Buy dairy and slaughter a calf

[Avinash 0]

Perhaps your mother meant "buffallo". Bulls just can't give milk.

[sudhaya 0]

 

yes, your right,

 

Thiest Prabhu I decline to comment. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

But I'd like to know, why is it we can maintain millions of cows everyday for flesh, the Government must fund these slaughter houses, what do you think?

[theist 1]

 

 

But I'd like to know, why is it we can maintain millions of cows everyday for flesh, the Government must fund these slaughter houses, what do you think?

 

 

Good question. With the use of far less energy we could have millions of self-sufficent refuges for cows providing milk instead of these heelish slaughter houses and feedlots.

 

I guess what we are seeing is the natural evolution of a grouping of demonic mentalities working in concert with each other over time. Demand and supply. Then they work to increase the demand through advertising etc. and it just snowballs.

 

It is truly amazing that the level of suffering caused to the animals is rarely thought of. No respect for life.

 

Just the lower modes acting. Also what kind of karma is it to be born into a slaughter house program?

 

I think the present cows may have been the slaughter house workers of the past.

 

A viscious cylcle for sure.

 

 

[ancient_paztriot 0]

You advised me on puss in milk a while back.

 

I've been drinking "organic milk" since.

[sudhaya 0]

 

 

"I think the present cows may have been the slaughter house workers of the past."

-------

 

<font color="blue"> This could be used as an excuse, </font color>

 

Maya-devi can use any means to punish, I don't think its necessary She uses, cow and humans together, and she can choose any number of animals. And since cows are very dear to KRSNA, it's these Mellacha cow-killers who are at fault not, the cows {karma}.

 

We could analyse for centuries about how the cows ended up in the slaughter houses, Karma is endless, you could say..

 

"I think the present cows may have been the slaughter house workers of the past."

 

Karma is endless, cows waiting to be killed--it's in their Karma to be killed? Cannot Karma be changed? Isn't that what KRSNA Consciousness is about?

[sudhaya 0]

 

http://www.mothercow.org/oxen/cow-statistics.html

[theist 1]

Karma is untracable really. But remember it's not the cow who suffers or enjoys but rather the soul identifying with that form.

 

Any way we look at it its all hellish.

 

Yeah I remember that article about pus in milk. I found it on PeTA. Really disgusting.

[sandra 0]

I do not thrive on the vegan diet. Reason: Multiple allergies (including but not limited to those: citrus fruits, peanuts...) and nutrient deficiencies. I actually made the transition to veganism for like a year but couldn't keep up with it. Believe me, it really was much against my will that i reverted back to lacto-vegetarianism. I am particularly stubborn! I didn't want to give up veganism even though i was turning sicklish... (I read so much about how cows suffer that i got disgusted with myself for consuming milk!) I like to work out and during my vegan year i had a difficult time just meeting my daily nutrient requirements. I never had this problem on a lacto-vegetarian diet before. Plus, i would have very low energy levels, take an awful long period of time to recover from flus and injuries and to make matters worse, skin rashes made their appearance on my arms and i become more prone to ecchymoses... And no, i wasn't overtraining and yes, i did make the effort of eating a variety of vegetables, salads, whole grains, whole cereals, fortified non-dairy milks, vitamin supplements, etc... But what really scared me back into lacto-vegetarianism was when my hair started falling in bunches!!! Strict vegetarians diet are prone to deficiencies such as B12, zinc, etc... And in my case, it was zinc deficiency. I don't especially like relying on supplements. All i do take however is a multi-vit tab daily. For me, the vegan diet is inadequate but i know people who do well on it! Anyway, the best i can do is buy organic dairy products... I think that veganism is alright... But didn't SP recommend milk products? I would really like to know more about SP's opinions concerning milk consumption. Many vegan advocates claim that milk is bad for humans but i do not completely agree. Sure, milk derived from cows treated with hormones or fed chemically processed foods, etc is indeed bad for your health but how about the organic alternatives?

 

Related websites:

http://www.diagnose-me.com/cond/C76343.html

http://dsp-psd.pwgsc.gc.ca/Collection/H48-10-1-86-1987E.pdf

http://www.academynaturalhealth.com/Vitamin/Zinc.HTM

[theist 1]

I would think that everything in cow's milk can be found elsewhere. The b-12 point is well taken. Although soy milk is usually fortified with it. I take a sub-linqual tablet often just to make sure my body keeps enough in store.

 

Either way I won't consume dairy. Easy for me to say though because I can't digest it well anyway. But how can we say we are protecting cows when we DIRECTLY support the veal industry by consuming milk?

 

Rather it is intended for humans to drink the milk of another species that they produced for their own babies I can't say. But certainly the present situation holds no resemblance to calves being herded by cowherd boys in the pristine forests of Vrndaban.

 

When the cows, calves and bulls are fully protected it might be another story. I know some devotees are working hard in that direction (and I mean hard). Their service is admirable and the example a great one. A few may follow but on a large scale I tend to doubt it.

 

I suppose we must let our conscience be our guide.

[sandra 0]

I admire vegans but it's not a way of life i can adopt. It's sad that iskcon doesn't have enough farms where one could buy dairy products from them! I believe anyone doing well on the vegan diet should continue with it (Like for you) but unfortunately, i can't...

[theist 1]

Sandra and others,

 

Here is a link to a very good article of the sunject of milk from the UK. Remember to click to link to the second article.

 

Well I've tried again and still can't get the link to work. I'll post it below. It is quite long so I tried to avoid posting it all on this thread. But I will in the next post. if the Admin. choose to replace that post with just a link that would be understandable. Sorry for my ineptitude with this linking stuff.

 

 

[theist 1]

 

Dairy monsters

 

We used to take it for granted that milk was good for us. But now the industry faces a crisis, with the public questioning such assumptions. So just how healthy is milk? Anne Karpf investigates

 

Saturday December 13, 2003

The Guardian

 

Does God's own PR company handle the account for milk? How else has it managed to hang on to its untarnished image, despite gallons of evidence to the contrary? White ergo pure, natural, nutritionally essential: milk seems more an element than a product, as if it were nature in a carton. While the reputation of other animal foodstuffs has plummeted, milk's has stayed relatively buoyant. Indeed, many people believe that their health will be jeopardised if they don't drink it. In the US, milk is virtually the national emblem (apple pie, in comparison, is an also-ran).

Yet something is bubbling up in the milk pan. The animal welfare groups, for so long preoccupied with chicken and beef farming, have begun to take up the cause of the dairy cow. The scientific evidence, too, is massing up that regular consumption of large quantities of milk can be bad for your health, and campaigners are making a noise about the environmental and international costs of large-scale intensive European dairy farming. Will milk be the site on which health scares meet animal rights?

