65° - 1:49 am
By Heather Hetterick
It was just starting to appear that everyone was, well, not exactly getting along, but at least cooperating with each other and finding some common ground. After all, Issue 2 was behind us and that war between Humane Society of the United States and the agriculture industry in Ohio ended somewhat peacefully with the creation of the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board.
Then, HSUS goes and files a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission against the National Pork Producers Council. It alleges that NPPC is engaging in deceptive advertising related to animal well-being with the “We Care” and Pork Quality Assurance Plus programs.
That, I believe, changes everything.
You see, the Pork Quality Assurance Plus Program is the pork industry standard for pork quality and animal welfare. With this claim HSUS is now saying, ‘Your standards are no good.’ They’re also throwing science right out the window. They are not even trying to play nicely on the subject. (Now personally, I think this is also HSUS’s way at getting revenge for NPPC not supporting their agreement with the United Egg Producers on cage size).
We were warned they wouldn’t stop and that they didn’t want better standards for livestock. They wanted to end livestock production all together. I think this certainly proves that’s the agenda here.
The question is though, how does this effect the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board that was built with HSUS permission, participation and cooperation, yet is centered around the industry welfare programs including Pork Quality Assurance Plus?
The main issues stated in the FTC complaint are sow housing and tail docking. The Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board has addressed sow housing, but currently tail docking is a permitted practice. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see for how long though.
With this latest act, HSUS is now criticizing the national program standards that they are already on the record supporting in Ohio. Does that mean they now condemn the other standards put in place by the Livestock Care Board in which they participated?
Now that they have attacked the pork industry’s program, who’s next? And, how will this all play out in Ohio?
Heather,
Let’s see if I got this straight: the HSUS is accusing a farm organization of “deceptive advertising”?
HSUS collects millions of dollars from donors by “advertising” that it supports animal shelters for poor homeless cats and dogs. Yet only 2% of all those millions goes to benefit cats and dogs in local shelters, as the donors are led to believe. The other 98% is used to pay lawyers and Washington lobbyists, pay lucrative retirement plans, and maintain fancy offices in DC.
Now THAT’S Deceptive!!