Circle M Farm

My first response to the news about this week’s gigantic beef recall was to read the stories and skip the videos offered on the internet. I feel pretty ambivalent about the ubiquitous access we have to graphic “news” footage. While I appreciate the accountability such access allows, I think the media often slides into a voyeuristic, almost abusive sensationalism that is as unhealthy for the viewers as it is unkind to the objects. Occasionally scarred by seeing such pieces, in this case I realized that as a small meat producer, I had a certain responsibility to know what the accusations of illegal and inhumane treatment at the slaughter facility were all about. The videos turned my stomach.

CNN.com kindly previewed the video clip embedded in their story with a “graphic content” warning, and a Madison news reporter warned her morning audience to stop eating before the clip was run. Nevertheless, I was unprepared for the first pitiful image of a huge filthy emaciated cow, unable to rise, kicked relentlessly down a grooved plank. Other shots showed more unresponsive cows repeatedly shocked with electric prods, shot in the face with high-pressure water hoses, pulled with chains on legs through muck, and poked around the eyes with sticks. What made me most sick and angry were repeated scenes of forklifts pushing, lifting and poking these huge animals, unable to stand because of sickness. Some were rolled over and over through inches of swampy feces. One “downer” cow is pushed with the tines of a forklift out of a ramp-less truck, where it falls roughly to the ground, head-first. Its neck bent at an unnatural angle, the cow remains motionless. We don’t see what the forklift operator does next.

Other than being repulsed and saddened by the treatment of animals at the California facility, why should we be concerned about these practices? Why does the USDA care? Because collapse of an animal is a sign of illness, including mad cow disease, and slaughterhouses are not supposed to include “downer” cows in the food supply unless a veterinary inspector looks at them and deems them fit for consumption. Those seen on the tape were inspected before collapse and apparently slaughtered without being re-inspected.

Another cause for concern is that, as is clear on the video tape, these immobile cows were laying in and dragged through a sea of manure on their way to slaughter, and their hides were literally caked in feces. Certainly when these hides were cut open, the meat inside was exposed to a world of feces-born pathogens, including e.coli, salmonella and listeria, the bacteria which killed two dozen people and sickened 100 others in the second-largest US meat recall, which involved 35 million pounds of beef in 1998 and 1999.

But why should those of us not living near California care about this incident? The Hallmark/Westland Meat Co., which operates the accused slaughterhouse in Chino, CA, is a top supplier of ground beef to the National School Lunch Program. In fact, the company won the “Supplier of the Year” award in 2004 and 2005. Hopefully, the award wasn’t monetary, since last year taxpayers paid $40 million to Westland for meat that went to programs for the elderly, the needy and children’s school lunches. The recalled beef had been shipped to 34 states, including Wisconsin.

Westland fired two workers seen on the tape, and the men face animal cruelty charges. Felony charges. However, a company spokesman said senior management was not aware of the use of extreme measures to get sick cattle upright. In an interview with The Washington Post, company president Steve Mendell, apparently not having seen the video, expressed disbelief that employees used stun guns to get sick or injured animals on their feet.

“That’s impossible,” he said, adding that “electrical prods are not allowed on the property.”

Asked whether his employees use fork lifts to get moribund animals off the ground, he said: “I can’t imagine that.”

Asked whether water was sprayed up animals’ noses to get them to stand up, he said: “That’s absolutely not true.”

“We have a massive humane treatment program here that we follow to the nth degree, so this doesn’t even sound possible,” Mendell said. “I don’t stand out there all day, but to me it would be next to impossible.”

Exactly. He’s either not out there at all, or he knows exactly what’s going on. My suspicion is the latter, since those multiple forklifts must be stationed on the slaughter floor for a reason. Either way, he’s the felon, as far as I’m concerned. Or the officials in the USDA are, who only issued the recall after the Humane Society of the United States released the video, in spite of being aware of infractions of federal law at the plant for “at least two years,” according to a statement issued by a USDA administrator on Feb. 17. And though Hallmark/Westland operations are shut down until they satisfy the USDA that they can comply with regulations, I’m not aware that any criminal charges at all have been levied against the company or management.

While there are clear villains in this story, there are also true heroes, like the slaughterhouse worker who secretly took the videotapes and made them available to the Humane Society of the United States. My teenage son Eli calls these characters in the story the “muckrakers,” which generally refers to writers and journalists who expose societal ills, but in this case can be taken quite literally. I’m thankful for the brave employee who endured risk and muck to bring us this knowledge.

And I’m thankful for the Humane Society, who managed with a few weeks of investigation and a well-placed video release to engineer the largest meat recall in our nation’s history. In spite of the fact that much of 143 millions pounds recalled by the slow-acting USDA has already been eaten, including most of 37 million allocated to public school cafeterias, this story should have far-reaching impact on a society already primed by the muck-raking efforts of high-profile writers like Michael Pollan, Sandra Steingraber, Barbara Kingsolver and Eric Schlosser, among others who are exposing the filth in our food supply.

“May the world’s feast be made safe for women and children. May mother’s milk run clean again. May denial give way to courageous action,” prays Steingraber at the conclusion of her latest book, “Having Faith: An Ecologist’s Journey to Motherhood.”
May denial give way to courageous action in us, dear readers. Read the books, watch the videos, visit the Humane Society website at hsus.com for action ideas and then do something.

This is Star, one of our bottled beef calves that will feed us in 18 months. In the meantime, we’ll get to know each other as he grows on the grass of our pastures and we’ll treat him gently and respectfully while he’s in our care.