Everything I want to do is Illegal

"A chef was out one time to see the pigs and we walked up to the pig pasture. He had never seen live pigs before. His only acquaintance with pigs was pork. These pigs were scratching on trees, rooting in the dirt, lounging under bushes, nibbling at weeds and grass. He stood quietly for awhile, mesmerized by the theater before him and the actors enjoying their parts. Finally he said, "I don't know anything about pigs. But I think if I were a pig, this is the way I'd like to live." Everything I want to do is Illegal -- Joel Salatin

This book will join The Dirty Life and Flat Broke with Two Goats as my all-time favorite "homesteading" books. Joel Salatin isn't perfect. Honestly, he's a bit kooky on a lot of things, and truly, I think this book could have been done in about one-fifth of the pages it uses. There are errors in this book. I really wish he would have let me check it grammar-wise. He also says way more than he should about many things, but his points are so ACCURATE. 

If you aren't interested in raising your own food or homesteading, you would get pretty bored with some of this book. But mannnn it would open up your eyes to what is going on in our food industry and how ridiculous the whole thing is.

All these rules that "they" are putting on farmers that in the end, are simply making it where "big food" will keep pushing the little guys farther and farther away from where we want them and NEED them to be. There are so many good quotes from this book, I simply do not know where to start. But let me share just a FEW of my favorites. 

Firstly, the idea that every single thing must be regulated and yet being "green" is still only "green" when it looks good on the outside. (An example: what American hang dries their clothes in a subdivision? None. Because it doesn't look good.) If we were responsible for our OWN footprint, things might really start to change. This quote was fantastic:

"Imagine a housing development where more than 50 percent of the building materials, all the water, and 50 percent of the energy had to come from the development's landscape footprint. Edible landscaping would replace Chemlawn. Little earthworm bins would replace garbage disposals. Cisterns would adorn house edges and catch all the roof runoff. We could do lots of innovative things if it weren't for these building code straightjackets. I know something is thinking about the poor quality workmanship that would occur. On the contrary. By and large the workmanship would be better because the contractors could not punt to the minimalistic codes. Just like slaughterhouse inspection, the bureaucrat takes all the pressure off the business." Everything I want to do is Illegal -- Joel Salatin

And then there is the quote below in discussing how rules say you can't hire a kid to work on your farm because of all kinds of legal mumbo jumbo. I will tell you what. My nephew, Gabe, who is 15 and my boys do a LOT of work on our farm. We pay for some of the work. They LOVE the feeling of being in control of their own spending and being an integral part of what we do. There are things we NEED Gabe or the boys for on the farm. They are required. Honestly, we don't have time for video games on our property:

 "When our kids were 14 and 15, not to mention 18, they weren't out roving the streets at 2 a.m. They went to be dat 10 p.m. because they were tired from a day of meaningful work. Modern society is wringing its collective hands, wondering what to do to 'get these kids off the streets.' And teens desperately need to feel necessary. But when we've outlawed everything they used to do at that age to prepare them for a meaningful vocational existence, all they can legally do is play computer games." Everything I want to do is Illegal -- Joel Salatin 

I learned so much in this book about all the RULES that are in place regarding food. I already knew about a lot of them. I know that we brought four of our lambs to a USDA certified processing plant only to be told that we could not have those animals organs because "they ALL had spots on them." YEAH! RIGHT! Let's be real here. You forgot to keep our organs and so you can tell us whatever the heck you WANT to tell us. I know that the way you process a sheep is not how Temple Grandin would do it, but we have no choice but to use this local USDA place or not be allowed to sell our meat. The rules are so, so, so frustrating, and most little farmers like our farm have no choice but just to do the best we can and sell to people we know because there is so much red tape. We are raising meat in the most humane way you will EVER be able to find, and yet, we may not be safe? Give me a break. This quote really spoke to me. Why is this EVEN A THING!?

 "The problem is that the government feels responsible for every consumer's decision. Somehow we need to let people formally absolve society of the responsibility for their decisions -- only the people who sign the freedom form. Creating freedom for autonomous food decisions is as American as anything I can imagine. What good is the freedom to worship, the right to keep and bear arms, and freedom of the press if we don't have the freedom to choose what to fee dour bodies so we can go sing, shoot, and speak? The only reason the founding fathers did not grant the freedom to choose our food was because it was such a basic, fundamental personal right that they could not conceive that special protection would be needed." Everything I want to do is Illegal -- Joel Salatin

 And here. Another good one. We have all these rules because of people who break the rules. But those people will break the rules anyways.

"Let's get this through our heads once and for all: you can't legislate integrity. A person either has integrity or not. You can take two people, read them the same protocol, and one can do a super job and the other creates a sloppy mess. That's human nature." Everything I want to do is Illegal -- Joel Salatin

I'm going to end with a smattering of quotes on random topics that really spoke to me as I was reading:

“A farm includes the passion of the farmer's heart, the interest of the farm's customers, the biological activity in the soil, the pleasantness of the air about the farm -- it's everything touching, emanating from, and supplying that piece of landscape. A farm is virtually a living organism. The tragedy of our time is that cultural philosophies and market realities are squeezing life's vitality out of most farms. And that is why the average farmer is now 60 years old. Serfdom just doesn't attract the best and brightest.”

“The shorter the chain between raw food and fork, the fresher it is and the more transparent the system is.” 

“A farm regulated to production of raw commodities is not a farm at all. It is a temporary blip until the land is used up, the water polluted, the neighbors nauseated, and the air unbreathable. The farmhouse, the concrete, the machinery, and outbuildings become relics of a bygone vibrancy when another family farm moves to the city financial centers for relief.”

“On a grander scale, when a society segregates itself, the consequences affect the economy, the emotions, and the ecology. That's one reason why it's easy for pro-lifers to eat factory-raised animals that disrespect everything sacred about creation. And that is why it's easy for rabid environmentalists to hate chainsaws even though they snuggle into a mattress supported by a black walnut bedstead.”  

“How much evil throughout history could have been avoided had people exercised their moral acuity with convictional courage and said to the powers that be, 'No, I will not. This is wrong, and I don't care if you fire me, shoot me, pass me over for promotion, or call my mother, I will not participate in this unsavory activity.' Wouldn't world history be rewritten if just a few people had actually acted like individual free agents rather than mindless lemmings?” 

“The stronger a culture, the less it fears the radical fringe. The more paranoid and precarious a culture, the less tolerance it offers.”