Thursday, May 3, 2012
Chow California Foie Gras Ban to Go Ahead
Posted by Bethany Jean Clement on Thu, May 3, 2012 at 2:50 PM
Despite a bunch of fancy chefs' wishes to the contrary, the impending ban on foie gras in California is set to proceed, say the people in charge in Sacramento. The chefs recognize they got a late start in protesting the ban, but don't sound exactly like they're going to abide:
Nate Ballard, a spokesman for the coalition of chefs, acknowledged that repealing the ban in the coming weeks would be a heavy lift.
"Even if the ban does go into effect, we will keep moving forward," he said. "Prohibition has never worked in this country."
2
He brings up an excellent point. I mean, child labor is still widely used and I've got at least six slaves. And there's not about 1,000 other types of liver available. He should really be the spokesman for everything ever.
3
They were talking about this on KUOW earlier today. Evidently these bans are pretty hard to enforce even when they are in effect, a fact I am sure makes Duck Jesus cry.
5
I love the celebrity chefs' regal, entitled attitude. That's totally going to work.
(And cokeheads taunting the voters with the failure of drug prohibition is especially winning. Keep that up. Dicks.)
(And cokeheads taunting the voters with the failure of drug prohibition is especially winning. Keep that up. Dicks.)
7
Great. One more product for the cartels to supply at enormous profits. Can't wait until the first foie gras shipment is seized at the border.
10
you can breed geese so stupid they'll gorge themselves without the funnel.
then foie gras will be "natural".
i'm getting hungry for the terrine at presse.
then foie gras will be "natural".
i'm getting hungry for the terrine at presse.
12
@10
If the food is made available and the geese feel like they're in a natural enough setting, they'll Foie Gras themselves, apparently, but making things comfortable enough for the geese essentially amounts to letting them run wild, so it's not a very cost effective way to go about it.
If the food is made available and the geese feel like they're in a natural enough setting, they'll Foie Gras themselves, apparently, but making things comfortable enough for the geese essentially amounts to letting them run wild, so it's not a very cost effective way to go about it.
13
@10: You can breed humans so selfish and uncaring they'll do exactly that.
Now go gobble up some rotten corpses, you gruesome, zombie fuck!
Now go gobble up some rotten corpses, you gruesome, zombie fuck!
17
@13: i was told about the self-gorging stupid geese by the owner of a 5 star french restaurant in about 1985. that's where he said he got cruelty-free american foie gras. so. bleah.
18
@10 Interesting though. I bet it's fairly simple to disable the genes responsible for a goose's brain's reaction to it's stomach stretch receptors. But than you'd have to label the fois gras GM. I live in CA and this is the stupidest thing in the world. I'll dine around in July and report on how much fois gras I can find. I don't think a single restaurant will be worried much about enforcement. We throw so many humans in jail for weed, let's send the first person to jail for fois gras and let the shit storm begin!
19
@18: "let's send the first person to jail for fois gras and let the shit storm begin"
I hope it's you!
I hope it's you!
20
Chicago resident here. We went through our own foie gras ban (and eventual lifting of the ban). Enforcement of it was pretty difficult; and the whole law sort of became ridiculous.
Anyway, if you eat any type of meat it's hard argue against foie gras. Foie gras ducks are treated no worse than any other domesticated livestock. Of course there's examples of bad foie gras farms, but the same is true with chicken, pigs, cow, etc. I'm not a huge fan of Anthony Bourdain, but his piece on foie gras is pretty excellent (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABeWlY0KF…).
As Bourdain shows, one of the big problems is that we anthropomorphize animals. But let's stop pretending that they think they're people and be honest: sticking a tube down a duck's throat is completely different than sticking a tube down our throat (unless you happen to work in porn). Don't ignore biology and act like these animals are your cuddly best friends.
Anyway, if you're anti- all meat, I can understand being anti-foie gras. But don't go eating a juicy cheeseburger and then get on high horse when it comes to foie gras.
