[QUOTE=JanM;8631168]
A new low for city people who think farming is a petting zoo, and people who raise animals to feed their families should shell out tons of money for so-called organic meat at the politically correct, overpriced gourmet grocery store. I guess these fools think the farmer should let his kids starve while the cow dies of old age, and the meat goes to waste.[/QUOTE]
Wonder where they think the organic meat comes from? The rare flank steak vine?
[QUOTE=RedmondDressage;8632029]
And unfortunately it seems that more and more people fall into that idiot category these days :sigh:[/QUOTE]
“Make it idiot-proof and someone will make a better idiot”.
I don’t think there are more idiots, I think the internet just makes them more obvious to the rest of us.
[QUOTE=Raincityrider;8630014]
This woman must be incredibly ignorant. It frightens me that there are hordes of people just like her who are ready to protest anything they find outside their personal values and they are willing to destroy lives in the process. Protest has been made so much stronger by social media. These days it’s a blood sport.[/QUOTE]
And she’s breeding!
That woman is nuts. Get your antibiotic beef from whole foods. Well lady, my buddy raises a few calves every year and names his, and he knows all of them and feeds them things that they enjoy, and when they go off to the auction sometimes it isn’t just his kids that cry. So is that better or worse than taking it to the custom cutter and eating it himself?
The most important point here is the disconnect between urban dwellers and farmers, which seems to be growing rather than diminishing.
However, if you think about it, these people grew up on Charlotte’s Web – all about saving a pig from being eaten – Disney movies, and animated cartoons about animals that had personalities and were anthropomorphized. Is it surprising they didn’t want a cow they had petted and fussed over to be eaten?
This made me think of a totally off topic thing, but I was at a wedding last weekend and the pastor told a story as part of the homily about his daughter seeing a couple kissing, and trying to explain it. He ended with, “and so I told her to think of the movie Bambi …” and all I (and a lot of other people I found out afterwards) could think was “where the mother died?!?” but no, it was that the people were "twitterized. "(I think). Anyway, I thought it was a terrible story to tell at a wedding, frankly.
Twitterpated I think it was…and yeah my first thought would also be, “this married couple is like a youngster being orphaned through homicide?” 
Odd comparison for a wedding, LOL!
I do agree that may people think animals are like books and Disney…but I also think that’s a tad bit scary since grown-arse adults are thinking the real world is like Disney. It’s one thing when it’s children…
[QUOTE=Gestalt;8630534]
While I think the protesters are silly I can also understand why they are upset. Giving the cow a name and portraying it in the way they did kind of asks for this response. It’s one thing for people to tour a farm and see how animals are used in our society as food, but naming it and having it appear to be a lovable pet??[/QUOTE]
I agree, and I’m really, really, really surprised that so many people now name and pet-ify animals they’re going to eat.
Certainly not a trend I’d support myself.
I wonder how Madame Sherriton likes her organic veal served, with or without sauce? Does she even know how it got to her plate?
[QUOTE=Red Barn;8633089]
I agree, and I’m really, really, really surprised that so many people now name and pet-ify animals they’re going to eat.Certainly not a trend I’d support myself.[/QUOTE]Is it actually new? Growing up we always named the pigs and calves we raised for food. We didn’t get too attached otherwise, of course. And my grandparents named every cow on their dairy farm, many after friends and family, and it’s not like those cows went to a glorious retirement pasture when they were done.
It isn’t new at all. It’s been done for ages, some people are just able to get online and be more vocal about how it upsets them even though the animal in question doesn’t give a flying rat’s hind end what it’s called, as long as the grub shows up. And then hopefully it has a humane death, which it can’t understand or anticipate to become afraid of to begin with.
Just another non-issue some people blow up into big nonsense.
We should be grateful that our lives are so good we have the free time to indulge in such nonsense, though.
[QUOTE=caffeinated;8633825]
Is it actually new? [/QUOTE]
Well, it’s new to me - at least based on the standard 4H view of the universe, which makes a very clear distinction between livestock and pets.
Of course, I do understand that agritainment is a thing, and I also understand the difficulty of maintaining a family farm at all. What I don’t understand is why these people thought that cutsifying a meat animal, and introducing it as a family pet, would somehow be a big winner.
I mean, seriously. Punter reaction seems exactly par for the course, all things considered.
[QUOTE=Red Barn;8634005]
Of course, I do understand that agritainment is a thing, and I also understand the difficulty of maintaining a family farm at all. What I don’t understand is why these people thought that cutsifying a meat animal, and introducing it as a family pet, would somehow be a big winner.
.[/QUOTE]
They didn’t introduce it as a family pet.
“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.”
They named it something other than a number. I know a pig named “porkchop”
[QUOTE=My Two Cents;8634146]
…I know a pig named “porkchop”[/QUOTE]
I knew a pig named Rupert who became bacon and a calf named Clara who ended up in the freezer.
This was at least 35 years ago…
[QUOTE=Red Barn;8634005]
Well, it’s new to me - at least based on the standard 4H view of the universe, which makes a very clear distinction between livestock and pets.
Of course, I do understand that agritainment is a thing, and I also understand the difficulty of maintaining a family farm at all. What I don’t understand is why these people thought that cutsifying a meat animal, and introducing it as a family pet, would somehow be a big winner.
I mean, seriously. Punter reaction seems exactly par for the course, all things considered.[/QUOTE]
All of the 4-H projects I have ever known had names. All of the steers that go to the big shows have names. It is not at all new nor unusual nor a 4-H thing that food animals can’t be like pets initially and then become food. Occasionally one is granted permanent pet status.
[QUOTE=roseymare;8634235]
All of the 4-H projects I have ever known had names. All of the steers that go to the big shows have names. It is not at all new nor unusual nor a 4-H thing that food animals can’t be like pets initially and then become food. Occasionally one is granted permanent pet status.[/QUOTE]
Many 4H heifers end up in the cowherd.
The 4H animals here, goats, lambs, chickens and rabbits, all have names, always have had names, even if meant for eventual processing and uses after slaughter.
[QUOTE=roseymare;8634235]
All of the 4-H projects I have ever known had names. All of the steers that go to the big shows have names. It is not at all new nor unusual nor a 4-H thing that food animals can’t be like pets initially and then become food. Occasionally one is granted permanent pet status.[/QUOTE]
And every 4H kid knows, from Day One, that the “project” consists of making market weight by such and such a day. I really don’t think many of these kids are confused about the difference between meat animals and pets.
Honestly. Do you?
[QUOTE=Red Barn;8634276]
And every 4H kid knows, from Day One, that the “project” consists of making market weight by such and such a day. I really don’t think many of these kids are confused about the difference between meat animals and pets.
Honestly. Do you?[/QUOTE]
Well except as Bluey pointed out, the heifers that are staying in the cowherd.
You seem to be the one with the problem differentiating. I have had steers that are pretty dang close to pets that have ended in the freezer. Kids who show steers, wehters and barrows get very close to them. Not everyone needs to completely compartmentalize pet versus food animal as some do.
Well then, perhaps I’m just a weirdo.
Still, Mr Benner got himself into real trouble with that Minnie the Edible Bestie gambit, and I honestly think he should have seen it coming. Whatever you or I may personally feel about this stuff, it really is hard to see how this particular agritainment strategy was ever going to be a big winner.
When I worked at a girl scout camp, we got weaned dairy calves (always male) that came to the ‘petting farm’ and they’d only hang around for two or three months before being replaced. I guess when they got too big, they went back to the original farm and ended up as 4H projects… and probably dinner not too long after that.
We never told the campers or their families.
They always had names, too.
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