[QUOTE=RodeoFTW;8635933]
Maybe these kinds of farmers shouldn’t try making money off of the unknowing public, then. Their educational program was ineffective.[/QUOTE]
Ah, so you don’t like it, so they should not be open to the public?!
Dang!
And somebody called you reasonable?
[QUOTE=Alagirl;8635938]
Ah, so you don’t like it, so they should not be open to the public?!
Dang!
And somebody called you reasonable?[/QUOTE]
If the public doesn’t like it. Not sure why you’re making it about me. XD I didn’t start the [edit] online petition, I just understand where those people are coming from.
They are boycotting a farm. Big whoop. The only thing those people did that was wrong was sending death threats. Everything else is perfectly legal and a lesson in PR skills.
[QUOTE=RodeoFTW;8635564]
“Our newest farm friend! Welcome
sweet girl…we’re in looove!?” That is just one of many examples of what the Benners have publicly posted about Minnie since her arrival at their “working farm” where visitors can pay to have their child’s birthday party or to just visit with Minnie and the other animals. While they don’t lie when asked, they are very deceptive in their outbound marketing referring to Minnie as their friend and professing their love for her. Never has the heart emoji been used more than in posts the Benner’s write about Minnie devised to lure paying customers to their place of business ; customers who mostly would not otherwise patronize such a place. So either they are guilty of deceptive marketing which helped line their pockets OR if their own words about the love they have for Minnie and their amazement at her sweet disposition are genuine , then they are guilty of the most cruel act of betrayal and that is to earn an animals love and trust to then, with the same hands that have only ever shown Minnie gentleness and kindness, lead her toward what will be a confusing ,terrifying , and painful journey to slaughter. Despicable on all fronts. Minnie -nor any living being for that matter -doesn’t deserve such a cruel fate."
Totally understand why parents would be upset.
We have Greenfield Village out here in MI and there is a working farm there. They raise and slaughter pigs, etc etc have working draft horses and plow ox but none of the food animals have public names or get Instagram fame. This guy should have known better. Food animals have to be anonymous to the public eye or people do get upset.[/QUOTE]
I was a 4H’er with market animal projects. Hogs and Rabbits. They had names and were treated like family until they day they were sold and or were no more. They were presented to the public annually at fairs with their names in plain sight! They were auctioned by name not number …their fate was not hidden and NOBODY lost their senses over it.
As for social media postings …every current 4H and FFA kid I know posts photos of their project animals on FB and Instagram and 90% of those animals are destined to be food. How crazy a society that we are so weak mined and so lacking fortitude that photos of food animals before they are processed along with their names causes pandemonium.
You can do that in a farm community/group/culture, though. Not city people. Why is that so freaking hard a concept to understand? Not everyone has the same feeling about animals (especially named animals) as ag-types do. Outsiders equate names with pets. That’s what is the status quo.
They don’t expect a heifer with a name at their kid’s 8yo birthday party to end up eaten just as much we horse people don’t expect our beloved old schooling horses to end up at New Holland.
Again, these are the same people who think pigs as house pets are a cute idea.
This is beginning to feel a little give everyone a participation trophy ish.
So who’s at fault the farmer for doing what has been done for centuries including naming and nurturing of food animals … or those who have devolved so far from critical thinking that they’ve forgotten where food comes from are now offended to learn they have names and are often loved.
Sorry Louise we can’t name that calf this year them city folks will get mad and start a petition. Lord help us!
BTW this would have merit if those fairs weren’t public settings but they were… and the public was encouraged to come through and meet the children and their livestock projects. I have to believe some of them even lived in cities 
[QUOTE=Lynnwood;8636033]
This is beginning to feel a little give everyone a participation trophy ish.
So who’s at fault the farmer for doing what has been done for centuries including naming and nurturing of food animals … or those who have devolved so far from critical thinking that they’ve forgotten where food comes from are now offended to learn they have names and are often loved.
Sorry Louise we can’t name that calf this year them city folks will get mad and start a petition. Lord help us![/QUOTE]
That’s not at all what I or anyone else was saying.
