The Rich Roll Podcast - Farm Sanctuary on Factory Farming, Ag-Gag Bills, Health & Consumer Choice

Episode Date: June 11, 2013

Today on the show I sit down with Gene Baur — activist, best-selling author and president & co-founder of Farm Sanctuary, the first animal rescue organization dedicated to farmed animals. You might have seen him in the documentary Forks Over Knives*. And I'd be remiss in not mentioning his is a pretty darn good marathon runner prepping for his first Ironman this summer (on a plant-based diet of course). I've had plenty of vegans with strong points of view on the program. But this was the first time I have interviewed a true animal rights activist. I'm certainly not an expert in this area, but Gene is such a great guy, he made it easy. I'm the first to admit that my original reasons for going vegan were far more selfish than ethical. But the more educated I become about how our food system functions to deliver meals to our plates, the more sensitive and attuned I have become to the indelible power of marketing; the extraordinary lengths to which BigFood and their adjuncts on Capitol Hill will go to keep the public immunized from the harsh realities of factory farming; and the unnecessary and horrific treatment of farm animals that inevitably results. Please understand — I take no moral high ground. But as my awareness of this issue continues to broaden, I do feel a certain imperative to cast light on what I perceive as exceedingly cruel abuse on a systemic level. In my very humble opinion, our current system is both untenable and unsustainable in the long term. There is a better way. And Gene is a great ambassador of a worthy message warranting our objective attention. If you come to this interview with a different perspective on this issue, I understand. And it's fine. Believe me, I get it. I ask only one thing – that you please listen with an open and mind. Thanks. And enjoy the show! Rich

Welcome to episode 35 of the Rich Roll Podcast with Farm Sanctuary's Gene Bauer. The Rich Roll Podcast. Hey everybody, Rich Roll here. This is the Rich Roll Podcast. Thanks for checking in. If you've been with us before, welcome back. Thanks for tuning in once again. I appreciate you guys out there, thee. That means that I'm not very fast, but I can go all day. And I guess I'm a glutton for punishment. I am a plant-based nutrition advocate. That means that I espouse the health benefits of eating a plant-based diet, eating a vegan diet, a whole food plant-based diet. I am a public speaker. I'm the best-selling author of a book called Finding Ultra, which I'm sure you've all already read, right? So I don't have to go into that.

What else? I'm here to bring you paradigm-busting personalities, forward-thinking individuals, the new voices of what it means to be healthy. So on the show, I've had all sorts of different kinds of people. I've had doctors. I've had nutritionists. I've had world-class athletes, everybody from Olympic gold medalist swimmers to MMA fighters and world champion triathletes like Chris McCormick. And I've had entrepreneurs too. In my opinion, health begins with what's on your plate, what you put down your throat. And I have a bunch of strong opinions about what's best in that regard. But I also wouldn't consider this to be a strictly

vegan podcast. I've had lots of people on the show with different ideas about nutrition and food. I've had paleo people, I've had low carb people, I've had people come in and talk about ketosis. And of course, I've had all the plant-based people, all my friends, all these people that I've met on this journey that I started about six years ago when I turned my health around by adopting a 100% whole food plant-based diet. But I like to bring different perspectives into the fray and have a mature adult long form conversation where we get to go deep into these issues, which in many ways is kind of a lost art form in this age of the sound clip and the sound bite. And it's been really fun and I find it to be the best way to really get to know people and to really hear their side of the story and explore new ideas.

And again, when I say health, it does start with what's on the plate, what we put down our throats, but that's not where it ends. That's really where it begins. Because in my opinion, true health, optimal health really means a balance of mind, body, and spirit. You got to tune the mind up. You got to be grounded spiritually. You got to take care of your body through what you eat and how you move it. And all of those things I think are important and critical in kind of devising your own personal protocol for how you live your life. And so my kind of goal or what I, you know, aspire to with this podcast is to bring to you all of these people and help you form your own opinions about what you want to do with yourself. And in a sense, I guess what I'm saying

is let me bring these experts in some of which which you may have heard of and many of which you probably haven't, but people that I believe in and feel strongly have something to offer. But the idea is to empower you, not to sort of put myself or anybody else up on a pedestal, but to provide you with as much information as I can so that you can divine or mine from that and take away from it what works for you and incorporate it into your life. In other words, to have greater self-empowerment over your choices and again, you know, what you put down your throat, but so much more than that. Again, the idea is to help you to be your best self, to unlock and discover and empower your best, most authentic self deep down inside yearning to get out.

yearning to get out. And today's guest certainly fits the bill. Today on the show, we have Gene Bauer, who is the president and co-founder of Farm Sanctuary. Gene's an activist. He's a best-selling author and, like I said, co-founder of Farm Sanctuary, whose mission is to protect farm animals from cruelty and to inspire change in the way society views and treats farm animals and to promote compassionate living. And he's an interesting guy. He's also a marathoner and he's preparing for his first Ironman on a plant-based diet, of course, getting ready for Ironman Lake Placid. And he offers a really unique perspective on what it means to be vegan. And certainly, you know, I'm the first to admit, and I talk about this in my book, that I did not get into eating plant-based, eating vegan for ethical reasons.

I did not become out of the gate an ethical vegan. My motivation was really much more selfish. I wanted to be more healthy. I wanted to feel better. I didn't want to have a heart attack. I wanted to feel my body again. I wanted to feel better. I didn't want to have a heart attack. I wanted to feel my body again. And kind of animal rights issues really did not play into my mental calculus at all.

But I have to say that the more I walk this path and the further along in this journey that I go, and the more I educate myself, the more books I read, the more documentaries I watch, the more attuned and sensitive I am to this issue. Because the truth is, is that we live in a society in which our food is provided to us predominantly by a factory farming system that is controlled by big agriculture, big food, farming system that is controlled by big agriculture, big food with very strong and powerful money to interest it, put interests in play. And the system has been erected and is sustained on the woefully cruel treatment of these farm animals. And there's just no escaping it. I mean, if you were to visit these factory farms and kind of observe how these animals are treated, even the most hardened, ardent meat eater would have to agree

that there's some deplorable conditions here. And to raise the issue or to kind of, I guess I would say to hide under a rock and pretend it's not there or to just sort of convince ourselves that it's fine and we're at the top of the food chain that's a very convenient argument but i really think that you know it deserves our attention and at a minimum an adult objective dialogue about what's actually happening and what can be done. Because in my opinion, it is a very inhumane

system that we perpetuate. And I believe that there must be a better way and that there is a better way. And having Gene on the show is kind of my first, he's my first guest that I've had on the show to address and discuss these issues. And I guess I'm a little trepidatious about it. You know, my message is always to be very inviting. You know, I want to create a soft landing pad for people that are interested in these issues to feel welcome and comfortable kind of exploring this way of eating, this way of living. And it gets tricky when you start using the word vegan and comfortable kind of exploring this way of eating, this way of living. And it gets tricky when you start using the word vegan and you kind of wear that hat. Everybody has their own, you know, sort of preconceived notion of what that means. And there are different camps within the vegan world. I mean, you have people that kind of come into it

like myself for health reasons, and then you have people that get into it strictly for the animal rights issues that are involved. And that's great. And that's fine. Sometimes those groups don't overlap. Sometimes they do. Sometimes they don't get along. Sometimes they do. But, you know, they have very different motivations for why they are choosing to live in this fashion. And I think there are a lot of people out there that get freaked out or turned off when the discussion turns towards animal rights. And my opinion is it doesn't have to be that way. It doesn't have to be a scenario in which barbs are being thrown and judgments are being made and accusations are flying around and somebody's standing up on a moral high ground, you know, from a pedestal looking down on other people. That is not my perspective on this issue whatsoever.

But I think it merits, you know, it merits our intention. We should talk about these things. And wherever you come down on this issue, whether you agree or disagree, I ask only that you listen to this interview with an open mind, because Gene is a wealth of information. He's been doing this for a long time. Farm Sanctuary operates a large animal sanctuary in upstate New York, and they also have two large animal sanctuary in upstate New York. And they also have two sanctuaries here in California. He's doing amazing work and he is a great ambassador for the message that he promotes. And he knows his stuff. I mean, when it comes to factory farming and GMOs and, you know, the ins and outs of how this whole huge, you know, behemoth of a farming system operates,

he can tell you exactly, you know, where it's gone awry and how we can get it back on track. All the way from the legislation, much of which he's been a part of, either lobbying for or against, and kind of explaining how it works when these ag gag bills that are sort of preventing whistleblowers from talking about what's actually going on with these food companies and at these farms to you know what monsanto is actually doing and what they're up to next and how the animals ultimately are affected in this kind of calculus. Certainly how humans are affected as well. It affects all of us. This is not an issue of protecting animals over humans. It's something that we all need to be made aware of. And like I said, we're here to just have an open discussion

to banter the ideas about. So check it out with an open mind. Before we get into it, just a couple quick announcements. If you've been enjoying the show and want to support what we're doing, the easiest way to do it is to click on the Amazon banner ad at richroll.com. On the podcast page or on the blog page, you'll see it, just a little black and white Amazon banner ad. If you're going to buy something on Amazon, like the paperback of Finding Ultra, because Father's Day is coming up

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you know, the full extent of the wellness curriculum that they have woven into the fabric of that school is amazing. And it was my honor to try to help get that story out to an even broader audience. So I appreciate all the great comments on that one. If you've been enjoying the show, also, you know what? Tag us on Twitter. Tag us on Instagram. I'm at Rich Roll on Twitter. I'm at Rich Roll on Instagram. I'll tell you what. Throw a photo up on Instagram of you reading Finding Ultra or listening to the podcast and just tag my name on it at Rich Roll. And I'm going to pick a winner. You know why? Because we got some t-shirts coming up,

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Life in recovery is wonderful, and recovery.com is your partner in starting that journey. When you or a loved one need help, go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best treatment option for you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com. So let's just cut it short now and get into the interview with Gene. Like I said, he's an awesome guy. He knows his stuff. And this is a fascinating interview from a very unique and passionate individual with an important message. So I implore you, open your ears, be objective, and give it a listen. Ladies and gentlemen, Jean Bauer.

make you think she needs it it's time no but i what i was saying is i know that you did a uh like a cross-country uh sort of road trip a couple years ago that's for the 25th anniversary yes farm sanctuary and kind of uh visiting what i mean did you visit farms along the way or you know sort of like a like a whistle stop tour kind of we got the old volkswagen van that farm sanctuary started in back in 1986 and the way we funded the organization in the early days was by selling vegetarian hot dogs at grateful dead concerts out of a volkswagen van you're a true hippie oh yeah come from that time come from that time period. And so we got the van back on the road and took it cross country and went to various restaurants that have vegan food. And it was sort of like an exploration of vegan America. And part of that also included going by agribusiness facilities.

agribusiness facilities. So we would be going through Iowa and see factory farms and swing by to just sort of talk a little bit about what happens inside of those windowless buildings and to just talk about the reality of agribusiness and animal farming and what it means. Like with the farmers themselves or with the communities? Well, we would usually not speak to the farmers. In fact, in one situation,

we were outside of a dairy farm in Southern California talking about what was happening on that dairy farm, and the farmer came out to shoo us away. He did not want us there. And on the back of his car was a bumper sticker that said, dairy farming is not a crime. So he obviously felt like he was being embattled. And so he was pretty intense.

