Why can't vegan's drink milk or have dairy? Its not hurting the cow? Do they breast feed their children?

Question

Actually I worked at a dairy farm in high school and that farmer loved his cows. And Males are called bulls cows are female and males are used for breeding and meat yes. But the females get fed get to graze all day and they dont' care about the pumping we would pump their mild while they ate it doesn't hurt them and they take good care of them. I live in a farm town they are not disgusting.

Answer 1

Because the vegan lifestyle does not include any animal products.  Breastfeeding has nothing to do with being vegan as there is no exploitation.  Milk from cows is for baby cows and milk from humans is for baby humans.

Answer 2

It's great that the farm you worked at treated their cows well, it would be wonderful if more farms were like that, but sadly they aren't!

Take a look at where most dairy products come from - factory farms.  These are farms where they may be 15,000 cows kept in terrible conditions for their 5-6 year lifespan.  I won't go into the gory details, but google it sometime.  It will make your head spin!

Dairy cows are bred today for high milk production. For cows who are injected with Bovine Growth Hormone, their already high rate of milk production is doubled.  Dairy cows produce milk for about 10 months after giving birth so they are impregnated continuously to keep up the milk flow. Female calves are kept to replenish the herd and male calves are usually sent to veal crates where they live a miserable existence until their slaughter. When cows become unable to produce adequate amounts of milk they are sent to slaughter so money can be made from their flesh. The cows are kept in a holding facility where they are fed, watered and have their waste removed mechanically and are allowed out only twice a day to be milked by machines.

As for human breastmilk,  it is made for human comsumption.  It is food made by human mothers for human babies.  It is perfect in every way.  I give my child breastmilk with free will and love.  It is not taken from me against my will to be fed to another species,  do you see  the difference?

Answer 3

Because they think it exploits the cow and it is wrong to take milk away from the babies.

Answer 4

yeah

Answer 5

Because the conditions at dairy farms can be disgusting and the dairy cows are not treated very humanely. Did you know that male dairy cows, because for obvious reasons can not produce milk, are used as "veal" cows??? Just do some reasearch on animal cruelty and you'll know why vegans don't drink milk. Hope that gives you some better insight.

Answer 6

FACTS.

Prior to my learning about the horrors of factory farming, if someone had told me that there are animals on this earth who for their entire lives are imprisoned in wooden crates, chained by their necks, and prevented from performing the simplest of movements such as walking or turning; that they suffer from malnourishment, deliberately induced to encourage the onset of disease; and that these things are done to them to enhance the taste and texture of their cooked flesh for human consumption, I would have thought that such practices could only be found within the confines of some fictional tale of the macabre; or that they were being performed by some tribe of barbarians in complete isolation from modern-day society.

As we are all discovering, however, the sickening truth is that these things are done to hundreds of thousands of male calves every year throughout the United States to produce the meat known as veal, or more specifically "white veal". But I would have been correct about one thing - these acts are without question being performed by barbarians.

The tragic story of the veal calf begins with his mother - the dairy cow.

In today's dairy factories, the dairy cow is treated as little more than a piece of machinery, like a tractor or harvester, with no concern given to her welfare other than that which also encourages her productive abilities. In order to produce milk, the dairy cow must of course give birth. Insemination is planned so that this occurs at about two years of age, and she'll continue to lactate for the next 10 months. However, she's usually re-inseminated after only 2 or 3 months thereby maximizing her productive cycle. Following the second birth, her udder is finally given a short rest, though ultimately she'll be expected to give one birth per year until the strain on her system proves too much and she's shipped off to slaughter.

The hardship of such an accelerated birth rate is compounded by various methods used to increase milk production even further. In addition to automated milking techniques and the use of antibiotics, the cows are administered a specialized high-protein diet based on grains and animal byproducts. As they are natural herbivores this diet is difficult for the cows to digest. Moreover, imposing a carnivorous, even cannibalistic diet onto dairy cows has resulted in various outbreaks of BSE (Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy), more popularly known as Mad Cow Disease, a fatal disorder which progressively attacks the brain and nervous system.

