Living with integrity

As I watch the undercover dairy abuse investigation by Animal Recover Mission (ARM) at Fair Oaks Farm (and joint partner Coca Cola) unfold in the media there is one thing that comes to mind for me. These men have no integrity and thus Fair Oaks Farm has lost it’s integrity as well. What do I mean by integrity? These men are doing things that have no integrity. Integrity is not just defined as “the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles.” Integrity to me means that not just your own actions have strong moral principles, but that those actions are for the greater good. Not just for you, but for the larger society around you.

Massive confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs) such as this dairy at Fair Oaks Farm set themselves up for failure when they became obsessed with growth and money. In the 1970s, agricultural policies led to smaller farms consolidating into big monocultures (single crop). Animals were taken off the farm and squeezed into these animal “factories,” and instead of using manure for fertilizer we increased our usage of synthetic fertilizers. CAFOs allowed us to raise many more animals cheaply; we produce enough meat for every American to eat half a pound of meat a day, or 190 pounds a year. But it comes with steep ecological, health, and humanitarian costs.

Fair Oaks Farm is the largest dairy farm in the United States milking 15,000 cows daily. Most of the video depicts veal calves confined to small pens for the production of veal meat. The process of producing veal is cruel in its creation and has no integrity. The extreme confinement of these calves violates every sense of an animals rights to live the way nature intended. The calves used for veal are a by-product of the dairy industry. Dairy cows are kept pregnant to maintain milk production, thus they are constantly producing calves. About half of the calves are male and half female. The male calves (bulls) have absolutely no use to a dairy farmer and aren’t ideal genetics for meat production. These males along with some of the females are kept for the production of veal. Each one of these calves confined to a tiny cage not much bigger than their body. The idea of veal is that the calf moves as little as possible so that the meat stays tender. They are kept in this cage for 8 to 16 weeks and then processed. It’s a linear process that is fundamentally flawed and broken. This “crate” method of producing veal should be banned and against the law. Dr. Mike McCloskey, founder and owner of Fair Oaks Farm, made a video following the release of the abuse video by ARM. He said “I am making a commitment to you that you will never see another video of our animals suffering.” I have seen this same comment across the realm of medias by industrial, conventional agriculture advocates that the owner is going to make things “right.” I call bullshit. The simple fact of the matter is that this system of agriculture is fundamentally flawed. In fact, I would argue it’s hardly agriculture at all, it’s a degenerative factory that has one goal: profit. It seems as though when we talk about money there is an over concentration and focus on money has left us in a place of abstraction. Money provides a layer of abstraction that allows us to do really horrible things. I don’t know of any business CEO or farmer that would beat a calf to death, but they fund a dairy that ends up doing that anyway.

The men depicted in the video, including the owner have a demoralized mind. They live within a system that was a failure upon it’s inception. Their descent into depression is almost unstoppable. It’s a direct cause of this type of agriculture. You can see in the scripted video of Mike McCloskey that there is no expression or emotion whatsoever. I’m not a psychologist or behavioral analyst, but I can see straight through a “broken” person. These folks have anesthetized themselves to their surroundings. Why would anyone want to work in such a place? James Kuntzler recently said “none of those places are liable to furnish a personal sense of a life that is worth living.” I think this captures it because there are consequences for our actions. It’s not natural for humans to participate in such a system.

Agriculture has gone down a path for the greater part of a century towards subsidized, industrial and commodity food production. The direction we have gone in agriculture is unsustainable and the corporate agricultural machine is unstoppable. The predominant form of agriculture on our planet is doing things that are ultimately destroying the beauty of the world. We know we have to go in a new direction. The only answer I have is to live with integrity. We must call upon ourselves in any situation to live with integrity. It may be all that remains.

My friend and fellow regenerative farmer Jordan Green posted this earlier in the week and I couldn’t have said it better: “You know who is least likely to abuse their animals? The farmer who has a say in the prices of his product. The farmer who brings her children with her on deliveries.  The farm that has an open door policy where customers can pop in anytime and see everything. The farmer who feels fulfilled in his life calling to care for the environment, animals and people he leads.  The farmer who regularly corresponds with her customers and regards many of them as friends. In short, the local farm with an invested community of eaters, living, eating and working together. Videos like the one circulating today are a symptom, not the problem.”