And they don't generally like us talking about what they're doing. In fact, they're trying to pass laws right now to make it illegal to talk about. Yeah, the ag-gag bills. And there's one, is it in North Carolina right now that's hotly debated? Yes. So what's going on with that? Yeah, there's an ag-gag bill in North Carolina that has been moving forward. A farm sanctuary and a coalition of other organizations are working to try to stop that bill.

And right now it's hard to know what's going to happen, but we're very concerned because agribusiness is very influential in North Carolina. And explain for the listeners what the ag-gag kind of movement is all about, for those that might not know. Yeah, well, in recent years, there's been lots of undercover investigations showing the abuses of factory farming. And agribusiness doesn't like those to be hitting the airwaves, so they're now introducing legislation in various states

to make it more difficult to obtain those kinds of undercover videos, to make it illegal to take those videos and to distribute them. So these ag-gag bills, is what they've been labeled as, have been introduced around the country, and many of them have died, thankfully. But there's one in North Carolina that's still alive and that is a great concern of ours. Right, and it's not just, it's not so,

I mean, it is an animal rights issue, but it's also a First Amendment issue, it's a human rights issue, it it's also a First Amendment issue. It's a human rights issue. It's a right to know issue. It involves a lot of issues that we should all be really concerned about. Absolutely. It's fundamental democratic issues. You know, the right to speak, free speech is so critical.

And the right of a free press to be able to talk about when things are not being done well. And it's important for citizens to be able to make informed choices. And when you have these kind of ag-gag bills passing, they make it a lot more difficult for advocates to speak out and for citizens to get information that they really should have about their food choices. I mean, it really sounds almost sort of despotic, you know, that we would be prevented by law

from understanding or having an idea of how our food is being produced and delivered to us. It's really, really unbelievable. And it's actually not new. This has been going on for years. When Oprah Winfrey, for example, talked about mad cow disease back in the 1990s, she was sued by Texas cattlemen and she had

to defend herself against them according to food disparagement laws so you cannot say disparaging words about certain foods otherwise you might find yourself in court as as oprah did with the beef producers it's amazing to me it's it's crazy it's crazy and is this i mean is it everybody points the finger at Monsanto? I mean, it's the obvious target and the biggest player in the field, but who are the other kind of big movers in this issue? Well, Monsanto is very much a lightning rod. They're very easy to look to because of the way they try to control the seeds and control other farmers and make it difficult for farmers to farm, you know, without having to pay homage and to purchase Monsanto products. But, you know, there's, you know, all the beef producers, you know, there's Cargill. I mean, and the fast food companies also are complicit.

I think what is difficult is that these industries are so intertwined. The pharmaceuticals work closely with the agribusiness producers and with the crop producers, even like corn and soy people are very tied into animal agriculture because corn and soybeans are the primary feed crops that are heavily subsidized by taxpayers. You also have issues of water rights and property rights, and agribusiness has preferential access to those things. Fossil fuels, they have preferential access to fossil fuels. So this is an industry that ties into so much of the economy, even banking and loans and finances. And at the end of the day, though, most consumers are

unwittingly supporting the system. Right, with an emphasis on unwittingly, I think. Yes, I think that's right. You know, most people are humane. Most people don't want to eat food that is coming from an agricultural system that's destroying the planet. But most people, unfortunately and unwittingly, are supporting that kind of a system by buying these animal foods without thinking enough about it. Right, and I've said this many times on the podcast, but the system is uh set up to prevent us from having any relationship or understanding from with how the food is produced and how it gets to us from the way it's packaged in the grocery store the way it's laid out and displayed the images on the packaging that show these pastoral farms and give you a good feeling about where your dairy product is coming from or what

have you. And we are meant to be insulated from all that nasty business. And there's a lot of energy and money that goes into maintaining that status quo. So true. And the fact is that when we're disconnected, we're going to be less informed and we will be sold products that don't really align with our own values and align with our own interests. And that's what's happening. Disconnected and also confused. When we're bombarded with all these different kinds of messages about what's good for us and what's not, the food business relishes that. Because the more confused we are, the more likely we are to just keep doing the same thing that we've always been doing.

So true. And then we become disempowered. And then agribusiness continues selling us this stuff that is bad for us, bad for the animals, bad for the planet. And it doesn't have to be that way. But more and more people, I think, are now starting to recognize that they need to be more mindful of their food choices and to ultimately make choices that they can feel good about instead of relying on the government and relying on food companies to provide accurate labels and accurate nutrition advice. So people are starting to take more responsibility.

And as that happens, I think there's going to be a major shift. I think we're beginning to see parts of it now. There's more farmer's markets than ever before. There are community supported agriculture programs. There are more and more alternatives to animal foods, you know, both dairy products, you can get, you know, coconut milk, almond milk and stuff. So it's getting, it's getting better. But people are busy, they're distracted. And you know, what is it that, that somebody who might be listening to this

who wants to make the right choice, what are some things that they could do to help become more empowered? I think the most important thing is just to recognize that you do have control over your food choices. There's many things in this world that we don't have control over. But when it comes to what we eat,

each of us every day has a lot of control. And that decision is one of the most important decisions we make every day. It has profound impacts on our own health. And tragically, in this country, the way we eat today, we're eating in a way that makes us sick. Heart disease is the number one killer. And the risk of heart disease can be seriously lessened

by shifting towards a whole food plant-based diet and away from animal foods. Risk of cancer can be reduced by shifting toward plant foods. Risk of the worst environmental problems we're facing can be reduced by shifting towards plant foods. So this is a system that we're currently supporting, this animal agriculture system that causes so much harm. And each citizen, each consumer,

can take responsibility for their actions and play a significant role in shifting us away from that. And I think that is starting to happen. I mean, I think there's a sense of, somewhat of a sense of powerlessness with the consumer and thinking, well, my vote doesn't really matter. And, you know, I'm up against these huge companies. Like, I just don't, you know, Dancing with the Stars is on TV. So, you know, I'm just going to check out. I just don't, dancing with the stars is on TV. So I'm just gonna check out, there's nothing I can do. And it's easy to point your finger at the fast food companies and the Monsantos

and here are the bad guys and kind of go about your way. But really you have to turn that finger around and point it at yourself and say, all right, well, what can I do? I can vote with my dollar. I can make the choice about what I'm putting down my throat because no government can control that. And start with yourself.

I mean, it has to be that way. I think it does. We can't control others. We cannot control the fast food companies. But we can control our own behavior. And that's where it ultimately starts. And at the end of the day, agribusiness depends on consumers

to buy their stuff. If we stop buying their stuff, they're going to shift. They ultimately depend on consumers, but right now there's a strong effort to keep consumers confused, as you mentioned, and to keep consumers distracted and to keep us mindlessly consuming in a way that is so harmful. Yeah, and yet the ag gag bills are really a reaction. It's a fear-based reaction to

this idea that consumers do want to know. And there are protests afoot and there are quite a few, you know, anti-GMO rallies going on across the country right now. And I think people are getting more and more informed and and uh you know we'll see where that goes but I I'm optimistic with at least with respect to this aspect of it I am too I am optimistic I am hopeful I think most people are humane most people want to live healthy lives and they want to live on a planet that's not being destroyed so I think we've got a lot going for us and when people have the information they need to make informed choices, I think most are going to make humane, healthy, sustainable choices. And you've been doing this since 1986.

Yeah, man. It's been a while. Yeah. We were talking before the podcast about, you know, what it must have been like back then, you know, sort of shouting from the mountaintops and, you know, there just wasn't the kind of energy and mainstream interest in all of this that there is now. So, you know there just wasn't the kind of energy and and uh mainstream um interest in all of this that there is now so you know that's got to feel feels really good we've come so far yeah back in 86 for soy milk you'd usually have to get like a a powder and mix it with water to get soy milk right you know now you go to the grocery store and there's all kinds of oh you were an insane person if you were going to the you, I remember my mom growing up in DC,

there was one like natural food market in Bethesda. And she, and she would every once in a while, she would courageously venture in to pick up some kind of, I don't know, trying to be healthy and bring something home. And she would say, I don't know what it is.

Like, I don't know if the people in there, like they don't look healthy. Like either they're, they're there because they're sick and they're trying to get better, or maybe they're sick because they're eating that kind of food. I remember her saying that to me. And it's like, you know, fast forward to whole foods and you know, what's going on now. I mean, it's a universe of difference. It's amazing how far we've come. Absolutely. And you have people, like Bill Clinton, for example, who was having heart issues and decided to go to a plant-based It's amazing how far we've come, absolutely. If you look at our bodies, we're better suited to eat plant foods instead of animal foods. So I think more and more people are getting that. There's more information.

