Member: Linda G
Location:
Date: 3/11/01
Time: 1:57:23 PM
Hi everybody, I'm LInda, an alcoholic:
I am very happy that today's discussion is on Step 10. I need this step to live joyfully more and more with each passing hear. For me, it has become a nearly automatic and daily way of life. Although sometimes a situation makes me angry and I want to blame someone else, I know, from this step, that I must always look at myself first; I need to take that personal inventory and admit when I am wrong. Oftentimes, it doesn't even matter who's wrong...I just must quiet "the storm inside" of me. I hope all of you are having a safe, happy and sober weekend! Linda G
Member: Gloria E
Location:
Date: 3/11/01
Time: 5:25:16 PM
Hello my name is Gloria. I'm an alcoholic/addict. Tomorrow will be my first year sober. I'm beginning to understand why I need to practice step 10 everyday. I sit on the edge of my bed every night and reflect on my days events, discussions, and little things I didn't bother to take notice of at the moment they happened. Sometimes they are good.... other times they are not so good... but the postive thing about it is.... I've noticed it... and have learned to go back and either correct it or accept it the way it is. I'm not sure sometimes if anyone else understands what I mean.... but then again... it doesn't matter... as long as I know what I mean.
Member: Misha B
Location: Dallas
Date: 3/11/01
Time: 9:50:51 PM
Hi everyone. I know this is going to sound really odd, but I learned at a meeting that sometimes being wrong and promptly admitting it is not a mea culpa breast beating kind of thing but just acknowledging my part in a situation and them moving on. Example: I need to confront appropriately two family members that I have had a hard time with. My Part: sitting on it, not taking care of it, and letting it fester into a fullblown resentment. If I look at any situation today where I have a problem, I may not have caused it but there is a part where I can see where I either helped it get bigger or contributed to the maintenance of the problem. Thank you for being there. I need you guys. Love, Misha
Member: Bob W.
Location: AA
Date: 3/11/01
Time: 10:44:08 PM
Admitting we are wrong frees us from guilt and remorse for days on end. It also clears the air with our fellows, and lets us move ahead socially and spiritually. Congratulations Gloria, keep working the program.
Member: daddy warbucks
Location:
Date: 3/11/01
Time: 11:04:24 PM
lu-lu come home.......daddy's waiting.....
Member: daddy warbucks
Location:
Date: 3/11/01
Time: 11:04:25 PM
lu-lu come home.......daddy's waiting.....
Member: daddy warbucks
Location:
Date: 3/11/01
Time: 11:04:26 PM
lu-lu come home.......daddy's waiting.....
Member: daddy warbucks
Location:
Date: 3/11/01
Time: 11:04:27 PM
lu-lu come home.......daddy's waiting.....
Member: dave z
Location: berkley mi
Date: 3/12/01
Time: 12:32:52 AM
gloria, big congratulations!!! twice in my early recovery stages(?)i'ld make it 11 months, only to fall back. CONGRATS! step 10 can be a "make it or break it" step for alot of us. if you follow your heart through out the day, reflections of the day can be quite peaceful and rewarding. if living the steps is more "lip-service" then this step will haunt you
Member: matt w
Location:
Date: 3/12/01
Time: 4:38:38 PM
I dont know much about the 10th step but i need to know what the principle of step 2 is?
Member: THE WAR ZONE
Location: SHIT HAPPENS
Date: 3/12/01
Time: 5:34:21 PM
US NAVY BOMBS KUWAIT
Member: Bill M.
Location: Southeast Georgia
Date: 3/13/01
Time: 12:06:55 AM
Bill, alcoholic Been looking at all the types of inventories available to keep the management of my life a little more in tow. (Listed in 12&12, under the 10th step). It seems that everytime I read it someones' changed the book again. And I thought that I might be almost done.