In recent years, the industry has also seen increased use of the highly controversial growth hormone, rBGH (recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone), otherwise known as BST (Bovine Somatotropin). rBGH is designed to increase milk production by approximately 15%. However, after a single artificially-enhanced lactation, the cow is "worn out" and becomes so useless she must be sent to slaughter. Most small family farmers have rejected the product, while it's use has been banned in both Canada and the European Union.

All these techniques take a tremendous toll on the cow. Pushed into producing more than 10 times as much milk in peak lactation as her calf would otherwise require, the life span of a dairy cow is reduced from 25 years or more to as little as three or four years. Her immune system is greatly compromised, and she becomes susceptible to a number of crushing diseases, such as mastitis (painful swelling of the udder), ketosis (disease of the liver), laminitis or lameness (resulting from metabolic strain), "milk fever" (unnatural loss of calcium from the blood supply), and infertility. Sadly, the industry's solution to these problems is to simply administer more antibiotics. Why alter the system to accommodate the cow, when you can alter the cow to accommodate the system?

Because so little attention is given to the welfare of the cows, an estimated 195,000 per year become so sick they're unable to walk or even stand. Up until recently, these "downers" were dragged or bulldozed into slaughterhouse trucks so their meat could still be harvested. This made perfect sense from a standpoint of profitibility, since the meat of a cow who dies before slaughter is unusable for human consumption. Fortunately, due to the indisputable relationship between downers and recent cases of Mad Cow Disease in North America, the USDA placed a temporary ban on this practice, forcing the industry to choose between immediately euthanizing downed cows or reducing their numbers by treating them more humanely in the first place. Efforts are currently under way in Congress to make this ban permanent.

But what of the siblings?

Calves are separated from their mothers after only one to three days, thereby preventing them from drinking milk intended for human use. As the suckling period in a natural environment would last anywhere from 6 to 12 months, early separation is distressing for both the mother and the calf. Furthermore, during the first 6 to 8 weeks of their lives, many of the calves are kept in individual pens, removed not only from their mother's attentions, but also from social interactions with their own kind.

A number of mutilations are routinely performed when the calves are still very young, such as castration for the males, removal of supernumerary teats for the females, disbudding (which prevents the development of horns), and tail-docking. As you might guess, all these procedures are very painful, yet they're performed without the benefit of anesthetics or the expertise of a qualified veterinarian.

Most of the females are ultimately selected as replacements for the dairy herd; while the males are either raised for beef, killed almost immediately for low grade veal, or confined in "veal crates" for 4 to 6 months to be slaughtered for white veal (also known as "fancy" or "milk-fed" veal).

It is these "white veal" calves who suffer the most cruel and inhumane treatment of all. From the time they're first introduced to the "veal crate", they'll know no other home. This wooden cage is extremely restrictive, measuring only 2 feet across, and is designed to prevent the calves from walking, turning around, or even stretching their legs. Manacled at the neck they're prevented from laying down comfortably and are even unable to properly groom themselves. The purpose of all this, of course, is to inhibit muscular growth, thereby keeping their meat as tender as possible.

But as if this weren't enough, the calves are further abused by feeding them an all-liquid milk-substitute diet deficient in iron and fiber. Borderline anemia is thereby induced which produces a pale or white colored flesh - hence the term "white veal". Even the littlest of details are attended to, such as denying the calves straw bedding for fear they may eat the straw which would darken the color of their flesh; while their crates are made of wood instead of metal to ensure the calves don't ingest unwanted amounts of iron by l*****g the bars.

Separated from their mothers at a tender age, prevented from engaging in social interactions, and even denied physical comfort or any semblance of a natural existence; it's not surprising that veal calves suffer from a number of life-altering diseases and impairments. Physical complications most often observed include abnormal gut development, stomach ulcers, impaired locomotive abilities, and an overall weakening of the immune system. Equally lamentable are the common psychological responses, such as frustration, depression, aggression, food refusals, acute sensitivity to stimulation, and chronic stress. Add to this the abnormal repetitive movements known as stereotypies (tongue rolling, l*****g or nibbling on the walls of their crates, or chewing on nonexistent cud).

