James Cromwell Challenges ‘Happy Cows’ Commercials in New PETA TV Spot

[shockra]

Actor Urges Consumers Not to Swallow Milk Board’s Farm Fantasy, Exposes the Real Misery Behind Milk Production

For Immediate Release:
July 13, 2005

Sacramento — Acclaimed actor James Cromwell, who just wrapped up filming the final season of Six Feet Under, is setting out to bury the California Milk Advisory Board’s deceptive "Happy Cows" advertising campaign with a provocative new TV ad in which he tells consumers, "The California dairy industry is allowed to lie to the public about how dairy cows are treated." The ad—which PETA is spending more than $50,000 to run in San Diego, Sacramento, Modesto, Santa Cruz, and Bakersfield—reveals the reality of dairy farms, including barren mud lots without a blade of grass, and shows cows as they stumble into the auction ring. It ends with a terrified calf chained inside a tiny veal crate as Cromwell concludes, "Decide for yourself if California’s cows are happy at UnhappyCows.com."

What’s PETA and Cromwell’s beef with the "Happy Cows" commercials? Not only do California’s dairy cows live in horrible conditions, they are also forcibly impregnated every year and injected with drugs to keep them producing such unnatural amounts of milk that almost one-third suffer from painful udder infections. Their newborn calves are torn from them and shoved into filthy, tiny veal crates, where they remain, unable even to turn around, for 16 weeks until they are killed. When their weak bodies can no longer produce a profitable amount of milk, dairy cows are packed onto transport trucks and sent to slaughterhouses where their throats are slit, often while they are still conscious.

For more information and to view the ad, please visit UnhappyCows.com.

http://www.peta.org/MC/NewsItem.asp?id=6739

[roguevalley]

1. gone are the days of small dairies where you could give good

care. Now its like this in too many places. Corporate farms are hell holes.

[RC]

2. If it is from PETA, there is a large dose of imagination involved.

Milk cows have to be treated well or the milk production goes down.
Facts and truth are as relevant with PETA as it is with the bu$h administration under karl rove and parallels can even be drawn.

[arwalden]

3. What Better Way To Make Me NOT Care, Than For PETA To Get Involved.

They are all a bunch of kooks.

[The Stranger]

9. PETA Bashers!

That didn't take long, did it?

By the way, know anything about dairy farming.

Ah-ha.

[Beelzebud]

11. Do you know anything about PETA?

They are not the animal friendly group they claim to be.

In my hometown we have a no-kill animal shelter. They were the ones that pointed out to me that if PETA really cared about animals, then why do they euthanize cats and dogs?

[RC]

16. Living in North dakota, yeah. Where is your profile?

Where do you live?

[donco6]

13. Me too.

Chocolate milk, anyone?

<img src="" alt="Image hosted by Photobucket.com">

[shockra]

7. Happy Cows

http://www.factoryfarming.com/dairy.htm

Regardless of where they live, however, all dairy cows must give birth in order to begin producing milk. Today, dairy cows are forced to have a calf every year. Like human beings, cows have a nine-month gestation period, and so giving birth every twelve months is physically demanding. The cows are also artificially re-impregnated while they are still lactating from their previous birthing, so their bodies are still producing milk during seven months of their nine-month pregnancy.

With genetic manipulation and intensive production technologies, it is common for modern dairy cows to produce 100 pounds of milk a day — ten times more than they would produce naturally. As a result, the cows' bodies are under constant stress, and they are at risk for numerous health problems.

Approximately half of the country's dairy cows suffer from mastitis, a bacterial infection of their udders. This is such a common and costly ailment that a dairy industry group, the National Mastitis Council, was formed specifically to combat the disease. Other diseases, such as Bovine Leukemia Virus, Bovine Immunodeficiency Virus, and Johne's disease (whose human counterpart is Crohn's disease) are also rampant on modern dairies, but they commonly go unnoticed because they are either difficult to detect or have a long incubation period.

<snip>

In a healthy environment, cows would live in excess of twenty-five years, but on modern dairies, they are slaughtered and made into ground beef after just three or four years. The abuse wreaked upon the bodies of dairy cows is so intense that the dairy industry also is a huge source of "downed animals" — animals who are so sick or injured that they are unable to walk even stand. Investigators have documented downed animals routinely being beaten, dragged, or pushed with bulldozers in attempts to move them to slaughter.

http://www.farmsanctuary.org/media/pr_dairy.htm

"The dairy industry's promotional images depicting happy cows whiling away their time in shaded pastures couldn't be further from the reality of dairy production in the United States today," said Gene Bauston, president of Farm Sanctuary. "Unfortunately, this report reveals that trends are falling further in-line with profit motive, leaving little to no regard for the welfare of the animals that are forced to live out their short lives within this industry. While scientists in Europe have led the way to studying how to improve dairy cow welfare, U.S. scientists have led the way in researching milk production efficiency."

[yukie]

4. You should see how they treat carrots! n/t

[Cocoa]

5. good for James Cromwell

and PETA. :toast:

[Obamarama]

6. Looks like George got one too many shock treatments....

Too bad he got suckered in by such a shrill, ridiculous organization. Oh well, I still like him as an actor. I'll have to remember to have a nice cold glass of milk next time I watch SFU.

[MisterP]

10. he was with them for quite a while: even got arrested protesting some

bloated grease-food chain or other. So much for getting suckered.

[GreenPartyVoter]

8. Good for him. It's inhumane to the cows and unhealthy for the

people who consume them (which I am sure is not on PETA's mind but it's true. Thank god I don't have to deal with Monsanto crap here in Maine.)

[yewberry]

12. Didn't Monsanto sue dairy co-ops in ME, NH, & VT?

I think Monsanto was trying to force the co-ops to stop labeling their own products as "BGH-free/rBGH-free" because they claimed that it implied that there was something wrong with Monsanto products.

Do you recall this effort? It was some time ago.

[GreenPartyVoter]

14. Yes, not that long ago actually. There are a bunch of articles

on common dreams about it (It's a progressive site, but it's also Maine-based so the topic was near and dear to the editors.)

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&safe=active&c2coff=1&q=site%3Awww.commondreams.org+monsanto+milk&btnG=Search

[faithnotgreed]

15. thank you james cromwell. always seems to be a great person

wonder if he is on bernard goldbergs list

[shockra]

17. Some background on James Cromwell

http://www.foodrevolution.org/askjohn/13.htm

James Cromwell, who played the pig-owning Farmer Hoggett, is a vegetarian. He has been one since 1975, and became a vegan in 1994, while making "Babe."

And yes, he is an animal rights activist as well. On July 3, 2001, the actor was arrested at an animal rights protest at a Wendy's restaurant.

"I don't regret the protest," Cromwell said at his trial. "I regret animal abuses are still happening." Outside the courthouse, protestors carried signs saying, "Please don't eat Babe for breakfast."

He pleaded no contest, and the judge ordered him to stay out of Wendy's restaurants in the county for a year and suspended a $1,000 fine. "In a just world," Cromwell said afterwards, "factory farmers would have been on trial today."