http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=aMfSGt6rHos<\/a><\/p>\n As always, I\u2019m a bit behind this week on pop culture topics \u2013 other than the death of Davy Jones<\/a>. I am, after all, a fan of\u00a0bubble gum pop, and quirky, cheesy TV from the 60s.<\/p>\n So I missed\u00a0the video that\u2019s making the rounds from Chipolte Restaurants, an animated short\u00a0called \u201cBack To The Start\u201d, which depicts a family\u00a0farmer who moves to a factory farming operation and then back to a family farm. The music is Willie Nelson performing Coldplay\u2019s \u201cThe Scientist.\u201d<\/p>\n I suspect that most Americans have absolutely no clue where their meat comes from, and they probably don\u2019t care. I confess that it wasn\u2019t all that long ago that I fell into that category. But\u00a0over\u00a0the last\u00a0several years, I\u2019ve become more and more interested in where my food comes from, and as I\u2019ve researched I\u2019ve been surprised (and often disgusted) by what I\u2019ve learned.<\/p>\n Once you\u2019ve seen the truth about factory farming and what it does to the animal, the economy, the farmer, and in the end, the consumer, you can\u2019t go back. It\u2019s like trying to unring a bell. Can\u2019t do it, and in fact you want to do just the opposite. Ring and ring and ring until everyone listens to what you\u2019ve learned.<\/p>\n I\u2019m not talking becoming a vegetarian. I eat meat. I eat less meat than I used to \u2013 way less. I eat more grains and vegetables, which means I spend less on groceries, I actually enjoy the meat that I do eat a lot more, and I feel better. Physically and spiritually.<\/p>\n It\u2019s clear that some Americans are speaking out. In the last few weeks, McDonalds and Hormel have taken a stand on the use of gestation crates <\/a>in the production of pork. Wait, let\u2019s not call it pork. Let\u2019s call it the production of pigs for human consumption, because that way you remember that pork comes from a living animal.<\/p>\n Oink!<\/p>\n But Chipolte goes further, committing to \u201cFood with Integrity\u201d<\/a> and it begins with their belief that \u201d\u00a0The best way to treat animals with dignity and respect is to allow them to display their natural tendencies.\u201d Chipolte\u2019s pork is 100% naturally raised \u2013 which means that a pig was raised like a pig, not mass produced like a widgets in a factory. They\u2019re working to eventually make all of the cattle and chicken and diary products they use\u00a0100% naturally raised animals.<\/p>\n Why is that important? <\/p>\n Did you know that in factory farms, the cows and pigs are fed other animals? Offal (which is \u2026 well \u2026 the parts that you don\u2019t want to eat), brains, spinal tissue, road kill, and other animals. In case you\u2019ve forgotten the lessons you learned in kindergarten, pigs and cows don\u2019t eat each other. They eat grass and grains.<\/p>\n So we\u2019re feeding cows and pigs food they don\u2019t normally eat. How do you feel when you do that? Sick, right? The animals aren\u2019t healthy, so they get\u00a0medicines to treat the illnesses they\u2019ve come down with from eating food they don\u2019t normally eat.<\/p>\n They also get hormones to help make them get fatter so they can get to market faster. But in order to save money, they\u2019re crammed into smaller spaces where they can\u2019t even turn around. Which means they\u2019re prone to more illness. So they get a daily low dose of antibiotics to prevent illness that can occur in a filthy, cramped environment.\u00a0<\/p>\n When a bacteria is exposed over time to a low dose of antibiotics, it begins to mutate and becomes resistant to the drugs developed to treat it. Ta da, now we have strains of super bacteria that are increasingly dangerous as well as\u00a0difficult to treat.<\/p>\n If you are what you eat, aren\u2019t you also what they <\/em>ate? Yes, because what goes into a cow or a pig eventually goes into you, too.\u00a0<\/p>\n The reality is that in many ways, factory farmers are responding to consumer demand. In the documentary \u201cKing Corn,\u201d Bob Bledsoe, of Bledsoe Cattle Co. in Wray, Colorado, said,<\/p>\n \u201cIf the American people wanted strictly grass fed beef, we would produce grass fed beef for \u2019em. But it\u2019s definitely more expensive and one of the tenets in America is that America wants and demands cheap food.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n And that sums up our entire food system: cheap and fast. And unhealthy and inhumane.<\/p>\n Tell me what you think: do you think about how the animals you eat are raised or how their care affects your health and well being?<\/strong><\/p>\n RELATED POSTS:<\/strong><\/p>\n As always, I\u2019m a bit behind this week on pop culture topics \u2013 other than the death of Davy Jones. I am, after all, a fan of\u00a0bubble gum pop, and quirky, cheesy TV from the 60s. So I missed\u00a0the video that\u2019s making the rounds from Chipolte Restaurants, an animated short\u00a0called \u201cBack To The Start\u201d, which […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[212,306,325],"tags":[493,492,308,314,453,452,494,167,767,491],"class_list":["post-1037","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-animal-health","category-animals-and-food","category-farm-animals","tag-chipolte","tag-coldplay","tag-factory-farming","tag-food","tag-gestation-crates","tag-hormel","tag-king-corn","tag-mcdonalds","tag-video","tag-willie-nelson"],"yoast_head":"\n\n