 

We have been weaned on the idea that cows' milk is the most complete food to serve youngsters - default sustenance for picky children, liquid calcium for thirsty bones. So thorough is our dairy indoctrination that it requires a total gestalt switch to contemplate the notion that milk may help to cause the very diseases it's meant to prevent. Yet as far back as 1974, the Committee on Nutrition of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) was answering the question, "Should milk drinking by children be discouraged?" (even posing it seems heretical) with a "maybe".

 

Today, there's a big bank of scientific evidence against milk consumption, alleging not only that it causes some diseases but, equally damning, that it fails to prevent others for which it has traditionally been seen as a panacea. At the same time, new claims about its health-enhancing properties are being advanced almost monthly - 30 years on, the AAP has changed its mind and now recommends dairy products for children. For this is a story of evidence and counter-evidence, of an elixir tainted and attempts to restore it to its previous pre-eminence. At stake are enormous commercial interests, deeply rooted patterns of agriculture and consumption - and our health.

 

It starts in infancy. Frank Oski, former paediatrics director at Johns Hopkins school of medicine, estimated in his book Don't Drink Your Milk! that half of all iron deficiency in US infants results from cows' milk-induced intestinal bleeding - a staggering amount, since more than 15% of American under-twos suffer from iron-deficiency anaemia. The infants, it seems, drink so much milk (which is very low in iron) that they have little appetite left for foods containing iron; at the same time, the milk, by inducing gastrointestinal bleeding, causes iron loss.

 

The dairy industry acknowledges (as Hippocrates did) that some people are allergic to milk - though this makes it sound as if the problem lies in the individual's aberrant constitution, rather than in the beverage itself. Yet, when you look at it more closely, the extent of lactose intolerance is extraordinary. Lactose is the sugar in milk, and it needs to be broken down by the enzyme lactase that lives in our intestines and bowels. If the lactose we absorb is greater than our lactase capacity, undigested lactose travels to the large intestine, where it ferments, producing gas, carbon dioxide and lactic acid. The result? Bloating, cramps, diarrhoea and farts. In 1965, investigators at Johns Hopkins found that 15% of all the white people and almost three-quarters of all the black people they tested were unable to digest lactose. Milk, it seemed, was a racial issue, and far more people in the world are unable than able to digest lactose. That includes most Thais, Japanese, Arabs and Ashkenazi Jews, and 50% of Indians.

 

According to various studies, there's a whole catalogue of other illnesses that can be attributed to cows' milk, among them diabetes. A 1992 report in the New England Journal of Medicine corroborated a long-standing theory that proteins in cows' milk can damage the production of insulin in those with a genetic predisposition to diabetes. The dairy industry dismisses this as "just a theory" - along with "myth" and "controversial", a term it applies to almost all studies critical of milk.

 

The anti-milk lobby also claims that consumption of dairy products can aggravate rheumatoid arthritis and has been implicated in colic, acne, heart disease, asthma, lymphoma, ovarian cancer and multiple sclerosis. Major studies suggesting a link between milk and prostate cancer have been appearing since the 1970s, culminating in findings by the Harvard School of Public Health in 2000 that men who consumed two and a half servings of dairy products a day had a third greater risk of getting prostate cancer than those who ate less than half a serving a day. In the same year, T Colin Campbell, the Jacob Gould Schurman Professor of Nutritional Biochemistry at Cornell University, said that "cows' milk protein may be the single most significant chemical carcinogen to which humans are exposed".

 

To milk advocates, this is outrageous. They counter that milk actively protects against a whole cluster of diseases, reducing the risk of hypertension and perhaps kidney stones. Milk, they say, helps remineralise tooth enamel and can be positively anticarcinogenic (particularly against colon cancer). What's more, Harvard University's huge Nurses' Health Study found a lower risk of breast cancer in pre- (but not post-) menopausal women who consumed a lot of low-fat dairy foods such as skimmed milk. Even more dramatic is a Norwegian study of premenopausal women that showed those who drank three glasses of milk a day had a 50% - yes, 50% - lower incidence of breast cancer. But stay that hand reaching for a latte: another Norwegian study found that those who drank three-quarters of a litre or more of full-fat milk a day had a significantly greater risk of breast cancer than those who drank more modest amounts. And so it goes.

 

As with milk and cancer, so with milk and fats: the research is by no means unanimous. Dissenting studies reach quite different conclusions. In one, Scottish men who drank milk every day were found to have a slightly lower risk of heart disease than those who didn't. Similarly, the Honolulu Heart Study found that non milk-drinking men had twice the risk of stroke of those who drank 16oz a day, while the Caerphilly Study found an almost 90% lower risk of heart attacks and strokes among Welshmen who drank at least a pint of full-cream milk a day.

 

The critics say these are small studies, in which other dietary and genetic factors, exercise and alcohol may swamp the effects of milk drinking. But couldn't the same accusation be levelled at studies revealing the malign consequences of milk? Not so, say the critics: those studies are far larger, build in the countervailing factors and still come up with a strong correlation between the saturated fats in milk and the risk factors for ill health.

 

Yet even if milk does play a part in causing some diseases, surely it's crucial in avoiding others? "After the first year of life," concluded Oski, "the child requires no milk of any type. The child, like... adults, can thrive without cow milk ever crossing [its] lips." A profane statement such as that lights a flare of questions. What about osteoporosis and our need for calcium? Surely if we don't eat dairy products we'll become brittle-boned and frail, destined for the dowager's hump? It's an intriguing coincidence that just as the alarm was sounding about the fat content of milk products, along came the panic about osteoporosis to propel us straight back to dairy.

 

To the milk critics, the shibboleth that osteoporosis is caused by calcium deficiency is one of the great myths of our time (each side accuses the other of myth peddling). Mark Hegsted, a retired Harvard professor of nutrition, has said, "To assume that osteoporosis is due to calcium deficiency is like assuming that infection is due to penicillin deficiency." In fact, the bone loss and deteriorating bone tissue that take place in osteoporosis are due not to calcium deficiency but rather to its resorption: it's not that our bodies don't get enough calcium, rather that they excrete too much of what they already have. So we need to find out what it is that's breaking down calcium stores in the first place, to the extent that more than one in three British women now suffers from osteoporosis.

 

The most important culprit is almost certainly the overconsumption of protein. High-protein foods such as meat, eggs and dairy make excessive demands on the kidneys, which in turn leach calcium from the body. One solution, then, isn't to increase our calcium intake, but to reduce our consumption of protein, so our bones don't have to surrender so much calcium. Astonishingly, according to this newer, more critical view, dairy products almost certainly help to cause, rather than prevent, osteoporosis.

