I’m putting this here because the article references NY carriage horses several times. If it would be better off in The Menagerie or Around the Farm, Mods please move it.
The article is about a Long Island family who have a sustainable 15 acres on which they raise their food, including a cow. If you read nothing else, read the quote I put in bold below.
Partial section of the article:
[i]Benner and his family have learned how to do something that is increasingly difficult in modern times – live off of their 15-acre farm in affluent, crowded Long Island since 1977. “We learned, made, and had our own heat. We made our own food. We made our own clothing. We raised a garden,” said Benner, who is 75.
In a rational world, this would be considered heroic, especially in our time, where such independence and self-sufficiency and respect for the environment is almost unheard of. We talk about sustainability all the time, the Benners are living it. We talk about keeping animals among us, and finding value in them. He is doing that.
He ought to get a medal, not death threats online and on the phone.
Benner and his wife Jean have also figured out how to make his family farm an attraction to the urbanized community around him. With a family of six to feed, he kept refining his budget and began raising some of his farm animals as a source of food. His farm offers strawberry picking, birthday parties and class trips for schoolchildren.
Opening his farm up has threatened it in an ugly way. On April 2, Jean Benner was taking a birthday party group on an educational tour of the farm, answering questions about what it is like to live on a farm. They met Minnie the cow.
A housewife and mother named Kimberly Sherriton asked about the fate of Minnie and was told she would be used to feed the Benner family.
Sherriton was upset, she said she would find a sanctuary where Minnie could live out her life.
Jean Benner tried to explain the difference between an animal on a farm and a pet, explaining that the farm was a homestead where animals have been raised for meat since 1751. “We grow and produce food for our family on our property,” said Benner. That is how the family is able to keep their farm going.
When she learned that the two-year-old cow will be going to slaughter to help feed the Benner family, Sherriton organized a series of protests outside of the Benner farm to demand that the cow be spared. She started a petition on change.org and collection more than 2,000 signatures and opened a Facebook Page to save the cow that has more than 700 supporters.
Benner said he is nearly overwhelmed with angry, sometimes obscene, phone calls, Facebook posts, bad reviews on his web page and threats on his family.
“There have been literally thousands of people who have supported us,” said Benner, “and a majority of them live right here in the community,” he said. “The people who are trying to impose their values on us do not live here. We’re talking about a national group of people who have a direction – they’re trying to tell us how to live.”
Sherriton’s comments to the media shocked me, even by the very low standards of animal rights rhetoric and lobbying.
“He doesn’t need this cow to survive and feed his family,” Sherriton told a reporter for FiOS1 news. “He puts a sob story on there. Please, tell him to go to Whole Foods and go get some antibiotic -free beef there.”
In a scenario now familiar to many farmers, Benner and his family are now being constantly harassed.[/i]
I guess buying beef from whole foods doesn’t involve killing cows, they must grow the steaks in a greenhouse right next to the carrots and potatoes??? :no:
