why in the goddamn fuck did I have this image of cows being milked as just like the gentle, loving ranch-hand going to say hi to Bessie in the morning?
That's not unique to you, there is a LOT of money and effort that goes into putting that image into people's heads.
Yeah, one of the things to remember is at any scale, to get more milk the mother must be impregnated. And her babies drinking that milk (which is why it was produced) would take away from the profits of selling it, so they will separate the babies from the mothers so as to get as much milk as possible, and then repeat this. Once the cow cannot produce milk anymore/isn't profitable, the cow ends up getting killed for meat, sometimes leather, etc. It's awful. And even small farms' goal is to make money, the local small farms near me all do this (having visited most of them).
And not to mention all of this views animals as commodities.
Far and away, the vast majority of animal "products" come from factory farms. Even small farms, despite how they sell themselves, are vanishingly rare and far from idyllic.
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That's not unique to you, there is a LOT of money and effort that goes into putting that image into people's heads.
Yeah, one of the things to remember is at any scale, to get more milk the mother must be impregnated. And her babies drinking that milk (which is why it was produced) would take away from the profits of selling it, so they will separate the babies from the mothers so as to get as much milk as possible, and then repeat this. Once the cow cannot produce milk anymore/isn't profitable, the cow ends up getting killed for meat, sometimes leather, etc. It's awful. And even small farms' goal is to make money, the local small farms near me all do this (having visited most of them).
And not to mention all of this views animals as commodities.
Far and away, the vast majority of animal "products" come from factory farms. Even small farms, despite how they sell themselves, are vanishingly rare and far from idyllic.