 

Consider this: American women are among the biggest consumers of calcium in the world, yet still have one of the highest levels of osteoporosis in the world. Lots of researchers have tried to work out the relationship between these two facts. A study funded by the US National Dairy Council, for example, gave a group of postmenopausal women three 8oz glasses of skimmed milk a day for two years, then compared their bones with those of a control group of women not given the milk. The dairy group consumed 1,400mg of calcium a day, yet lost bone at twice the rate of the control group. Similarly, the Harvard Nurses' Health Study found that women who consumed the most calcium from dairy foods broke more bones than those who rarely drank milk. Another piece of research found that women who get most of their protein from animal sources have three times the rate of bone loss and hip fractures of women who get most of their protein from vegetable sources, according to a 2001 National Institutes of Health study.

 

The pattern of diet and fractures in other parts of the world is equally revealing. Most Chinese people eat and drink no dairy products, and get all their calcium from vegetables. Yet while they consume only half the calcium of Americans, osteoporosis is uncommon in China, despite an average life expectancy of 70. In South Africa, Bantu women who eat mostly plant protein and only 200-350mg of calcium a day have virtually no osteoporosis, despite bearing on average six children and breastfeeding for prolonged periods. Their African-American brothers and sisters, who ingest on average more than 1,000mg of calcium a day, are nine times more likely to experience hip fractures. Campbell puts it unequivocally: "The association between the intake of animal protein and fracture rates appears to be as strong as that between cigarette smoking and lung cancer."

 

Almost none of these scientific findings has been reflected in mainstream nutritional advice, which continues to emphasise the need for calcium. In fact, the recommendations on calcium are now so high that it is difficult to devise practical diets that meet them. The AAP, for example, currently recommends five daily servings from the milk group for adolescents (try getting those into figure-conscious teenage girls).

 

But there's another vital part of the calcium puzzle that suggests that the American Dietetic Association and its UK counterparts are looking in the wrong place. Instead of recommending multiple servings of dairy, they'd probably have done better to advise women, and especially teenage girls, to take more exercise. A 15-year study published in the British Medical Journal found that exercise may be the best protection against hip fractures and that "reduced intake of dietary calcium does not seem to be a risk factor". Similarly, researchers at Penn State University concluded that bone density is affected by how much exercise girls get in their teen years, when up to half of their skeletal mass is developed. The girls who took part in this research had wildly different calcium intakes, but it had no lasting effect on their bone health. "We [had] hypothesised that increased calcium intake would result in better adolescent bone gain," said one researcher. "Needless to say, we were surprised to find our hypothesis refuted."

 

What's the dairy industry's response to all this? The Americans say the idea that excess protein makes you pee out calcium is controversial. The British call it a myth. And those figures on the higher rates of fracture in countries where large amounts of dairy are consumed? Ah, they say, that can be explained by the fact that the northern hemisphere has a limited number of months a year when we're outside for long enough for our bodies to synthesise vitamin D, which is vital for the absorption of calcium. And they're right - vitamin D is critical. In a major follow-up to the Nurses' Health Study, the risk of hip fracture in postmenopausal women was reduced not by milk or a high-calcium diet, but by higher vitamin D intake.

 

The Dairy Council also says that we protein- and calcium-guzzling northerners keep breaking our hips because of our sedentary lifestyle - ie, we don't exercise enough. Remarkably, here they acknowledge one of the milk critics' central arguments: that no matter how much calcium you down, without adequate exercise and vitamin D, it's to no avail. So much for milk as the great bone protector.

 

By now, the reader (unless you're Bantu) may be despairing. So what is it that you should be eating, especially since soya milk is now suspected of having undesirable, even toxic, effects. Should we eat nothing, since all of it makes us sick? Or, in that case, we might as well eat everything? For the record, calcium from leafy vegetables seems pretty benign (though watch out for pesticides) - it is, after all, where elephants, rhinos and most other animals get their strong bones from - as are nuts, seeds and dried fruit. Absurd, says the dairy industry: you'd need seven servings of cooked broccoli or eight medium bags of peanuts to get the same amount of calcium as in a 200ml glass of milk. Milk isn't only nutrient-dense, but it needs no preparation and is easily swallowed, both important considerations with the very young and the old.

 

But given that the benefits of cows' milk have been seriously questioned, why is it still nutritional orthodoxy and a staple of government policy? One reason is history. Even within living memory, rickets was widespread. In the poor living conditions that the working class had to endure early last century, milk seemed indispensable, with the result that it came to be indissolubly linked to health. The 1934 Milk Act, providing elementary schoolchildren with a third of a pint a day at the subsidised price of a halfpenny, enshrined this idea; by 1965, the majority of English and Welsh schoolchildren were downing their daily third. When, in 1971, as minister of education, Margaret Thatcher controversially decided to withdraw free school milk for children over seven, she was widely vilified as a "milk-snatcher". (Perhaps she's retrospectively due some gratitude?)

 

Yet already 10 years earlier, the Framingham Heart Study had reported a link between coronary heart disease and raised cholesterol levels, and by the 1970s the Royal College of Physicians was recommending the replacement of saturated fats by polyunsaturated. But still the association of milk with health is hard to break. Says Tim Lang, professor of food policy at City University, "The contradictions in policy are a leftover from the 1940s, when nutritionists argued, with justification, that milk provided a good technical fix for poverty. Sixty years on, nutritional science has advanced, and important evidence of the impact of saturated fats has come to the fore."

 

Another reason why official policy on milk is often at odds with medical evidence lies in the conflict of government role, both in Britain and the US. The US department of agriculture, for example, has the twin, and often mutually incompatible, tasks of promoting agricultural products and providing dietary advice. In 2000, it was still recommending two to three servings of dairy products a day, to the rage of critics such as the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. PCRM claimed that six of the 11-member drafting panel had close ties with the meat, egg and dairy industries (five of them with dairy).

 

Britain isn't free from conflict of interest, either. The government is heavily involved in encouraging us to drink milk. The department for the environment, food and rural affairs (Defra) sponsors both the dairy industry and the Milk Development Council, responsible for the generic marketing of milk. Equally parti pris are the British and US dairy councils - apparently the source of public health information, but in reality branches of the milk business. In the UK, the National Dairy Council is the promotional arm of the industry, funded by dairy farmers, milk processors and manufacturers. Its website includes the "fact" that eating three portions of dairy products a day significantly lowers cholesterol and the risk of coronary heart disease. Of course, it's no crime for the industry to promote itself; what's disturbing is its masquerading as a disinterested source of incontrovertible information.