The internet has been a huge plus. You know, people can see videotape of factory farming to see how bad that is. But there's also information about healthy recipes, where to get healthy plant foods. And so there's the information about why it makes sense to shift towards plant-based eating. And there's information about how to shift towards plant-based eating. Right. Yeah, it's great. It is.

It is. It's cool. So what kind of got you going on this? I mean, tell me a little bit about your background. And I know you grew up in Hollywood. And from what I understand, a relatively conservative upbringing. And then you become this sort of ardent, you know, firebrand. Like, you know, how does this happen?

Well, I grew up and my parents are conservative Catholics. And I went to Catholic school and was sort of hit with a strong dose of morality, right and wrong. And the thou shalts and thou shalt nots and so on. And a lot of that stuff was too dogmatic and judgmental for me. But there were certain basic things that stuck. And the idea of don't kill, treat the least of these kindly and do unto others, those types of things I thought made sense. And I wanted to grow up and do things that would be positive in the world. And I didn't want to be a cog in a wheel of a system that I thought was very harmful.

Growing up in the Hollywood Hills, I remember seeing beautiful oak trees being cut down so that houses could be made bigger. I remember seeing neighbors' backyards where wildlife was being harmed. I remember there was a deer, for example, that got stuck in a chain link fence that was killed because he got tangled in this fence. And those types of things had a very sort of visceral impact on me. And I didn't want to be part of a system that was causing so much harm. So in high school, I started volunteering at Children's Hospital,

working with kids who were terminally ill. And then in college, I started getting involved with some adolescents, adolescent folks that needed help. And then I got involved with environmental issues, involved with Greenpeace, got involved with Ralph Nader organizations. And as time went, I started- Meanwhile, your Catholic parents are saying what to you? Meanwhile, they, I don't think, really understood

what I was trying to figure out but i was the oldest of six so they had plenty of other kids to kind of keep them occupied as yes but our oldest son our prodigal son yeah well you know they he had a family we go wrong it's those kind of things right you know my father had a family business where he managed properties down near MacArthur Park. And I think that his kind of thinking was that I and my other siblings would go into the family business. But it wasn't something that really spoke to me. And it wasn't something that changed the status quo of a system that I thought was harmful. And so I just started exploring different things.

But yeah, I think there were some challenging moments. Right. And I... Our son, the hippie. Our son, the hippie, exactly. I had long hair and things like that, and very much a nature boy. And I don't have long hair anymore, and I don't have a beard anymore. But it was a time of exploration and growth and trying to figure stuff out. And I also hitchhiked around the country in the early 80s,

which was another part of my becoming more aware of animal farming and what happens to rural America when you have these factory farms. And I started meeting other people that were vegetarian and aware of these issues. And that was really helpful because we are social animals and we learn from those around us. And if you've never met another vegetarian,

you don't even think that that's a possibility. So I started recognizing that there were other ways that I could be living. And the thing about factory farming is that it combines so many issues. It combines our health. It combines many issues. It combines our health. It combines environmental destruction. It combines animal abuse. And all of these things come together in this one huge issue that was not getting a lot of attention back in the mid-1980s. Right.

I mean, even more than that, it's issues of indentured servitude and the democratic process and, you know we said the right to know and now you know i want to talk about gmos and the proliferation of gmos and the kind of threats posed by that because there's i think there's a lot of confusion about that as well but there's a whole pantheon of issues that get raised by factory farming and the predatory nature of it and the imperiled farmer as a result like i just saw my wife and I just rented that Matt Damon movie, Promised Land, which I thought was really a very interesting, I don't know if you saw that movie. It's really from the sort of farmer's perspective of what's happening in small towns with, you know, the advent of factory farming, the pressures, the sort of economic pressures on these small farmers to grow or perish.

So it has economic issues on the kind of heartland and the towns and the families that for generations have been farming a certain way, and that way of life is no longer viable. Yes, no, it's very true. So in addition to producing unhealthy food, there's, as you say, this sort of indentured servitude, this sort of control of local communities that is imposed. And you sort of get with a program or you get out. The USDA for decades has said, get big or get out. And that's what's been happening. And it's tragic to see what's

happening in rural America. And this is something that's been studied by anthropologists. And they've recognized the social harm that comes from this kind of an industrial farming system. In addition to the pollution, in addition to people who can't even go out on their porch anymore during certain times of year because the stench is so bad. They can't hang their clothes up on the laundry line because it smells so bad their clothes will stink. So this is what happens in these factory farm areas. And so explain a little bit about your perspective on GMOs and the kind of patented seeds and the grains and the sort of, you know, what we're growing to feed the livestock and how that's impacting us. Well, you know, there's a lot that is not known about it. You know, we hear a lot about allergies and it's possible that some of those are coming

from these GMOs. But there's sort of a desire not to really look too closely. It's sort of a don't look, don't find approach. Because I think if agribusiness looked, they would see that there are really negative consequences. And if they are aware of those, then they become more culpable for those. Oh, that's interesting. So, I mean, usually you would have a pharmaceutical company, say, for example, perform a study to establish

that a certain drug that they're developing has a benefit. But in this case, it's, I guess what you're saying is it's the reverse, like, let's not do a study. Then we can say there's no proof that this is harmful. Exactly, exactly. For years, we were arguing that in the U.S. we were likely to have mad cow disease. But agribusiness and the USDA kept saying there's no evidence that we have mad cow disease. And so we said it's sort of a don't look, don't find approach. Because once you find that you have mad cow disease, export markets are now going to be much more difficult to find.

And so there's a vested economic interest in not finding certain problems. Because once you do, you are then culpable, potentially legally responsible. And these companies would rather just be selling stuff and making money instead of really looking into the consequences of what these foods could be doing.

They're very short-sighted, unfortunately. As a result, human consumers are basically guinea pigs. We're all kind of an experiment. We'll see how it works out. That's just sort of life. We can't predict the future, but unfortunately agribusiness is really driven by profit. And producing things in volume, selling as much as possible.

And maintaining government subsidies to keep the prices. Yeah, and to keep the guarantees for them. So the government guarantees a certain price for their products. So if they produce a lot of it, they're going to get a lot of money for them. So the government guarantees a certain price for their products. So if they produce a lot of it, they're going to get a lot of money for it. And then there's also risk aversion techniques where they have, you know, insurance policies that are also underwritten by taxpayers to make sure that they're not going to lose money. This is why you have finance people involved so often in farming. And then there's also tax breaks and tax incentives.

If you have agricultural land, there are some benefits that come from that. So this is an industry that's very entrenched, and it's very complex, and it's very harmful. And most citizens are just unwittingly engaged in it. And the best thing to do is to just get food from places you know, from like farmer's markets, from CSAs. Grow your own. And to become empowered in that way. Because buying into this food system the way it currently operates ties into so many bad things. And

the pharmaceutical industry is one of the biggest industries involved. Most of the antibiotics produced in the U.S. are fed to farm animals to make them grow faster. Interesting. And then people eat these animals. And by the way, it's legal for diseased animals to be slaughtered and used for human food. Yeah, explain that a little bit more fully. I was reading about that recently. Yeah, we actually had litigation against the U.S. Department of Agriculture some years ago,

and we argued that downed animals, those that are too sick to walk, are diseased. And legally, we argued that diseased animals cannot be used for food. The USDA responded to our petition and our lawsuit arguing that it was legal and common and appropriate for diseased animals to be used for food. So that's a USDA policy.

And so you have diseased animals going into the food supply. You have animals routinely being fed antibiotics to grow faster. So you then have antibiotic-resistant bacteria developing. And then you have consumers eating too many of these animal foods which contribute to heart disease and cancer and things like that so now then you have pharmaceuticals selling you heart medications that get you coming and going perfect cycle of keeping you kind of wed uh to these to these drugs at every stage along along the journey right it's so horrible and it's so disempowering

because now you're dependent on the drugs, which kind of gets back to the Monsanto GMO thing a little bit, where you have farmers that are being prevented from saving their own seeds and being empowered in a sense to develop their own food products. And they end up having to buy Monsanto seeds that then comes with Roundup and Monsanto

pesticides and herbicides that work with their seeds. And so a large part of the problem I think has to do with the socioeconomic control that Monsanto and these other companies then start having on farmers. And so farmers become disempowered, and they just sort of have to go with a program, and it's not a healthy program. Yeah, I mean, they have to get new seeds every year too, right? They sign these contracts that obligate them to do so, and it's essentially criminal for them to do otherwise, right?

Yes, yes. And some of the seeds are actually called terminator seeds because they will not they're not perennial they're right they'll just one one yeah so you one season and out exactly so you have to buy them everywhere right and now with i mean i'm i'm a real you know i'm no expert in this arena but my understanding is that these seeds you know they blow in the wind and they start to, you know, germinate in other areas until it's just, you know, everywhere. And it's basically, I mean, is it even possible to get corn that's not GMO?

I mean, it's got to be difficult, right, even in small farms. It is difficult, yeah, because this stuff does blow. And in Monsanto, if some of these Monsanto seeds have blown onto a farmer's land, even if the farmer didn't plant it, Monsanto has actually challenged them in court, saying that they're growing their yield. Unlawfully growing their seeds. Crazy. It's crazy. So it's been getting more difficult.

But I really do think, too, that there is a burgeoning small farm movement. There's a lot of young people. Oh, there's no question about that. You know, it's sort of like, you know, the adage, rock is dead. And, you know, there's nothing new that could be said through rock and roll. And then Nirvana comes along. You know, there's always a reaction to every action. And there really is this amazing new movement of really dynamic, well-educated young people interested in sustainable agriculture.

And, you know, rather than going off and getting a job at a consulting firm, going and joining these farms and becoming farmers. And our family spent last winter living on the North Shore of Kauai at an organic farm. And, and it was great experience. The kids got to work the land with some of the young people that were, that were there working in, and they all had like graduate degrees and they were there by choice to like really learn about agriculture and how to grow their own food, like well-educated,

really neat, like young people. And I mean, that, that, that wasn't something that I would have thought of doing when I was right out of college or anybody I knew for that matter. So it's pretty cool to see that. Very exciting.