Anyway, if you eat any type of meat it's hard argue against foie gras. Foie gras ducks are treated no worse than any other domesticated livestock. Of course there's examples of bad foie gras farms, but the same is true with chicken, pigs, cow, etc. I'm not a huge fan of Anthony Bourdain, but his piece on foie gras is pretty excellent (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABeWlY0KF…).
As Bourdain shows, one of the big problems is that we anthropomorphize animals. But let's stop pretending that they think they're people and be honest: sticking a tube down a duck's throat is completely different than sticking a tube down our throat (unless you happen to work in porn). Don't ignore biology and act like these animals are your cuddly best friends.
Anyway, if you're anti- all meat, I can understand being anti-foie gras. But don't go eating a juicy cheeseburger and then get on high horse when it comes to foie gras.
21
If I bring foie gras in a cooler down to California my next time down there, will I be able to triple my money at a few restaurant back doors? If they call it "old screwdriver handles" on the menu will anyone know?
22
@ 19, tell me something. Are you opposed to foie gras but otherwise believe it's right to eat meat? If not (meaning you're a vegan), why should you be happy about this? Much, MUCH more inhumane animal-based food will be consumed by millions of Californians legally every day.
23
This bill places an unequal burden on the poor. Sure, if the rich need foie gras, they can just fly out of state. But the poor don't have those resources. It'll be all dangerous, back-alley foie gras for them.
24
@20
"As Bourdain shows, one of the big problems is that we anthropomorphize animals."
You don't need to anthropomorphize animals to recognize that animals feel pain and suffering and that it is wrong to inflict that pain and suffering on them.
Sentience is not exclusive to human beings.
This is an area of study being explored by people with a few more scientific bona fides than Anthony Bourdain, and the evidence is mounting that animals experience pain and suffering.
This is "the biology". Don't ignore it:
More...
"As Bourdain shows, one of the big problems is that we anthropomorphize animals."
You don't need to anthropomorphize animals to recognize that animals feel pain and suffering and that it is wrong to inflict that pain and suffering on them.
Sentience is not exclusive to human beings.
This is an area of study being explored by people with a few more scientific bona fides than Anthony Bourdain, and the evidence is mounting that animals experience pain and suffering.
This is "the biology". Don't ignore it:
Smith & Boyd (1991) assess the evidence for the pain-sensing capabilities of animals in the categories of whether nociceptors are connected to the central nervous system, whether endogenous opioids are present, whether analgesics affect responses, and whether the ensuing behavioral responses are analogous to those of humans (see table 2.3 in Varner 1998, p. 53, which updates the one presented by Smith & Boyd). On the basis of these criteria, Varner follows Smith & Boyd in concluding tentatively that the most obvious place to draw a line between pain-conscious organisms and those not capable of feeling pain consciously is between vertebrates and invertebrates. However, Elwood & Appel (2009) conducted an experiment on hermit crabs which they interpret as providing evidence that pain is experienced and remembered by these crustaceans. Varner also expressed some hesitation about the evidence for conscious pain in “lower” vertebrates: fish, reptiles and amphibians. Allen (2004b) argues, however, that subsequent research indicates that the direction of discovery seems uniformly towards identifying more similarities among diverse species belonging to different taxonomic classes, especially in the domains of anatomy and physiology of the nociceptive and pain systems.
It is generally accepted that the mammalian pain system has both a sensory and an affective pathway, and that these can be dissociated to some degree both pharmacologically (with morphine, e.g.) and surgical lesions. The anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) is a particularly important structure of the mammalian brain in this regard (Price 2000). Allen et al. (2005) and Shriver (2006) argue that this dissociability provides a route to empirical assessment of the affective component of animal consciousness, and Farah (2008) uses it to distinguish suffering from “mere pain”.
25
@22
Yes I am a vegan.
No, foie gras does not account for a large proportion of animal products consumed in California. It will not create a "meat vacuum".
"Much, MUCH more inhumane animal-based food" is already consumed by inconscientious flesh eaters. (Though I'm curious what you're referring to, as foie gras is pretty fucking inhumane, and is up there with veal.)