 

What has galvanised the whole debate has been a major change in our dietary habits. We just aren't drinking milk in the quantities we used to. The British went down from 30.55 gallons each a year in 1969 to 25.42 in 1993; by 2001, this had fallen further. But the milk industry is fighting back.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[theist 1]

Dairy Monsters

Part two

 

Anne Karpf

Saturday December 13, 2003

The Guardian

 

For years, milk producers thought their product so essential that it didn't need marketing - you don't promote water or air, after all. But when sales declined because of anxieties about cholesterol, the rise of eating out and competition from soft drinks and bottled water, they realised it was time for a makeover. Out went the goody-two-shoes image, and in its place came the birth of cool. Milk was repositioned by major ad campaigns. The first was the "Got Milk?" campaign, launched in California in 1993, in which celebrities and high-profile sports figures were adorned with a white milk moustache: Naomi Campbell, Serena Williams, Melanie Griffiths, the cast of Friends - all were featured with one. The idea has now travelled to Britain, where milk's unhip image is challenged by the National Dairy Council's The White Stuff campaign, launched in 2000 (and co-funded by Defra). It plays the macho card (white stuff/right stuff), suggesting that milk drinkers are as tough as aviation heroes, reinforced by a punchline demanding, "Are you made of it?" (calcium and strong bones, that is). Recruiting homegrown celebrities such as George Best and Chris Eubank, it increased UK sales.

 

The Americans also tried to staunch the flow away from milk by introducing flavoured milks. Forget chocolate, strawberry or banana; today, you can choose between "Orange Scream: a whole new concept in milk" (contents: cellulose gum, pectin, soy protein, high fructose corn sugar, sugar and annatto colour), cappuccino-flavoured milk, caffeine milk, even root beer milk. And anyone for carbonated milk, with carbon dioxide for added fizz? In Britain, the industry is promoting the provision of milk in primary schools, and installing milk bars in secondary schools. On average, each bar shifts 10,000 litres a year.

 

The final, and perhaps most insidious, dimension of the dairy fightback is funding research. Michael Zemel is director of the Nutrition Institute at the University of Tennessee; his study demonstrating that the consumption of skimmed milk, yogurt and cheese can lessen the risk of obesity attracted international publicity, as well as an enthusiastic press release from the National Dairy Council, which omits to reveal that it funds him. A recent Zemel study shows that people who included three servings of Yoplait Light yogurt in their diet lost significantly more weight than those in the control group (another of his funders is General Mills, makers of Yoplait Light). The British Nutrition Foundation, however, cites the yogurt study as if it were independent research.

 

How come it's taken so long to learn about milk's less health-giving properties? Partly it's to do with how research is conducted. Until recently, no one had done the science - the epidemiological and population studies. What's more, though the milk advocates maintain that humans have kept animals for milk products for thousands of years, milk-drinking on the scale we have it now is relatively new. Fresh, raw milk was rarely consumed after childhood until the late 19th century, except in nomadic countries. Milk is essentially a modern, industrial phenomenon - its consumption only really took off after the discovery of pasteurisation in 1864.

 

In the west, we've moved very fast (in historical terms) from undernutrition to overnutrition, from insufficiency to excess. While milk had a major role to play early in the last century, today's nutritional needs are different. Says Lang, "I'm not saying that milk is lousy. It does have lots of nutrients and is a rich source of energy, quickly taken up in an easily digestible form - good when children were short and you needed growth. But should we be basing our diets on it today, as though without dairy we couldn't survive? I'd say no."

 

Alongside the researchers raising questions about milk sits the more inflammatory animal rights movement, which has recently focused its attention on dairy farming and what it argues is its intrinsic cruelty. For a long time, those concerned about animal welfare seemed magically to exempt milk from their preoccupations. They suffered from what Richard Young of the Soil Association calls "the vegetarian fallacy": non-meat-eaters who still drink milk and so perpetuate the cycle that ends in crated veal calves destined for European dinner tables. Now many of them have begun to contend that, organic or not, there's no such thing as humane milk. For in order to lactate, cows - like humans - first have to get pregnant. Calves are essentially the waste by-product of the industry. What happens to them once they've done what they were created to do - stimulate a cow's milk production by the very fact of their being conceived?

 

Male udderless cows are of no value to the dairy industry, so if prices for male calves are low and the veal route unprofitable, most are killed within a couple of weeks for baby food or pies, to make rennet, or sent to rendering plants to be turned into tallow or grease or, in other countries, animal feed. Female calves, on the other hand, are bred as replacement stock for their mothers. The provision of beef essentially originates in the dairy industry: if we didn't drink milk, we wouldn't have all that extra meat to get rid of.

 

Though a male calf's life is unenviable, its mother's is no better. To ensure almost continuous lactation, she endures annual pregnancies. Her calf is removed from her within 24 hours of its birth. Calves hardly ever drink their mother's milk.

 

Like agribusinesses everywhere, milk producers have tried to increase output while cutting costs. The victims are the cows. Today, from the age of two, they're expected to produce up to 10,000 litres of milk during their 10-month lactation stint (before they dry off, are re-inseminated and the whole process starts up again). Milked once or twice (or even three times) daily while pregnant, they produce around 20 litres a day, 10 times as much as they'd need to feed a calf. The amount of milk cows are required to make each day has almost doubled in the past 30 years, because having a smaller number of high-yielding cows reduces a farmer's feed, fertiliser, equipment, labour and capital costs. That's why the variety of cattle breeds in Europe has declined so much - everyone wants the high-yielding black-and-white Holstein-Friesens.

 

You don't need to be sentimental about animals to pity the poor bloated creatures, dragging around their vast, abnormally heavy udders. Many each year go lame, and they rarely live longer than four or five years, compared with a natural lifespan of around 25 years. Then they are slaughtered.

 

The official view is that not only do dairy farmers care about their cows, but that it's in their interests to keep them healthy. The reality is that overmilking, problems with cleanliness and the choice of high-yielding breeds together cause more than 30 incidents of mastitis per 100 British cows each year. Mastitis is a painful infection of the udder. Cows' mastitis has implications for human health, too, because to control infection farmers use more antibiotics. Although milk from cows being treated with antibiotics must be discarded and can't be sold, there are far more antibiotics in commercial use than are tested for.

 

The industry's most indefatigable foe, Robert Cohen, a former scientific researcher and author of Milk: The Deadly Poison, has declared, "We are at war... Monsanto is the enemy." The object of Cohen's wrath is Posilac, Monsanto's trade name for rBST, recombinant bovine somatotropin, which is injected into cows to get them to produce more milk. This synthetic growth hormone, approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 1993, boosts a cow's milk output up to 15%. According to the FDA, hormone-treated milk is "not significantly different" from untreated milk. Cohen, along with other critics, disagrees. He went on a 206-day hunger strike to pressurise (unsuccessfully) the FDA into banning Posilac.

 

Cohen et al maintain that greater levels of IGF-1 (Insulin-like Growth Factor-1) in rBST milk are linked to breast and colon cancer, hypertension and diabetes. On the other hand, respected health bodies, such as the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, World Health Organisation, American Council on Science and Health, and American Medical Association, have all confirmed the safety of milk supplemented with rBST.

