PETA is taking a new approach and trying to get youngsters to stop drinking milk. To that end, they spoke to a middle school the other week, and have come out with a set of trading cards of weird and nasty things you can expect from drinking milk.

I'm convinced that PETA have to make up the majority of crack cocaine consumers.

Mike

PETA are the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

They're the guys that rose all the fuss about the CBS airing the contestants killing & eating rats, chickens, and other such animals on "Survivor".

They're complete morons. There are organizations to stop poverty, disease, hunger, opression, and other such evils of the world, and they're wasting their time on stopping the practice of milking cows. I have no sympathy for those people.

Mike

PETA

This brings to mind an idea I had earlier. Remember, in Roman times, proscription lists? The basic idea is that the government puts your name on a widely publicized list, and you can be killed by any citizen without fear of punishment. I think that these PETA idiots shoud go on a list like this. Interesting side note, my health teacher, who can't even spell his name, has tried to convince us that milk is poison. Then he wants us to take him seriously when he speaks about drugs and the like. I love fucking America, man.

I must admit, though, their demonstrations about skin/leather/fur are quite interesting. On the other hand, rest assured that if someone spraypaints my leather jacket, I will bury them with it.

Kick ass, man, and take names.

Milk may not be the perfect food but there's nothing wrong with it. 1% milk is pretty much the exact combination of protein, carbohydrates, and fat that you're supposed to eat. Plus, if these PETA idiots take away the proteins from dairy, they probably want eggs too, and of course all meat, and pretty soon it's gonna be hard to get enough protein in yer diet.

Protein

Peanuts are gonna become one hell of a commodity.

In all seriousness, though. People are too damn self-righteous to realize that we are animals. We need to eat meat, which means we need to kill animals. I'm all for the ethical treatment of animals, but I don't think that being milked once daily is unethical in the least. And what about the ethical treatment of other people while we're at it? There are wars going on, people are killing each other, people are starving, people are freezing on the streets of New York and Chicago, in our own back yards, so to speak, and apparently a cow living a sedentary lifestyle, getting fed well, getting milk once a day, and eventually getting converted into fine meat products is more of an outrage.

This whole thing reminds me of a quote from Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle

This is parphrased by the way, but

I'm glad that Vonnegut wrote the Almighty to sound like the "Cap'n"*, Steve.

* - inside joke as to our VB teacher

~Mike

the cap'n

Just for the record, because you don't all enjoy our visual Basic 'experience', the Cap'n is what Mike (Chew) and I call our teacher, who is an excellent programmer, and an intelligent guy, but is flakier than your average pastry. He has a habit of simply giving us a problem, and the resources to learn what we need to to solve it. He does *not* teach. I, Mike, and a few others thrive in this sort of environment; everyone else struggles, and it jades them to the whole concept of programming. Which I guess is why they chose this class as a pre-requisite for C++, to weed out the word processors and other (l)users and only allow those who can develop coding skill carry on to the more complex, but far more powerful, language.

Personally, I think that this is the way programming should be taught, as a career. This is a field where things will(!) change constantly, and you must be willing and able to teach yourself what you need to know in order to get by. Unfortunately, most people are used to the standard regurgitation method of teaching. You know it; teacher tells you soemthing, and you repeat it until you can spit it back out on command. Programming requires a higher level of thought than this, as do the complex mathematics and sciences, and it's important to develop this talent as early as possible.

Now that I've attacked every teacher in the building (thank the gods I'm not posting froms chool right now), I should sign off

--Steve

I agree.

I went through CS in 1985 when college CS was just getting started. The brutal weed-out is always expected in programming. It's just necessary. They do it a lot worse in college pre-med courses; in CS it's "You aren't capable of this" while in pre-med it's "You can't HANDLE this". People are brutalized.

That said, it IS good to get a walk through certain algorithms when you're seeing them for the very first time. So I hope he's at least doing that.

He just recently installed Altiris Vision User to that effect. The obvious effect being that he can set a demo mode to show us his computer screen and walk the class through new stuff. The real reason is because a lot of us are downloading game demos and other such things and they're trying to put a leash on us. "Us" being the coders and programmers.

Naturally, the programmers are going first. We're the only ones in the school that show a streak of independence. The Comp. Apps. kids are repressed from day one. Steve, one day we must tell the tale of Cini-Mini in freshman year.

What I don't like about this (and I just filled out a survey to the fact) is that it's like giving a recovering alcoholic a Guinness. This is the school's way of imposing the "classic" form of education on those that have been seeing and thriving another way. We're being force-addicted to the classic form again, then upon graduation, we'll be yanked off it and be forced to go cold turkey.

It's like they're prepping us for a life eerily similar to "Office Space".

~Mike

Re: Protein

Re: Re: Protein

I think I'll go to a PETA protest wearing a real fur coat, drinking some milk, and munching on a cheesesteak.

I'll meet you there with a legion of vendors doling out cheesesteaks, burgers, milkshakes, and wearing Kevlar.

~Mike

My wife was a fine arts major in college (obviously she's now a programmer/analyst) and loves to tell about one poser chick in the art school at Syracuse. The girl would stomp around campus in heavy leather boots and a "Meat is Murder" patch on her jeans. She was definitely not trying to be ironic. That, to me, defines the animal rights movement.