Outlawing any inhumane practice is a good thing. It would be even better if the public voluntarily stopped perpetuating inhumane practices by opting out of animal exploitation industries.
Go vegan.
Eat beans 'n' greens. Nuts 'n' seeds. Herbs 'n' spices.
Good for you. Good for the planet. Good for animals.
Yes I am a vegan.
No, foie gras does not account for a large proportion of animal products consumed in California. It will not create a "meat vacuum".
"Much, MUCH more inhumane animal-based food" is already consumed by inconscientious flesh eaters. (Though I'm curious what you're referring to, as foie gras is pretty fucking inhumane, and is up there with veal.)
Outlawing any inhumane practice is a good thing. It would be even better if the public voluntarily stopped perpetuating inhumane practices by opting out of animal exploitation industries.
Go vegan.
Eat beans 'n' greens. Nuts 'n' seeds. Herbs 'n' spices.
Good for you. Good for the planet. Good for animals.
27
@24 I never said animals don't feel pain or suffer. I was primarily referring to the practice of force feeding ducks. Many foie gras protesters have taken issue with this practice, presumably because they assume that foie gras ducks have the same (or similar) gag reflex we experience when someone tries to shove something down our throats. That's not how duck biology works. Ducks don't have a gag reflex. The tube doesn't cause them pain and they can breathe just fine while still taking in the feeding tube.
Do they experience any pain or suffering during their lives on the farm (which seems to be your general point)? Maybe. After all, we are killing them. But we do the same with cows, chickens, pigs, etc. The Bourdain video simply shows that fois gras ducks are treated in a humane manner prior to slaughter.
Now, vegetarians will probably argue that there's no such thing as humane treatment if the endgame is slaughter. While I disagree, at least that position is logistically consistent.
Again, my problem is the meat eaters who protest foie gras, but keep on scarfing down all the other animals. Typically, foie gras ducks are treated no worse than other livestock (and, often times they're treated much better).
Do they experience any pain or suffering during their lives on the farm (which seems to be your general point)? Maybe. After all, we are killing them. But we do the same with cows, chickens, pigs, etc. The Bourdain video simply shows that fois gras ducks are treated in a humane manner prior to slaughter.
Now, vegetarians will probably argue that there's no such thing as humane treatment if the endgame is slaughter. While I disagree, at least that position is logistically consistent.
Again, my problem is the meat eaters who protest foie gras, but keep on scarfing down all the other animals. Typically, foie gras ducks are treated no worse than other livestock (and, often times they're treated much better).
28
I like it. They'll hit a few restaurants with some fines, and foie gras will still be available, just at a higher price. Finally a sin tax that's progressive and not regressive.
29
Foie isn't that bad of an actress and she sounds okay in the duo with M. Ward so I don't see why California has to ban her.
32
If the geese were suffering so terribly when the tube was in they probably wouldn't come running towards it whenever they see it. Geese LIKE being stuffed.
If you are upset about animal pain, the pain occurs when the goose is slaughtered, not when it is stuffed. And the slaughtering of a stuffed goose is not different than a non-stuffed goose, or a duck, or a chicken, or a grasshopper, or any of the thousand other animals we kill for food. Yet no one is attempting to ban those. It will still be perfectly legal to order goose breast in a California restaurant, which harms the goose exactly as much.
The law, and the objection to foie gras, is pure hypocrisy.
If you are upset about animal pain, the pain occurs when the goose is slaughtered, not when it is stuffed. And the slaughtering of a stuffed goose is not different than a non-stuffed goose, or a duck, or a chicken, or a grasshopper, or any of the thousand other animals we kill for food. Yet no one is attempting to ban those. It will still be perfectly legal to order goose breast in a California restaurant, which harms the goose exactly as much.
The law, and the objection to foie gras, is pure hypocrisy.
