NY Metro on Foie Gras
Alaina mentions a New York Metro article about foie gras, and of course I have to comment. Melissa hopes that one day I'll just let these things go, but it hasn't happened yet.
The author has a decent command of the facts: He knows there are three producers in the U.S., which so few journalists figure out. But he demonstrates a clear bias with "Two or three times a day, the birds have a tube jammed straight into their esophagi, at which point a few pounds of cornmeal are injected." The ducks get at most 500g (1.1 lb.) in any single feeding, and one would be hard-pressed to say the tube was "jammed" down the throat. The feeder inserts it quickly and efficiently, of course, but he has to be careful not to puncture the esophagus, so it involves a delicate touch that "jamming" doesn't convey.
People have their biases, but the author (or his editor) does his readers a disservice with them. He gives the animal rights activists the last word on studies that argue against their case, but he doesn't reveal that the decidedly anti-foie-gras EU exploratory committee accepted those studies and only suggested further research that might expand the knowledge. He also points out that Hudson Valley Foie Gras has a 3.5% "unintentional" mortality rate, but never mentions that 10% is an accepted level at normal poultry operations.
I find it interesting that Ginor's helping draft the anti-foie-gras bill facing the New York legislature. He's clearly learned from Guillermo's example. At the end of the California debate, Guilermo actually backed the bill banning the sale and production of foie gras because it gave him seven and a half years of freedom from lawsuits. Backing a law whose terms you control is a good fallback tactic, and you can always hope the political climate changes in time to revoke it. I believe that will be a hard bill to dislodge, however. I always maintain that foie gras is in its sunset years, but we'll see how this plays out.
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