So from mother to sibling, the vicious cycle is completed, and at just the right time, the calf is sent to slaughter so that gourmet chefs and discriminating consumers around the world can relish the perfect cut of veal.

Answer 7

Vegans' believe that it is in a way still part of the animal as food. The most common reason people become vegans is ethical commitment or moral convictions concerning animal rights, the environment, human health, and spiritual or religious concerns. Most would probably breast feed because it is not a animal but a human, some might have problems with it

Answer 8

Actually many people, not only vegans do not drink milk because they don't believe in the so called health benefits of milk. And they believe that milk from cattle are meant only for calves not humans.

Vegans do not partake in any kind of animal exploitation period. Keeping animals in pens (even wide open ones) and raising them for food whether as milk cows or beef cattle is animal exploitation as far as they are concerned. they simply don't want any part of it.

Human milk is meant for human babies and vegan moms are certainly not penned or forced into breast feeding their children. Neither is the milk forcibly (read no choice whether pain free or not)extracted from them to be sold to other humans or animals

Answer 9

Vegan means no animal by-products... this would include dairy products.

Answer 10

Of course vegans breast feed.

However, consuming the breast milk of another species is unnatural, unnecessary and repulsive. (Would you suck an udder?)

Dairy cows are injected with hormones and antibiotics, and their food is laced with pesticides. (This is to decrease the amount of insects attracted to their f***s, a major problem in industrial dairies.) Residue from the hormones, antibiotics and pesticides are found in milk. These have been linked to cancer and compromised immune systems.

Dairy cows have to be impregnated before they give milk, just like people.  The offspring, if male, get to be VEAL!  (yippee!)

Answer 11

Because they do not consume anything that come from an animal. However some Vegetarians would. Breast feeding has nothing to do with milk from a cow. That makes no sense

Answer 12

It is because of the conditions at many dairy farms, and ethical reasons regarding the treatment of the animals.

It has nothing whatsoever to do with breast feeding.  It's not the *milk* itself that is the problem, but the exploitation of the animals for it.

Some people, who are "mostly" vegan, will drink milk/eat cheese from a particular breed of goat, which continually produces milk, even without pregnancies.

Part of the ethical considerations, as far as I know, is that dairy cows have calfs, to make them start lactating, then the calfs are separated from their mothers too young, and bottle-fed separately, so that their mothers can then be milked for commercial production.  Many people see this as a cruel intervention in the animals natural life.

Another consideration for some people are the treatments often used on dairy cows, like hormones, for increasing milk production unnaturally.

Then there are the overall concerns of some vegans that any kind of unnecessary exploitation of creatures for mankind's benefit, particularly when it leads to abuses of animals, is something they don't want to participate in.  (why they don't wear leather, or eat any animal product or byproduct - so as to not create any kind of further market for it)

There are a lot of reasons why someone might be vegan.  Some people (a lot more than you think - and many of them still drink cow's milk) are simply very intolerant of cow's milk.  Others, it's because of ethical  reasons.

Whether it's an ethical or practical reason to not drink cow's milk, don't confuse the choice to not do so with having a problem with "milk" itself.  I think most vegans are very pro-breast feeding, because it is a natural process, and actually much better for the baby than artificial nutrition (or cow's milk!)

Answer 13

Oh, they didn't mind?  Did they tell you so?

Taking cow breast milk from cows is exploitation and theft - cows can't consent to being milked when they're enslaved by humans.  Furthermore, drinking the breastmilk of a different species is just downright gross.

Breasfeeding an infant isn't exploitation... it's consentual and natural.

Answer 14

I am not a vegan but I have read and studies show that milk is not as healthy as we have made it to be. This is why the new slogan for milk changed in the mid ninties, from 'Milk Does a body good' to 'Got Milk?'

We can no longer say that milk does a body good. The breast milk is meant to develop baby calfs as well as human babies. You Don't see me askin momma' for a nipple suck at age 25, do you? There are hormones in breast milk that are purposed for child developement and cell growth. These same hormones are now linked to irregular cell developement and cancer. Of course I supose moderate consumption could do little harm, but when it comes to vegans their main concern is health and PETA. Health would way heavy in this case because, as you stated, milking a nipple is natural.