It was Karl Marx who originally suggested that religion was the opium of the people and I would be very surprised if very many religious representatives actually embraced that sentiment. And yet, in the current age of prescription drugs, here is a church billboard (I have rendered illegible the UPC-styled phone number and church website) advertising its drug-like characteristics. (more…)
Archive for May, 2007
Marketing Religion as a Prescription Drug
14
May
Flex-Time for Cows
08
May
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Lest you think this has turned into an agriculture site, this isn’t really about the cows. It isn’t really about enlightened farming practices either although the sight of proactive cows in charge of their own milking schedules was really cool.
Child with freckles and dungaree coveralls sits in the barn in the early morning. He/She is humming to him/herself while sitting on a small wooden stool and milking a contented cow; squirting milk into a metal bucket.
Smoke belches in the dark gray sky that could be any time of day. Cows are penned in cages, standing miserably in their own excrement and unable to move. They are fed hormone laden slop and hooked up to machines that suck all the milk out of them.
Cows line up lazily outside the milking area when they feel like being milked. One at a time they walk into the milking area and the Lely automatic milking machine opens its gate. The cow lopes in where it can feed on alfalfa rich food and have its udders cleaned before the automatic computer guidance system connects the milking cups.
The results: less mastitis, more milk, happier cows and an interesting reflection of our changing views on work, society, and self-determination.
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