The Hen Report: “People Don’t Want This” | Good News for Animals in a Sordid World

That sounded a kind of ominous, didn't it?

[00:00:10] Jasmin Singer: Yeah, it did, but it is...

[00:00:14] Mariann Sullivan: Thank you. I think

[00:00:16] Jasmin Singer: Actually, no, this is like a good news, a good news, uh,

[00:00:19] Mariann Sullivan: Good news, we're only doing good news.

[00:00:22] Jasmin Singer: Yeah. The

[00:00:23] Mariann Sullivan: Pretty good. Mo mostly only doing good news.

[00:00:26] Jasmin Singer: Murray is currently trying to get into my office. Uh, so you keep talking. I'm gonna just let him in.

[00:00:32] Mariann Sullivan: All right. Well, uh. As you know, or maybe you don't know, which is why I'm saying it, we now have three podcasts. Rising Anxieties comes out on Tuesdays. The Hen Report, which is this, comes out on Thursdays and the long form interview on most Fridays and once a month. The long form interview is actually the Animal Law Podcast.

And of course, we're both a podcast and on YouTube and subscribe on both, on everything that you can because that really helps us out. You know, that's how the algorithms work and like, and subscribe if you, if you, if you want to. You don't have to, but please do. Uh, and, and yeah, we thought we'd do sort of a good news.

Mostly a good news episode this week because like the news, let's face it like.

[00:01:19] Jasmin Singer: Yeah,

[00:01:20] Mariann Sullivan: I can't get away from, I mean, I'm not saying all the news out there is bad. It's actually kind of like obsessing in, in interesting ways. Mostly bad, but not all bad. Bad in, in numerous different ways.

The other thing that, you know, I get so caught up in watching all of this political back and forth and everything, and uh, I'm sure you do as well. And I feel like that's all I think about and it's really, it's so ugly, but then everything we think about all the time is ugly.

Uh.

[00:01:50] Jasmin Singer: least we have the, at least we have responsible, uh, journalism and responsible media, like Our Hen House and, and public media as well. Oh, wait, public media

[00:02:03] Mariann Sullivan: Oh,

[00:02:04] Jasmin Singer: is,

[00:02:04] Mariann Sullivan: was the phoniest intro

[00:02:07] Jasmin Singer: know

[00:02:08] Mariann Sullivan: ever heard.

[00:02:08] Jasmin Singer: to, it was intended

[00:02:10] Mariann Sullivan: yeah, public media, it's a problem. It's one of, it's one of Jasmine's many jobs is, is hosting, um, on our local public media outlet.

[00:02:19] Jasmin Singer: Yeah,

[00:02:20] Mariann Sullivan: For the moment.

[00:02:21] Jasmin Singer: At the moment we're recording this. We don't exactly know how it's gonna go, but we're pretty sure that maybe even by the time this airs, there will be a, the, like a huge shift in public media. Not for the better, but for the significantly worse, and it's going to. Basically in short, remove a lot of the governmental funding for the member stations as, as one of the fallouts from this.

There

[00:02:49] Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, and this doesn't mean, at least here, this doesn't mean that it's closing tomorrow because you know, there are other sources of money and there is some backlog, but it's pretty bad. I mean, that money isn't gonna last forever.

[00:03:03] Jasmin Singer: No, I mean, it would be a huge cut at WXXI here in Rochester, but a lot of the rural stations will be obliterated because they won't have additional funding

[00:03:13] Mariann Sullivan: Isn't it crazy how like everything. Everything is happening. All these bad, bad things are happening, but they're all worse in rural areas, which is, you know, Trump's base or has been in the past. Like, wouldn't you think that somebody would do something to help people who vote for them? I mean, that seems like the way he works, you know, uh, not so much to support blue states, but to support his people.

But apparently that's not how it is, how it works. 'cause everything, all the rural hospitals are gonna be closing, uh, the rural and, well, I guess he thinks that rural people really don't need NPR because he probably thinks, or he, uh, by he, I mean all of the Republicans, they probably think, uh, think, you know, NPR is not good for you anyway.

I don't know.