And they're happening all, it must be happening quite a bit in upstate New York. Yeah, it's happening, I think, everywhere. There's these, it's just an entrepreneurial spirit as well, where you have these small businesses you know people that are or even people that have been in you know a regular business in the city and they leave that and move to the country to start a farm kind of business so you have older people you have younger people there's a lot of energy behind growing food in a more sustainable way that is more aligned with societal values that is something that people could actually visit the farm and feel okay about it right which is very different than the mainstream animal farming business today right right absolutely we started off the conversation talking about your uh your cross-country trek when i think it was right when your book came out and it was the 25th anniversary

of farm sanctuary and and before we were recording, you were asking me, like, oh, it would be cool to go across the country or something like that. And I was like, yeah. I was thinking what would be fun would be to run across the U.S., like create this crazy endurance event. I mean, people have run across the U.S. There's plenty of people that have done that. There's nothing incredibly unique about that. But to sort of map it out so that every day you end up at a new organic farm or at a school and you really wed like the movement and the message and the educational aspect of it to the endurance aspect of it.

So they're kind of one in the same. Like make a documentary and like, oh, I'm going to go visit this farm today. I'm going to learn how these guys are doing it. Talk to them or go to this school. Hey, what are you guys eating for your school lunch? Like, hey, well, you know, and talk to kids and, you know, kind of spread the word. I think that would be really cool. I think so too.

Very exciting to see. There's so many people doing really good things all over the country. I mean, in the middle of nowhere. Right. You have these schools that have gardens. You have veganic farms in like Iowa. So there's people that are really making a difference in their communities. And I think that's ultimately how the change is going to happen through grassroots.

Yeah, no question. I was in New York two weeks ago, and I went out to PS244 in Queens. So you know about this? Yeah, the first vegetarian school lunch, and I did an interview with the principal and the teacher who's head of the wellness program there about how they got that going, and it's pretty neat. It's really neat. There's a woman named, I hope I don't get her name wrong.

I think her name is Amy Hamlin. Amy Hamlin, yeah. In Ithaca, right, from New Yorkork coalition for healthy school food i think that's i think that's it's cool food or school lunch yeah and and so i guess that's the organization that kind of they worked with to really get this up on its feet and it's pretty cool yes absolutely it's very very positive to see that happening and school kids are the future oh and they love it you know the kids love it it's like you know you get them you get them at that age and you know they they want to do the right thing and they're all i mean i was there it was after school but they were doing after school programs and there were kids there that

were doing a blackberry tasting and there were other like kindergarten kids making their own granola bars and they have um you know it's on the it's a city school it's on a city block but in the in the playground and back along the fence they were hanging these pouches where they were growing their own food, and they have a tower garden in their library. So it's not just school lunch. Wellness is integrated into the DNA of that program. And what's so cool is that it's not like some crazy private school or even really a charter school or anything like that. It's a public New York City school. And if they can do it and that can be replicated, it's pretty cool, right?

That instills healthy habits, too, because we grow up and we develop habits. And if we develop bad habits, those can stay with us and they can ultimately kill us much younger than we need to be dying and cause a lot of suffering along the way for ourselves and other animals in the planet. And when you see programs like that, it's very encouraging because, again, these kids have a long time ahead of them and many years of habits that are going to contribute either good or bad to the world. And so when you have examples like that, hopefully, as you say, they can be replicated.

And it makes all the sense in the world. That's the thing about it, is that this type of food system is good for everybody, except, I guess, the status quo. But it really is good for consumers, planet, animals. It makes all the sense in the world when you look at it. Let's talk a little bit about the environmental implications of factory farming, because that's something that I know in a very general sense.

Oh, it's bad, or it contributes to greenhouse gases. But I figured you'd be a good person to kind of help educate me and the listeners about that a little bit more. Yeah, well, the United Nations put out a report a few years ago called Livestock's Long Shadow, where they talked about how animal agriculture contributes more to greenhouse gas emissions than the entire transportation industry. So that's one example of it. The United Nations also talked about how animal agriculture is one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems we're facing. And at the end of the day, to produce animals for food requires enormous amounts of resources. It makes a lot more sense to grow crops and for humans to

eat them directly instead of growing crops and then feeding them to animals. So when you start raising animals and feeding them these crops, you need a lot more land. And when you're raising these crops today, it also comes with petrochemical fertilizers, which then can contribute to environmental pollution. And then you feed these to animals who are kept in these factory farm warehouses confined by the thousands so they're generating enormous amounts of manure and the land cannot absorb it so now you have this excess manure getting into waterways polluting groundwater and the animals are given drugs and that results in the development of

antibiotic resistant bacteria so now you even have antibiotic resistant bacteria in groundwater downstream from these factory farms so this is a system that is destroying the planet it is wasting scarce resources and and and i think ultimately it's just not economically viable over time and i I think it's going to have to change. What is the reality of grass-fed beef and this whole upswing of humanely raised livestock? And how much of that is marketing spend to make people feel better about their animal product choice? And how much is reality? Well, I think most of it is spend, unfortunately. And I think it comes out of a good place to begin with on the part of the consumer who does not want to support the factory farm. But what is

happening is that because people don't want to support factory farms, they're looking for alternatives. And from Farm Sanctuary standpoint, the best alternative is plant-based eating and not animal eating. But unfortunately, in animal agriculture, you have folks now starting to label products as free-range or cage-free or organic. And these terms sound good. Free-range makes you think animals are out ranging freely, right? But it doesn't mean that in most cases. Free range only requires that animals have access to the outdoors, but access is not defined. So what that often means is you have animals raised in a warehouse with a little door that goes to a crummy little paddock, and that is access to the outdoors, and that can be sold as free range and in the case of chickens you know

raised for egg production for example those birds are still so crowded that they have parts of their beaks cut off so they don't peck each other so these terms sound good but they don't really reflect very good conditions for the animals so if like what so what is the reality of beef that's grass-fed? What does that look like? Well, in the case of beef, in the beef industry you have different times in the animal's life. Most beef cattle in the US,

whether they're grass-fed or feedlot-fed, start on a cow-calf operation where you have a cow who has a calf, and then at a certain point the calf is taken away to be fattened, often on a feedlot, and in fact, in most cases, on a feedlot. With grass-fed, there are different definitions. It's very rare that a calf will grow up and live on grass for his or her whole life. Usually, they're fattened toward the end of their life on grain or on some kind

of forage. So grass-fed also tends to sound better than it is. Yeah. Is that like a regulated term? Like, you know, organic, it has to be a certain way under the law, but is grass-fed something that is... It's starting to be because there's been such abuses of the term. And so it's starting to be looked at more carefully now in Washington, but it's still a work in progress. And there's been such abuses of the term. And so it's starting to be looked at more carefully now in Washington. But it's still a work in progress. And there's constant tension between big farms and small farms. Some of the smaller ones who want the regulations to actually have some meaning, and the bigger farms who want to push the standards down. And the bigger industrial farms tend to be more influential and tend to be able to push the standards down. And the bigger industrial farms tend to be more influential and tend to be able to push the standards down. Right. So that what you think you're getting isn't quite

as good. I could see the small farms, they want it to be for real, right? Because then that plays into their hand of what they're offering that's distinct from what the factory farms are able to offer. That's right. There are some small farms that want to do things in a more responsible way, but they tend to get pushed down, unfortunately. There was actually a slaughterhouse in Kansas, believe it or not, who wanted to test all of their animals for mad cow disease because they wanted to be able to export to Korea, who at the time was saying, we don't want to buy US beef. The USDA did not allow them to test all their slaughtered cows, which is pretty crazy. You'd think, why not? And there was really no good reason given other than it would set a certain standard and they didn't

want to set that high standard. My thinking is that they probably didn't want them to test every animal because if they did, there's a good chance they would start finding disease problems like mad cow disease. That's my guess. It becomes a publicity nightmare for them. It does. If they're doing it a certain way and nobody else is. And so the problem is there's very few farmers that are actually doing things very well.

There's starting to be more, but generally speaking, the system is one that is factory farming. And a lot of the products being sold as free range and grass-fed and so on still come from farms that are very much like factory farms. Right. Interesting. All right. So you're hitchhiking across the country. You've got to get to farm sanctuary. How does this path lead you to 1986? Yeah, well, I'm hitchhiking around the country just learning about various issues.

And I basically become very much an activist during that time. And I wanted to do something meaningful. I wanted to do something that was going to make a positive difference. And the factory farming issue was not something that was getting a lot of attention. So I decided that that was the area that I was going to make a positive difference. And the factory farming issue was not something getting a lot of attention. So I decided that that was the area that I was going to focus. And early on, I felt it was important to know what was happening. So I started going into farms to document conditions and would literally find living animals thrown in trash cans

or living animals thrown on piles of dead animals. I started rescuing them. And at the time, I was living in a little row house in Wilmington, Delaware, that somebody was letting us use as a donated space. And we rescued animals, rehabilitated them, and placed them into good homes. So our adopt-a-farm animal program began.

Children from the neighborhood would come over and be very curious about the animals. They wanted to hear about where they came from. So we started talking about the reality of animal farming. And it became very apparent that these animals were ambassadors and people were learning from them. And so those early lessons ultimately resulted in creating Farm Sanctuary the way it currently exists. So in 1986, we funded the organization by selling veggie hot dogs at Grateful Dead concerts. Very small, very grassroots. It's grown.

And we now have three farms and about 250,000 supporters. Yeah, it's amazing. So you have this really large farm in Watkins Glen, New York, right? How many acres do you have there? We have 180 acres in Watkins Glen, New York, and we have 300 acres in Orland, California, which is north of Sacramento. And we have 26 acres in Acton, California, just outside of Los Angeles. And that's the newest farm, right? That's pretty recent?

