“I became a vegan the day I watched a video of a calf being born on a factory farm. The baby was dragged away from his mother before he hit the ground. The helpless calf strained its head backwards to find his mother. The mother bolted after her son and exploded into a rage when the rancher slammed the gate on her. She wailed the saddest noise I’d ever heard an animal make, and then thrashed and …dug into the ground, burying her face in the muddy placenta. I had no idea what was happening respecting brain chemistry, animal instinct, or whatever. I just knew that this was deeply wrong. I just knew that such suffering could never be worth the taste of milk and veal. I empathized with the cow and the calf and, in so doing, my life changed.” ~ James McWilliams
Wow. How sad is that?
I know lovely people who eat veal and dairy who would never be able to stand the idea of this let alone look at it straight in the face. Yet they eat and drink it daily/weekly – most likely because they don’t know the truth of how the meat landed on their plates or how the milk got to their grocery store.
This is the reason I embarked upon the path to veganism-I used to think that dairy was fine until I learned that in order for us to get dairy, female cows have to be repeatedly impregnated on ‘rape racks” – yes that’s what they are called in the industry – and have their newborn babies taken away from them as soon as possible so they can be milked for human use.
http://freefromharm.org/animal-products-and-culture/the-milk-of-human-unkindness/
Male calves are led off to become veal (an unbelievable sad story in itself) and female calves get to have a life just like their mothers, and are very soon themselves on these same ‘rape racks’.
Call it instinct or call it love, all animals should be allowed to care for their young and all young deserve a loving, safe start to their lives.
We need to open our eyes to the sad reality these animals face every day.
More on cows suffering here (warning-sensitive material in article and videos):
http://www.nzdairy.webs.com/thelifeofadairycow.htm
veganlivinggirl 