Matt: You can make step 2 fall under almost any principle you want as long as you get to work. Talking with a sponsor is necessary for me. I learned that it is easier to work the steps with someone thats been there and done that. The three main principles I've found, The first was Hope, the fellowship was reponsible for that, the second was Faith, my belief in a Higher Power helped out there, and the place I found these two was called Alcoholics Anonymous, and they didn't charge me one red cent - thats Charity - I can survive on Faith Hope and Charity fairly easy as long as I try to help a newcomer understand that we are folks with an illness and that there is way to recover with the help of others, many others. We remain a taker in the beginning and when the time comes we become both a taker and a giver rather than just a taker. Not a do gooder but a giver. Do gooders kill as many alkies as psychiatrist. Talk about good feelings, there just ain't nothing out there to compare to giving and getting too. But like the book says we gotta have something to give away. They told me to try (AA) for ninety days without drinking and if I didn't feel better, they would refund my miseries. Hang in there and go to the meetings Recovery is easier with help. Guess thats why they use "we" so often. Oh yes, they said the 2nd step had three parts 1. Came 2. Came to 3. Came to believe. And thats just how it has worked for many of us. Step 10 will take care of ego when you get there, just don't let it screw you up now. We have a terminal illness and it will take serious measures to get well, like getting down on your knees to pray. Praying standing up is one of the last things alkies give up. When you stand up after being on your knees, you'll feel taller. Knowing there are so many on my side including a Higher Power do make one feel better. Welcome Aboard
Member: Linda C.
Location: Winnipeg, Manitoba
Date: 3/13/01
Time: 2:33:46 AM
Hi everyone. My name is Linda and I am an alcoholic.
(matt w.)..The principle of step 2 is HOPE. I have heard it said at meetings as: I came, I came to, I came to believe. The HOW of this program is Honesty(step one),an Open Mind(step two),and Willingness(Step three).
Step 10: We continue to take personal inventory and continue to set right any new mistakes as we go along...This is a step I need to do for the rest of my life. Step 10 is the combination of steps 4 to 9. Everyday,to the best of my ability,I need to watch for selfishness, dishonesty,resentment and fear. I do this by doing an inventory of what or who I am angry at. Then I talk it over with someone because I can't always see where I'm completely at fault until I talk it out. I admit my wrongs to another and make whatever amends are needed as soon as possible. Sometimes I'm not able to talk it out with anyone,so I write it out on a piece of paper instead. This way I can see where I am at fault more clearly. I need to do this step on a daily basis to stay spiritually fit. When I don't do this step on a daily basis I find I let "little" things bother me more,am more irritable than normal and have little patience with other people,places and things. On page 85 of the Big Book it states,"It is easy to let up on the spiritual program of action and rest on our laurels. We are headed for trouble if we do,for alcohol is a subtle foe. We are not cured of alcoholism. What we really have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition." Most days I am spiritually fit, but I do have days where I am not. And that's okay,too. "We claim spiritual progress rather than spiritual perfection."(p.60,big book).
Member: AnilG
Location: Mt vernon
Date: 3/13/01
Time: 8:55:11 AM
my name is anil I am an alcoholic and an addict after i was introduced to the 12 steps I started to practice 10th step what I found was this step gave me more peace within me 'cause now i carry no guilt or shame. sometimes we get into an argument admitting that I was wrong releases immidiate tentions between us nothing gets prolonged it has imroved my relationship with others especially people around me. It requires lot of courage to accept the resposibilties of your actions easpecially when u are wrong. Our HP gives us this courage.
Member: Von
Location: Ohio
Date: 3/13/01
Time: 2:31:53 PM
Thanks Linda, that made a lot of sense to me.
When I first got to step 10, it had to be a deliberate activity because I was not used to self-refletion in that manner. After a while it became more habitual and automatic, but usually only when I made a conscious decision to do it. Lately, I've found that it occurs anytime, anywhere. But I have a lot of work to do, because I do not always "promptly admit anything", nor do I write things down all the time. And many things that come up come out of defects of character so yes, I do a 4-9 on them.
God (my HP) is giving me the grace to be proactive instead of reactive. To think and consult my inner voice before I act. This isn't happening by osmosis (I wish), but by being willing to make mistakes and take chances. I'm learning that some of my greatest lessons that help me with my 10th step are the experiences that come to me one day at a time.
I know why now. How else could I grow?