That's right. Farm Sanctuary acquired that a couple years ago. And we're very excited to be in the LA area because there's a lot of people here. There's a lot of people with influence here. And I think that ultimately we need to reach larger and larger audiences. And being in LA, I think will help us do that. Yeah, for sure. I mean, tell us about what happened yesterday. Yeah, we had our Hug a Farm Animal Day. We had over 300 people sign up to come out and spend time with farm animals in a positive environment. At Farm Sanctuary, the animals are our friends, not our food. And that's the model that we try

to put out there, the type of relationship that we think is the best for all involved. And it was wonderful to see so many kids come out and connect with these animals and to look into their eyes and to see that cows and pigs and chickens are not that different than cats and dogs. They have feelings. They have personalities. They develop relationships with other animals and with people. And it was a beautiful day. It was so neat to be out there with so many people enjoying a positive time with animals who, sadly, are too often seen just as commodities in our country. Right. I mean, I think when you get up close and personal and you develop that emotional connection, that emotional attachment, it becomes a very different thing. And it goes back to what

we were talking about, about the way the system is set up to prevent us from developing that connection. And just, you know, from on a personal level, I'm the first to admit that I got involved in all of this for health reasons. You know, I was not an animal rights activist by any stretch of the imagination. Like I honestly just wanted to feel better and like lose weight. And I was worried about my health, but in the six years that I've been kind of, you know, on this journey and the more I learn and the more I read and the more people that I meet like yourself, it becomes impossible for me to not develop, um, a much greater, uh, compassion and compa and capacity, uh, for, um, being more vociferous about these

issues. And I think it's really important and it's definitely become much more important to me even than it was a couple of years ago. Um, it's not a sustainable system. It's not a humane system by any stretch of the imagination. And it's really important to, it's becoming more important to me to voice my opinions about this. Whereas at first I was a little bit trepidatious about it, I think. You know, it's important to speak out and it's great that you're doing that, you know, and especially, you know, given what you have done athletically, you know, you can demonstrate that as eating plants, you can do all these things. So you're a great role model in that sense. But the ethical issue can be a

little bit touchy. And people don't oftentimes like to think of themselves as cruel or participating in cruelty. So it can be challenging to start raising these issues. Yeah, I think it's very delicate. And it's important to, for me, it's always important to make people feel comfortable about switching their lifestyle rather than threatened or defensive about it. So it's about trying to find a way to create a soft landing pad that makes people feel good and excited about exploring something new and different as opposed to some kind of judgmental, I don't know, holier-than-thou perspective. And we were talking about this, you know, before the podcast about labels and teams and joining a team and kind of infighting between groups and, you know, subcultures and all of this, where the forest gets lost, you know, for the trees. And I would imagine you've, you know, waged more than a few of these

battles over the years and have, you and have weathered through plenty of this. I mean, how has your perspective evolved? Well, I think that each person has their own perspective and each person is on their own path. And ultimately, what we try to do at Farm Sanctuary is just encourage people to take positive steps in the direction of healthful, compassionate vegan living and recognize that not everybody's going to become vegan overnight.

But if people start taking small steps, I think those oftentimes lead to bigger steps. But I completely agree with what you said about trying to create an attractive movement that people want to be part of. I think our movement is not so much a club, an exclusive club, and it shouldn't be. And that's where labels sometimes come in. And if you say you're vegan, if somebody's not a vegan,

it's a black and white situation. So I oftentimes look at being vegan as really an aspiration. Because even the most vegan vegan isn't perfect. I fly in airplanes, which isn't perfect, and drive cars, things like this. So I do the best I can, and I think if each of us tries to do the best we can and just be open to making additional improvements and changes over time, that is, I think, a very positive approach.

And for myself, as an animal rights person since the mid-1980s, I wasn't eating all that healthy. Now, I'm trying to eat healthier. So that's an improvement I'm trying to make, eating more greens and stuff. Right, right, right. Yeah, I mean, I think this idea of perfectionism or some kind of idealized persona, whether you're coming from it from an ethical point of view or a health related point of view creates um it creates problems for the person who might otherwise be interested because they're like well i could never do that that's too difficult or i could never eschew all of this or that and and for me it's like just just change one thing you know start your day with a green smoothie

instead of pancakes or just do one thing and then try to empower that person to go on their own journey with it. And they'll go in a new direction and learn and grow and change in their own way and their own version of that. But it's about like these tiny little steps that set people on different trajectories, I think,

rather than saying it has to be exactly like this or you have to be 100%. I think that's so true. And each person is going to do it differently. And each person has to follow their own path. But I think most people want to be healthy. I think most people want to be compassionate. I think we are hardwired to have empathy. And when we see somebody else harmed, that we feel it. And I think most people would rather not cause harm. And I think most people also want to live on a planet that's not being destroyed by factory farms. Or being an unwitting cog in a giant wheel that somebody else is profiting off of your sort of ignorance or lack of understanding of what's really at play. Yes, totally.

It's tragic. I mean, most people, good people, are unwittingly part of this horrible system and disempowered and confused. And so I think people just need to think more and get more information about their food choices and what options they do have. And there are plenty of options now

that are much preferable, much healthier, and feel much better in so many ways. Oh, it's ridiculous. I mean, even at the, you know, I mean, and you don't have to go to Whole Foods. I mean, I don't know what it's like in the Midwest or upstate New York, but I mean, Los Angeles isn't a great barometer

because we have everything here. But I know you go to Ralph's or like the regular grocery store and there's 10 different varieties of plant-based milks. Yes, it's incredible. And I'm seeing that all over the place now too, more and more plant-based milks. And there's also farmer's markets that are popping up all over the country, all over the country. And community support and agriculture programs. There's a food not lawns movement where people are tearing up their lawns and planting food.

So it's a very empowering, positive thing that we're starting to see. Right. Let's talk about, because we're talking about plant-based milks, let's talk a little bit about dairy. I mean, I think there's an idea that, well, I'm not eating beef, I'm not eating chicken,

but like, you know, milk. I mean, the animal's still alive. You know, I'm not really harming that animal. I mean, can you talk a little bit about what dairy farms are really like, at least on a factory farm level, and also the impact of the dairy council and kind of their lobbying efforts? Oh, gosh. The dairy industry is one of the most influential in Washington, D.C.,

and that's why when school kids are given school lunches, you know, it's required that they be given a glass of cow's milk. And that's been the case for years. Now, there's some pushback against that, and hopefully they will have less influence, but that's been the way it has been for years. And I think most people don't realize how politicized this sort of food pyramid or the food plate is and all of the kind of government influence and lobbying influence that goes into play into what ultimately ends up on the wall in every public school across the country. Yeah, no kidding. And it's funny, when we go into schools and start talking about the benefits of plant-based eating, we're accused of brainwashing, Whereas the dairy industry is in there every day and they don't recognize that as brainwashing.

But the dairy industry, so they sell us their products through the school lunch program and the government buys up excess milk products to support dairy farms and the dairy industry. So tax money is going to bolster this business that otherwise would probably not be continuing. Where does the excess dairy products go that the government buys up?

What do they do with it? School lunch. And also military and foreign aid. We use food as a weapon in international relations too. Give it to certain people and not to other people. So these dairies are one of the most influential though in Washington and that's why this food is so available.

And on a dairy farm, for a cow to have milk, she has to have a calf. Like other mammals, they don't just lactate for the heck of it. They lactate to feed their baby. So on modern dairies, big or small, the calf is taken away from the mother immediately at birth so that the

milk can be sold to people. And the cow is hooked up to a milk machine two or three times a day and it sucks her dry. These cows are pushed to produce about ten times more milk than they would produce in nature. These cows are pushed to produce about 10 times more milk than they would produce in nature. Their bodies are under intense stress.

In a healthy environment, a cow could live 20 years, but on these modern dairies, they're usually sent to slaughter after just about three or four years in production. And they're so worn out in some cases that they can't even stand, and they call them downed animals. So their lives are very tough. And then when the cows are taken out of the dairy herd and sent to slaughter, they become beef. So dairy cows become beef cattle. Their calves, if they're female, are raised to become milking cows. If the calves are

male, they're not going to become milking cows, obviously. So the veal industry was actually created to take advantage of this plentiful supply of unwanted male calves born on dairy farms. So the veal industry was literally born out of the dairy industry. And these young male calves were taken from their mothers at birth, chained by the neck in small wooden crates where they lived their whole lives to produce veal. Their whole lives being very, very short. About 20 weeks. Yeah. And these veal calves are fed a being very, very short. About 20 weeks. Yeah. And these veal calves are fed a diet that's deficient in iron and fiber

to produce a borderline anemia. So their flesh is a pale color to be sold as milk-fed veal. So that's one of the ugliest industries. And people have heard about it and been educated about veal. And veal consumption has actually gone down in the US. So that's an indication that consumers do not support that kind of cruelty right you see it with that and you're seeing it with with uh foie gras yes very true when people hear about this stuff

it is it is appalling and people don't want to be part of it but what the dairy industry is now doing is because veal consumption is going down, they're now starting to take these unwanted male calves from dairy farms and raise them for beef. So they end up in feedlots. And if you drive by some of the big feedlots in California, for example, you'll now see a lot of the Holsteins, the black and white Holstein cattle, which come from dairy farms and they're being raised for beef. So the dairy industry has a lot of death involved with it. cattle which come from dairy farms and they're being raised for beef. So the dairy industry has a lot of death involved with it. And at the end of the day, human beings don't need to drink cow's milk. Why not drink pig's milk or giraffe's milk or dog's milk? But the dairy lobby has done a very good job of convincing us that that's basically an essential element of any healthy diet.

I mean, we've been told that since birth, and it's so deeply ingrained into our psyche that to try to explain to somebody that you really don't need that, and in fact it might not be good for you, is anathema for most people. It is. It is a statement that a lot of people are very reluctant to hear because we have been so bombarded with this notion and with this assumption that drinking cow's milk is normal for people. And it shows you, it's a testament to just how effective marketing messages can be, especially when you're given those messages at a young age, kind of reared with them. I mean, to overcome that,

even if you show somebody all the science, they'll say, yeah, but still. You know, it's sort of like, you know, and it shows you just how powerful advertising can be. Yes, absolutely. And how crazy humans can be in terms of rationalizing things. You know, people that have lactose intolerance,

for example, that's an indication that they probably shouldn't be drinking cow's milk. But rather than shifting away from drinking cow's milk, they take lactate or they come up with some milk that has some additive or some way to prevent lactose from being a problem. Instead of just shifting to a non-cow's milk-based milk product, if you wanted. It's amazing how habits become so ingrained, and those are habits in behavior and habits in thought as well.

