On Stockyards and Compassionate Carnivores

I don’t know about you, but I was hit particularly hard by Dan Barry’s "Silence Replaced Bids and Moos at Stockyards in Suburbs" in this morning’s New York Times. And the accompanying slide show was even more devastating because of the photos and the sounds of the animals.

It was the language that struck me, of course, as Barry tried very hard to present a romantic tale of the end of an era. If he just gave me the facts, I wouldn’t have been nearly as disturbed. When I read it, I wonder if I’m the only person on the planet who feels a pang, both in her stomach and her heart.

Here’s what hurt me most, as Barry describes the last day the stockyards of South St. Paul, Minnesota were open for business:

• "where the auctioneer’s sweet serenade only hardens those bovine expressions of uh-oh." The sweet serenade leading to slaughter? And mocking the animals with uh-oh? Would he have felt the same way if the animals were dogs? And dare I say the same scenario occurred with humans not that long ago. Does he not see the similarity?
  
• "Punctuation to this reality came in January, when yet another animal escaped from the stockyards. A bull weighing nearly a ton apparently did not like what it had been sold for and wound up for a while on Interstate 494 during the morning rush hour. A police officer’s shotgun blast soon freed the animal from worrying about the evening commute." Mocking the bull is not journalism. He wanted to be free, Mr. Barry. He doesn’t know–or care–how much he was sold for. And calling him "it," well, at this point, despite the fact that we know he’s a he, we also know enough about Barry to know he doesn’t care.
• "Here is John Barber, big and strong and 69, the yard’s main auctioneer for nearly four decades. What a voice he has, so deep and soothing that you want to bid on something, anything: Would there be room for a heifer in the apartment?" Something. Anything. And the heifer comment is just rude.
• "The Kruegers have donated a 900-pound heifer to be the last cow auctioned at the stockyards, with the sale proceeds going to an agricultural scholarship fund. Its father was a Simmental named Red Rock, and its mother was a Black Angus named, simply, N501 Commercial. As for its own name, chosen well before its historical role was determined: Timeless." IT is a cow. IT is a heifer. IT is female. IT is not an inanimate object. SHE is an individual. SHE WAS an individual.
• "a black-white-brown sea surrendering puffs of steam from wet hides, and the occasional yardman shout of Hey! Hey! Hey!" At this point, since he’s so fond of telling us what the animals think, I’d be interested to hear what he thinks is going through their minds. Perhaps it rhymes with: Free me.
• "After a while Mr. Barber reclaims his seat, signaling that the final cattle auction is about to begin. All that livestock from Minnesota and Wisconsin, unloaded from trucks and herded into pens, now to be rushed into the arena for some momentary preening, bought, rushed out, loaded up and carted away.

  At the same time there comes the smell of cooking beef — free hamburgers! — to settle over the arena and pens, and to underscore the fate of at least some of those gathered here." An honest moment of commentary.

• "He sings to the cattle trotting into the arena 10 and 20 at a time, many of them relieving themselves to convey what they think of the honor." Perhaps that’s why they were relieving themselves. And who could blame them.

Listening to the slide show was difficult for me, but it was also educational. Just when I was relieved that the stockyards were closing, I learn that the "service" will now be online. As John Barber said: "Change is hard but we’ll make it through. Nobody’s died from change."

That’s not true. When people change their minds and decide to eat animals that do not come from factory farms, somebody dies for that change. For each meal made with animals, somebody dies.