Member: Anonymous
Location:
Date: 3/13/01
Time: 4:53:51 PM
Step 10,-Continued to take personal inventory, and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.~Having thus turned my will and life over to the care of God; I have a whole new set of standards to live by. God, who afore time was in none of my thoughts now controls me accordingly by his Word and by his Spirit. When I am confronted by anyone or anyting to make response, It is now according to what as I precieve it God would have me to do in any and all situations; and herein resides the inventory that continues. It is an ongoing inventory of my conduct in accordance with what God would have me to do, and when I am wrong, I promptly admit it. Amendment then is necessary when I find that I was wrong, that I should to have responded differently than I did. If I have been quick to anger, or have given place to wrath, or if I have thought of myself above others, if I have exalted myself above measure knowing that I am the least and as the youngest and would rather instead to have had my own way. If I have offended any or made any to stumble having not considered one whos faith is weak, if I have given way to inordinate affections not considering the will of my Father which is in heaven who may have caught me with my hand in the cookee jar. If my conversation has become corrupt not considering the great cloud of witnesses that compasses me about to the dishonor of God, then I make amendment to such behaviour admitting my wrong promptly asking forgiveness and praying that I might walk worthy of the Lord which is my desire. "We continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it; and if I have failed to do so then this too is my confession that I might have let myself slip, that I have been remiss, that I have neglected my responsibility to Him with whom I now have to do, not considering myself as before him. With so many infirmities that I have and the passions of the sinful nature I must keep watch, keep sober; No longer is it my name at stake, and as the word of God instructs me to do: "He that nameth the name of Christ, let him depart from iniquity;" and who is sufficient for such things that he might neglect to do an ongoing personal inventory of himself if God be his higher power?....
Member: William.A
Location: High-Point
Date: 3/13/01
Time: 6:04:59 PM
Hello,Wlliam,A. Alkie.
Thanks for the other steps that came before this one that this alkie has finally gotten sober and am well on my way to sane thinking as the result of this and the other steps.
Member: Jack B.
Location: Palo Alto, Pa
Date: 3/14/01
Time: 2:02:20 AM
Hi I am Jack, a real alcoholic.Step 10 for me contains one of the strongest words in our 12 step program.The very first word Continued.This tells me that I am never finished checking up on myself.This step for me encompasses what it says on our anniversary coins To thy ownself be true.We keep the focus on us, allowing others to live and let live. For me the luxury of the tenth step allows me to compare myself with myself.If I look at the person I would love to be, this step tells me that I have an awful lot of work ahead.However if I look at the person I was, and look at the person I am becoming, and the keyword for me is becoming-on a daily basis,something has happened that I can take no credit for.Its thru the Grace of God, the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous and these twelve steps, that I am not the person I used to be. As far as taking someone else's inventory, that is impossible for me, I am not God, I can't look into someone's heart.However when I am focusing on others, in reality, I am obtaining a mirror image, of what I may have been like, what I am like now, or maybe even what I would love to be like. Thanks for allowing me to share and God Bless all on our amazing journey in sobriety.
Member: roo
Location: ny
Date: 3/14/01
Time: 4:00:38 PM
im a toilet turd,just a floating log.
Member: Rich R
Location: Detroit
Date: 3/14/01
Time: 5:01:32 PM
http://www.dailyinventory.com/
Member: GordonG
Location: Baltimore
Date: 3/15/01
Time: 9:01:05 AM
icametoaain1982-7-13ihaventhadadrinksinceithank godeverynightandussethesernityprayeralltime iamnewatthisinternetsoyouhavetoexcusemefornow ifyoudontpickup[adrinkyouwontgetdrunkaskgodto helpyouonadailybasisitworksformeforover18yrs9mo' thankyouforbeingthere
Member: reba mcantired
Location:
Date: 3/15/01
Time: 12:21:11 PM
gordan, where did you learn to type at?a bosnian refugee camp?????? tee-he-he
Member: JOE MAMA
Location:
Date: 3/15/01
Time: 2:59:29 PM
OH MY GOODNESS,THE SKY IS FALLING CHICKEN NOODLE HELP ME MR.WIZZARD,I AM INSANE AND I HAVE NO PLACE TO STORE WHAT BRAINS I HAVE LEFT.DO YOU HAVE A DIRTY SOCK I COULD PUT THEM IN?
Member: CARL B CLEANER
Location:
Date: 3/15/01
Time: 4:39:54 PM
WHATS A CHICKEN NOODLE?
Member: sister ignatia
Location:
Date: 3/15/01
Time: 5:36:40 PM
oh stop that
Member: Jennifer
Location: Chicago
Date: 3/15/01
Time: 5:48:37 PM
Thank you everyone for your comments. The 10th step is exactly what I needed to hear about! I logged on to this page because I am on hold with the phone company, trying to sort out a very large bill. I have been back and forth with them since October without resolution. Essentially I'm right in the middle of a financial tenth step. I really wanted to just forget about this...the dispute is between my local carrier and long distance. It seems like my bill got lost between the companies- no one is even billing me at this point. I just want to sweep this under the rug so bad, especially since they are making it so hard to find out what I owe and who I am supposed to pay. Dealing with money really scares me, but I have been around long enough to hate the icky feelings when I fail to keep my side of the street clean. In the Big Book it stresses taking care of financial business, stating that we may drink over fear of creditors. I've now been on hold and/or talking to confused people, or being transferred between departments for 1/2 an hour! God must really want me to prove it to him/her this time. Thanx all
Member: father joe
Location: a car ,a boat,a plane
Date: 3/15/01
Time: 7:17:32 PM
yes joe i do
Member: broke norm peters
Location:
Date: 3/15/01
Time: 7:19:26 PM
jennifer can i borrow some money?
