Oh the Humanity

There is a rant that’s been building up inside me for a while. It has to do with the federal government needing to revisit the standard of identity for many food items.

Cream is now milk with thickeners. Bread is pretty much flour-based goo. Cereal is mostly sugar-coated corn, except for when it’s corn-enriched sugar. The yogurt aisle resembles a candy store. Frozen dairy dessert parades around like ice cream. Chocolates are no longer chocolates but rather candy made with chocolate.

It’s Orwellian. But we haven’t even gotten to the best part.

What do you think happens these days if a supermarket labels its chicken as raised “in a humane environment” and “cage free” when it lives a life protected from cruelty and free of cages? Well, in Los Angeles that supermarket gets served with a lawsuit.

I suppose I understand better than most where the lawsuit is coming from. Kroger charged a premium for its “Simple Truth” store brand of premium priced chicken. But in reality, it was conventionally raised by Purdue Farms, enduring all of the hardships that birds go through as they are transformed from chicks to meat faster than our forebears dreamed possible.

Frankly, I too would feel duped if I were charged a premium for a Purdue bird with some fancy, feel good copy points in a cleverly designed package.

But there are some long standing maxims that cannot be ignored.

“Let the buyer beware” comes easily to mind. As much as I understand the implication of the claims on the product, the supermarket never lied. All fifty states have laws against farm animal cruelty. If a farm is abusing its livestock there will be consequences. The great tragedy of course is that factory farming processes aren’t considered to be cruel by lawmakers.

For what it’s worth, I think they are. And I know I’m not alone. This is why there are now all kinds of labels like “Certified Humane” which are supposed to give consumers confidence that some meats are being raised in better conditions.

But looking solely at semantics,
IF Purdue’s chickens are raised in an environment that prohibits cruelty (by law), and
IF an accepted antonym of cruel is humane, and
IF there is no legal definition for the humane treatment of farm animals,
THEN it would seem that Purdue chicken can be called humane.

Who is not aware that brands engage in a practice called puffery? They try to make their products sound as good as they can. Statements like “The Best Burger in America” don’t need the burden of proof. They are perfectly okay.

It’s important when shopping to look closely at labels and claims to see if the manufacturers have given themselves any wiggle room. If they have, you can bet they will take advantage of that fact. “Made with whole grain” might sound or look like “Made with 100% whole grain” but it’s meaningfully different.

So Kroger said their chicken was “cage free”. It is. But so is virtually all conventionally raised chicken. The chickens that are kept in cages are egg chickens. Those poor poor souls. So is that deceptive or descriptive?

I guess we’ll have to wait for the judge to ultimately decide where the law comes down on this.

The problem here isn’t Kroger. It’s not even Purdue. The problem here is part of the larger trend of troubling food definitions. It’s a problem that conventional meat production isn’t considered to be cruel. Keeping sentient beings confined and indoors their entire lives, fed a diet of nasty things mixed with GMO grains, and dispatched without regard doesn’t sound terribly humane to me.

I think we need to drop the charade that as a country we’re doing right by the animals that feed and sustain us. The elimination of outright abuse and unthinkable cruelty isn’t a high enough standard. The standard should be humane. And then we wouldn’t have to argue about semantics because all farmers would be responsible for their animals’ happiness, stress levels and overall well being.

In the meantime, I’m afraid the plaintiff in this case is fighting a losing battle.