[00:04:05] Jasmin Singer: it's another reason why we at Our Hen House are super grateful to you all our, our viewers, our listeners, our flock members, our supporters, because you keep us going and you have for all this time. So that's good news. Now, if people wanted to hear bad news, where should they go? Besides the headlines, Rising Anxieties this week?

[00:04:26] Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, I mean, I, I figured we would do a good news episode on The Hen Report, but, but you can always get plenty of bad news from Rising Anxieties. Uh, you know, it's basically. Where I cover things that from the, mostly from the industry itself that show that their anxieties are rising, but also inevitably there are many things that cause our anxieties to rise as well.

Like this week I talked about salmonella. There was this huge outbreak of salmonella, um, where one person died, but a lot of people got sick. It was from eggs. I think they, it was a cage-free company. Um. And Oh yeah. The, the Trump administration's lawsuit blaming California's cage-free laws, for the high price of eggs.

Not blaming for flu. I laugh. Uh, why do I This is, this is, there's, there's suing California for, for requiring eggs sold in California to be cage-free. 'cause they say that's what's causing the rise in the price of eggs. Um, alright. This dairy vet who pointed out the cows, aren't she, she's an expert on, on cow welfare and she says, of course they're not milked to death like all the animal activists say they're, they're just killed when they're no longer profitable.

It's a whole different thing. You don't want 'em to live forever. Um, oh, and some stuff about methane. Always a little stuff about methane, since the industry is churning out the methane.

[00:05:53] Jasmin Singer: You are doing a terrible job at this good news

[00:05:56] Mariann Sullivan: Well, I said if you want bad news, you can go there. From now on, we're just doing good news.

[00:06:01] Jasmin Singer: Let's talk about, uh, what we've been talking about recently, which is proof that activism can work. And you know this, this story is about chimpanzees and basically thanks to relentless pressure from animal activists, the National Institutes of Health has begun transferring a bunch of chimpanzees from a horrible lab that is now shuttered in New Mexico to a primate facility.

[00:06:31] Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, the to Chimp Haven, which a lot of people have, of course, have heard of. And this is, you know, part of this, the NIH saga, which is unbelievable. It is still going on. NIH stopped using chimpanzees in research years ago and, and as a result of activism and lawsuits and, and, uh, and promised that they could go into retirement, but kept holding onto some of them just in case they changed their minds.

And there's been constant law, further lawsuits, further activism. And there is motion now. They are, they, it looks like they're gonna get all of them out of, um, Alamogordo, which is this place where they're stored. They're not being used for research anymore, so why store them in these horrible places? Um.

The first group of the, this new group chimpanzees arrived at Chimp Haven in February. And you know, they're trying to raise money and they do have some foundation money that that seems to be coming through. And um, of course they have to build the facilities. You can't just like move a bunch of chimps there.

Um. So that is good news. There is a little, I know I promised only good news, but there's a little connected bad news that there's this other group of chimpanzees. 'cause this was, you know, this wasn't any law that was passed that you can't do research on chimpanzees anymore. It was just the NIH.

There are other chimpanzees in, in other kind, well almost all research is funded by the NIH, but I guess not absolutely all. And then, you know, they can be used in entertainment and all sorts of like other horrible things. Though you know, that is dying out. Um, but there's also some chimpanzees being stored 40 chimpanzees at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Texas.

Um, and there is no plan for their release. So, you know, it's good news, but in the context as always, good news in animal world is always in the context of some bad news as well. Um, so it's not over. I don't know whether that'll ever be over, but, uh, but it is a lot of progress. I mean, I can remember the day when, you know, they, the Coulston found the facility, they were testing oven cleaner on chimpanzees.

I mean, they were testing anything on the, so anyway,

[00:08:41] Jasmin Singer: Yeah,

[00:08:42] Mariann Sullivan: I would be cheerful today. Well, no I didn't. I didn't really promise that. Yeah.

[00:08:46] Jasmin Singer: But something that I think might be surprising to some people is that in most US public schools, a child cannot be served soy milk instead of cow's milk unless they bring in a doctor's note. An actual medical excuse, and it looks like that could soon change.

[00:09:04] Mariann Sullivan: it actually isn't a, a school can is allowed to obey a parent's request, but it's not required to. To, to give, um, a, a certain child plant-based milk.