Member: stop that
Location: right now
Date: 3/15/01
Time: 9:28:50 PM
oh you boys stop that
sister ignatia
Member: michael c
Location: st pete
Date: 3/15/01
Time: 10:09:13 PM
Just had 3 mo.s on #10 sure is a 24 hr a day step, plus keeping open at all times. An ok messed up by yelling and coming back down to make a real recovery in seconds where as before never or days later maybe sorry, So thanks aa, being a dad is lots more fun. And my Rachel gets to hear dad is not a saint but...
Member: Daniel
Location: Euphrates River
Date: 3/16/01
Time: 12:09:59 PM
When taking your inventory, think on this article below, your diet, your health, your position on the 3rd and 11th step, etc.
March 5, 2001 WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The U.S. Department of Agriculture began taking steps Monday to prevent the spread of foot-and-mouth disease into the United States, including conducting inspections and disinfecting footwear. The USDA said travelers coming into the country who have been on farms are being asked to "clean and disinfect" their clothes prior to returning to the United States. Travelers returning from Europe, who have livestock in the United States that are susceptible to foot-and-mouth disease, are being told to stay away from their animals for four to five days after their return. A USDA spokesman said anyone who has been on a farm will have his baggage examined. The USDA is also disinfecting any footwear that has been on a European farm. The disinfection is being done at point-of-entry airports in the United States, and includes passengers deplaning non-stop flights from England and Ireland. The USDA is also seizing any European meat or dairy products found at U.S. airports. The USDA spokesman said the United Kingdom is not letting anyone go onto farms -- even by vehicle. That, he said, should limit the number of people who might have been exposed to the highly contagious disease. Foot-and-mouth disease does not affect humans, but destroys the economic value of cloven-hoofed animals it infects by causing them to lose weight or produce less milk. (End of news article)<<<<<>>>>> And here is a Columbia Encyclopedia definition of this disease:<<<<<>>>>> FOOT-AND-MOUTH-DISEASE: Highly contagious disease almost exclusive to cattle, sheep, swine, goats, and other cloven-hoofed animals. It is caused by a virus that was identified in 1897. Among its symptoms are fever, loss of appetite and weight, and blisters on the mucous membranes, especially those of the mouth, feet, and udder. Discharge from the blisters is heavily infected with the virus, as are saliva, milk, urine, and other secretions. Thus the disease is readily spread by contact; by contaminated food, water, soil, or other materials; or through the air. Humans, who seldom contract the disease, may be carriers, as may rats, (((dogs))), birds, wild animals, and frozen meats. Quarantine, slaughter and complete disposal of infected animals, and disinfection of contaminated material, are prescribed to limit contagion. There is no effective treatment. With vaccines, introduced in 1938, and sanitary controls, foot-and-mouth disease has been excluded or eliminated from North and Central America, Australia and New Zealand, Japan, and Ireland; and occurrences have become infrequent in Great Britain and continental Europe. The disease persists through much of Asia, Africa, and South America. (End of article).<<<<<>>>>>19) And lo! seven other heifers emerging after them poor and very ugly in form and lean in flesh,- I had never seen such in all the land of Egypt for ugliness! 20) Then did the lean and ugly heifers eat up the first seven fat heifers; Gen 41:19,20
Ah! "But none of the lawless shall understand!!"
Member: the chosen one
Location:
Date: 3/16/01
Time: 12:30:04 PM
im a vegetarian,dont eat from the cloven hoof
for one reason...........tee-he-he.......
dont put your hoof in your mouth.
Member: Michael
Location: Overall
Date: 3/16/01
Time: 1:07:53 PM
This article supports Daniel's words above:
Foot and mouth -
A disease of the profit system Over the past weeks the news has been dominated by the story of yet another crisis in farming. Appalling pictures of funeral pyres of animal victims of the foot and mouth outbreak have even made the front page of stateside-based 'Time' magazine. What the hell is going on?
