Cow’s ‘Dump Dairy’ Plea: ‘Do I Look Like Your Mother?’

PETA Ads Encourage ‘Festival of Cheese’ Attendees to Leave Cow’s Milk for the Calves

For Immediate Release:
July 25, 2018

Contact:
Audrey Shircliff 202-483-7382

Just in time for “Forged in Cheese,” the American Cheese Society’s annual conference and competition—which includes a “Festival of Cheese”—PETA has placed ads on buses that run near the event’s venue, the David L. Lawrence Convention Center. They show a cow alongside the words “Do I Look Like Your Mother? Cow’s Milk Is for Calves. Dump Dairy. Go Vegan.“

“Behind every block of cheese is a grieving mother cow and the calf who was torn away from her shortly after birth,” says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. “PETA’s ads encourage everyone to dump dairy ‘products’ in favor of healthier, cruelty-free cashew cheeses, soy yogurts, almond and coconut beverages, and other vegan treats.”

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to eat”—notes that humans are the only species to drink milk beyond infancy and to consume the milk of another species. In today’s dairy industry, calves are taken away from their mothers within hours or days of birth so that their mothers’ milk can be consumed by humans instead. Male calves are often shipped off to be caged and slaughtered for the veal industry, while females endure the same fate as their mothers: repeated artificial insemination in order to produce a steady supply of milk until their bodies give out and they’re sent to the slaughterhouse.

The consumption of cow’s milk has also been linked to an increased risk for everything from cancer and heart disease to diabetes and strokes. Fortified soy beverages, however, contain high levels of essential nutrients like calcium, vitamin D, protein, and vitamin B₁₂, with none of the cholesterol, hormones, or cruelty of dairy “products.”

For more information, please visit PETA.org.