And I think when people step back, though, and just think about these things and ask if they really do need to drink the milk of another species, it's not very reasonable or logical to be doing that. And I think people are starting to get that. And the dairy industry, as well as the beef, pork, chicken, egg industries, they're all starting to be more and more vulnerable. Oh, for sure. And I talked about this on an earlier podcast, but I mean, just using the dairy industry as an example, you know, it's undeniable the proliferation of plant-based milks in the typical grocery store. So obviously there's a declining market share there. And so you're seeing their advertising shift to address that and these sort of attack ads. Whoops. Uh-oh. Oh, we went out for a second there. We're back. Yeah. So the, um, yeah, these attack ads on plant-based milks as being kind of unnatural, you know, it was like,

I don't know if you've seen all those. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's interesting, you know, that, you know, they know that they're up against it. Um, and there's a new battle being waged and it's going to be interesting to watch it play out. It will. And I's a new battle being waged and it's going to be interesting to watch it play out. It will. And I think what's starting to happen too is some of these dairy industry companies are starting now to invest in plant-based milks, which is an indication that they realize that that's where the future is and that's where the profit is. Interesting. It's really cool to see. And at the end of the day, business is about making a profit. And if consumers start buying more of these plant-based alternatives, the businesses are going to go there.

And I think we're seeing that with the dairy companies. I think also there's going to be alternatives to meat. There's a company called Beyond Meat. It's a great thing to see. Have you tasted it yet? I have, yeah. I think it's really good. I talked to somebody,

who was I talking to who tasted it, and said, yeah, it's unbelievable. It has the consistency of chicken, everything about it. Yes, and there's been taste tests by people like Mark Bittman, who's a food critic for the New York Times. He couldn't tell the difference

between Beyond Meat and other meat. That's pretty amazing. It is, it amazing. It is. And is that the one, because I know there's a couple of these new products coming out, but there's one that was, the backers are like Biz Stone from Twitter,

I think is he, and he's a friend of Farm Sanctuary too. Yeah, he's a good friend of ours. So that Beyond Meat is his, right? Or the one that he's involved with? He's one of the investors. um and there's another company called beyond eggs that's developing alternatives to eggs there's a restaurant i think in new york called beyond sushi now so there's this whole movement of beyond and moving forward from those old ways of eating but you know we're very excited about what what's with Beyond Meat. And I think Bill Gates also has an investment firm that's behind that,

as well as other plant-based food products. Yeah, I mean, there's been a lot of press lately about the technology sector and the venture capital sector getting interested in these new food products, these plant-based food products. And like you said, it's a business, you know what I mean? And there's a business opportunity here, and people are interested this so you know it's a new direction it's very positive the goal is to produce something that will be a direct substitute so you can use it just like you would use meat or eggs but it will be cheaper to produce and it will last longer it

will have less problems with salmonella uh use less resources, and it will be able to compete directly against meat and eggs and other animal foods in the marketplace. And I think it can win. The mission of Farm Sanctuary, though, essentially, your core mission really is to rescue these animals from poor conditions in these primarily factory farms, right? I mean, so how does that play out on a day-to-day basis? I mean, when you find out about an animal, I can't imagine these farmers are that keen on having you come and pay them a visit. No, they're not, usually. I mean, how does that work? Well, our mission is to stop cruelty to animals, to change how society views and treats farm animals,

and to promote compassionate vegan living. And rescuing the animals and caring for them allows us to present a different sort of model and a different sort of relationship. You know, one where the animals are our friends, not our food. And when we approach farmers, they oftentimes feel very threatened because our message and our vision

is sort of exactly the opposite of theirs, where they're seeing the animals as commodities to be raised and slaughtered and then sold and profited from. Now, things have gotten so bad, though, on factory farms that there are occasionally individuals that work at those farms that think it's gone too far, that the animals are being treated too badly. And they have actually contacted us from time to time and brought animals to us. For example, there was a guy in Northern California

who's driving a rendering truck. And the rendering truck and the rendering business takes dead animals from farms to a rendering plant to be boiled into soaps and fertilizers and byproducts of the industry. So this is a guy driving a rendering truck going from dairy to dairy, from farm to farm, picking up dead animals.

And he went to a dairy and the farmer had thrown out a calf who was severely injured and very sick for the renderer to pick up, to take to the rendering plant. But this trucker, instead of just taking this calf to the rendering plant, knew about Farm Sanctuary and he brought the calf to us and we were able to rescue and care for him. So occasionally have individuals like that that will do what they can in that industry to help individuals. And those, I think, are examples of human kindness that we like to talk about because ultimately everybody has the ability and the capacity for empathy and kindness. Even people in the industry that are doing really bad things.

for empathy and kindness. Even people in the industry, they're doing really bad things. Yeah, because it's amazing that a guy driving a rendering, a truck for a rendering plant would do that because it almost has to be like this Stanford prison experiment kind of mentality where you have to kind of immunize yourself emotionally

from what you're doing on a daily basis. Like you're, I mean, in order to be able to do that every day, you can't develop an emotional attachment to anything you're doing or you wouldn't be able to function. Yes, people shut off their empathy in these factory farms and people that work in these factory farms have to become very hardened. And I would also say that consumers who say,

don't tell me I don't want to know about what happens on factory farms, they're just in denial because maybe they haven't shut off their empathy, but they're not. Well, they're aware that they have empathy, and they're aware that if they connect that empathy to the system, that it's going to create dissonance for them. Exactly, exactly. And so they don't want to have that dissonance, you know. So that's kind of laziness in a way, I think.

And I think it's important for people to confront their dissonance and ultimately make choices that they feel good about. And that, at the end of the day, is very empowering and very positive for everybody. But yeah, farmers feel threatened by the work we do, by and large, because we are challenging an existing paradigm, challenging this notion that these animals are commodities.

And when you do that, yeah, you shake things up. But it's good because most citizens believe that what is happening on factory farms is outside the bounds of acceptable conduct. And I think that we're at a time now where more and more people want to look at what's happening and want to make a positive difference. Mm-hmm. So you get these animals and you provide shelter and you care for them, right? That's right. And they become just residents of your property, right?

That's exactly right. The animals are rescued from these abusive situations. They come to live at Farm Sanctuary. Oftentimes they're very sick when they first arrive. They're very fearful when they first arrive because they've only known cruelty at human hands. So it takes them a while sometimes to warm up. And I think the animals that are residents at the sanctuary

play an important role in welcoming the new residents because they can sort of pick up that this is a safe place, that these other animals are not afraid, and that these other animals interact with people in a positive, healthy way. And so the new arrivals sort of take their cues from the animals who've been there for a while. That's interesting. And it really helps them to become adjusted to living in a sanctuary setting instead of the kind of abuse they've experienced in the past. Right. Do you have any good stories about that acclimation process?

Yeah, there was a calf that I found at a stockyard who was sent to the stock. He came from a dairy farm. He was sent to the stockyard on the day he was born. He was still wet from afterbirth. He was dying of hypothermia and he was just left for dead. And I rescued him, brought him to farm sanctuary. It took him a while to respond physically because he was so sick, but he started warming up. He started suckling, which is very important. It's a very good indication that he's on his way back. He was able to stand within a couple of days. So those were all very positive signs in terms of his physical rehabilitation, but he still wasn't really thriving. He wasn't really enjoying life. So then I took him out to the barn with the other cows. And when I did that, they started moving to him. He started moving back

to them. He started kicking up his heels and he started thriving. So farm animals are social animals just like others. And that is an example of how they need to be with their people, in a sense. And by being with the other cows on the farm, Opie recovered and had a long, happy life at Farm Sanctuary. So you have a very optimistic disposition. You're a very positive dude. And I hear stories like that, and they're heartwarming and heart-wrenching and all that, but I'm thinking, you know, I can't help but think, well, we're talking about one calf and there's hundreds of thousands of animals

that are in this system. And it's one, you know, tiny victory in this sea of, you know, kind of, you know, horrendous treatment of these animals. So how do you kind of maintain that positive outlook? Yeah, it can be tough sometimes. And the sanctuaries actually play a big role in that. Early on, I spent a lot of time going into these farms and documenting

things and videotaping and just seeing horrible, horrible things day in, day out. And being able to rescue individuals from those situations and watching them heal and watching them begin to enjoy life was healing personally as well because it was something you could do instead of focusing on and becoming disempowered by thinking about what you couldn't do. So for me, we face a lot of horrible things in the world. I think we need to be aware of them.

We need to deal with them. But I don't think we want to dwell on them because if we dwell on them, they can take us down a bad spiral. So being aware of them, but then dwelling in the good things that happen and focusing on and building on and encouraging and supporting

and creating more of the good things, I think has a way to push out the bad things. And it's something that I found to be very, a positive way to deal with challenging situations. Yeah, I mean, I think that's a great message for living your life too, not just in your approach to what you do personally, but to be able to look at the things you can change.

What are the improvements you can make and focus on that? Yeah. There's that serenity prayer, right? Yes. I know that well. Yeah. It's really true.

It's a lot of things that we can't control, but there are some things we can control and to spend more time and energy and focus on the things we can control can be very empowering instead of being worried and fretting about things we can't control. Right. All right. So just to shift gears a little bit, you live in Washington and you're kind of mired in the sort of, you know, inside the beltway goings on, like what's going on legislatively right now that's interesting? Well, you know, Washington DC is a tough place to be, as you can imagine, when you're working on these issues.

Agribusiness is very entrenched. They're very influential. And whenever issues come up that address farming, we're very much outgunned financially and with the whole lobbying muscle of farms. I mean, what do you, like, paint a picture of, like, how a lobbying group, you know, throws money around to change the minds of the powers that be.