What is going on is capitalism as usual on the farm. 'Townies' can be a bit schizophrenic in their attitude to farmers. On the one hand you hear about farmers driving around in Range Rovers paid for out of the European Union's Common Agricultural Policy subsidies. Then you read the horror stories about smallholders who are only getting paid £1 for a sheep. Which is true?
They're both right. On the one hand farming is one the most cosseted sectors in the so-called free market system. Brussels bureaucrats dished out £23 billion in subsidies last year - £3 billion in Britain, where there are just 168,000 farms. That was just European Union largesse. BSE cost us, the taxpayer, over £600 million in compensation. It seems the BSE outbreak was a health and financial crisis for the rest of us, not for beef farmers! So if someone suggests that occasional disease is a cost of the cheap food the farmers are providing through intensive agriculture, don't forget you're paying for food twice - once at the checkout and a second time through tax deductions from your pay packet.
Farmers should be in clover. But actually it's the richest 20% of farmers who get 80% of the subsidies from the public purse. And it is true, despite the whining from rich farmers that we hear all the time, that farming is at present in crisis. A supermarket pays 17p for a litre of milk. But it costs the dairy farmer 22p to produce. And sheep do sell for as low as £1. The majority of farmers are struggling. And tens of thousands have left the industry. Ten years ago there were 233,000 farms. Now only 168,000 are left. 70% of these farms only provide a livelihood for one person. At the same time there are 4,000 acre prairies worked by £150,000 tractors directed by satellite navigation. Farming is big business, with the little people going to the wall as the big firms flourish. And that's where foot and mouth comes in.
The initial reaction of consumers (and that's all of us) to the news of the outbreak is along the lines of, 'Oh no, the food industry is poisoning us again'. And that's not true. No human can suffer the effects of foot and mouth. And the disease is not fatal to the vast majority of farm animals. It's the animal equivalent of flu. At worst, if the disease were left to run its course, about 5% of the youngest, oldest and weakest creatures would perish. The rest would suffer discomfort for about the same length of time we suffer from flu, and then recover. So what's the problem?
The problem is money. The reason the farm industry has poisoned our food so often in the past has always been for money. The good news: a cow now yields 5,800 litres of milk a year compared with 4,000 litres twenty years ago. The bad news: we infected our herds with mad cow disease to get that result, and the disease jumped from that species through the food chain to kill humans horribly. To get milk yields up it was necessary to put a little protein in the cattle's diet. To add protein it was necessary to turn them into cannibals by feeding them with dead sheep and cows. What the present outbreak has in common with past contagions is that it is 'an economic disease', as some commentators have noted. In the main it hurts the big farmers who are responsible for the lion's share of the £1.2 billion of meat and livestock exported every year.
One of the symptoms of foot and mouth is loss of appetite. And meat animals are treated by capitalist intensive farming as eating machines until it is time to go to slaughter. For instance it takes 5 months to get a piglet ready for market. A further delay of a month or so makes pig breeding uneconomic. As Ian Campbell of the National Pig Association puts it, "(Waiting) would severely damage the economics of it."
The mass slaughter is being conducted for one reason - because it is the most profitable course of action. As Matthew Fort says (Observer March 11), "Commercial operations, of which farming are one, are designed to make a profit. You can no more expect them to put social consequences above that need for profit than you can expect a great white shark to become a vegetarian."
Most of us, including most meat eaters, are horrified at the scenes of unnecessary slaughter from the country. Who is taking these decisions on our behalf? For the farming industry and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food there is no alternative. The farmers are represented in the corridors of power by the National Farmers' Union. In fact the NFU pushes the interests of the big agribusinesses. The MAFF, in turn, is supposed to represent our interests to the farm industry. In fact for decades the Ministry has misrepresented the interests of agrarian capitalism to the rest of us, and has not hesitated to cover up the fatal consequences of cost-cutting, right up to the last moment. They led the whispering campaign against Richard Lacey, the microbiologist. who predicted in 1988 that humans could catch CJD from eating beef infected with BSE.
There are alternatives to shooting the animals and burning the bodies. The first one is to let the disease run its course. We don't actually know when the virus first started to cause outbreaks. Before the twentieth century, the only option for farmers was to put up with the loss of output. The problem is that foot and mouth is quite incredibly infectious. It can be borne on the wind for quite a distance, so it is likely that the entire population of farm animals in the country would go down with it. Capitalist farmers affect to find this insupportable. In fact all they have to do is sit tight and wait for the compensation.