I'm no fan of industrial style farming, mainly because my roots are in family farming and I recognize what is lost when the manager/worker isn't the owner. If you ever get a chance to work on a production line... don't, unless you really need the paycheck. Animals should be well taken care of and they will be if your goal is producing healthy food.

This thread reminds me of a couple good red neck bumper stickers People Eating Tasty Animals and EARTH FIRST! we'll ruin the rest later.

(the following not for weak stomachs)

Alphageek,In my indestructable youth, I shared an apartment, in Scranton, with five other guys and there was a constant round of "You don't have the cojones to...". Well, at one point, we had a lot of raw venison in the fridge and some of it was marinating in speidie sauce (local food cooked on a skewer like a kabob but just meat, lamb being the best, vinegar, oil, and Italian spices) So I ate a cube of the marinated venison. It was absolutely delicious! After that, we ate a lot of raw speidie meat, like a pack of wolves. Nobody got sick, but that was pretty stupid. Oh, did I mention there was alcohol involved, a lot of alcohol... Surviving that period is my personal proof for the existence of a benign greater power. I've only been on an antibiotic twice in my life and I agree with your assessment that the immune system has to be tested to function. I was raised on raw cows milk which is full of microbial life which many folks think inevitably leads to illness. I've done barnyard butchering, never wearing gloves and shoveled a lot of crap. Both of these activities could potentially impact an uninitiated immune system.

Re: Re: Re: Protein

Re: Re: Re: Protein

I think I recall hearing that the rise in asthma problems has been attributed to cleaner environments.

I've heard on occasion that the United States is TOO clean. The anti-bacterial antiseptic kick going on here is actually leaving us susceptible to new strains of everything. People take an antibiotic for a chill these days...ridiculous.

Meat, Milk and Animal rights

I think that the point behind Milk being an objectionable substance is not that it is poisonous but because farms treat the cows badly when they farm them. Though I do think that milk farming is less objectionable in than the practices used for farming other animals. It is not that the meat is bad or the milk is bad ... it is that under current farming practices with big business making big bucks ofen leads to the inhumane and downright cruel treatment of animals. If you want to eat animals then fine but I don't think we need to torture them first and being a vegetarian means that I am no longer condoning the torture of animals just as I wouldn't want any part in the torture of human beings.

If you want the facts as to why peta objects to milk then have a look at:
http://www.goveg.com/rfact8.html

leedee, I'm glad you had the intestinal fortitude to jump in here, since this threads balance of opinion leans decidedly in the other direction. Welcome aboard! I'll follow your link but remember I grew up in farm country so my opinions may not be "paletable". (sp?)

I'll say

Welcome, and jump right in, and stick around a while. But if Griff's message is fair warning then here's the first bold attack. Nothing personal but the link you gave us has a section entitled "vegetarian cats and dogs" which is the foulest thing I've ever seen on a website.

Cats and dogs are natural meat-eaters. I don't give a rat's ass if they think they have worked out all the additives that these animals need to survive.

The page is full of incorrect information and very subjective statements tossed around like facts. You know what the dog biscuit recipe is? For a dog, nutritionally, it's total crap disguised with garlic powder to be something they'll enjoy.

Dogs are, nutritionally speaking, miles away from humans. A dog will eat vegetables in the wild? Only under three conditions that I know. One, as shredded material in the stomach of the beast they are consuming. If someone brings down a wildebeest, the dogs are happy to eat everything that's left over after the real predators have had their meal. That will include the stomach and intestines with partially-digested vegetables. They particularly enjoy the bones and much of their nutritional needs are solved by eating raw bones and bone marrow.

Two, dogs will eat vegetables out of desperation. And three, dogs will eat grass and such for medicinal purposes. It helps them vomit if they need to do that.

The real truth is, if you want to mimic dogs' natural diet, buy whole chickens, cut off the breast and thigh meat and feed the rest, bones and neck and all, to the dog. But if you lack the fortitude to nip into the meat yourself, just buy quality commercial dog food. It's largely made from the waste products of other meat production anyway. The cheap stuff is more like the "dog biscuit", crap disguised so they will eat it.

Re: I'll say

Why did the chicken cross the road?

..because it knew riding in a truck was dangerous. One of our local channels showed an accident involving a jacknifed chicken truck. The camera zoomed in and there were some unmoving, probably dead, chickens. This apparently upset the anchorpersons, who immediately began to reassure themselves that some of these chickens must be just stunned.

Now, considering that a 'safe trip' for these chickens meant getting their necks broken or heads chopped off at their destination, I find it just a little hard to shed too many tears about them perishing in a traffic accident. As a matter of fact, the chickens who didn't make it score a minor victory in that they will probably not end up as human food (although they might be ground into animal feed).

I appreciate the need to minimize animal suffering. This is one of the requirements of kosher killing. However, there is no point at being at the top of the food chain if you can't have a burger. To quote Mel Brooks "It's good to be the king".

Here do msot new virus/bacteria strains develop???
Hospitals.
WHere are the most antibiotics used?
Hospitals.
'Nuff said.