 

Perhaps the most bizarre aspect of the rBST milk saga has been the introduction since 1993, in 13 US states, of Food Disparagement Acts. Hitherto only a living person or company could be libelled, but under this legislation you can now libel fruits, vegetables, cattle, even fish, and be sued for large sums. Opponents claim that the acts are just another weapon designed to intimidate critics and curtail evolving nutritional knowledge. It was under this act that Oprah Winfrey was sued when, in the wake of the UK's mad cow disease outbreak, a guest on her show disparaged beef.

 

In one sense, this needn't bother us, since the EU, along with Canada, Japan and 100 other countries, has banned rBST milk because of its effects on animal (rather than human) health and welfare. On the other hand, there are no restrictions on the import of rBST dairy products, or a requirement to label them. And even if we scrupulously try to avoid GM products ourselves, we're drinking milk from cows unable to do the same, since 6% of animal feed in Britain is made up of GM products (maize, soya and corn).

 

If you're struck by the absurdities in the milk story so far, this last part will have you thinking you've woken up in the middle of a Dalí painting. It concerns the common agricultural policy (CAP), a system so opaque and complex that it seems expressly designed to elude (or should that be evade?) public scrutiny. In her recent briefing on the dairy industry, Land Of Milk And Money?, for Sustain, an alliance of more than 100 national public interest and farming organisations, Vicki Hird unearthed its follies. Here are some gems:

 

In 2001, CAP provided €16bn of direct and indirect support to dairy production, and yet, over the past 10 years, average farm income has all but collapsed. Most British dairy farmers sell milk at less than it costs to produce - they get around 18p for a litre that sells for 43p in the supermarket. CAP subsidies to traders allow dairy products to be dumped (exported below cost) on to the international market, destroying the livelihoods of thousands of small-scale farms in countries such as Jamaica and Kenya. Equally bizarrely, the EU imports Brazilian soya beans to feed to its cows, then sells some of the resultant surplus milk powder back to Brazil.

 

The WHO recommends that we consume not more than 10% of our total calories from saturated fat, but CAP encourages milk fat production and subsidises schools to buy full-fat (but not fat-free) milk and food manufacturers to buy surplus butter. And just when nutritionists have vaunted the healthiness of the fruit- and vegetable-dominated Mediterranean diet, those Mediterranean countries joining the EU, and therefore CAP, have increased milk production and consumption, and decreased fruit and veg production. This trend, known as "nutrition transition", is not, Hird argues, inevitable but shaped by food policy and pricing.

 

It gets worse: milk quotas are set by CAP at a level that guarantees a surplus, allowing cheap export, yet in the UK the current milk quota is not enough to meet domestic need. Milk quota (effectively the right to produce milk) can be traded as if it were milk. Until the end of 2003, even non-producers were allowed to rent and lease it - so, for instance, Manchester United has traded in milk quota.

 

And the final insult: a large proportion of subsidised skimmed milk powder surplus to European requirements is sold cheaply to veal producers, who then feed it to calves. In other words (and with only a dash of poetic licence), after the calves have been forcibly removed from their mothers, the milk they would have been drinking is turned into powder and fed back to them. At taxpayers' expense.

 

So what's the alternative? Compulsory veganism and the banning of milk? The dairy industry is the single largest agricultural sector in Britain, which is the third largest milk producer in the EU. It generates £6bn in retail sales, and can't just be wished away. Nor do most of us respond well to attempts to police our eating habits. Yet what we eat and drink isn't just the result of individual choice and cultural tradition: the contents of our shopping trolleys are at least equally shaped by government policy and official decisions.

 

Dr Tim Lobstein, co-director of the Food Commission, an independent watchdog on food issues, is scathing about dairy overproduction. He advocates the removal of all EU subsidies from dairy production, with the money going to support sustainable forms of food production, including some organic dairy farming. What would he say to struggling dairy farmers?

 

"I can't help to stay in business the producers of commodities that aren't helping human health - they'll have to find alternative employment. The EU should help farmers transfer to products more helpful to human health, such as horticulture."

 

Why, Lobstein asks, do we need to import onions from Tasmania or beans from Kenya? Perhaps the ultimate folly is the import of New Zealand apples into a country in which so much of that fruit is grown already. Hird's report recommends more radical CAP reform, the removal of free school milk, the adoption by the WTO of anti-dumping measures, as well as other structural changes that would produce "less, better milk from happier cows".

 

Of course, changing food policy and individual eating habits is hard and slow. The first major step is a national debate about milk production and consumption - a real one, not the kind the government has conducted on GM foods. Part of this debate will have to be a frank appraisal of whether milk can jeopardise human health. Finding a way of discussing milk that neither evangelises nor demonises will be tough. So, too, is distinguishing the dogma from the science, especially since the research is so often conflicting. Yet it seems increasingly clear that dairy prodicts alone probably don't protect bone health in the way we've long thought, and that calcium intake on its own has only a small effect on bone density.

 

At the same time (and Atkinds notwithstanding), while some fats are essential, the human body does not thrive on excessive amounts of milk fat. Yet milk's connotations are so primordial, its associations so pastoral and the interests that promote it so enormous, that changing the way we think about it, and drink it, will be a process every bit as challenging and root-and-branch as the loss of unquestioning religious faith.

 

 

 

[sandra 0]

Hare krsna! I think i read somewhere (Some Ayurveda book? Or was it SP who mentioned it...? Can't recall exactly...) that it's not recommended to drink more than 2 glasses of milk - becomes toxic for the body. Thanks for pasting the whole article. Well, i'll just moderate my dairy consumption! At least i can do that! Some say soy is bad, others dairy... Makes your life much too complicated!

 

Maybe milk could be good or bad for you according to your ayurveda constitution: Kapha, Pitta or Vata

 

I think I'm Pitta... Gotta check that out!

 

From http://www.mothercow.org/oxen/cow-milk.html :

 

ABOUT COW MILK

(From THE AYURVEDIC COOKBOOK by Amadea Morningstar with Urmila Desai)

 

Dairy is a builder, not a cleanser. Dairy is used as a prelude to some Ayurvedic cleansing. It gives grounding, mass, sweetness, and usually coolness to meals. For these reasons, it is excellent for children, teenagers, pregnant and nursing mothers, those seeking calm and grounding, and convalescents. It is superb for Vata, miserable for Kapha (with a few key exceptions) and at times quite beneficial for Pitta. It offers calories, calcium, protein, and some vitamins. It builds bones and teeth, and in Vata strengthens the heart and nervous system. In Kapha it can do the opposite for the heart, adding congestion where it is not needed. Its cool sweetness is good for tonifying Pitta, if the appropriate dairy products are used.