[00:09:16] Jasmin Singer: But

[00:09:16] Mariann Sullivan: So, um, alright, so this is this bill that I thought was terrible, but, you know, not really an animal related thing. It's a, you know, it's probably related to RFK Junior, who knows? Um, that they're going to be serving whole, it's a bill to require that schools serve whole milk.

Right now I think they're serving 2% and, and they're not allowed to serve whole milk because, you know, it's full of saturated fat. And so, you know, a health issue, but not really an animal issue. There's no reason to suppose the children would drink more of that. It's just, it will be worse for them. Um, but what I didn't realize, and this was reported by Seth Milstein at, um, Sentient Media, they, yeah, this bill actually requires that on a parent's request, the schools will be required To give a child, uh, a plant-based milk instead, which is really good. 'cause who can go get a doctor's note?

It might not be a health related issue, it might be an ethics related issue. Uh, it might be like a preference issue. Like why can't a kid get plant-based milk? Sorry. Um, the other thing in here,

[00:10:18] Jasmin Singer: what it reminds me of when we went to Disney World, like, uh, 15

[00:10:22] Mariann Sullivan: 10 million years ago.

[00:10:23] Jasmin Singer: And we could not get the vegan ice cream unless we specifically

[00:10:28] Mariann Sullivan: We had to say we had an allergy.

[00:10:31] Jasmin Singer: It reminds me of, of that. But

[00:10:34] Mariann Sullivan: know.

[00:10:34] Jasmin Singer: yeah,

[00:10:35] Mariann Sullivan: right.

[00:10:35] Jasmin Singer: Honestly what, what really shocked me about this is that the requirement for cow's milk in schools wasn't born from, you know, health science obviously, but it was born from agriculture policy.

[00:10:49] Mariann Sullivan: of course.

[00:10:50] Jasmin Singer: Since, since the creation of the National School Lunch Program in 1946, part of its mission has been to encourage the consumption of quote, nutritional agricultural commodities. And milk, obviously, being

[00:11:04] Mariann Sullivan: Huh? No.

[00:11:04] Jasmin Singer: from the dairy lobby

[00:11:06] Mariann Sullivan: They've been pouring that stuff down our throats, uh, since the day I was, I mean, I remember getting those creepy little cartons of milk. I never liked milk.

[00:11:14] Jasmin Singer: Mm-hmm.

[00:11:15] Mariann Sullivan: and we would get those horrible little cartons of milk and sometimes they were a little off. I, it was disgusting. Um, and they had to be refrigerated.

It's like re it was hard. Like they had to like have refrige. For, for all of these little cartons of milk for all of these kids in the school, I used to get, you could either get graham crackers or Waverly wafers. I always used to get the Waverly wafers, but I wonder why 'cause they're salty and that wouldn't go well with the milk.

Maybe I just didn't drink the milk. I don't remember. But there's another thing in here, which is really good that I didn't get to yet, and that is that schools will now be allowed. This is, I think this is even bigger. Schools will be allowed to offer. They're not required, but there'd be allowed, which they aren't now, to offer plant-based milk in addition to the offering of, of, um, uh, you know, animal torture based milk.

Um. I think a lot of students would just choose it if they, if they have the opportunity. So I think that's, that's really good news. I didn't know that Bill, which I thought was stupid, had like all this good stuff in it. So thank you to Seth Milstein for informing me of that.

[00:12:18] Jasmin Singer: Tofu also has a lot of good stuff in it, and one of my favorite dinners is breakfast for dinner, which is tofu scramble in my house. I had an non-vegan the other day ask me what I did about eggs, and I was like do you mean like as its own food or in a, in an ingredient. And of course he got a much longer answer than I think he ever wanted, but I'm not the only one who is admiring tofu these days. There's this recent YouTube video. This is as reported by Plant-based News, and in its celebrity chef Jamie Oliver visited Okinawa, Japan, which is one of the world's five official blue zones where people frequently live past a hundred.

[00:12:59] Mariann Sullivan: Well people, I mean, I think the article is a little inaccurate on that point because, wait, if you watch that program on the Blue Zones, it's pretty clear that it's only older people in Okinawa who are super healthy because younger people have been, you know, introduced to hideous western diets and are not nearly as healthy.

