Monday, July 27, 2009
Food Chain / Food & Drink Foie gras ban activists return to City Council
Posted by Mike Sula on 07.27.09 at 02:15 PM
Eagle-eyed friend of the Food Chain Martha Bayne spotted an item in the New York Times last week about a curious resolution, introduced to a Chicago City Council committee, ostensibly to promote local green foods, community-supported agriculture, farmers' markets, and community gardens.
We can all get behind that, right? Maybe not.
Turns out it's part of a campaign to pass similar resolutions across the country by the animal rights organization Farm Sanctuary. The New York-based group, you might remember—especially if you've read Mark Caro's excellent book The Foie Gras Wars—was one of the chief supporters of the foie gras ban, rallying behind legislative architect alderman Joe Moore, hiring lobbyists at state and local levels, flying in anti-foie activists to testify in council hearings (including Loretta "Hot Lips Houlihan" Swit), and generally supporting that extended three-ring clusterfuck.
This "Green Food Resolution," introduced by 39th Ward Alderman Margaret Laurino to the Committee on Energy, Environmental Protection and Public Utilities, is nonbinding, and the way the Farm Sanctuary boilerplate reads, looks fairly toothless. But it appears to have taken the local food cognoscenti by surprise, as Martha points out, and one has to wonder about Farm Sanctuary's real motives.
Asks Martha, "Is this “Green Food Resolution” simply the latest salvo in a well-organized, well-funded campaign to promote vegetarianism (or “plant-based foods”), this time tricked out with local-food lingo?"
Comments (3)
Showing 1-3 of 3
Yikes! That is my Alderman! Maybe she should be spending her time making sure my neighborhood doesn't flood or picking up the sandbags from the LAST flood instead. Ellen
like
dislike
Bring in PETA to say a few words to those gluttons who insist on gorging on Foies Gras, and don't give a damn how much the duck or goose who's liver they are ingesting has been tortured, to fill their own sorry gullet!
