Last post I touched on how dairy comes from raped, abused and exploited mothers. Now image you are her newborn baby.

Milk is Murder

Having spent your entire life so far inside the warmth of your mother’s womb, the rush of her blood bringing comfort and the movement of her body rocking you to sleep, suddenly, you are thrust out into the strange, cold world. Confused, disoriented, feeling the weight of your own body after having spent your entire life thus far in a liquid suspension – you know your mother’s smell, the sound of her voice. You cry out for her, looking to be soothed by the same one who been their for you all the while.

In nature, as soon as your wet, slippery newborn body hit the ground, your mother would turn around and immediately start kissing and licking your stinky coat, an act that helps stimulate breathing and bring comfort. As you struggled to get steady on your stick-thin legs, she’d be there, her warm breathe brushing your matted coat, ready and waiting with an udder full of warm, nutrient-rich milk. Born with the natural instinct to seek your mother’s teat, the simple act soothes and reassures you: “It’s okay. Mama’s right here. I’m safe”.

This whole natural process is completely interrupted on commercial factory farms. In the Farm Sanctuary video “It Doesn’t Have to Be This Way”, a newborn calf, steam curling of his freshly born body, is seen being dragged through a mud and feces filled lot immediately after having passed through the birth canal. A careless farm hand drags him by a leg through the filth as his poor mother desperately runs after him, helpless, desperate.

If you are born a male, a dairy “by-product” (not genetically bred to grow grotesquely large and unable to produce milk), this is your fate. No mother to comfort you and no human around who thinks you’re more than just a veal production unit, you are thrown into a dark, wood slate crate – no bedding, no straw. A chain, just shy of a foot long, pinches your neck, securing you into this place that will be your home for the next 6 months until you are trucked off to slaughter, too weak from muscle atrophy to even walk. You are deprived of your mother’s milk and kept stationary so that your flesh stays nice and tender, just what veal connoisseurs are after. Some heartless farm hands take advantage of your desperate need to suckle what ever is put in your mouth – you know no better, you just want your mama.

Even if your tail hadn’t been hacked off for “sanitary” reasons (one less thing to get covered in your chronic, nutrient-deprived diarrhea), you’d never wag it. You have nothing that makes you even remotely happy. Six months of no sun, no grass, no breeze blowing through your fur, no mother, no love, no kisses. Six months of “why, why, why?!” You are living in a hellhole that is worse than the fate that fell upon many at Auschwitz. You are another number, another forgotten victim of our modern day holocaust.

Female calves suffer an ill existence as well. They are forced into the same slavery their mother’s suffer. Endless cycles of rape, being robbed of their child, and having their milk forcibly removed, with no compensation for their lives of servitude.

The one thing mother cows and their babies, be they boy or girl, have in common is their final fate: slaughter. Even on “organic, grass-fed” farms, cows are offered no retirement to a lush green field where they can chew cud till their last breath. No pat on the back or “atta girl”. Mother and child will all, at one point, get shoved into an over crowded cattle car and trucked off to slaughter. Having their life taken away so that a man could profit, they are forced to “sacrifice” their body – their only true belonging – so that Burger King can have a dollar value menu.

This is the face of dairy. This is where the cheese on your veggie pizza came from. This is where the half-n-half in your grande mocha latte came from. This is where the cow’s milk in your cereal came from. Is THIS worth it when there are humane, compassionate vegan alternatives to every dairy product in existence?

Do the right thing. Dump meat. Dump dairy. No mother deserves to be robbed of her child and a life that even remotely resembles a natural existence so that humans can eat what her breasts secrete. No food has or ever will be worth that price.

[image credit: Word1000.com]

May sound counter intuitive coming from a strict, “no, not even honey” vegan but I’m completely serious. Granted, I’d rather lick the soles of Britney Spear’s feet after she’s come traipsing out of a gas station bathroom than gnosh a slab of steak but if I had the choice between meat and dairy, I’d take the meat, all the way. And here’s why.

Male cattle raised for their flesh live a horrific existence, no doubt. Ripped from their mothers at birth with no chance to bond and know love, having their testicles and horns cut off with no pain killers (a method approved by the American Veterinary Medical Association yet, if you did the same thing to a dog, you’d be arrested on animal cruelty charges); living in feces filled feed lots, often times being denied veterinary care for fatal infections that the massive amounts of hormones they are fed can’t ward off. There’s no denying, cattle raised for their flesh live a life I would describe as hell on earth. Think it can’t get worse?

In order for cow mothers to make milk for their babies, they are repeatedly raped again and again by farm hands with a shoulder high latex glove and a vile of bull cum. A little after 9 months of gestation (hmmm, just like humans… but no! We have nothing in common!) and feeling their sweet little babies kick in their bellies, cow mothers push through the natural pains of child birth only to have their babies ripped from them the second they hit the ground. Cow mothers cry and bleat and beg and kick at their confine bars – they love their calves and like any mother, it kills them to have their precious little one stolen away.

How Dare We consume DAIRY

Then cow mothers, whilst recovering from the physical and emotional trauma of having their babies stolen, don’t even get to feel the lips of their little babe suckle their udder. Nope. Shortly after giving birth, there are hooked up to a steal machine that rips and tears their teat – and they get this fabulous little spa treatment six times a day, every day, after they have their first baby. A mama cow’s milk that her body has made for her baby is sucked out of her breast by the same people who raped her, who kidnapped her freshly newborn baby before she even had a chance to turn around to smell them, all so they can sell it for profit.

What does mama cow get as compensation? While we humans are paid for the time we spend making money for the man and we get to go home at the end of each work day, cow mothers are forced to devote their whole lives, their whole existence, to making profit for their rapists, without a day, an hour, a moments rest. They don’t even receive a soft bed of hay, a nice pet behind the ears, a healthy meal free of by-products and hormones. No. These mothers are treated like trash, production units, baby-making machines.

They are forced to live in mud and shit filled lots, sometimes sheds void of any natural lighting. They suffer case after case of mastitis, a breast infection (which results in puss in your milk) – coming from a mother whose has mastitis, it’s like someone punched you square in the tit. It hurts to high hell and along with the breast pain, you’re whole body aches like you have the flu. I only had it one day – dairy cows live with it every day of their lives. And when their tits don’t make enough milk, they don’t even get the luxury of retirement to a happy little field with rolling green hills. When Farmer John is all done raping her, stealing her babies, stealing her milk, he shows his gratitude by shipping her off in a feces encrusted, over-packed trailer to be chopped up into ground chuck.

The life of a dairy cow sounds like a hell on earth that no sick mind could even make up. As a mother, the thought of living a life like that physically makes me ill. But it doesn’t stop there. Next post, let’s take a peak as to where that stolen baby ends up.