By Baxter Black, Amarillo Globe News, October 16, 2007

To: Directors of HSUS, PETA, and the Farm Sanctuary

The first step in engaging an issue is to have the ability to
understand your ‘opponents’ point of view. I have watched your criticisms as we in animal agriculture have become more productive.

Your criticisms range from a distaste of raising chickens in cages to
promoting a vegan lifestyle and degrees in between.
I have visited with each of you on the telephone and I can’t paint you
all with the same brush, but I can include you in the same picture.

It appears to me you have a distrust for modern agricultural methods;
genetically modified foods, hog confinement sheds, beef feedlots,
farmed salmon and chemical fertilizer.

You mourn the loss of a bucolic family farm lifestyle that no longer
exists. You assume, I guess, that animals were treated more humanely
50 years ago.

You abhor growth stimulants, veal barns, hog gestation crates.

You use buzzwords like chemicals, factory farming, corporate farms,
antibiotics and hormones with the intent to demean.

And you spend considerable amounts of money to impede our efforts to produce livestock.

So it behooves me to try and understand how and why you are so
prejudiced against what we think of as a noble calling. Four
contributing factors:

1) You are vegetarians. In itself not a root cause but certainly a
bias… you would be unable to relate to a juicy steak, spareribs,
sushi or ice cream.

2) You evaluate ‘animal cruelty’ on your feelings of how you think a
human would react to a procedure or condition, as opposed to our less
subjective methods including egg production, pounds of milk, and
average daily gain.

3) As best I can tell, none of you have any first-hand knowledge or
experience making a living in animal agriculture.

4) You all favor more expensive, less efficient means of livestock
production even though you realize they will not allow us to meet the
demands of the majority of consumers.

Reciprocally, it would be nice if you understood why we work in a
business that is so physically and financially risky:

1) We love it. The animals, the land, the family and the lifestyle is
worth all the sacrifice. Obviously, because it is us who are taking
care of them, not you.

2) We take seriously our responsibility to meet the public’s demand
for the essential commodity: FOOD. Thus, our continuing search for the right balance of the animal’s well-being and her productivity.

3) We do not believe animals have rights, but that man was given
dominion over them and is obligated to care for them properly.

In conclusion, you label us as food terrorists and we call you animal
rights lunatics. But I’ll concede we have a few lunatics on our side,
too!

Baxter Black is a veterinarian and cowboy poet. His column appears
weekly and airs each Monday at 6:20 a.m. on KGNC Talk Radio 710.

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Posted by FFC on July 19th, 2009 :: Filed under Education and public awareness
Tags :: activists, animal welfare, Consumers, Farmers, meat, Vegetarian
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