Thursday, November 20, 2008

A Compassionate End

From the moment Head Chef and I decided to raise birds for meat, we knew it would mean killing them. Yes, the joy of holding day-old chicks in your hands and raising scruffy young birds into beautiful specimens is a big part of the fun. But the killing was a part of the process. Part of these birds' life cycles.

So we did a lot of reading on compassionate butchering techniques for the backyard flock. And we gasped at the horror of factory farm techniques that often enough entail dismembering live animals. Not dead or unconscious birds, but fully awake, screaming creatures, being plucked and quartered for the American table.

We knew we could do better in our sleep. We could do better than that accidentally. So we raised our birds with attention and care, and planned for their respectful, quiet end.

We think they have had marvelous lives. They receive as much good quality feed as they can eat, table scraps, and as much roughage as they can forage on the three acre yard we have enclosed around the house. We shoo them from the flower garden whenever they start to dig, but they've had their way with it anyway. They obviously love the soft moist soil and the insects that live beneath the surface. The flock of turkeys and chickens runs to us when the see us, so we think they're happy with us, and by extension, their lives.

But Thanksgiving is coming, and that means it's time. Time for two turkeys and a guinea hen.

So yesterday we set up the ladder, a table, and filled the turkey fryer with water. The water approached 150 degrees so we went to the coop and selected a turkey hen.

The birds were all locked up to prevent roaming, as it wouldn't be appropriate to have them pecking around as we sealed the fate of their peers. And within, we wrapped Hurty Gerty within an old bath towel and covered her eyes.

Gerty was a broad breasted bronze turkey, another of those unthinkable abominations we humans have bred from something wild and noble. Wild turkeys are quick, agile, and such good flyers they can leap 20 feet vertically into a tree, or fly for hundreds of meters across the treetops. But broad breasteds have a unique genetic mutation that causes their breast muscles to overdevelop. They become so large that they waddle awkwardly when they walk and are completely incapable of flight. But their instinct-driven brains don't know that. So they manage to get to high perches they can't get down from. Then believing they can fly, they plummet to the ground like bowling balls with pointlessly flapping wings.

And this is how Hurty Gerty got her name. One night she managed to hop from limb to limb up to a reasonably high branch in a pine. The following morning, she spread her useless wings and fell to earth, tumbling across the ground like a snowboarder who's just edged in at 35 miles per hour. By the time she stopped rolling, she had damaged one leg. Gerty was now hurty. She refused to move on her own for days. We lifted her and moved her to the food, then the water, and watched her carefully. But she was improving. Eventually, she walked on her own, but never without a slight limp in each burdoned step.

So yesterday, with her eyes covered, Gerty fell calm. She stopped struggling in Head Chef's arms, and just sat silent. This was what we expected and were surprised none of our research had suggested. Most birds have terrible night vision, and so moving about at night is a bad idea. In fact, if you're a bird, remaining calm and quiet is the best bet for survival whenever it's dark. So barnyard fowl benefit from this same effect. Cover their eyes or make it dark, and they feel calm and stop moving.

We felt that making use of this instinct was a critical step in the compassionate experience we wanted to be these birds' last minutes. The bird would be calm and quiet, making it less stressful for everyone. They would be cooperative in their last moments, and they would not become alarmed, struggle, or call out.

And we were more than satisfied with the results. We tied Gerty's feet together, and cradling her massive weight within the towel, we slipped the hook between the ropes we'd strung from the ladder. She was relaxed, and her breathing was slow. We thanked her for being a good companion and for making this so easy on us. Head Chef pulled out the knife and made one quick and decisive cut across the neck, and I released her weight so that she hung by her feet.

Head Chef was moved. He was flushed and we stepped away for a few seconds and I hugged him. He breathed heavily a few times. It was tough to take a life, but we said nothing. This was the food chain in action, and we were trying to be responsible participants in that process.

Gerty lost consciousness within a minute, and as she hung bleeding, she never called out or struggled at all. Within three minutes her breathing stopped and her brain was dead, and we removed her body from between the ladder and began the process of dressing her for the holiday.

The process was not nearly as yucky as we expected. Head Chef removed the head and we dipped the body into the hot water and counted to 25, then moved it to the table and began plucking. The feathers came out in generous handfuls. We discovered that a 25 second bath had been too much, and some of the skin was fragile as result. But we managed to deal with the repercussions without tearing the skin.

Then Head Chef cut around the vent without severing the intestines, and reached up into the body cavity, removing the package of organs without any trouble at all. We rinsed and tidied the body one more time, soaked it in a cold water bath, and bagged it. It looked exactly like a thawed bird from Safeway. A 25 pound bird. It was amazing. And the process had taken us just under an hour.

Gerty and an unnamed sister of hers now sit in the freezer. One will be shipped to Head Chef's mother for her own holiday, and we will enjoy Gerty here at our home with family and friends.