But anyway, I digress.

[00:13:18] Jasmin Singer: In Okinawa, tofu isn't a protein swap. It's a staple. Why don't you talk about it?

[00:13:25] Mariann Sullivan: I love tofu. That's why I was excited about this story. And according to that, um, to that show, that was that show on Blue Zones? It was on Netflix. I dunno whether it still is. Um. Okinawan tofu is particularly healthy. I forget why. And I was just excited about this. 'cause every, you know, vegans love tofu and non-vegan think it's horrifying and it must be.

It just must be like, I don't think all vegan foods are like unbelievably good, but I love tofu and you can do so much with it. But even when you don't do stuff with it, it's just good. I don't know why. Like, and, and so yeah, I was, um, I was excited to see this 'cause I think Jamie Oliver, you know, he's a British celebrity chef, so we don't really hear that much about him, but I don't hear that many good things about him.

So this was in a travel VI video he posted to his YouTube channel and he, he said that tofu was a superfood ingredient and that it's eaten more in Okinawa than anywhere else in the world. It's in virtually every meal. And, and. He said, if you're not sold on tofu yet, then bear with me because it's incredible and really, really nutritious.

So that is really good to hear from, you know, somebody who has a lot of clout, uh, in this, um, world. So I always like to hear anything good said about tofu, which is, like I said, one of my favorite foods.

[00:14:44] Jasmin Singer: Yeah. I like overdid tofu for a while, and I mean, I had it

[00:14:50] Mariann Sullivan: Well you were just talking about tofu scramble.

[00:14:53] Jasmin Singer: Yeah, I, I'm now easing my way back into the tofu scramble, but for a while it was like all tofu all the time.

[00:14:59] Mariann Sullivan: Okinawas, have it at every meal.

[00:15:02] Jasmin Singer: Oh, okay. Well, that's cool.

[00:15:04] Mariann Sullivan: What am I, you know, so, so maybe you should rethink.

[00:15:09] Jasmin Singer: Well, let's talk about this exhibition that's currently on view at the National Museum of Contemporary Art in Athens, because there is a really bold message pulsing through this new exhibition that's called Why Look At Animals, A Case for the Rights of Non-Human Lives. And this is a show that is really daring to do what most galleries and much of society for that matter still won't, which is to confront this, the violence of animal agriculture head on and, and ask us to imagine a world that refuses to normalize it.

This is incredible.

[00:15:47] Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, this article is by Emily Watlington and it's in Art in America, even though it's about a exhibit in Athens, but, uh, it's not, but it's not from an animal rights magazine or anything, and it's very strong. You know, it, it has, it goes into the exhibit quite a bit and apparently this is a big museum.

I think they said it was seven floors. And the whole museum is, is doing this exhibit, this, this Why Look at Animals exhibit. Um, some of the things she mentioned is a film, um, called High-Rise Pigs about a skyscraper factory farm model, um, and thinks about endangered species.

A print by Sue Coe at the exhibition's entrance,

[00:16:28] Jasmin Singer: Love it.

[00:16:29] Mariann Sullivan: provocatively linking human to animal suffering. Um.

[00:16:32] Jasmin Singer: Love it.

[00:16:34] Mariann Sullivan: This is huge and, and she's aware that this an she is sympathetic to the issue, but she, she is aware that this is an unpopular topic, quote as awareness of it all but demands the sacrifice of personal comfort. Doesn't actually, but I know what she means.

Um, what people think is personal comfort, uh, and, and the, the curator's name is Katerina Gregos and, and, um, she described pitching the exhibition for 10 years. So there's an activist for you. For 10 years she's been trying to get this exhibition and, and it was turned down and now she is curating it with a vengeance, it says. Yeah. And there's seven floors in the museum, and it's on all seven floors. And, and it just sounds extraordinary. I, you know, there are some criticisms of it that, that, you know, some of the work is, is not as sophisticated as she would've preferred, but it really sounds like there's a lot of very powerful stuff here.

Um, one of the works that she does really like is Lin May Said's the liberation of Animals from their cages too, showing masked activists, fleeing open gates and setting animals free. Uh, and it just sounds extraordinary. I wanna go to Athens.

