Saturday, December 04, 2010

Salmonella?

That looks to be among the LEAST of the problems with this system.



I didn't understand what I was seeing in some of that footage, but there are dead/dying hens with prolapsed uteri, eggs resting on corpses, manure-covered hens, and worse.

I've sometimes rethought the passionate words I typed in a former post, exhorting us all to trust God for provision that doesn't violate His creation.  There are moments that just seems so elitist, so arrogant.  And then I'm reminded of things like this, and I'm convinced all over again.

Perhaps not surprisingly, this stirs up my politics too.  Not in the way of some, "why is this legal?  The government needs to do something about this!" but more, "see what happens when we trust some bureaucracy?  When we give regulating power over to some Department, when we allow the FDA or EPA or USDA to say what "organic" means - and then trust it?" [just to clarify, the above video was NOT of organic production, but if you trust a product just because it sports the organic logo, you're trusting someone else to control your food] Please, know where your food comes from.  Educate yourself.  If you're not sure, take a notepad with you to the store, and jot down brands/products you could know more about.  Do you know which "organic" milk brands are from cows raised on cement, in the dark, with organic grain as feed?  Which ones feed at least a portion of hay and use pasture when possible?  Which brands of cheese use milk from rBST-treated cows?  Better yet, buy what you can locally, put 100% of the price of your food into the producer's hands.  Isn't this a lot of work?  Maybe.  But do one thing at a time.  Eggs, this month.  Learn, choose, buy.  Do it consciously, not like one more Black Friday lemming who is swayed by every wind of advertisement.  Next month, milk, or yogurt, or some other staple of your home.  You can't change the big company featured in the video, but you can certainly change where your own grocery budget goes, who and what your dollars support.

Is it worth it?  You bet!  You will (probably) get far better food when you're judging its source for yourself.  There is something very satisfying about looking someone in the eye who caretakes your eggs, or beef, or carrots, or whatever.  You don't need to worry "where it came from" when you feed it to your children, whether their fried egg was first with a corpse, then workers-of-questionable-hygeine, then chemicals, then..?  If you are concerned about the well-being of the land, you can determine whether you're a help or hindrance to that, with your purchases.  You will more likely be eating fresher food and avoiding genetically-modified frankenfood.

You can do it!  Don't trust Big Brother with your food!  That responsibility is yours! :)


More on egg production/processing here.

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