers

Froth I've also spent a lot of time with several farmers and they are the same. They do what they must to keep the animals healthy so they can make money from them but no more than that. I think people like to think of farmers as patrons of the countryside who care deeply about animals. But the ones I've have met are the complete opposite. Their vehicles are barely road worthy, their hedge ditches and drains are not maintained. They are obsessed with money and make their immediate neighbours lives unpleasant with their sense of entitlement of the surrounding lanes and land. Their livestock are a means to an end and that's it. Of course there are some small farm that have animal welfare at the core of their operations but imo most do not.

can you imagine generalising like that about any other section of society?

I know hundreds of farmers. Your description doesn't fit a single one of them I know, and unless you know the ins and outs of what their stewardship agreements look like then you can't really comment on why ditches/hedges etc are the way they are.

I am laughing (bitterly) at this comment actually because its really interesting to see it from the other perspective. So often on farming facebook groups/ forums you have farmers tearing their hair out at 'neighbours' who seem to take exception to the workings of rural life.

There are always tales of neighbours complaining to trading standards/ the council about sheep eating stubble turnips/ being stuck behind sheep and lambs being moved up the road to a new field etc. Tales of neighbours complaining about hedges that are in particular schemes being let to grow too tall and 'ruining their view', that the sheep in the field are too noisy, that the cow muck is too smelly or that ditches have become over grown (the environment agency won't allow a permit to clear them out because 'crayfish').

If farmers are driving round in tatty cars and appear to be money obsessed then just perhaps have you stopped to consider its probably because they are struggling financially.

Their livestock are a means to an end and that's it. Of course there are some small farm that have animal welfare at the core of their operations but imo most do not

I find this absolutely insulting and frankly offensive. You should be ashamed that you feel its okay to make such offensive generalisations about a whole group of people you clearly don't understand.

It is a minority of farmers who don't have animal welfare at the absolute core of what they do and anyone in the farming community who has animal welfare issues on their farm is offered a huge amount of support within the community to try and help/ improve if its caused by mental health issues/illness/financial problems , or roundly condemned by others if its through laziness or disinterest.

My comments are based on my experience of farmers. I spent a lot of time with. Sorry if this offends anyone but I did say it was my experience and I stand by them.

in what role did you spend time with them?

And while you are at it why not tell us what you do for a living so we can also make sweeping generalisations about your temperament and personality?

@cushioncovers

My comments are based on my experience of farmers. I spent a lot of time with. Sorry if this offends anyone but I did say it was my experience and I stand by them.

What do you do or will that be 'outing'🤣

Have you told this group of evil farmers what you think of them?

I stopped drinking cow's milk ten years ago. I didn't like the taste of plant milks at all at first, soya milk was the only type I found tasted okay. I now think it's so delicious I sometimes have a glass of it pure. I had a glass of cow's milk not long ago and found it absolutely disgusting!