“To animals, all people are Nazis.”

This statement was made after a national campaign by HSUS Food Policy Director and former PETA activists, Matt Prescott, created it and placed this statement on advertisements across the nation to gain supports to fight against farmers. A statement so bold and inconsiderate to our nation, especially since they don’t tell consumers about the farmer who gets home to his family at 9 p.m. after a long day at work, only to wake up three times during the night to pull back on his boots, grab a flashlight, and make his way out to the pasture to check on the cows and heifers during calving season to ensure no problems arise and new mothers are healthy. They won’t tell you many new mothers will end up having trouble and that farmer will stand out in the cold, dead night and wake his 7-year old child from her bed to help pull the calf before he runs out of time. They won’t tell you that there are times the mother won’t survive the birth, and the farmer is left heartbroken at his loss and his child left to care for the now orphaned calf and spend weeks, even months, bottle-feeding the calf she named “Brown Jack”. They don’t tell you about the bond formed between the child and the calf and the heartbreak she experiences when she returns to the barn after school to find her Brown Jack had died from scours before running to the house, tears streaming and cries screaming as she tells her parents the news.

The HSUS farm-animal vice president will tell you, “Eating meat causes animal cruelty.”

But what Paul Shapiro won’t tell you is somewhere a young boy is bathing his show steer twice a day as he feeds him an “all he can eat buffet” of corn and oat grain and walks him each evening and allows a stop for a quick taste of grass. All while the young boy understands the day will come when he has to sell his steer to the highest bidder at the fair to be harvested for meat. Shapiro won’t tell you the shattering moment the boy feels as he takes the halter off one last time and returns home to prepare for the next year, and the photo that will remain in the house as a special memory of his purple ribbon.

HSUS and PETA will show you advertisements of a sheep bleeding “so you can have your clothes.”

What they don’t want to tell you is the moment when the days start becoming hotter and spring weather begins to move out as summer moves in, the farm hands will bring in the sheep to shear their wool so we can, yes, have our clothes and the sheep may keep cool in the increasing temperatures- without having to touch the sheep’s skin. They won’t tell you this typically becomes a family event as the farmer and his hired hands hold the sheep and remove the wool as the farmer’s wife brings glasses of lemonade and sandwiches out as the children have fun packing the wool down into the bags with their bare feet.

Animal Activists will declare animals should be left to roam in pastures and feel the grass beneath their feet.

However, they forget to tell you the harsh realities of extreme temperatures in the middle of winter when sheep are trying to lamb and cows are starting to calve. They won’t tell you how the frost and snow will cause frostbite and lead to lost ears, feet, and tails or cause a lamb to freeze to death. They don’t tell you the hours farmers spend on keeping watch and bringing a newborn lamb into the laundry room to keep safe and warm, when they are found quick enough after birth, or the calf that had to be brought into the shed and placed by a space heater and force-fed warm milk through a tube so he can be brought back from the brink of death from the harsh winter.

They do not know agriculture.

Although they most definitely want you to think they do. While I, and many other farmers, agree people are entitled to their own opinions, we cannot remain gullible to statements and advertisements placed before us on television or the internet. There is always so much more to be heard and more knowledge to be gained, and two sides to every story. Make your decision as to who and what to support after both sides are known. Deception is out there, and HSUS and PETA are masterminds of this. They know how to get emotions, and they know how to promote their business, but they do not know agriculture and they do not know farmers. For I am a farmer’s daughter, and I know the love a farmer has for the livestock that provides for his family. It’s time you do, too.