Are Vegans Unfairly Accusing Farmers of Teaching Their Children To Abuse Animals?

Article In The Independent About Vegans Accusing a Farmer of Teaching His Children To Abuse Animals! 

I was asked my view on whether that was unfair treatment of the farmer and wrote this response.

 

Let’s see if there’s any truth in it first! I’m slightly of the belief that 99% of parents are handing down a complete indifference to animals and the planet, all in the name of convenience, fear of change and embarrassment that their child might turn out to be empathetic or allergic to something and have no friends at school and not be invited anywhere for tea!

So, at the moment, I’m planning to acknowledge the feelings of the 56 billion animals slaughtered each year plus the animals and birds enduring the endless cruelty inherent in dairy and egg production. I don’t think I have the emotional energy left over to worry about the feelings of a farmer or any lazy parents or other influencers, really.

I generally feel that the next generation are going to have to get over their addiction to animal ingredients anyway and get way more observant about chemicals too, to stop polluting the place, so teaching regard for and fresh observation of other lives is a good place to start. Also, teaching children to look at their choices and make changes if they’re not that kind or they’re going to have a negative impact on something or someone. That, as well, can only be taught by example!

As a vegan campaigner myself,  I have often been called names – I was called a wanker actually yesterday at the Hare Coursing Finals! That was just for standing there on the side of the road, saying nothing, with a poster of a hare sitting in a field! Luckily, I love that word, always have done. It brings me straight back to being fifteen and everyone called everyone a bit of a wanger!

I agree it’s probably not a great plan to blame one person at a time or accuse people of perpetuating abuse but I don’t see any harm in saying it. Animals are vulnerable and always exploited – and I’m on the ‘If you see it, say it’ buzz at the moment. If you are producing dairy, you are also producing calves that never get their mother’s milk at very least and more often than not become veal or beef themselves and often get pneumonia for the first few months of their short few months’ of life as any youngster would without the colostrum and being sent off from it’s natural setting (it’s mother, the dairy cow). And don’t get me started on the artificial insemination. Let’s just say, I don’t think any of us would like it. I know that farmers are also a bit vulnerable (to the meat producers, dairy giants and vets, with their price setting and endless shots, respectively) and so are also a bit abused.

But is anyone really okay about using animals and the massive emissions from agriculture or have we all just been taught not to think about it? As George Bernard Shaw said, it is not hatred that is worst, it is indifference.

I bet you 50c though that that farmer in question was questioning himself a bit that’s why he found himself in the conversation with vegans in the first place and getting offended. That or the activists actually observed abuse happening. I bet another 50c that he really is totally passing on to his children every detail of what he thinks is okay and what is not okay. Everyone else does it too but still, why not say it?!

I’m just delighted that someone bothered to write the article. Doesn’t anybody realize how silly it is to be annoyed with ‘vegans’? Be annoyed with the ruthless people, the ones making money at some one else’s expense, the ones trashing the environment, the ones scaling up their animal agriculture operations and providing none of the 5 freedoms an animal should get as basic. When a ‘vegan’ says something just take it as probably a wake up call that there is another conversation or investigation we need to have and another change we might need to make. After all, all a ‘vegan’ is just someone who has bothered to look in to various practices and has decided to no longer support them, buy them, eat them for a variety of valid reasons – all of which they will elaborate on, if anyone asks (like our interview where we got to outline the 30 or so reasons hare coursing should be banned!) Vegans are also good role models for children as we show that if you don’t think something is right, you don’t have to do it.  Most in society are madly addicted as far as I can see. People are slaves to technology and meat and convenient processes and substances and money. If someone who manages to abstain from something (like a vegan for example!!) says something, the likelihood is that they have considered it in some detail.

The thing about addiction is that it favours impulse over deliberation. I’m all for deliberation!! Otherwise, isn’t it just a race to the bottom, with everyone teaching animal abuse and ecocide as perfectly fine to overlook.