Tuesday, January 02, 2007

Braaaaaaaaains!

Have we learned nothing from zombie movies?
Google News. Regular morning internet stop.

This morning, found under the heading of science:
BREAKHROUGH!1! Genetically engineered cows are free from mad cow! AMAZING! Science wins again! HURRAH!!

It appears that Japanese and American scientists bred 12 calves from cells that had the protein prion-making gene removed. They don’t appear (yet) to be unhealthy, nor, in theory should they be able to contract mad cow. Media feeding frenzy ensues.
"This research is a huge step forward for the use of animal biotechnology that benefits consumers," said Barbara Glenn of the Biotechnology Industry Organization…
Oh, my god, this is infantile.
I’ll try to be brief:

Cows are bovines. Herbivores. Ruminants. Built to eat grass. Very good at eating grass.

Cows can only contract mad cow from eating another animal who has it. Cows do not willingly seek to eat each other.

There. I’ve quite calmly shown this to be moronic, but here:

Farmers everywhere have for years fed to their cows other animals. Chickens, pigs, other cows, etc. Not steaks and thighs, but the waste products from processing, brains, tendons, feathers, and the like. Utterly useless waste except that it’s high in proteins. And cheap. Even if it is wholly not what Nature intended. Along comes her reply: mad cow.

We humans, it seems, have decided one up Nature. Take out a gene, see what happens. Where are the fucking klaxons and warning lights and tornado sirens? This ain’t right. We have a very simple problem, with a very simple solution, and yet we’re spending money over here in a lab trying to bend reality so we can go along fucking things up? Why was every single article on Google News happy and crowing about this? Are we all this blind?

You want mad cow free cows? Don’t insist that the waste meat products your future steak is fed has been properly irradiated, insist that your future steak ISN’T FED MEAT!
Vote with your mouth. This is crazy.

5 Comments:

Blogger Lisa said...

Lotb:
You learn something every day. If asked, I will announce proudly and defiantly that I am in favor of grass-fed cows only!!! Rock on.

3:34 PM  
Blogger laughjon said...

Drew, this is the kind of commentary I come to this site for. Bravo! Well this and pictures of cow poop.

10:10 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Huzzah!!! I smell a new federal agency being formed now in order to certify only grass-fed cow meat, a resulting grassroots (no pun intended) organization, and the commensurrate rise in the price of non-zombie beef.

P.S. I totally agree.

10:25 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I heard that eating brains (or animals that have eaten brains) makes you smarter.

Is that True or False Drew?

12:48 PM  
Blogger Lord of the Barnyard said...

pat: true.
also, attending a school called bainco will make you smarted with zero efforts.

5:10 PM  

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