Behind the "Local" Label

From talking with other individuals who buy local when they can, they’ll often say this when I say that I don’t eat animals: “Well, I only eat animals and animal products if they are local and I know the animals lived happy lives.”

I was always curious about this response, I didn’t really know if local animals lived happy lives; from the Ben and Jerry’s pictures, they sure looked happy.

Last summer, I got to find out. I was staying in Vermont with a friend and we had decided to go to Shelburne Farms, one of the most popular local food spots in Vermont. Their cheese is promoted all over my University.

It was beautiful; there were peaceful picturesque fields and chickens roaming around in the front. In the main “petting” area, there were some goats, sheep, and a mother cow and her calf who were separated by a fence. There was a young woman there who was answering questions and letting the little calf suck her fingers.

She was very nice and clearly cared about the animals. Because I had read up on factory farming and animal rights, I asked what they did to the male cows once the mother gave birth. I thought that it might be different here in this seemingly idealist place than in the factory farms that I had read about. 

I was wrong. She explained that they had to separate the calves from their mothers right away because if the calf suckled, they would form a bond that would be hard to break. She said that this was the hardest part of farming life because the mother and calf would cry out to each other. She said it was even harder than shooting the excess female cows right through the head with a bullet. And the male cows…she wasn’t sure what happened to them, but she guessed that they were shipped off to become veal.

When calves are turned into veal it means they are kept in tight areas where they can’t move and they can’t develop properly. They are killed when they are only two years old.

The thing that stood out to me the most was that at the end of this explanation she said, “I wish it weren’t this way, but that’s just the way things are.” The thing is I don’t think, that’s the way things have to be. The woman who worked at Shelburne seemed as equally compassionate towards animals as any vegan I’ve ever met.

I think we don’t realize that we have more power than we think we do. Every movement starts by one person feeling that something is wrong, like the woman who works at Shelburne farms and then living and looking at the world differently. I don't think we should let our inner instinct of taking care of other beings be over shadowed by the "way things are."I think the challenge of life is not causing the least amount of harm but aiming to achieve the greatest amount of compassion. 

I do like supporting local farmers and going to farmer’s markets. I do not think that we should close off our aim of compassion just because something is labeled as “local.”