A 4H fair is still very different from a ‘working farm’ that had social media to encourage people and their children to see very particular named animals that they had no idea were going to one day be eaten and killed. Different from using said animals as petting animals for children like riding ponies at a party and doing online updates on them for people and their children to follow.
That’s not how typical farmers raise livestock. I’m sure your steer didn’t have fans.
You say one thing and then do the exact opposite. To outsiders, it doesn’t make sense, and majority opinions always become public opinion.
Or just continue acting like the poor farmer is being bullied on even though he largely brought it upon himself.
Oh wow THAT CHANGES EVERYTHING!!! ;);) because I’ve never seen a fair before, thanks for educating me so much!!! Appreciate it!!!
eye roll
[QUOTE=RodeoFTW;8636053]
That’s not at all what I or anyone else was saying.
A 4H fair is still very different from a ‘working farm’ that had social media to encourage people and their children to see very particular named animals that they had no idea were going to one day be eaten and killed. Different from using said animals as petting animals for children like riding ponies at a party and doing online updates on them for people and their children to follow.
That’s not how typical farmers raise livestock. I’m sure your steer didn’t have fans.
You say one thing and then do the exact opposite. To outsiders, it doesn’t make sense, and majority opinions always become public opinion.
Or just continue acting like the poor farmer is being bullied on even though he largely brought it upon himself.
Oh wow THAT CHANGES EVERYTHING!!! ;);) because I’ve never seen a fair before, thanks for educating me so much!!! Appreciate it!!!
eye roll[/QUOTE]
Glad your up to speed with the sarcasm I’d hate for you to miss something…
Doesn’t “working farm” insinuate “we raise things for food”? I mean seriously you are stretch Armstrong’ing the heck out of this.
My steer didn’t have fans because it was 20 plus years ago… I’d wager there are PLENTY of kids who’s livestock end up with pages and followers.
You are right i’ll keep saying the famer was bullied and you keep making excuses for people to keep acting like Ostriches. Just not ones with names …that have social media pages …that may or may not end up as food.
[QUOTE=RodeoFTW;8635933]
Maybe these kinds of farmers shouldn’t try making money off of the unknowing public, then. Their educational program was ineffective.[/QUOTE]
ONE mother got bent out of shape and posted on social media for others to gang up on.
[QUOTE=Lynnwood;8636056]
Glad your up to speed with the sarcasm I’d hate for you to miss something…
Doesn’t “working farm” insinuate “we raise things for food”? I mean seriously you are stretch Armstrong’ing the heck out of this.
My steer didn’t have fans because it was 20 plus years ago… I’d wager there are PLENTY of kids who’s livestock end up with pages and followers.
You are right i’ll keep saying the famer was bullied and you keep making excuses for people to keep acting like Ostriches. Just not ones with names …that have social media pages …that may or may not end up as food.[/QUOTE]
Not if you don’t even know what that term means…
I’m just trying to explain a really easy to understand concept that people grow up with different kinds of exposures to animals, cultures surrounding animals, and therefore are under a different kind of impression when being allowed to bond with food animals.
Why is that so hard to grasp? I knew a city girl who screamed because she saw a butterfly and tried to skip town because of it. These people don’t know about ag. Zip. Nada. You let them treat something like a puppy and they are going to consider it a puppy.
A farmer living in New York City, liberal capital of USA, land of the vegans and yuppies, should have known freaking better. Good lord.
You can try to teach someone about farming too, but it doesn’t change the fact that they might not agree with how you’re doing it.
I personally have nothing against farming or raising livestock. I’ve even taught kids about livestock before. But if I was going to present them an animal that was going to be eaten, I knew better than to tell some urban/suburban kids that the cute baby calf was going to end up as veal steak one day. They can learn about cattle without becoming distracted about the fact of the particular animal in front of them.
I hope that clears up any confusion you might have about my argument.
[QUOTE=roseymare;8636062]
ONE mother got bent out of shape and posted on social media for others to gang up on.[/QUOTE]
Did you even read the petition? There were a lot of complaints about the farm from many people who went there. It wasn’t just one woman. A lot of people were upset. They felt that if the owner had been clear that his animals were for slaughter, they wouldn’t have spent their money patronizing it.
