PETA: Got (Human) Milk?

September 24, 2008 By: Marshall Cutchin

If you had any doubt before now about whether PETA was off their collective rocker, check out their request to Ben & Jerry’s that the ice cream company replace cow milk with human breast milk. Apparently they got the idea while vacationing in Switzerland (which makes me want to run check the labels on my chocolate morsels). You can read the full, amazing text of their letter here: “Storchen restaurant is set to unveil a menu that includes soups, stews, and sauces made with at least 75 percent breast milk procured from human donors who are paid in exchange for their milk. If Ben and Jerry’s replaced the cow’s milk in its ice cream with breast milk, your customers-and cows-would reap the benefits.”
Even if my human milk sources were raised organically (no antibiotics, ate no animal by-products and ate farm-raised salmon less than twice a week), I’d still wonder if this was all that smart. Indeed, my reluctance to consider consuming human secretions in order to improve the lifestyle of cows got me to thinking about other “green” and animal-friendly ideas:

  • Collect and bottle human sweat as an alternative energy drink (recycles essential minerals)
  • Natural human hair undergarments, available in this season’s most dramatic colors: blond, brunette, and ravishing root red (fewer shivering sheep, and a closer bond with all humanity)
  • Feed Swiss cows human milk (apparently it is quite plentiful)

In all seriousness, though, shouldn’t these women who sell their breast milk consider donating it to women who can’t produce their own and must resort to formula? There are plenty of them. Probably even in Switzerland.

(Thanks to reader Luca Adelphia for the original news link.)