 

As Robert Svoboda points out in his excellent book Prakruti, Your Ayurvedic Constitution, dairy has gotten a bad name in health circles more through its methods of preparation and mode of consumption than through its innate qualities. In the West, it is usually served cold, unspiced, homogenized, with other foods, and in excess. Its high-fat content, heaviness and coldness does not lend it to these uses. Served in this way, it can increase one's risk of heart disease, cancer or obesity. Dairy needs to be used skillfully and not in excess.

 

Cow's milk was highly regarded by the Ayurvedic sages, being lighter and easier to digest than most dairy. It invigorates and works well for both Vata and Pitta, so long as they are not allergic to it. Unfortunately, cow's milk was introduced extremely early to Western babies of the post-war period, for widespread sensitivities to it as a food now. If it agrees with you (i.e. does not cause diarrhea, gas, congestion, or other discomforts) it is an excellent and balancing food, when properly prepared.

 

Preparation is the key. There has been a lot of controversy over raw versus pasteurized homogenized milk in the last few decades. In Ayurveda, raw milk is recommended whenever possible, and milk is always boiled before serving. This high heat effectively kills bacteria in raw milk. It may also denature the proteins of pasteurized milk further, causing their breakdown into shorter amino acid chains which are then easier to digest. In general, boiling makes it safer and easier to digest; this is especially true when it is raw. The boiling process also warms a usually cold product as will the addition of warming spices such as cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, and black pepper. A bit of honey added after heating will also balance the qualities of the milk, warming and drying it.

 

Pasteurization has made the consumption of mass-produced dairy safer in terms of eliminating the chance of bacterial infections for large groups of people. But its lower heating point (15 seconds at 161 degrees Fahrenheit or 30 minutes at 145 degrees Fahrenheit) does not make the dairy more digestible nor does it eliminate the risk of potential viral contamination. The incomplete heating of pasteurization seems to cause the partial breakdown of proteins into tangled coils. These disorganized tangles are difficult for digestive enzymes to hold on and break down. For some people, this raw dairy does not. The homogenization process is another controversial one. It apparently splits the fats down into small enough globules that some pass into the blood stream whole, initiating a complex process which may lead to a greater tendency to create atherosclerotic clots. Whether such a tendency actually exists is still being hotly debated in medical and health circles. In any case, the cow's products extolled by the ancients is not the same as that sold in most markets today.

 

Another interesting website on cow protection, etc:

 

http://www.love4cow.com/virtues.htm

 

 

[theist 1]

I have also heard that there is a limit to how much soy one should consume. I find myself tending to ore and more nut drinks like almond cashew etc. I don't actually make them into what people call milks but rather I just grind them into a powder and mix them with a little fruit and spices like cardamon.

 

I think the following quote makes a valuable point.

 

 

In any case, the cow's products extolled by the ancients is not the same as that sold in most markets today.

 

 

Seems they are not even remotely the same product.

 

Plus the real concern should be with the cows and calves. If we can find alternatives then we should. I really can't speak to the nutritional side of it as it seems the more I read on the subject the more confused I become.

 

These _knig(sorry i can't help myself)factory farm demons should not even set foot on the same pasteuring ground as a gentle cow. Let's try to act more and more in their interests.

 

haribol

[Guest guest]

I thought I was doing alright not eating meat & eating paneer instead. Now after reading this thread, I am seriously worried about buying milk. I was buying organic milk. Is that no good too? I will go vegan if you say that organic still means the calves are being slaughtered. Let me know.

[Guest guest]

We can only wish all people were that conscious. Male calves are still born so they are sold to veal producers. The mothers are kept in virtual slavery and forced to produce much more milk than their bodies were designed for. Organic milk still contains somatic blood cells and pus only somewhat less. After the cow is found to produce less milk then they desire she is slaughtered and sold as meat.

 

The dairy industry and the meat industry are really the same industry only with emphasis on different products.

 

Do a Google search on organic milk and animal rights.

 

Here is one for you.

 

 

 

TROUBLE ON THE HORIZON

Horizon Organic Dairy is America's leading producer of organic milk and dairy products with sales of over $50 million per year.

 

The people at Horizon want you to believe that their cows are so happy, that they've trademarked the phrase "HAPPY COWS."

 

Horizon's press kit includes a re-printed article, originally excerpted from Rodale's "Your Organic Kitchen."

 

The opening paragraph, accompanied by a photo of "happy cows" in a tranquil field setting, reads:

 

"Although Horizon Organic Dairy doesn't claim that its Happy Cows are sacred, the nation's leading organic dairy treats its most honored employees like deities."

 

According to my year-2000 almanac, there are about 4 million Jews in America and over 5 million Muslims. There are one million Hindus. The rest of Americans worship as their "deity," Jesus.

 

Wasn't Jesus nailed to a cross? Didn't Jesus "die for man's sins?"

 

That's no way to treat a deity, and Horizon farms seems to be doing just that. After their cows are milked, what becomes their fate?

 

They end up dying for man's meat consumption. Our sins against their health and happiness.

 

In India, where cows are worshipped as gods, these gentle animals live free, walking the streets as protected wards of the state. On Horizon's farms, their "deities" end up tortured, dying alone with great fear and then pain. The blood from their cut throats sprays out by the gallon, staining workers, flooding the slaughterhouse floors, causing the animals to gurgle and choke on their own blood.

 

Horizon pretends to have happy cows, yet these animal's udders become so large that it is necessary to milk them three times per day. Most dairy farms milk their cows once or twice each day.

 

Horizon pretends to have happy family farms, but nothing could be more distant from the truth. On March 9th, 1999, the World Street Journal wrote:

 

"Horizon buys about 40% of its milk from other organic-dairy operations, but it has two farms of its own, in Idaho with 3,700 milking cows, and Maryland with 500 cows. The company is looking to establish a third farm...and have a capacity for 2,000 cows..."

 

Folks, Horizon runs a factory-farm operation. I've investigated the Idaho farm which actually contains nearly 7,000 cows. Each animal produces 80 pounds of body wastes daily. That's 560,000 pounds of excrement and urine each day entering Idaho's environment.

 

How does Horizon fool so many people all of the time?

 

They have just purchased 600 acres of property (known as the George Dairy Property) next to the Nature Conservancy's 40,000 acre Cosumnes River Preserve.

 

At last! An organization ready, willing, and able to protest another factory farm and the ensuing pollution, right? Wrong!

 

Horizon and the Nature Conservancy have cooperated together for the past year on this project, and obtained government funding for this acquisition. More cows, more pollution. When the cows no longer give milk and have outlived their usefulness, they will have their heads bashed and necks slashed. Their body parts will be cut into smaller pieces by men with sharp knives, and they shall feed the masses. Such is the fate of Horizon Farms' deities. Hallelulah!