They also just happen to care about the cow, which isn’t a bad thing. Better than not giving a shit about animals at all.
Well it is not NYC it is Long Island. And we still don’t know exactly how the animal was presented to the tour.
Rodeo I TOTALLY understand what you are trying to say. What I disagree with is that further pandering to their ignorance is not the way to solve the problem.
Its not the farmers fault that some people are idiots. Why should the farmer have to change their way of life to make some ignorant women feel better about Minnie’s fate. Its fear mongering at its finest.
[QUOTE=roseymare;8636066]
Well it is not NYC it is Long Island. And we still don’t know exactly how the animal was presented to the tour.[/QUOTE]
Close enough. Similar kinds of people.
If you read the petition, you can understand how she was presented to the public. That was the biggest complaint about why they didn’t want her going to slaughter. People expected a ‘family-friendly’ farm where their kids could see Minnie the cow and enjoy seeing her for years to come and that wasn’t the case. There was a big failure in communication.
If the farm was private and closed off to the public (or at least wasn’t using the cow to advertise people to come in and see her), I wouldn’t feel so strongly about it.
[QUOTE=Lynnwood;8636067]
Rodeo I TOTALLY understand what you are trying to say. What I disagree with is that further pandering to their ignorance is not the way to solve the problem.
Its not the farmers fault that some people are idiots. Why should the farmer have to change their way of life to make some ignorant women feel better about Minnie’s fate. Its fear mongering at its finest.[/QUOTE]
If that’s what you think, you don’t really understand what I’m saying. What do you think I’m trying to say?
Also, just because someone has a difference in opinion or culture than you or what you’ve experienced, doesn’t make them stupid.
[QUOTE=Lynnwood;8636022]
I was a 4H’er with market animal projects. Hogs and Rabbits. They had names and were treated like family until they day they were sold and or were no more. They were presented to the public annually at fairs with their names in plain sight! They were auctioned by name not number …their fate was not hidden and NOBODY lost their senses over it.
As for social media postings …every current 4H and FFA kid I know posts photos of their project animals on FB and Instagram and 90% of those animals are destined to be food. How crazy a society that we are so weak mined and so lacking fortitude that photos of food animals before they are processed along with their names causes pandemonium.[/QUOTE]
Oh, for God’s sake.
This is the Beef Project page from the Animal Science section of the official 4H website: http://www.4-h.org/resource-library/curriculum/4-h-beef/
As you can see, the very first item, at the very top of the page, is a project guide called Bite the Beef - a title so pithy and unambiguous that the dumbest kid in America could easily wrap his head around it in 30 seconds or less.
Kids following Minnie’s adorable antics on the Benner Farm, on the other hand, not only failed to realize that their “new farm friend” was a beef animal to begin with, but somehow continued to miss this crucial point for two solid years.
4H and agritainment aren’t even distantly related cousins, so don’t even try and go there.
Unless they said specifically that the cow was the farm mascot and never to be eaten then there was no fraud. People like the woman and her followers are a lot of what is wrong with our country. Everyone thinks they have a right to decide how everyone else is running their lives. What their morals should be, their beliefs. It is hysterical to me that acceptance is shoved down our throats, by the most un-accepting people. Why should this or any other person have to explain anything to anyone? The farmer may open his farm to tours ect., however, they do not need to consult with the public on how to run it.
Then other people can say whatever they want about it; boycott, petition, and whatever else they feel like because that’s a right, too. 
You can’t have it both ways.
The impression people had was that the cow was a mascot. Why they’d keep a beef animal for over 20 months is beyond me.
If you look at the website, it’s clearly agritainment. Kids camps, “mommy and me” classes, music concerts, arts & crafts, animal petting, etc etc. There’s very little about it that screams working farm and nothing beyond ‘we keep animals for self-sufficiency’ to give people any kind of impression that the animals they are paying to love on and enjoy with their kids are going to be eaten. Just a lot of ‘come see the new baby animals!’
You can put out a product and people don’t have to like it.
But it is not a simple boycott. They are not standing outside the farm or on the internet saying.don’t visit Benners because of their slaughter policies. No instead they are wanting to dictate that they don’t slaughter but instead buy meat…
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