5 uncomfortable truths about milk

The truth hidden behind the milk industry is decidedly different from what is shown every day on television and through any type of advertising (happy cows, running lambs, chickens scratching in the grass, etc.)

The aim is to show the reality of these farms : we cannot hide from ourselves that behind the production of milk and cheese lies violence, mistreatment and puppies brutally torn from their mothers. In fact, the dairy production cycle is also closely connected to meat production.

«We think about their well-being» «Cows must be raised with respect and passion» «Just think that cows take showers and massages, so they relax!»

How many times have you heard these FALSE sentences ? These are the phrases with which dairy cows are described by the industry and by advertising which is conveyed in a false and biased way by the lobby closely connected to the farms.

Cows are mammals, like us, and to produce they must give birth, like us women, this is the fact that we must keep in mind every time we talk about milk. If you keep this in mind, you will come to understand on your own.

There is no other way, just like us and all other mammals, cows must be impregnated to breastfeed. Cows are not milk factories and, like all mammals, produce it only after pregnancy until the puppy is weaned. To ensure that their bodies continue to produce them, on farms they are continuously artificially inseminated and milked for long months. While their puppies are separated from their mother as early as the third day and fed with milk replacers.

Milking is not manual, but takes place through machinery attached directly to the udders, which extracts up to 40 liters of milk per day . Are you really sure they are happy? (answer to other classic questions!)

But what happens to the born puppies?

After about 3 days they are separated from the mother to be able to take all the milk from her, preventing it from being drunk by the puppy.

The paths are also divided according to sex. The males are sent to the slaughterhouse after a few months to become "tender" meat in butcher's shops. Females, on the other hand, are reserved for a different fate, perhaps worse: they themselves become a dairy cow, only to be slaughtered when incapable of reproducing and producing.

TV commercials advertising dairy products show cows chewing their cud freely in high mountain fields. Happy animals? It is not so.

Only an extremely marginal part of the milk and dairy products we find on the market is produced in that way (and you certainly cannot find it in large-scale retail trade). The rest comes from cows that live in large industrial barns from which they can never leave, and eat industrial feed all their lives.

Many people don't know that cows exploited for milk and cheese production are killed just like animals raised for meat. In fact, after a few years, the quantity of milk that cows produce is reduced , lowering the profit margins of the industry that decides to slaughter the cow.

When this happens, now completely exhausted by the intense and unnatural production cycle, they are sent to the slaughterhouse and replaced with younger cows.

In nature these animals can live on average 20 years, while on farms they are sent to the slaughterhouse at around 5 years of age to become meat.

The calves are taken away from their mothers immediately after giving birth or when they are a few days old, because the cows' milk is entirely destined for our human consumption. Females usually becomedairy cows like their mothers, while the males are destined for meat production and fattened up to the maximum age of two years before being sent to the slaughterhouse.

A part of the calves are instead used for white "veal" meat . They are killed when they are a few months old, spent in tiny boxes to prevent their movement, so as not to develop muscles and obtain more tender meat, as requested by the consumer. Furthermore, to keep their meat white, they are made anemic and fed a milk substitute .

In nature , however, calves practically never leave their mothers, especially females. In some cases, adult males are chased away by their mothers.

In reality, a cow could live up to 25 years, breastfeeding her calf for a year, while on farms they are never considered mothers, but only milk production machines. They will live a maximum of 5 years and will never raise their children. Even on the smallest farms the ultimate goal is always profit and the road to the slaughterhouse is always the same. This is why it is important to understand that there are no differences between the dairy industry and the meat industry.

All this applies to every type of farmed animal.

Let's reflect: Man is the only animal in nature that drinks milk from another species and without having any need for it, especially in adulthood. However, he can do without it. As stated by Dr. Luciana Baroni of the SSNV, «No type of milk, vegetable or animal, is nutritionally indispensable to human beings (with the exception of breast milk for infants)».

Good news!! You too can decide to give up a product that is cruel to cows and calves without having to give up cappuccino, whipped cream and all the recipes that require milk. Dozens of different types of vegetable drinks based on soy, rice, oats, almonds or other cereals have been on the market for years, as well as vegetable-based "cheeses", yogurt, ice cream, bechamel and cooking cream.

1. Cows do not graze freely in the fields

2. Dairy cows end up at the slaughterhouse

3. And what happens to the calves?