 

Oh yes...organic milk. The healthiest milk from the healthiest cow is naturally loaded with lactoferrins, immunoglobulins, and growth hormones. Horizon's organic milk contains animal fat and cholesterol, dioxins, and bacteria. The amount of somatic cells (pus) in organic milk is lower than milk from non-organic cows, but it's still dead white blood cells and dead bacteria. Ask yourself this question. Does organic human breast milk sound like a delicious drink for an adult human? Instinctively, most people know that there are substances in breast milk that are not intended for their adult bodies. Same goes for pig's milk and dog's milk. Same for cow's milk.

 

Some people may not be able to tolerate lactose, a milk sugar. One hundred percent of humans are allergic to casein, a milk protein. Eighty percent of the protein in Horizon's organic dairy products is casein, the same glue used to adhere a label to a bottle of beer. Eat casein and your body produces histamines, then mucous. This sludge congests your organs. Give up all milk and dairy products for just one week and an internal "fog" will lift from your body.

 

Is genetically engineered milk dangerous? You bet! Organic milk contains just a little bit less of the same hormones. I find very little difference between the two.

 

Robert Cohen

Executive Director

Dairy Education Board

201-967-7001

http://www.notmilk.com

 

[theist 1]

Great article from the Food For Life web site.

http://www.ffl.org/

 

-------------------

Why does ISKCON use milk?

 

For the most part (80%), Food for Life is vegan, but yes, it is unfortunate that some programs continue to use commercial milk products. Food for Life Global is doing its best to encourage them not to, however, you really have to understand the "tradition" that the Hare Krishna movement represents to better understand why they appear so determined to use milk, despite all the arguments and medical evidence that supports a vegan diet.

 

Ancient Tradition

 

It is a long story, but I will be as brief as I can. First of all, the Hindu tradition of India is centered on worship of Krishna the "cowherd boy" and the cow is respected as "Mother." This very ancient culture has existed on cow's milk for tens of thousands of years. The cow is therefore worshiped. Milk, whether we like it or not, is an integral part of that very ancient culture and it always will be.

 

History has proven that cultures can survive for thousands of years and enable their people to live healthy, long lives when there is a symbiotic relationship between man and animal. If we ignore this fact, we ourselves will appear ignorant. The fact that hundreds of millions of Hindus have used dairy for so many thousands of years does give some credibility that dairy products can be safe to take.

 

Milk is not "one"

 

Secondly, one important consideration that is always overlooked, is that "milk," whether it comes from a cow or human is not one and the same. All milk is uniquely different. For example, the milk that a brown cow produces is different from that of a spotted cow and within each herd, every individual cow has the ability to produce a unique blend of milk for its calf.

 

Similarly, even among breast-feeding women, the milk that each women produces is not exactly the same. By nature's arrangement the milk that a mother produces for its child is perfectly suited to that child. Amazingly, even while breast-feeding, a mother's milk can change according to the needs of the child! Obviously, a more subtle influence is present here — the influence of love. In the same way, if a cow is loved and protected, the milk it offers to humans will most certainly be uniquely beneficial. On the other hand, the "commercial milk" that comes from mistreated and diseased cows is certainly very harmful. And it should be noted that it is this "commercial" milk that all the dairy research is conducted on!

 

[The Vegan Issue]

[Commercial Milk]

[Milk Facts]

So although vegans certainly have strong scientific evidence, albeit — limited to the effects of "commercial" dairy on humans, we should also recognize the overwhelming evidence of one of the world's oldest cultures — Hinduism. And at the same time not generalize that "all milk is the same." It isn't.

 

So having said that, some may be wondering why I (a practicing Hindu) decided to go vegan. Well, it is partly the same reason as most vegans: I am vehemently against the viscous and cruel commercial dairy industry that exploits cows. It is certainly hypocritical for any Hindu to support it. On the other hand, I do not have a problem with people who love and care for a cow at home or on a farm and who accept the excess milk the cow offers with love. (By the way, it is not completely true that a cow must be in calf to produce milk. This is another generalization bandied about in the vegan movement. There are many examples to the contrary, including one cow at the Hare Krishna Bhaktivedanta Manor in England that has been giving milk 9 years after calf!!! How is that possible? The cow feels loved and she offers her milk with love).

 

So in that sense I am a "conditional vegan." A new kind of Hindu, that will only accept milk from loved and protected cows and from those that are not slaughtered, as are the cows at the organic dairies (another hypocrisy of the modern day).

 

As for the popular Krishna argument that "because the food is blessed by Krishna it is somehow ok." This is a pretty weak argument but does have some validity in the sense that all our food should be blessed (offered to) by God as a humble act of sacrifice. After all, we come into this world with nothing and we leave the same. Ultimately, therefore, we are never the proprietors of anything but are merely borrowing from God. When we offer our food to God first (before we eat it), we acknowledge our dependency and consequently the food is purified of any karma. Hence, the term "karma-free" food.

 

Because there is a small degree of violence even in the gathering and preparation of vegan meals, they can never be totally karma-free or “ahimsa.” If, however, we offer our food to God to eat first, that food becomes pure, antiseptic, and spiritually nourishing! Hindus call this food "prasada," or the mercy of Krishna. Our hope is that the vegan movement will also make the extra effort to "spiritualize" their meals and thus complete their quest for real peace and harmony. Despite our good intentions, if we fail to recognize God as the source of all good things, our efforts will always remain mundane, dry and inadequate.

 

So the above argument posed by certain Krishna devotees does have some validity, but it certainly does not justify their use of "commercial" dairy. A vegan´s confusion in this regard, therefore, is completely justified.

 

I hope this sheds some light on this dilemma. Food for Life Global is trying its best to bring ISKCON members up to the ideal standard outlined by our founder Srila Prabhupada. Right from the beginning of the movement he encouraged the Krishna devotees to develop self-sufficient farms that could supply all their needs, completely independent of modern society, including commercial dairy. Thus far, as a whole, ISKCON has not lived up to this dream. Granted there are exceptions in spots around the world. For example, the beautiful self sufficient ISKCON project in Brazil, called “Paramatma.”

 

The challenges of tradition

 

Finally, it should be understood that it is not easy trying to establish a religion and culture in foreign soils. Nor is it a “piece of cake” maintaining the ancient traditions that come with that culture. Dairy is a big big challenge for the Krishna devotees, but it is only one of many. For most Krishnas it will never be a high priority. In the decadent and crazed societies we now live in, the values and morals that ISKCON brings to the Western countries, including celibacy, vegetarianism, abstinence from all forms of intoxication and gambling, certainly deserve acknowledgment.

 

In any case, through Food for Life Global’s education, as well through the efforts of the vegan movement, Krishna devotees are beginning to take a good look at this commercial milk issue. We are confident it will be resolved in time, and in the not too distant future there will be a major paradigm shift and a "commercial dairy-free" diet will take hold.