The second alternative is vaccination. Again there is no technical problem. The form of foot and mouth we are confronting (type 'O') has a well-developed and effective vaccine available. There are millions of shots of it stored in the European Union for use. But it's expensive. Farmers have to pay for the vaccine. But if animals are slaughtered, we the taxpayer foot the bill for compensation. As the President of the British Veterinary Association comments, "You're balancing costs with benefits." In other words it's all about money again.
The other problem about vaccination is 'the British'. That's not you and me, of course. We never get consulted about matters of food safety and animal welfare. But the big farmers in the NFU lobbied the MAFF and the MAFF lobbied the European Commission. The French, Germans and some other governments were all in favour of a policy of mass vaccination against foot and mouth. The European Commission was persuaded by the British farm interest that vaccination showed there were still traces of the disease in a country. And if you have traces of the disease in your country, you shouldn't be allowed to export into the single market. This is a never-never land argument! It means that the only policy left to an exporting nation is mass slaughter. In 1967, during the last major outbreak, 400,000 animals were destroyed. And there will be further losses for hard-pressed farmers. We are entering the lambing season. Ewes have to be brought indoors to give birth. But in quarantined areas they can't be moved. "This morning at 5am., farmer Meirion Lloyd will have trekked four miles to pick his dead lambs out of pools of blood in the mud. Some might be hanging stillborn from their mothers. Others will have died from cold and starvation. Rain will be pounding their field in north Wales."(The Guardian, 10th March) These sheep are unaffected by foot and mouth.
In any case why are animals shipped such long distances? It causes stress to the creatures and harms the quality of the meat. Again the reason is the scams and quirks of food as a capitalist business. Most meat customers are prepared to pay over the odds for home produced meat. Now the requirements for acquiring a new nationality for farm animals would make the Hindujas envious. Two weeks' residence in France makes a sheep a French sheep! This concession was made because of the lobbying of the 'British' (the MAFF and the big farmers) who have spearheaded the drive for deregulation and neoliberalism in the European Union. So sheep reared in Britain are taken on long traumatic journeys to France or other continental countries. Once they've acquired French nationality, any attempt by the sheep to explore their new Gallic identity is cut short by a bolt in the head.
The European Union has regulations on traceability. We need to know where meat has come from. With all these food scares, quite right too. In effect livestock travelling across borders should carry a passport. These regulations were opposed by the 'British' (you know who) on the grounds that this was the nanny state shackling the animal spirits of entrepreneurs - in other words the right of rich farmers to poison us. The European Commission started taking action against the UK to enforce traceability two years ago. They were brusquely ignored by a Labour administration that grovels to capitalism
One reason why livestock are transported long distances within Britain is because many of the small local abattoirs have closed their doors. The slaughtering industry is going the way of the rest of the food industry - the big firms engulf the little ones. The original outbreak of foot and mouth seems to have been in Heddon-on-the-wall, outside Newcastle. This farm was a revolting slum with rotting pig carcasses lying in the pigpens with the live animals. It should have been closed down on health and safety grounds long ago. It was linked to a slaughterhouse in Essex, hundreds of miles away. Pigs from the farm were sold at a market in Carlisle to a farmer from Dartmoor - again hundreds of miles distant. This operator is described as a farmer, but he seems to be a dealer or speculator in livestock - prepared to drive all over the country in search of a bargain. Of course what all this travelling does is to immediately amplify any localised outbreak into a national disaster. If we still had the local abattoirs any local infection could be contained. 'Globalisation' in the food industry means we import beef from Namibia while exporting home produce all over the world. Naturally to be shipped such distances the meat must be treated with chemicals and processed. And imported meat can spread the disease. Southern Africa has seen outbreaks of type 'O' foot and mouth recently.
This is not really a farming crisis. It is a crisis of the countryside. Most people who live in the countryside are not farmers. John Major can forget his fantasy about 'old maids cycling to holy communion through the early morning mist.' Country dwellers in affected areas are effectively under house arrest. They can't even go to church! Rural schools have been closed because of the epidemic. Normal everyday life in the country areas has ground to a standstill.