It is odd to have meat that has a name, but it also seems OK. Hurty Gerty had been dealt an unfortunate card upon conception. She would be a monstrosity, and butchered before her first year. But we feel grateful that we got to hold her as a chick, raise her into an impressive bird, nurse her wounded leg back to function, and say thanks before taking her life ourselves.

It's been rewarding, humbling, and empowering to know her. Thanks, Gerty.

Thursday, November 06, 2008

Subversives With Lawyers

Subvert the will of the people?

If the people are wrong, then I would argue that it is not only right to subvert the will of the people, it is our duty.

When a majority places their own interests above the interests of a minority at the expense of the minority, that's called
tyranny of the majority. Hurting people just because you don't like them is wrong.

Third graders know that. Third graders would not have voted for Proposition 8.

But a slim margin of Californians
voted tyrannically.

So will we
attempt to subvert their will? Most definitely. Utah Phillips has said, "Freedom is something that you assume, then you wait for somebody to try to take it away from you. The degree to which you resist is the degree to which you are free."

We will be free.

Wednesday, November 05, 2008

The Americans California Forgot

Obama knows what Californians forgot. From his acceptance speech last night:
If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.

It’s the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen; by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the very first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different; that their voice could be that difference.

It’s the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled – Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been a collection of Red States and Blue States: we are, and always will be, the United States of America.
I actually gasped upon hearing that. Gay? Gay and straight? The forty fourth president of the United States acknowledged that I exist, and that I am an American. I didn't even hear his next few sentences. I just felt so included that nothing else mattered for some moments.

Not even Proposition 8.

Obama opposed Proposition 8, the one that Californians passed last night. The one that, like so many others, defines me as less American than the straight people President-elect Obama also acknowledged. It's desperately sad to me that Obama knows about the American dream - about equality and liberty and the pursuit of happiness - but that the people who elected him don't.

Californians forgot that we're all Americans. Californians, of all people.

Or did they? Going into election day many polls indicated that No on 8 still had a lead. And that means anonymous Californians lied to pollsters. Why would they lie if they're anonymous?  Because they were too ashamed to tell the truth. Californians knew what they were about to do was wrong.

Obama knows that to bouy the country, we must lift all people up. And that to discriminate against any group drags us all down. Part of me thinks that Obama has the power to bring us together. Part of me believes that in time, if he remains persuasive and dedicated to that ideal we will realize, as a people, that to truly prosper we must uplift all Americans.

To do anything less hurts us all. And although on this day I am not a full American, I still have hope.

Saturday, November 01, 2008

Prop 8's Supporters, and a Letter

I know that, by and large, if you read my blog, you're a part of my choir. Which is to acknowledge, of course, that if I make a point and I intend it to be public, I'm just preaching to the converted. Which is probably pointless.

But I can't help it. No on 8. No on 8. NO ON 8!

What I am most struck by is this:

Those who would lay claim to the greatest achievements of piety and grace are bearing false witness in order to hurt and oppress others. And, it would seem, they are doing it for at least partially prideful, even gluttonous purposes. They want marriage for themselves, and they don't want to share.

I have a much easier time with high school jocks yelling 'f*!^king fags!' out a car window. They are grappling with what it means to be themselves, and part of that is demonstrating their idea of who they should be to their peer group. They're immature and it's shameful, but it's not who they are.

But these 'Christian' people tell lies to change public opinion and actively and at great expense try to hurt other people. How on earth are we supposed to accept that they are loving and pious? How in their god's name could anyone - including their god - think that the path to righteousness is paved in lies and the oppression of their neighbors?

They believe in this afterlife filled with reward or damnation and for their sake, I hope they're wrong. Because if there is an afterlife and we are each judged as they believe we are... Their afterlife is gonna be all kinds of hell.

------- Part 2 --------

Dear No On 8 Christian,

I know, I just painted you in a terrible light. I just lumped you in with Christianists, people who are not merely content to worship the way they choose, but whom wish to force all citizens to live by their tenets. People who wish to abolish the separation of church and state, as well as freedom of religion.

That was unfair. And I'm sorry. But you have to understand.

You mention your gay buddy or sister to a coworker and in their minds they picture a category, not a person. I personally think categories are useful, but they come with burdens, too. As a gay man, I have to constantly combat any number of stereotyped behaviors associated with men in my category. Drag queens, ACT UP clones, park cruisers, etc.

But I do, through my own example and words, illustrate that I, as a gay person, am not like those people, and that they do not represent all gay people.

Blacks, Jews, Hispanics, Republicans, Liberals, Women, and Teenagers also have to deal with these categories. It's no big deal, and it's not personal.

You are voting No On 8. And for that, I thank you. But you are a Christian and that puts you in a category, too. So it is your burden to illustrate that you do not lie. That you do not oppress others. And that you do not wish to legislate your faith and in so doing eliminate Americans' rights to worship or not as they choose.

This is your burden. The voting ends on Tuesday. I'd recommend you start now.

There's the phone. Start dialing.

Thanks,
Pastry Chef