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Jun 7, 2007 It's
Time to Ban Foie Gras, the Trifecta of Misery FOIE GRAS is French for "fatty liver." For many, including Councilman Jack Kelly, it is animal torture, and that's why he introduced a bill to ban it. Chances are, you never ate foie gras. Chances are, if you knew what it is and how it is made, you never would. A Zogby International poll of likely Pennsylvania voters said 61 percent never eat foie gras. A piddling 2 percent eat it at least once a year. One-third said they've never even heard of it. Each year in the U.S., almost a half-million ducks are caged, tortured and slaughtered for their livers, deliberately diseased by the cruel hand of man. To create "fatty liver," tubes are jammed down the throats of helpless male ducks two or three times a day to force-feed them up to a total of four pounds of grain mush. The forced feedings go on for 12-15 days. The "feeding" stresses the duck's liver, exploding it up to 10 times normal size. Foie gras producers (only two or three in the U.S.) say forced feeding is a day at the spa because ducks' throats are tough and desensitized. I have yet to see a photo of a duck happily waddling up to a man holding a feeding tube. No, a caged duck is grabbed so the tube can be rammed down his throat. Sometimes necks are pierced, sometimes wings are broken. The grotesquely enlarged livers can make it hard for ducks to even walk, but cruelty is overlooked to satisfy the palates of those who'll pay $30-45 a pound at retail for foie gras - the trifecta of misery: unnecessary, unhealthy, unkind. The cruelty earlier led Chicago to ban foie gras, along with California (by 2012), several European nations, plus Israel, which had been the world's third-leading supplier. In March, celebrity chef Wolfgang Puck removed foie gras from all his menus, followed by Philadelphia uber-restaurateur Steve Starr, who called it "cruel." Philly restaurants banning foie gras run from chains (The Palm) to independents (Valanni), from down home (Marigold Kitchen) to exotic (Susanna Foo). Locally, Assouline & Ting owner Joel Assouline says foie gras accounts for about 15 percent of his gourmet-food business and losing it would result in layoffs for five or six of his 25 workers. "Banning foie gras will be a major detriment to the restaurant business in Philadelphia," he says, but admits "only 1 percent of the population eats foie gras." Would depriving 1 percent of their wretched goo crash the restaurant trade? The callous 1 percent who need to spend $24 for a foie gras appetizer could be seduced to shell out for truffles or caviar, or some other unusual, overpriced item. I'm convinced if you gave it a French name and charged enough for it, you could sell snot. Assouline worries that foie gras is the tip of the spear. He fears a move "to ban all farm-raising, period. No chicken, no veal, no meat." Gene Baur, president of Farm Sanctuary, which paid for the Zogby poll, says eliminating all farming isn't on his plate, but foie gras is "egregious cruelty." That's why restaurants that serve it are picketed here and elsewhere. I don't usually favor government intrusion (smoking and trans-fat bans) into free-choice areas, but the cruelty element makes this different. Not long ago it was common to beat horses unmercifully, or to bag puppies and kittens and drown them in the river. A slow-dawning enlightenment birthed the idea that brutality to animals is wrong. It didn't lead to rampant vegetarianism. It didn't give animals the vote. Neither will banning unnecessary, unhealthy, unkind foie gras. * E-mail stubyko@phillynews.com or call 215-854-5977. For recent columns: http://go.philly.com/byko.
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