What is the goal of animal rights activists? Is there an ultimate humane condition relating to farm animal production in their view?
Dan Murphy posed those questions at the Farm Animal Council of Saskatchewan meeting last month. And his answer to the second question is no.
Murphy, a food industry commentator and former executive with the American Meat Council, believes the activities of such activists are lifelong engagements. Their more radical views are often written off as ludicrous by those involved in the livestock industry, but that attitude has allowed the radicals to gain a foothold with the public.
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“It’s never going to stop,” Murphy told the gathering of those interested in responsible food animal production. “The time to fight back has definitely arrived and the key will be the people involved in the business. You’ve got to take on the challenge.”
Murphy is doing his part. In 2007, he published a compilation of columns in The Meat of the Matter, a book that should be required reading for those willing to take up the challenge of providing the counter message to outlandish animal activist claims.
Producers might laugh out loud over some of Murphy’s writings. His contempt for the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals group is especially florid and his recounting of PETA’s pleas for stray animal care amid the war in Afghanistan is real entertainment. (“Hello? Wouldn’t a ceasefire on suicide bombings maybe, just maybe, have a positive ripple effect on the people … as well as the stray cats they can’t feed…?”)
His comparison of vegetarianism with celibacy gives one pause, as does much of the book’s content.
One of Murphy’s techniques is to counter those arguments that drive livestock producers crazy because of their deceptive simplicity, their grains of truth buried in complex situations. For example, the radicals’ assertion that if livestock producers would just stop feeding corn and barley to cattle, there would suddenly be more food for people in the developing world.
Or the idea that eliminating livestock production, with its accompanying fertilizer and fuel use and animal methane production, would halt climate change. Another is the suggestion that use of antibiotics for animal health puts mankind at risk of imminent decimation by antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
Such simple cause-and-effect scenarios play well to an uninformed public, but the reality is a different kettle of fish. The FACS group did well to highlight this speaker. Murphy’s book can be obtained by going to www.themeatofthematter.com.