[00:17:49] Jasmin Singer: Well, and we live near a town called Athens, which is spelled the same way as Athens.

[00:17:53] Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, that's because every town in New York State is pronounced differently than is after. There's Milan. Um, instead of Milan. Um,

[00:18:03] Jasmin Singer: Yeah,

[00:18:03] Mariann Sullivan: There's lot, there's lots of them. Oh, no. What's the best, oh, Chiai Chile. C-H-I-L-I. How do you pronounce that? You pronounce it Chiai. I

[00:18:10] Jasmin Singer: it's spelled chili, but it is,

[00:18:14] Mariann Sullivan: think you could have figured that out from the fact that I spelled it.

[00:18:18] Jasmin Singer: That's true. I

[00:18:19] Mariann Sullivan: It's spelled Chile.

[00:18:21] Jasmin Singer: It's too bad that we're not going to a reason all otherwise known as Arizona, because if we were, we could eat our feelings and go to Mr. Charlie's. I love this story too. I, I, I appreciate these good news stories, Mariann, but this is kind of

[00:18:40] Mariann Sullivan: This is a good one. Yeah.

[00:18:42] Jasmin Singer: McDonald's, right?

[00:18:44] Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, I, I, I was wondering whether you were familiar with Mr. Charlie's, 'cause apparently it started in Los Angeles. The first one was in Los Angeles.

[00:18:53] Jasmin Singer: I'm not, I'm not familiar with it, but

[00:18:54] Mariann Sullivan: it is, it is like a vegan McDonald's, um, an ethical McDonald's. It serves burgers and fries and, and cokes and, um, and, you know, how often do we hear of, of vegan, vegan companies going under?

It seems like it's every week these days. Well, Mr. Charlie's is not. Mr. Charlie's is apparently doing great. So they started in Los Angeles in 2022, which is not very long ago. And, um. They also have nuggets, burgers, fries, nuggets, all plant-based. It looks super cute. Uh, and they've ha they have one in San Francisco, um, and one in Sydney, Australia, and now they are opening 18 in Arizona like they must be doing great.

[00:19:40] Jasmin Singer: And they, uh, it, they have a partnership

[00:19:43] Mariann Sullivan: go. I wanna go.

[00:19:45] Jasmin Singer: with LA's Dream

[00:19:45] Mariann Sullivan: don't Wanna go immediately.

[00:19:47] Jasmin Singer: they hire, uh, unhoused and formerly

[00:19:50] Mariann Sullivan: Yeah.

[00:19:50] Jasmin Singer: people. They pay above minimum wage. Uh, and I mean, I love the fact that a burger joint can be both profitable and principled. This is sure something that I feel really good about that that kind of expansion is unheard of.

It really is.

[00:20:08] Mariann Sullivan: I know it's, it's really exciting. I mean, that's really fast. They opened in 2022. Uh, so they're, they're really going gangbusters. Uh, you know, it is, it's just nice to hear of, of things going well, and I, all right. Getting back to the thing we started with, the thing I started talking about, which is the state of the world right now, like don't, do you feel kind of like this is, this is so pie in the sky.

I'm embarrassed to say it, but like we are so immersed in sordidness right now. Like it's almost unbearable to watch the news, which I watch 24 7, even though it's unbearable and it's all so sordid. I mean, the Epstein thing is just the icing on the sordid cake like. Like, maybe this is a moment where people are ready for, you know, things that are virtuous.

I mean, one thing that I think the Epstein case has revealed is that, you know, we think of the MAGA people over here and the, the libs over here. They, they, they'll basically agree about this, that it's, it was terrible and we need to know about it. And like the idea that all of these people who we think of as a totally different sides of the spectrum on every single issue, actually agree about something really, truly disgusting.

[00:21:30] Jasmin Singer: Yeah.

[00:21:31] Mariann Sullivan: I don't know. Am I being Pollyanna? Probably.

[00:21:33] Jasmin Singer: A little bit, but I'm I'm here for it.

[00:21:36] Mariann Sullivan: I'm not Pollyanna every day of the week. Let's face it. So take it when you can get it.

