Joel Salatin of Polyface Farm in Charlottesville, Virginia attained a certain moderate level of fame when his operation was featured in Michael Pollan’s book The Omnivore’s Dilemma. Now he’s got a book of his own called Everything I Want to Do Is Illegal.
Reason asked him to name some of these illegal things he wishes to do. Here’s one of them:
Sell custom-slaughtered meat by the piece: “My position is that if meat [slaughtered outside the normal factory processes] is OK for people to eat, give away, or feed their children—which indicates that it is not an inherently hazardous product—we should have freedom to also sell it. The restrictions are on the commerce of it. The attitude is: The only thing that is safe to eat is something with a government stamp on it, unless you get it free. Exchange money, and it’s somehow not safe.”
What do you think of this?
List: Fresh From the Farm [Reason via Fark]
More From Consumerist
-
If People Want To Drink Raw Milk, Should Dairy Farmers Be Able To Sell It To Them?
-
Walmart And Monsanto Team Up To Sell Genetically Modified Sweet Corn
-
Worst Company In America Round 1: Dish Vs. DirecTV
-
Man Reunited With His Wallet And The $800 Inside Three Years After He Lost It
-
There Is Such A Thing As The Milk Cliff: If Congress Doesn’t Act Soon, Prices Could Double
@sketchy: Human Beings are Omnivores. That means we are suppose to eat meat.
@P_Smith: I prefer to have it cleaned and plucked myself. This is an animal that eats its own droppings. They are nasty.
@Lo-Pan: Try Virginia’s prosciutto — its much cheaper and oh so good.
The problem is CONTROL. The main food controllers, ADM, Cargill, etc., don’t want little people selling a good, healthy product (e.g., raw milk and fresh meats). Instead most folks are forced to buy the chemical-laden cancerous meats and other products, which also keeps the chemical and drug companies in (big) business. And Big Brother is there to keep the little people down, in favor of the Big $$$.
@generalhousewifery: You go so much farther than I would be willing to go. I am a vegetarian and feel incredibly uncomfortable if my friends will not enjoy their meat dinners in front of me.
Vegetarians are like christians or other religious people. If they are willing to keep their practices to themselves, they’re easy to respect and get along with. It’s the ones who want to tell other people how to live that are met with hostility.
Going without meat for a meal so I can socialize with vegetarian friends isn’t going to kill me – that’s obvious, since you do it every day – so it’s no big deal. My objection is to the morons who think they can knock a ham sandwich out of my hand and onto the floor. I’ve met people like that.
@B: I’m not okay with unpasteurized milk or uninspected beef @MercuryPDX:I’d eat “unregulated beef” the same day I drink that “raw” (un-homogenized) milk… never.
Well I wouldn’t recommend either of you travel outside the country!
@zyodei: Excellent post, especially this part: Go to a Wal-Mart in middle America and look around. Do you see a bunch of healthy people glowing with life? Heeee!
@TheLoneIguana: @CaptainRoin: Brilliant!
Folks, this guy is in Virginia. The law he is complaining about is a Virginia law, not a US law, and it is not enforced by the USDA. There are plenty of states where he could do what he wants, but he would rather bitch about what Virginia won’t let him do than actually find a place where he could do it.
And if you don’t live in Virgina, this doesn’t affect you and you can’t do anything about it. If you do live in Virginia, write a letter to your state representatives.
BTW, it is possible to get RABIES from unpasteurized milk and the cow that produced the milk can be completely free from symptoms. Still want unpasteurized milk?
There is no way to know if the meat was inspected or not. Food poisoning is not fun and I have had it with the inspected (supposedly) stuff. To say anyone can sell un-inspected meat and let the buyer beware? NO WAY.
@mikelotus: Human Beings are Omnivores. That means we are suppose to eat meat.
Actually it means we’re capable of eating meat, but I applaud your efforts to redefine reality.
@ghettoimp: from Webster’s “feeding on both animal and vegetable substances.” But i do applaud your effort, failed that it is, of trying to convince us that you have half a brain.
My great-grandfather owned a dairy, and I still own a share in a herd of cows. We drink raw milk for several reasons, the main one being that pasteurization is only necessary in the first place because of large agribusiness firms mistreating the cows, never allowing them to see the light of day or roam free in a pasture. It causes infections and unhealthy cows – giant agribusiness practices make the milk filled with the infections in the first place – grass fed free range cows simply have far healthier milk from the get-go. Secondly, pasteurizing the milk destroys all the probiotics and beneficial enzymes. Dead milk (milk that has been pasteurized) has little if any true nutritional value outside the calcium (which is a mineral and isn’t alive). Live (“raw”) milk has actual health benefits which are documented. People have been eating cheeses and drinking live milk, yogurt, kefir and other dairy products for thousands of years, yet giant agribusiness firms want you to think their puss-filled dead milk is better for you. It isn’t.
As Americans, we want things to be good, fast, and cheap; what we get is cheap, fast, and protected by patronage/bureaucracy.
@sketchy: I eat what I eat, you eat what you eat. Kindly keep YOUR morality away from my dinner plate. I swear, vegans are worse than evangelical christians.