Farmers don't own the countryside. It belongs to all of us. Millions of city dwellers use the countryside every weekend for recreation - walking, cycling, riding, sports and sightseeing. Farmers are just custodians of the countryside. And their industry has sealed it off from us. Rural tourism is reckoned to be a £1.2 billion industry. So far the hotel owners, bed and breakfast accommodation, tea shoppes and country pubs have been haemorrhaging £100 million a week. This compares with the £30 million lost to the farmers. The streetwise commercial farmers already have their hands outstretched for compensation. But the tourism industry will never get that money back. Country tourism actually provides five times as many jobs as farming. And as we come up to the crucial Easter and May bank holiday weekends, it looks as though the country will still be closed for business. The owner of the Wasdale Head Inn works it all out. He's lost £26,000 so far because there are 600 sheep in the valley worth £30 each. "At local market prices...I could have bought every single beast in the valley and have money to spare for a great night out. I could buy all the sheep, slaughter them, let the walkers and climbers back in and remain open for business - it would make more sense." This is the logic of the policy carried out by Nick Brown at the behest of the big farmers. This is the logic of capitalism!
Country dwellers have all sorts of problems which have been compounded by the present crisis. Rural Post Offices are going to the wall. The Post Office is a publicly owned business. It ought to be publicly accountable. But its managers have been instructed to maximise profits, and minimise costs, just like a private firm. The other hub of village life apart from the shop/post office is likely to be the pub. Four or five country pubs a week cease trading. Usually they are turned into upmarket housing. The influx of commuters and affluent retired people into villages drives up house prices beyond the reach of many who were born there. And Labour has failed to deliver on its manifesto pledge to save country bus routes, a lifeline for those who can't afford a car.
Farmers are just one link in the food chain. Compared with the supermarket chains, they are small fry. So the supermarkets, through their buying power, have farmers by the short hairs. Fifty years ago farmers got 50-60% of the price of food returned to them as revenue. Now it's only 9p in the pound. Last year the Competition Commission took a look at supermarkets. It wasn't easy. Their suppliers would only give evidence if they were granted anonymity. The Commission spoke of 'a climate of apprehension'. 'Fear' would be a better word. They had such leverage over small farmers that 'a request amounted to the same thing as a requirement.' In particular the big chains made 'requests for retrospective discounts'. They were demanding money with menaces! It's true that Tony Blair recently had a pop at the supermarkets for the food crisis. But with the likes of Lord Sainsbury in the government, they've had an easy ride since 1997.
The farmers respond to the pressure from supermarkets in the only way they know: by relentless cost-cutting. This is inevitably at the expense of animal welfare and our food health. A broiler chicken reared for sale in a supermarket lives out its life in a space the size of a sheet of A4 paper (the size of the front cover of the Socialist Appeal journal!). No wonder 'Which', the journal of the Consumer's Association, found 22% of poultry were riddled with infections. We have paid a very high price for these economies in the food industry. But the firms who cut the corners are not the people who pay the bills in terms of disease and all the other social costs. The Irish, the French and Germans too are understandably furious as they are forced to slaughter thousands of imported livestock because the 'dirty man of Europe' has yet again failed to exercise any minimum of control over the drive for profit in the food industry. They will have to pay the price. Britain remains a country where capital is king and where the civil service is imbued with a Thatcherite, neoliberal attitude of indifference to the public welfare. This after four years of a Labour government!
What the crisis shows is the conflict between the profit motive and the wider social interest. It is easy to blame farmers, but they are just a cog in the money-making machine. We cannot go on like this! We need a fundamental rethink of our food industry. Individual farmers can't change things. They're cutting corners because they have no alternative. They are responding to market forces. Market forces are not an expression of what people want. We don't 'vote' with our money to be poisoned. Market forces are the way the rule of profit imposes itself on us. We can have healthy nutritious food from animals reared in humane conditions. Or we can have a capitalist food industry. We can't have both.
M Brooks, March 13th, 2001
Member: Fluzy
Location: Swineburg
Date: 3/16/01
Time: 1:23:37 PM
Put this one in your pipe too!