[00:21:40] Jasmin Singer: I mean, the truth is, it. Is animal agriculture that is funding Trump. And so the best way people can boycott Trump is to go vegan. And is

[00:21:51] Mariann Sullivan: It's a little bit of a stretch, but Yeah.

[00:21:54] Jasmin Singer: well,

[00:21:54] Mariann Sullivan: I'm happy to, I'm happy to go with it. Yeah.

[00:21:57] Jasmin Singer: but it does kind of

[00:21:59] Mariann Sullivan: It's all part

[00:21:59] Jasmin Singer: what you just said about.

[00:22:00] Mariann Sullivan: of the same sordid like reality.

[00:22:04] Jasmin Singer: Yeah.

[00:22:05] Mariann Sullivan: uh. Like, nobody's really in favor of what we do to animals. It's just all hidden and there's so much money piled onto it, and it's just like everything else that's bad.

It's like it, it's like there are some people who are making money and the rest of us just are in the dark. And you know, with animal agriculture, there are other things, you know, that go on with why people remain in the dark. But ultimately people don't want this. People don't want it.

[00:22:34] Jasmin Singer: Well, I'm glad that there are many opportunities, especially for those living in Arizona, uh, to, to

[00:22:42] Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, when I first saw that article, it just said 18 opening, and I was like, oh, maybe one's in upstate New York, but actually it's Arizona or nothing,

[00:22:50] Jasmin Singer: Not quite yet. Yeah.

[00:22:52] Mariann Sullivan: or LA or Sydney, we can go to Sydney.

[00:22:55] Jasmin Singer: Sure. We'll go to Sydney. That sounds like a plan. I'm sure that, uh, everyone is ready to open their doors for Americans who wanna go there and eat, eat their

[00:23:03] Mariann Sullivan: Oh, will we ever be able to go anywhere in the world ever again? I don't blame, I don't blame them for one minute.

[00:23:12] Jasmin Singer: So

[00:23:13] Mariann Sullivan: I'd be, I, I, I'm annoyed with us too.

[00:23:16] Jasmin Singer: Oh, I have to tell you, not you, but you, we have such a great show tomorrow. Our interview is with Aishwarya Veerabahu and she's talking about mushrooms, which is one of your favorite subjects and one of your favorite foods.

[00:23:29] Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, absolutely. I, I, I love mushrooms cooked well. I can't say that I'm very good at cooking them well, but you know. That has a lot to do with, you know, not using enough, enough, uh, butter or oil. But I do love mushrooms and I just am fascinated by them and by fungi in general.

[00:23:48] Jasmin Singer: I went through a real moment like, I don't know, 10, 15 years ago where I was eating a lot of salads, and before I did that, I would water saute, just button mushrooms briefly just to like, kind of give it that

[00:24:02] Mariann Sullivan: Well, I think you're supposed to. They're healthier if you cook them. Raw mushrooms aren't as good for you, and it might be bad for you. I don't know. Oh, much better. They don't have any, really any fla, much of any flavor raw. Now. You should always cook 'em a little bit at least.

[00:24:17] Jasmin Singer: So make sure you tune in tomorrow for our incredible interview with Aishwarya. She's gonna be talking about it, not so much from a culinary perspective

[00:24:26] Mariann Sullivan: No, no.

[00:24:27] Jasmin Singer: talking about it, but from like a, you know, can mushrooms save the world kind of way. And she's vegan obviously, so she has this really cool way of tying it all together to

[00:24:35] Mariann Sullivan: Yeah,

[00:24:36] Jasmin Singer: how

[00:24:36] Mariann Sullivan: she does point out.

[00:24:38] Jasmin Singer: and, yeah.

[00:24:39] Mariann Sullivan: She does point out that she's not saying mushrooms can't save the world or aren't hugely beneficial, but we better start treating them a little better.

[00:24:48] Jasmin Singer: Yeah. Well, let's also start treating one another a little better,

and ourselves a little better. And with that, I'm gonna let you go do your day, dear listeners and viewers, thank you so much for tuning in. Make sure you subscribe to Our Hen House on your favorite pod catcher, as well as on YouTube. And, uh, yeah, we love you tons and we'll chat with you tomorrow.​