 

Food for Life Global appreciates the vegan movement and encourages their members to continue cooperating with us. However, when you do, we hope that you’ll be a little more understanding of the cultural challenges organizations like ISKCON face.

 

By Paul Turner

Food for Life Global

 

Email Priyavrata Das

[Pankaja_Dasa 1]

 

 

Mmm.. If say for example- mother was breast-feeding baby, and she was taking meat produce & brest-feeding then isn't she also participating in the killing? So in same way if somebody says not not drink milk from cow, read between lines for what I am saying, I can't really put it words sometimes what I mean. Just something I thought of, don't take offence. Hare krishna!

 

ps Its time for devotees to bring out thier own brand of milk. Even Muslims have thier own Cola {kibla-cola} to use crude analogy heh

[theist 1]

Sorry Pankaja. I don't understand the question. Please rephrase it.

 

Here's the thing if you buy milk from unprotected cows you are paticipating in cow slaughter. It really is that cut and dried.

 

People have to decide for themselves if their warm banana milk at night is worth torture mother cow and calve over. That is the choice.

 

"Oh but it's for Krsna's pleasure that we offer it and just take the remnants therefore it's karma free."

 

Perhaps so. That is if Krsna accepts it. How can we offer,with love, Krsna milk that we know His beloved cows were tortured and slaughtered to produce?

 

With knowledge comes responsibility.

 

It's an individual choice that all should consider well.

[Pankaja_Dasa 1]

 

 

Anyway I don't write so well what I feel. ahem.

 

I was watching this programme on Tv, they had a Beef farm, I was curious to know what they did. Its like some sort of Mafia situation. Feed the cows when they are no longer wanted kill them. But I do see your point I feel a little sick if I think about what the cows go thru.

 

While watching this show you could see the love these cows wanted they were so friendly and the farmers because of they unmercifulness couldn't see it. It was like seeing a kid who wanted love and compassion and the parents rejecting. Very sad. But also the independance of the cows is plane to see and the calmness they bring.

 

They are expansions of Surabhi cows in Vrindavana, I don't actually know how degraded you would have to be to eat them even after knowing what you know. Its seems also clisha {sp} but only chanting will make anybody see. Thats why Prabhupada said 1st let them chant.

 

Also I don't know and I want to ask you this. If by offering milk to Krishna from cows, maybe the person doing the cow herding will get Sukriti and was as unpiousness. Bit like chanting, good and bad, then all good. ?

 

Sorry for all typos. I am just typing this. I am being lazy to check anything.

[theist 1]

 

Also I don't know and I want to ask you this. If by offering milk to Krishna from cows, maybe the person doing the cow herding will get Sukriti and was as unpiousness. Bit like chanting, good and bad, then all good. ?

 

 

Yeah this is what is usually said by devotees when questioned on this point.

 

I heard one of iskcon's guru challengeed about cruelty to cows by a young vegan woman at a Ratha yatra years ago. That is basically what he said also. he wanted to justify his support for the dairy industry by saying that because the milk is offered to Krsna everyone involved including the cows is benefited. It was embarassing actually. A devotee guru fighting with a woman and defending his cruelty to cows and calves in this way. He never even told her that she didn't have to offer milk to Krsna. He was busy explaining how she had no vision to see the spiritual aspect.

 

Another thing to consider is can I really offer such milk to Krsna with love knowing what I now know about the process of how that milk was obtained. Krsna knows I know. What does He think about it? Does he desire milk at such a cost to these gentle creatures? Or am I really just going through the motions of offering the milk so that I can feel justified in taking the "remnants" without a guilty conscience.

 

Each person must make this decision. The issue is not going away. Devotees who have done so much for popularizing vegetarianism and promoting cow protection need to take the final steps.

 

Milk from protected cows only.

 

[Pankaja_Dasa 1]

 

 

Well what exactly can devotees do about Slaughter of cows except distribute Harinama and Prasadam even if it is made of Milk from Cows in these farms. I wonder what would happen if all devotees became Vegans. Come on Prabhuji!

[theist 1]

 

Well what exactly can devotees do about Slaughter of cows except distribute Harinama and Prasadam even if it is made of Milk from Cows in these farms.

 

 

Well there are several things they can do about it. First thing is not to take part in it. Chanting certainly. Vegans can also chant and be devotees. Pass out vegan foodstuffs that has been offered to Krsna.

 

Plus set a good example for others by not taking part in cow slaughter. Has does it look to preach about cow protection while drinking milk from enslaved cows destined for slaughter who have had their male children snatched from them at birth and slaughtered for veal.

 

Does the word hypocritical come to mind? Example is better than precept. Educating the society is what this mission is all about. We shouldn't preach that which we refuse to practice. Someone preaching cow protection shuld not be daily partaking in the products that cause their slaughter.

 

I think you just don't want to confronted with the need to give up something you like, milk.

 

 

I wonder what would happen if all devotees became Vegans. Come on Prabhuji!

 

 

If you will notice that article I posted above was written by the vegan devotee Priyavrata who is in charge of the Food For Life program.

 

What would happen? Leaving aside health issues one can see that a few less cows would be tortured and slaughtered and devotees would not look so hypocritical on this issue.

 

Besides just consider this yourself. Are you sure you want to offer this milk from murdered cows to Krsna? Why not offer Krsna milk from protected cows only? No such milk close by? Then how about almond or cashew milk instead?

 

He is Gopala, the Cowherd Boy. The cowherd boys were first given the responsibility of watching over the calves. Do you think they will allow calve killers into Their play in the forest of Vrndavan?

 

He is Govinda, He gives pleasure to cows. He does not milk them like machines and then slaughter them when the bag runs dry.

[Pankaja_Dasa 1]

 

 

Hare Krishna

 

I think you just don't want to confronted with the need to give up something you like, milk.

 

--

Yeah your right. You've convinced me to give up milk for now. I gave up Alcohol and Cigarettes giving up Milk will be like walk in a park. But I do see most foods contain milk i.e. butter, ready made panner.

 

I do not think for a second think this is advisable to all. At the start of Krishna Consciousness {or at the start, start, start, some kind of paradox, so near yet so far}. It's hard enough for most to give up meat. So this must be known as high standard. Even then I don't agree with being all high and mightily about it. But that goes with the territory if your doing something somebody is not it creates so kind of ego. {aham} "Oh look what I am doing".

 

But also I believe in Tyaga, a devotee said without sacrifice you cannot attain anything. So I shall think like this. Even though I don't like to give up, it has to be done for my own needs.

 

You made me think because I offer milk products a lot to Guru & Gauranga, so I feel a little sick now knowing where it might have came from. I don't have deity's so maybe I have an excuse not to keep to a high standard. Tell me what you think. Hare Krishna.