In folkloric terms, eating the meat of the pig is said to contribute to lack of morality and shame, plus greed for wealth, laziness, indulgence, dirtiness and gluttony. We insult a person by calling him or her a "Pig" when they demonstrate these characteristics. Muslims are forbidden by God to eat the meat of the pig (pork). This is detailed in verses 2:173, 5:3, 6:145, and 16:115 of the Qur'an. An exemplary verse is quoted here "He has only forbidden you dead meat, and blood, and the flesh of swine, and any (food) over which the name of other than Allah has been invoked. But if one is forced by necessity, without wilful disobedience, nor transgressing due limits, then Allah is Oft- Forgiving, Most Merciful." Is Pork Forbidden to Muslims Only? The Jews and Christians are also forbidden from eating pork. Here is a quote from the Old Testament to that effect: "And the swine, because it divideth the hoof, yet cheweth not the cud, it is unclean unto you: ye shall not eat of their flesh, nor touch their dead carcase." Deuteronomy 14:8 Many Christians believe that this verse was directed only at the Jews. But Jesus himself says during the Sermon on the Mount; "Think not that I am come to destroy the Law, or the Prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill." Some Christians say that, after a vision by St. Peter, God cleansed all animals and made them fit and lawful for human consumption. If ALL animals are cleansed by Peter's vision, this includes dogs, cats, vultures, and rats: but you just don't see people getting excited about a cat-meat sandwich like they do over barbecued pork or bacon. Others say that it was Paul who rescinded the law forbidding pork to humans, in order to appease the Romans, who enjoyed the taste of pig-meat. Many excuses have been given, but none are very sound. Many Far Eastern traditions also discourage the eating of pork. The 3,000 year old Confucian Book of Rites says, "A gentleman does not eat the flesh of pigs and dogs." Although many Chinese are avid eaters of pork today, physicians of ancient China recognized pork-eating as the root of many human ailments. Buddhists, Jains and Hindus usually avoid eating any kind of meat. Bad effects of pork consumption Pig's bodies contain many toxins, worms and latent diseases. Although some of these infestations are harbored in other animals, modern veterinarians say that pigs are far more predisposed to these illnesses than other animals. This could be because pigs like to scavenge and will eat any kind of food, including dead insects, worms, rotting carcasses, excreta (including their own), garbage, and other pigs. Influenza (flu) is one of the most famous illnesses which pigs share with humans! This illness is harbored in the lungs of pigs during the summer months and tends to affect pigs and humans in the cooler months. Sausage contains bits of pigs' lungs, so those who eat pork sausage tend to suffer more during epidemics of influenza! Pig meat contains excessive quantities of histamine and imidazole compounds, which can lead to itching and inflammation; growth hormone, which promotes inflammation and growth; sulphur-containing mesenchymal mucus, which leads to swelling and deposits of mucus in tendons and cartilage, resulting in arthritis, rheumatism, etc. Sulphur helps cause firm human tendons and ligaments to be replaced by the pig's soft mesenchymal tissues, and degeneration of human cartilage. Eating pork can also lead to gallstones and obesity, probably due to its high cholesterol and saturated fat content! The pig is the main carrier of the taenia solium worm, which is found in its flesh. These tapeworms are found in human intestines with greater frequency in nations where pigs are eaten. This type of tapeworm can pass through the intestines and affect many other organs, and is incurable once it reaches beyond a certain stage! One in six people in the US and Canada has trichinosis from eating trichina worms which are found in pork. Many people have no symptoms to warn them of this, and when they do, they resemble symptoms of many other illnesses. These worms are not noticed during meat inspections, nor are they killed by salting or smoking. Few people cook the meat long enough to kill the trichinae. The rat (another scavenger) also harbors this disease. There are dozens of other worms, germs, diseases and bacteria which are commonly found in pigs, many of which are specific to the pig, or found in greater frequency in pigs. Pigs are biologically similar to humans, and their meat is said to taste similar to human flesh. Pigs have been used for dissection in biology labs due to the similarity between their organs and human organs. People with insulin- dependent diabetes usually inject themselves with pig insulin. If you pour Coke (yes, the soda) on a slab of pork, and wait a little while, you will see worms crawl out of it.
Member: bin ladeen
Location:
Date: 3/16/01
Time: 2:38:19 PM
i eat worms,roundworm is the best,my girlfriend likes the penial worms best
Member: sister ignatia
Location:
Date: 3/16/01
Time: 3:18:57 PM
oh you boys stop that,worms have feelings too
Member: Hipolito
Location: chi-town
Date: 3/17/01
Time: 2:52:57 PM
Hi Hipolito alcoholic !!The tenth step for me is a way of preventing having to do another 4th if i do this step on a daily basis things don't pile up on me and i don't have those dangerous feelings that can take me back to who i used to be an active alcoholic all the steps are important and this one is one that will help keep me sober now that i am sober God bless and keep it simple
Member: Anonymous
Location:
Date: 3/17/01
Time: 4:32:32 PM
"...even as it is written: ÷God hath given unto them a spirit of stupor, ÷eyes not to see, and ears not to hear, ÷until this very day; And David saith ÷(((let their table be turned into a snare, and into gin, and into a trap, and into a recompense unto them))), let their eyes be darkened not to see and their back do thou continually bow down!!" Romans 11:8-10