33
Veal makes me feel guilty as well 'til I take that 1st, delicious bite, and then the images of those baby calves licking the bars of their mini-cages to get the iron their diet lacks otherwise drift away into a tender, juicy blanket that completely covers the cage that was there previously.
35
@ 25, foie gras is NOT up there with veal (by which you must mean crated veal, as opposed to free range), nor most anything else produced on an industrial scale. The force-feeding doesn't inflict the round-the-clock suffering that industrial meat and dairy production methods do. IF the force feeding is, indeed, inhumane (and your declarations notwithstanding, that is a matter of debate), it's something the geese experience momentarily, and apparently without dreading the next instance. The suffering is quantifiable, and it's much less.
You can argue that it's still too much, and that's your right. But you can't say it's the same as laying hens who live their whole miserable lives in cages too small to even turn around in, or meat chickens whose beaks are cut so they won't peck at each other out of stress, or pigs whose tails are docked for the same reason, or crate-raised veal.
You can argue that it's still too much, and that's your right. But you can't say it's the same as laying hens who live their whole miserable lives in cages too small to even turn around in, or meat chickens whose beaks are cut so they won't peck at each other out of stress, or pigs whose tails are docked for the same reason, or crate-raised veal.
36
@35
The examples of animal suffering you cite are significant and all good reasons to go vegan.
Though your claim that the suffering of foie gras birds is "quantifiable and much less" is specious. (Quantifiable? Really? As in, to describe in quanta with standardized "units of suffering"?).
Try making that claim to these birds (and Kate Winslet).
Many foie gras birds are also forced to live in cages too small to even turn around in -- it helps with the grotesque fattening.
From Foie Gras: Delicacy of Despair:
It's really pretty simple, folks:
Stop exploiting animals. That shouldn't be controversial.
More...
The examples of animal suffering you cite are significant and all good reasons to go vegan.
Though your claim that the suffering of foie gras birds is "quantifiable and much less" is specious. (Quantifiable? Really? As in, to describe in quanta with standardized "units of suffering"?).
Try making that claim to these birds (and Kate Winslet).
Many foie gras birds are also forced to live in cages too small to even turn around in -- it helps with the grotesque fattening.
From Foie Gras: Delicacy of Despair:
To produce "foie gras" (which literally means "fatty liver"), workers ram pipes down male ducks' or geese's throats two or three times daily and pump as much as 4 pounds of grain and fat into the animals' stomachs, causing their livers to bloat to up to 10 times their normal size. Many birds have difficulty standing because of their engorged livers, and they may tear out their own feathers and cannibalize each other out of stress.
The birds are kept in tiny wire cages or packed into sheds. On some farms, a single worker may be expected to force-feed 500 birds three times each day. Because of this rush, animals are often treated roughly and left injured and suffering.
A PETA investigation at Hudson Valley Foie Gras in New York (then called "Commonwealth Enterprises") found that so many ducks died when their organs ruptured from overfeeding that workers who killed fewer than 50 birds per month were given a bonus. Many ducks develop foot infections, kidney necrosis, spleen damage, bruised and broken bills, and tumor-like lumps in their throats. One duck had a maggot-infested neck wound so severe that water spilled out of it when he drank.
It's really pretty simple, folks:
Stop exploiting animals. That shouldn't be controversial.
37
@32
Go Fnarf yourself. I think you like getting stuffed (and I ain't talkin' about duck liver).
Read my previous comment and watch the video.
Do those birds look like they're having a good time to you?
Stop exploiting animals.
Go Fnarf yourself. I think you like getting stuffed (and I ain't talkin' about duck liver).
Read my previous comment and watch the video.
Do those birds look like they're having a good time to you?
Stop exploiting animals.
38
My 6 year old niece, who tries to be vegetarian but understands why others aren't, has a more enlightened and mature view on food and the natural order.
Her jokes are also a little more clever.
Her jokes are also a little more clever.
39
@37, wow, I get it -- I like getting "stuffed"! You're calling me gay! That's HILARIOUS. Really good stuff there.
