It happened yesterday in that parking lot in Michigan’s Washington Township, that a member of My Family Co-Op demanded she be allowed to take the milk she had contracted for via her herdshare agreement. An inspector with the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development told her she couldn’t have it, that if she climbed onto the truck to claim it, he would call the police and have her arrested.
 
This is a not-uncommon occurrence that has played itself out in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Ohio, Kentucky, California, Georgia, and, yes, Michigan, among other places. I describe a number of these cases in my books on food rights, Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Food Rights and The Raw Milk Revolution. Most of the time, the individual contract owners are intimidated by the ag inspectors’ threats, and they back off. The backing off is understandable, because no one wants to confront police. (The photo above of Georgia raw milk owners dumping their milk under government orders is an example of how not to respond.)
 
But the reality is that the threats are mostly empty. They are made in loud voices by ag inspectors with little real power. The ag inspectors don’t have police powers, so they must call a police officer or sheriff if they want an arrest made. At that point, they have to explain to the officer what the problem is. The contract owner can explain as well that he or she owns the food in question, and is merely taking delivery.
 
Now, if the ag inspectors have a search warrant and are accompanied by police of some sort to carry out the search, that puts a different spin on the situation. But if it is a situation like what occurred yesterday in Michigan, in which the agents were simply putting condemnation stickers or ribbons on food, then they can’t themselves stop people from taking their food, and they may not get support from local police.
 
It’s important for people to understand their rights, and to be aggressive in protecting their rights. Food theft is a serious matter, and it is much more serious if it is a government agency that is doing the thieving.
 
Here are six suggestions to anyone joining a herdshare or food club, and those running these entities, for reducing the chances of government food theft:
 
Join a food club or herdshare with an activist mindset. Understand when you sign up that one of the responsibilities that comes with ownership or membership is an obligation to demand and obtain your food, even under threat of arrest.
Likewise, herdshares and food club owners should inform prospective members that they may be called upon to claim their food, under threat of arrest.
Herdshares and food clubs should develop a plan in the event their food is “seized.” This can include cutting the hazard tape, re-claiming the food, and otherwise defying orders that “condemn” food.
Know that if you are arrested, the government will have much difficulty making a case against you for taking food that is yours. The charges would most likely have to do with disturbing the peace or resisting arrest or interfering with a police officer—charges that would most likely be dismissed. Yes, you’d have to go through a legal action, but it would be for a very important principle.
Keep the comments and letters to ag officials and politicians coming. A few that have been sent in the My Family Co-Op matter are reprinted in the comments section following my previous post.
Operators of herdshares and food clubs should seek out financial support from their owners/members if food is forcibly seized, to help replace the food and continue operations. They should also seek out legal help from the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund. That helps the operators deal with the the financial threats that hangs over their heads for resisting.  
We have some successful models of resistance. We have examples from Kentucky, where John Moody’s food club re-claimed their food, along with Minnesota, Wisconsin,  and Canada, where farmers Alvin Schlangen, Vernon Hershberger, and Michael Schmidt refused to be intimidated, and emerged with stronger farming operations than before.
 
The reality is that the biggest fear of the ag and public health officials who periodically decide to confiscate people’s food is that the food owners will fight back. The absolute last thing any government official wants to do is get into a fight with the people about their food. It is the worst sort of PR, since it conjures up images of masses of people rioting over food, the kind of actions that over the course of history have led to revolutions and governments collapsing.

The ag people carry out these kinds of operations for the sake of intimidation. They want to send a message to farmers that they shouldn’t be selling food this way, that they are cutting into corporate profit margins. That is why the best way to put a stop to these actions is to send a message of intimidation back. If people stand up to the food police, they and their overseers will get the message.

I have an aunt who lost 9 children due to the consumption of raw milk.

That's ridiculous. It's not even open for debate that raw milk is poisonous. It was created by God and is completely natural.

The cause of those deaths could have been anything. Maybe she should have used a cleaner container for the milk, refrigerated it, or not stirred the milk with a spoon used on raw meat, or something along those lines.

It's a fact that the human gut (intestine) needs beneficial bacteria to be healthy. In fact, there is a close relationship between gut flora and a healthy immune system. Those with Autism almost *always* have gut issues as well. Did you know that?

I attended St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary for 3.5 years and the whole time I was there 100% of our milk supply was raw milk from the cows on our land.

So I know what I'm talking about. Not because I trust this or that alternative news site -- but because of direct personal experience.


We're talking about dozens of people drinking raw milk (plus what was used in cooking, which was quite a bit) for years on end. None of them got sick, nevermind anything worse than that.

She had 9 miscarriages and the doctors blamed it on the milk at the time was not pasteurized.

That's because the doctors are a bunch of flaming morons.

Think about it, man -- how did the human race manage to have full-term babies for THOUSANDS OF YEARS before the advent of pasteurized milk?

By the logic of this "doctor", the human race should have gone extinct milennia ago.

Talk about stupid.

County sheriffs across the country need to stand with locals in the community and reject the state and federal goons who try to impose their despotic will against free people - freedom granted to us by God, not government. These diabolical bureaucrats come in to communities and try to ruin people's lives, therefore, the response of sheriffs should be to kick them out of their counties or arrest them for treason.

Quote from: poche

I have an aunt who lost 9 children due to the consumption of raw milk.

Aren't they the ones who died from not being vaccinated against measles?

No, these didn't have a chance to be born.

I have been drinking raw milk for years with only positive effects.  The milk is not the problem, it is how it is handled that can contaminate it, not just at the source but also at home.

I assume your Aunt's miscarriages occurred many years ago before modern testing methods and that her doc just blamed the milk because he could not test for other problems she might have been having.  In high school the mom of my best friend had 6 miscarriages before finally having my friend, docs never new why she lost all those babies, no tests back then.

Marsha

A seventh way.

Eat it.