What are some of the things, if you could, share what you've seen that just makes you shake your head and go, I can't even believe I'm seeing this guy do this? Well, there's a guy, Steve King from Iowa, who's attached an amendment to the farm bill to basically negate state laws protecting animals. And he's a guy that's very entrenched and very supported by agribusiness. And unfortunately, whenever you have farm animal issues come forward, they get referred to the Agriculture Committee. And the Agriculture Committee tends to be made up of legislators who represent agricultural interests. And you have folks that are just so immersed in that world that they're, and they're become very combative. When you start talking about animal issues, they see it as a threat to their livelihood. Yeah, it's an economic issue. Big time.

It's not a, you know, it's not a. An ethical issue. And you can look back at the abolitionist days too. And it's a kind of similar mentality. And so those defending slavery were saying, this is business. And the folks that were speaking out against slavery were considered to be sentimentalists. And they have soft hearts, and that's sweet and everything, but this is business, and business is more important. So that's kind of the mentality.

And money talks in a big way in Washington, D.C. So the factory farming industry has a big voice. And so it's tough. There's a bill that we're working on and supporting that would require that egg-laying hens be given more space. And the United Egg Producers actually supports this. They and the Humane Society of the United States made a compromise to both support federal legislation that they could both live with. So that's something we're supporting too. And they're supporting it because, I mean, I would imagine that would help reduce disease. Well, they want to have a uniform standard across the U.S. Right now, there are

several laws in the U.S. that have different regulations on what kind of space egg-laying hens need. We were able to pass a law here in California in 2008. Proposition 2 was on the ballot. Citizens voted to require that egg-laying hens have at least enough space to stretch their wings and turn around. Then there was another law that passed in Michigan that gave egg-laying hens some more space, but it was not identical to the California law. We've worked on some other state laws as well. So United Egg Producers basically wanted a federal uniform standard. So that was their interest.

And they also didn't want to keep fighting these state battles and getting beat up in the press and having these images shown to lots of consumers. The Humane Society of the U.S. is supporting animal protection issues and they felt if we could get this federal law, then it would be across the country, and it would protect millions and millions of animals, whereas going state by state meant that we were going to only be protecting

handfuls of animals here and there. So that was where there was sort of a combined interest. But although Humane Society of the U.S. and United Egg Producers, which represents most of the egg producers in the U.S., both support this legislation, the cattlemen, the pork producers, the dairy people, the Farm Bureau, all these other agribusiness groups are against it. And so the chance of it passing is hard to say.

It's going to be tough. And so that just sort of speaks to how influential agribusiness is. Even when you have one of these groups that'll pull off, the others all band together and fight you. And that's what we're currently looking at now in Washington, D.C. Right. And how does it work with you cooperating with other like-minded nonprofits? I mean, I would imagine your interests are generally aligned, but there's got to be times when you have different perspectives on things. Yeah. I mean, there are some things that we may just not get involved in. But at the end of the day, we don't really know what's ultimately going to lead to the type of change we want to see. We got a long way to go. And this

bill, we think, is a positive thing. It will give HINs some more space. We've worked closely with the Humane Society of the United States since the early 2000s on these anti-confinement efforts around the country. So we've oftentimes been very much of like-mind with HSUS. We also work with the ASPCA on legislative issues. And we work with a variety of different organizations. And thankfully, environmental groups, consumer groups have started to come into these issues as well.

But you work with folks that you see eye to eye on. And if you don't see eye to eye, you just maybe take a pass on some things. And so this is a bill we think would be good the other thing about this egg bill we think is very positive is that it will require that all eggs being sold be labeled so if they come from hens and cages it will say from cage tens and that i think is a positive thing because i have a hard time believing that's going to pass that they're going to let that kind of you know lexicon it's fine it's way into the labeling yes i hear you there word cage unless it's cage free you know yes no very true cage in the affirmative is yeah i would imagine you'll be getting some resistance on that i think that's right you know so that's probably one of the reasons the other industry

groups are rising up to oppose it but the united United Egg Producers agreed to that. So that was part of the compromise with Humane Society of the US. Right. There needs to be, you know, some real clarity in a very elementary sense with respect to these food products. I mean, I just know you go to the grocery store and you see the eggs and there's like, it looks like there's 20 different kinds and they all have different words of, you know, whether it's cage free or whatever it is. And it all sounds good, but you don't really know what any of that really means. Is this good? Is this one better than this one? No, it's so true. It's so true. And there's a lot of different labeling schemes now. There's different certifying organizations, but there's not really an adequate infrastructure for these certifying organizations even but there's not really an adequate infrastructure for these certifying

organizations even to have proper oversight and to ensure that the conditions that they're espousing are actually being met. So this labeling thing is, again, it's good news and bad news. The good news is that there's widespread opposition to factory farming. There's a desire for alternatives. That's the good news. The bad news is that these labels tend to sound a lot better than they are, and consumers are paying a lot more for certain products because they think the animals are being treated a lot better than they really are being treated.

Right. And when we talk about the FDA and the USDA, there's a sort of consensus, general public consensus is, well, these organizations are here to help the consumer make educated decisions. They're here to protect us. Knowing what you know, can you speak to that assumption a little bit? Gosh, yeah. Well, the USDA is very close with agriculture. And they have sort of dual roles.

One is to promote agriculture. One is theoretically to promote healthy nutrition and dietary guidelines. But they have a long history of not promoting healthy nutrition and dietary guidelines, and it's been very much influenced by the big meat and dairy industries. In the 1970s, Senator McGovern put together a commission of health experts to advise the government on nutritional guidelines. And in their recommendations, they suggested that U.S. citizens should eat less meat. That report and that suggestion was in print for about a day, then it was changed to say that U.S. citizens should eat more meat that's lower in saturated fat. This was in the 1970s?

70s, like 77, 78, yeah. So it's completely reframed to, instead of saying eat less meat, to say eat more meat of a certain kind. And that's been the message. more meat of a certain kind. And that's been the message. And that's a USDA guideline that has continued to be the case where the USDA is basically promoting the industry's interests. And it's not promoting consumers' interests. And that's been a big problem.

And you have a very close relationship between USDA and agribusiness and lawmakers who kind of move in between these different groups. You know, a lawmaker who's been, for example, Charles Stenholm was a congressman from Texas. He was the head of the Livestock Subcommittee of the Agriculture Committee for many years. Now he's a lobbyist and he represents the horse slaughter industry in Washington, D.C., for example. So you have these former lawmakers who have a lot of connections on these committees who are now representing agribusiness. And that's a type of thing that happens regularly. Right. And that's not just the case in agriculture. It's the case with the pharmaceutical industry, with the defense industry.

I mean, you know, it's- It is. It's very, so the legislative process is challenging. You're a lawmaker and you get in tight with all these lobbyists. You get to know, you know, the powers that be at these huge companies that are sort of kowtowing to your subcommittee.

And then when your term is up, you just go work for them. Yes, that's exactly what happens. That's our system. I mean, it's a systemic issue. It's not just the food business. Very true, very true. It's the best government money can buy, unfortunately.

It's so sad, so sad. And most consumers are just not involved in that. But it's the interest groups that have a lot of influence. Right. And have you seen any changes? I mean, has the Obama administration been proactive in any regard? Neutral? Not so good?

Like, how would you characterize kind of, or does it even make a difference? I think they've done some good things symbolically. You know, for example, there's the White House Organic Garden that Michelle Obama started, and they have this MOVE program where they're encouraging kids to eat more fruits and vegetables. Yeah, Let's Move, I think it's called, right? Yes, yes, so that's good.

They have the Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food program within the U.S. Department of Agriculture. But the woman who ran that has recently left, and so I think she's got a lot of resistance for it. So they've done some things symbolically, but systemically I don't think that they have the sort of influence that would be needed to create the changes that are necessary. So I think they have done some things

and have done better than some in the past, but the system is kind of rigged and the influence is not at the presidential level. It's really at the committee level and it's at the budgetary level and it's in policies that tend to be the same year after year. So the farm bill is being discussed right now, and there's been some awareness about how factory farms get subsidized and how small farms don't really get supported like the big farms. So there's awareness about that, but there's going to be very little, if any, changes because a lot of these policies are actually made behind closed doors.

The way it's done is crazy. You have the House Agriculture Committee and the Senate Agriculture Committee who work on legislation, then it goes to the floor of the House and the Senate for discussion. Theoretically, it can be an open discussion, but there's very little really that's discussed when you have thousands of pages. Then after those discussions on the floor of the House and the Senate, the different bills, because they're usually different, go to a conference committee. The conference committee made up of legislators from the House and the Senate who are the heads of the agriculture committees. And those are closed-door discussions, and there's no light on them at all. And that's where the final decisions

are made. And the public has very little or no knowledge of what's being discussed. Years ago, we worked on a downed animal amendment to the Farm Bill to say that if an animal is too sick to walk, they should not be used for food. And the USDA cannot pay federal inspectors to inspect these downed animals. And if the USDA can't pay them, then they cannot go into the food supply. That bill, that language passed the House and the Senate. It went to the conference committee and then it was taken out. And that's what tends to happen.

So the conference committee operating behind closed doors has a lot of influence. And also I would imagine the other way it would work would be pork, to use the term, getting put into other bills, sort of, I don't know if secretly, but sort lot of them are discussed quietly and move quickly without being widely known about, even by lawmakers. Right. So what's next for Farm Sanctuary? Well, what's next for Farm Sanctuary? We will continue operating our sanctuaries. It is visitor season now, so people are invited to come visit us in Watkins Glen, New York,

in Orland, California, or in Acton, California. We have bed and breakfast cabins. We do events at the farms. And so people can come visit. And then just check out our website, farmsanctuary.org. And we work on various legislative issues from time to time, so people can plug into those. And we just encourage people to think about their food choices and ultimately to make choices that are aligned with their own values,

aligned with their own interests, and to live mindfully instead of just sort of doing what we do because it's a habit we developed. So a big part of our work is just encouraging citizens to live in more thoughtful, compassionate ways. Balanced. Balanced, ultimately. Yeah.

