Milk - The Other White Meat

So we’ve established that my friend Megan thinks cows have souls and deserve a long life, and while I disagree, I can respect her position.

So what about milk?

I mentioned to Megan that drinking more milk would keep a cow alive longer, as well as providing great nutrients to her diet. Her response was this. “Hmm, I’m not sure how much more compromise either of us can make. haha, I suppose we just see the dairy industry differently. I’ve heard that milk isn’t actually as nutritious as we’ve been told: “They (dairy products) contain no fiber or complex carbohydrates and are laden with saturated fat and cholesterol. They are contaminated with cow’s blood and pus and are frequently contaminated with pesticides, hormones, and antibiotics.” In addition, I wouldn’t want to support “Corporate-owned factories where cows are warehoused in huge sheds and treated like milk machines,” even if that isn’t true for all farms.

So where did Megan get this information from? That’s even more interesting.

“I’ve been getting all of my information about dairy from PETA (http://www.milksucks.com/index2.asp) and, while considering the fact that some of their claims may be biased and exaggerated, I generally believe what they say.”

I was stunned. I didn’t know that PETA had gone to that end to discredit our industry, and the extent to which they went to make “us” look bad.

The fact that milk gets numerous tests on the way from the farm to the consumer, the fact that it gets tested for a wide variety of contaminates, the good that the nutrients in milk do for us, is not getting to this group of young people.

I sent a link to Megan that talked about the good things that are in milk, and would dispel some of the “facts” that were on the PETA site. http://www.feedstuffsfoodlink.com/ME2/dirsect.asp?sid=F7B9ABB3F82C4F90BBA7424BE84C2C41&nm=Food+Facts

This site contains a lot of great information on the facts of the dairy industry concerning milk. But it’s pretty cold and clinical. Definitely not as “sexy”, as the horrible people, horrible products view that PETA portrays. So how do we make what we do look more attractive? Well, first we need to find someone better looking than me to tell the story.