40
@37
There are quantifiable units of suffering, though the entity doing the suffering typically needs to be able to communicate the answers to a couple questions in order to get an accurate pain reading (they use this at pain management clinics).
Whatever...I'm an omnivore. I got over this shit the last time I quit being vegetarian. If the geese are suffering, then it makes up for all the times they attack me on the golf course (unprovoked).
Geese are mean, nasty animals. I say stick some electrodes to their little geese balls or geese vaginas while you force feed them, just to add some additional pain into the mix.
If geese had thumbs, they'd do a hell of a lot worse to you.
There are quantifiable units of suffering, though the entity doing the suffering typically needs to be able to communicate the answers to a couple questions in order to get an accurate pain reading (they use this at pain management clinics).
Whatever...I'm an omnivore. I got over this shit the last time I quit being vegetarian. If the geese are suffering, then it makes up for all the times they attack me on the golf course (unprovoked).
Geese are mean, nasty animals. I say stick some electrodes to their little geese balls or geese vaginas while you force feed them, just to add some additional pain into the mix.
If geese had thumbs, they'd do a hell of a lot worse to you.
42
@38
"My 6 year old niece, who tries to be vegetarian but understands why others aren't"
Really? At six years old she already understands that some people are willing to exploit, abuse, and kill other sentient beings in order to satisfy their own selfish desires?
Good for her! That understanding will help her navigate this world!
A six year old voluntary vegetarian, that is awesome. You might learn from her innate compassion.
"Her jokes are also a little more clever. "
I don't believe you.
"My 6 year old niece, who tries to be vegetarian but understands why others aren't"
Really? At six years old she already understands that some people are willing to exploit, abuse, and kill other sentient beings in order to satisfy their own selfish desires?
Good for her! That understanding will help her navigate this world!
A six year old voluntary vegetarian, that is awesome. You might learn from her innate compassion.
"Her jokes are also a little more clever. "
I don't believe you.
43
As Fnarf so elegantly points out ("old screwdriver handles"), the law is a joke if all you have to do is relabel the dish.
44
@41: Everyone will take your arguments seriously when you respond by claiming your detractors like things up their butts, so they should not be taken seriously.
Way to find another way to brag to more people about your dietary choices.
Oh any by the way, the computer you are using, the home you live in, the car/bike you drive, the medicines you take, the phone you play with, and the machines that produce your goods all contain animal products. You are not a vegan.
Stop exploiting animals, right?
Way to find another way to brag to more people about your dietary choices.
Oh any by the way, the computer you are using, the home you live in, the car/bike you drive, the medicines you take, the phone you play with, and the machines that produce your goods all contain animal products. You are not a vegan.
Stop exploiting animals, right?
45
@24 - I have no idea if the rest of the study talks about birds, but you've gone to the point to bold the word "mammals" which geese are not because they are birds. It kind of discredits whatever you're trying to say.
You'd also do better to quote from academia and research rather than agenda drivers like PETA and HSUS. The agenda turns people off and nobody hears your sermon.
You'd also do better to quote from academia and research rather than agenda drivers like PETA and HSUS. The agenda turns people off and nobody hears your sermon.
47
@ 37,
eating animals ≠ exploiting animals. Animals eat other animals, and humans are omnivores, not herbivores. Claiming otherwise is what's truly specious.
We can agree to stop exploiting animals, but going back to old animal husbandry ways - those with a feeding goal, and without a capitalist money-making goal - is every bit as valid as veganism.
If some foie gras is produced in the way you describe, we can agree that that's bad.
eating animals ≠ exploiting animals. Animals eat other animals, and humans are omnivores, not herbivores. Claiming otherwise is what's truly specious.
We can agree to stop exploiting animals, but going back to old animal husbandry ways - those with a feeding goal, and without a capitalist money-making goal - is every bit as valid as veganism.
If some foie gras is produced in the way you describe, we can agree that that's bad.
48
I love how jack-off Ipso Facto thinks that getting penetrated anally for pleasure is insulting and shameful.
Comments (49) RSS