05 October 2011

Protecting us from Ourselves

Hey, readers in Wisconsin: your state government is on the case, protecting you from any stupid decisions you might want to make about what you put into your own body. You know, like ... raw milk.

N.B. this is a crackdown extending even to those who've organized their farm to sell ownership sales to those interested in obtaining raw milk. Selling shares has been an effective traditional means of circumventing prohibitions on raw milk sales. If I own a share in the cow, the milk from the cow is mine and I'm free to drink it. I'm not buying or selling the milk. Just drinking what came from this cow that I'm a part owner of.

It would be one thing if the state wanted to protect ignorant consumers who might accidentally grab unpasteurized milk from the shelf at the grocery store. But these farm share owners, by the nature of the trouble they've gone to, have demonstrated themselves to be about as highly aware of the risks and benefits of raw milk as it's possible to be.

Raw milk has some pathogens which are potentially harmful if the milk isn't handled correctly? Yeah, yeah. I know that. But I'm an adult, a thinking and reasoning subject, who has decided that this product's benefits far outweigh any of those potential harms. And that this product is far superior to the chalk water that the dairy industry wants me to be stuck with.

Let's hope that at some point, government at all levels will get out of our way and let us make nutritional decisions like the free adults we are.

5 comments:

Barb said...

Oh my, it has been a long while since I caught up on your wonderful blog! Thanks for the laughs and vigorous head nodding from my computer desk this lovely Sunday. As a fellow small farmer, I so get it. :) Did you ever write another book after Passport? My (homeschool) family would love to read another great novel.

TYF said...

Barb - thanks for the great comment. I have in fact written another novel, but it's still in the editing stage. Been trying to squeeze those edits in around everything else, but hopefully I'll have something close to finished next year.

Barb said...

Well I'm glad to hear it, looking forward to reading it. Thanks!

jch said...

I am not quite sure, if I have ever drank pasteurized milk ever before age 17, but I am still alive and kicking. I think the city folks get the idea that people who are talking about raw milk are some weirdos who are attempting to drink from the udder of a kicking cow. if you simply boil the milk and use it in 24 to 48 hours, it is certainly healthier than the store bought, plasticky milk which is milky white and without a smell...

May be one day Ron Paul or one of his disciples will make it possible for us to drink real milk without the additives from a glass bottle.

jch said...

I am not quite sure, if I have ever drank pasteurized milk ever before age 17, but I am still alive and kicking. I think the city folks get the idea that people who are talking about raw milk are some weirdos who are attempting to drink from the udder of a kicking cow. if you simply boil the milk and use it in 24 to 48 hours, it is certainly healthier than the store bought, plasticky milk which is milky white and without a smell...

May be one day Ron Paul or one of his disciples will make it possible for us to drink real milk without the additives from a glass bottle.