You can't argue with that. It's sensible, right? Who's got an issue with that? That's right. It makes sense when you think about it. People don't think enough about it. Well, I'm not ready to wrap up yet because we haven't talked about your training. Oh, yeah, man.

Yes. I'm getting ready for Ironman Lake Placid. I'm getting ready for Ironman Lake Placid. How do you feel? I feel pretty good. I feel pretty good. Took a little spill ready for Ironman Lake Placid. How do you feel? I feel pretty good. I feel pretty good. Took a little spill on the bike a week or so ago. Oh, you did?

I saw like on your elbow there. Is that where you went down? Exactly. Went down on my left side, went down on the asphalt. So I kind of had a little bump on my hip. Yeah, I've got a few of those. Yeah, I've seen some pictures of some. You had to see some big bumps.

I got little bumps. You had big bumps. But I'm feeling pretty good, you know, and don't really have a program as much as I would like because I travel a lot, you know. So when I'm on the road, I tend to run because I can do that. Yeah, you can always do that. Yes, but getting on a bike is tougher.

Right. And can you do that just at a gym or it's not really the same? I think you can. I'm not one who's done that though. I mean, I've been traveling, you know, way more in the last year and a half than I, than I had in the last 10 years prior. So I'm facing the same kind of thing and that's what I've been doing. I've been doing more running than, than usual. And when I'm at home, I try to get my big cycling blocks in um and then you're sort of then when you're traveling you're running and you're focusing on your running so when you are home make it a more cycling intensive kind of focus that makes sense and just you know and the bike is a big part of the oh yeah

you gotta yeah you gotta get some saddle time in yeah yeah yeah so that's that's something i'm trying to do so that that makes sense to just get on the bike a lot when I'm at home. And you've got to keep a bike here in L.A. Come on, look outside here, man. Oh, it's beautiful. I know. We should have just done this on the bike today instead. That would have been fun as heck.

Yeah. Next time. Yes. But you've got some marathons under your belt. You qualified for Boston, right? I did, yeah. I've done three marathons under your belt. You qualified for Boston, right? I did, yeah. I've done three marathons, and each time I qualified for Boston. That's amazing.

Yes, I feel pretty good about my running. You qualified for Boston the first marathon you ran, right? I did, yeah. So my running is my strongest of the three triathlon legs. My biking is decent. My swimming is, you know, I'm kind of on the lower end of that one. But I'm working on the swimming. I've been getting in a pool. And, you know, for me, a lot of it was just breathing and basic stuff, basic technique. And so I'm making some progress

there. But the nutrition is the other thing, because I've done a half Ironman, and I didn't really pay much attention to nutrition. And I basically was very dehydrated when I got off the bike. And so we were talking a little bit about that earlier. Yeah, we're going to sort you out. Yeah, man, getting hydrated. We're going to get you on a new program. But like I always said, part of training isn't just getting a workout in, it's practicing your nutrition so that when you arrive at race day,

you know exactly what you're doing, and you take all the guesswork out of it. And that involves a lot of trial and error, trying different things. And, you know, what works for me may not work for you and, you know, giving you a bunch of options and then playing around with that and playing around with how much and how often and seeing what, you know, what you're able to absorb. And, you know, some people sweat at a greater rate than other people. So electrolytes are more important, you know, and some people are more sensitive to the humidity versus the dry heat.

There's so many variables that go into it. So that's why I think it's really incumbent on you to really kind of put it to the test and be focused on that when you're doing your training. Doing like long bike rides or long runs, that's when you really do that. Well, I like what we were talking about earlier about sweet potatoes.

Yeah. And they use it like a gel, right? Yeah. You what we were talking about earlier about sweet potatoes. Yeah. And they use it like a gel, right? Yeah. So you squeeze the stuff out of the skin. Right. There's a great source of energy easily absorbed on the bike and easy to prepare too. You just bake them. You kind of like lightly bake them.

Don't overcook them. And you can put them in a little Ziploc bag in the back of your cycling jersey. I think I'm probably gonna do that. Or even just like potato wedges, like baked potatoes and cut them up into little pieces and put them in a Ziploc bag. I can't say that word. Ziploc bag.

Yeah. And Enduralites are a good electrolyte capsule that you can take. And coconut water might work well. I'm talking about freezing your bottles overnight so you don't have like – coconut water gets kind of gross when it gets hot and warm. Right. It's getting hot in D.C.

It's going to be hot soon if it isn't already, right? Oh, yeah. It's been hot already. The humidity there is a killer. It's brutal. No, I definitely got to get a bike out there. You got to like run around like Haynes Point in that area? Sure have. Haynes Point, the Mount Vernon Trail. Yeah, I've done a few laps around Haynes Point. That's easy because it's nice and flat. Yeah. It works out very well.

But I think Lake Placid is pretty hilly. It is. You're going to have to get up to Watkins Glen and do a training camp, I think. That would be neat. The riding up there has got to be really beautiful, I would imagine. It's gorgeous. The riding up there has got to be really beautiful, I would imagine. It's gorgeous. It's gorgeous. There's lots of forests right near our farm up in Watkins Glen.

There's gorgeous. We both went to Cornell, so. I know. It's gorgeous. Wait, what years were you there? I was there in like 92 to 95. We were there at the same time. No kidding.

Yeah, I was there 91 to 94. Really? I used to walk by the law school almost every day when I was in class. I was the guy in Ruloff's most of the time. No, I lived way out to Gannick on the lake in a tiny little cabin just before that little restaurant a little restaurant bar what

was it called i can't remember huh that's a beautiful area yeah it's beautiful waterfalls and everything like yeah yeah which is really close to farm sanctuary too and there's wineries up there so it's a beautiful area yeah you know but i uh but yeah when i was going to school there i was mainly doing it at night it was sort of a part-time thing i did it got a master's in agricultural economics the idea was to really understand the agribusiness industry right that's the place to go to learn that stuff oh yeah oh yeah and uh so that was very illuminating and very interesting to see how students were sort of acculturated to accept certain factory farming thinking um but it's basically there it's an agricultural school to train students to sort of acculturated to accept certain factory farming thinking. It's basically there.

It's an agricultural school to train students to understand how farming works just so that they can go and basically be a part of this system, right? Totally, totally. So that was what I witnessed. There was this one class I had in animal science where the students were being shown routine farming practices on pigs including cutting off their tails and cutting notches into their ears and at first these students were very squeamish about these cruel practices because the little piglets were screaming and bleeding and but the graduate student teaching the course was very comforting and encouraging and saying well

this is what we do and he even said we do it for their own good, which is kind of ridiculous, but that's what he said. And that's the rationalization. And eventually one of the young freshmen students stepped forward and tried his hand at these mutilations. And as he did it, others watched. Then a second student stepped forward and did it. And each time one of these students participated, you could see the initial resistance in the group draining away and bad was becoming normal. And it really speaks to how we are social animals. We tend to do what those around us do. Everybody's doing a bad thing. It's just like we said, it's the Stanford prison experiment. It is the psychology of the human

brain. It's amazing how that works. And stepping out of it it can be hard but it ultimately can be very empowering right but you know for the training man it's going to be uh i'm very excited about it and be good and you got a half merit you got a half iron man before that right i've done one half iron man and i've got another one coming up that's right in in june and uh that's in willburg, Virginia. And I feel pretty good. I feel like I'm going to do okay at that. And I feel like I'm okay and I can finish in Ironman, but I'd like to do it relatively well. I mean, not great, but relatively well. All right, man. Well, consider me a resource because I want to help you.

That sounds great. Get across that finish line. Right on. I will definitely do that. All right, cool. Well, all right. So if people want to, first of all, thanks, man. That was awesome. My pleasure.

Yeah. Thank you. It was cool. We did pretty good, right? Yeah, I think so. Covered a lot of ground. Anything else you want to say? No, I think just, as I mentioned, come out to the farm, you know, and eat plants, not animals.

That's right. Eat plants. So if you want to learn more about Farm Sanctuary, and eat plants, not animals. That's right, eat plants. So if you want to learn more about Farm Sanctuary, go to farmsanctuary.org. And if you want to get all up in Gene's kitchen, you can follow him on Twitter, Gene Bauer, and it's B-A-U-R, no E, right? B-A-U-R, Gene Bauer.

That's right. And Farm Sanctuary is on Facebook, and they have a youtube channel too with a bunch of cool videos i like the video with steve-o oh yeah that's right steve-o did a video for us yeah yeah we're we're well i know him a little bit i don't know if we're friends but that's right yeah no he's cool he's been a great right oh he's amazing yeah he's amazing his story is incredible like just kind of where he is now compared to where he was a couple years ago, it's extraordinary.

Beautiful. It's wonderful to see that kind of positive transformation. He's an amazing guy. Neat. So I'm glad to see that he's working with you guys. Yes. As are lots of cool people. Yes.

We're very lucky to have Steve-O and others and people just engaging in these issues. We've got a lot of momentum right now. Yeah, it's great. So the website, farmsanctuary.org, Gene on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, anywhere else people want to learn more about what you're up to.

No, I think that's it. All the social networks and light up the social networks too. Yeah, for sure. One of the reasons that people are starting to get aware of these issues is because people are communicating through these social networks.

So light them up. Absolutely. And I'm gonna put in the show notes on the blog some other links to some stuff that Farm Sanctuary is doing and some other stuff Gene is up to. I'm gonna post that Runner's World article, which I thought was pretty cool. Oh yeah, we were really happy with that.

And a couple other things there too. So check that out. All right, so that's it, man. Thanks. Absolutely. Thank you very much. It's an honor and a pleasure to have you. You're inspiring.

You're doing great work. And I'm really happy that you made the trek up here to sit down with me. It's great to see your place out here in beautiful Calabasas. We just need some animals here. It can happen. We can arrange that. All right. We're going to talk about that.

Great. All right. Cool. Thanks. All right. Thanks. Peace. Plants. some animals here it can happen we can arrange that all right we're going to talk about that great all right cool thanks all right thanks peace plants Thank you. you you you you you you you