<p>Somehow the past 20 years, and especially the last 8 years, we seem to forget some Ethics. Leaders have to Lead but lead morally, ethically, and legally. </p>
<p>This recall is very disturbing. Tremendous amount of effort is spent by farmers and growers to produce food. Tremendous of amount of various subsidies, direct tax dollars, and labor. The fuel costs, direct and indirect dollar and human that our nation expends all over the world is for nothing. </p>
<p>I used to be in food processing and growing food. There is a line that should never, ever be crossed. </p>
<p>I read about this recall a couple weeks ago because it affected our local school district, but it looks like they’ve really expanded it now. I agree, it’s a terrible waste and a danger to innocent people. I think the plant should be ordered closed forever, but then I’m a vegetarian and would say such things because I despise factory farming.
Still, if I did eat beef, I wouldn’t be too happy if I’d eaten a hamburger or dozen since last year when the beef was sold.</p>
<p>No doubt there. Spinach has killed more people than beef in the last year, though I believe the problems with spinach had something to do with animal farming nearby. Can’t remember the details.</p>
<p>I read the article, and went to the link to browse all the recalled products. Think we’re safe, but the very bottom of the list caught my eye (…and turned my stomach). Tell me, what does one do with BEEF LIPS???</p>
<p>Various weight boxes of HALLMARK MEAT PACKING BEEF CHEEKS.
• Various weight boxes of HALLMARK MEAT PACKING BEEF PLATES.
• Various weight boxes of HALLMARK MEAT PACKING BEEF SMALL INTESTINES.
• Various weight boxes of HALLMARK MEAT PACKING BEEF LIPS.<br>
• Various weight boxes of HALLMARK MEAT PACKING BEEF SPLEENS.
• Various weight boxes of HALLMARK MEAT PACKING BEEF SALIVARY GLANDS, LYMPH NODES AND FAT [TONGUES].
• Six-gallon containers of HALLMARK MEAT PACKING BEEF BILE.
• One- and six-gallon containers of HALLMARK MEAT PACKING BEEF BLOOD, .2% SODIUM CITRATE ADDED.</p>
<p>The size of this recall would indicate that the Management had no idea what was happening. The amount recalled would also indicate that the cow records are also sparse which would also mean that Management and the Feds+State don’t know where the cows came from. If you do not know where the product came from and where and when the product was sent- we have big problems. </p>
<p>W, did your handlers warn you of the consequences, before you went off to Africa?</p>
<p>astrophysicsmom,
I imagine the items you list are common ingredients in “all meat” dog food.</p>
<p>I’m just starting a unit on the Progressive Era in my history class and will have students read excerpts from The Jungle. I think I’ll give them this article, too.</p>
<p>I saw on the news last night that this potentially tainted meet was shipped out in February of 2006 and so far not a single illness has been reported. Can this be right? It was CNN. If so, then it seems pretty doubtful that anyone is going to get sick from it, although I’m no food scientist. Doesn’t excuse what happened, of course. The sheer scope of the challenge facing the fda in assuring the vast amount of food in this society is safe seems pretty huge.</p>
<p>Thisoldman - I don’t think ethics are any worse or better than a generation or two ago. We are still just human - sometimes good, sometimes bad. Fallible.</p>
<p>A comment not about the beef recall but about ethics:</p>
<p>As a parent, I’m ashamed that I wasn’t more black and white about right and wrong when I brought up my children. As an adult, I know life is full of grays. I should have left that realization up to my children when they got older, not tried to teach them grays when they were young. I don’t think they’re as grounded in ethics as they should be, and it may be too late for me to change that.</p>
<p>^ not sure I agree VH. The older I get I find that those who scream the loudest about the need for ethics can often be terribly judgemental and myopic and ultimately rather cruel. It’s hard to raise kids to see in shades of gray but I think they can be more questioning, less likely to settle for doctrinaire answers.</p>
<p>thisold man, I do not think this news article is an indictment of only current business practices. Recall the use of child labor, the robber barons, sweat shops, and horrendously dangerous mining practices to name just a few examples.</p>
<p>Many business owners and executives have used tools at their disposal to maximize profit or merely stay in business. Often times this means stepping over an ethical threshold if not a legal one.</p>
<p>So this means that government needs to pass laws evening the management/labor playing field and then taking steps to enforce those laws.</p>
<p>I watched a tv show just last nite about the Sego mining “disaster”. There are plently of mine safety laws but enforcement is lax and mine operators take advantage of this fact. But the greater shame is that for every Sego mine disaster which kills multiple miners and captures national attention, there are hundreds of mining accidents which take the life of a single anonymous miner but is still a disaster for that miner’s family.</p>
<p>Small mistakes and small decisions were made all along the process. Any one one of the the decisions could have prevented the tragedy. It is a tragedy because someone could have prevented it by simply saying STOP.</p>
<p>Basically, in the food industry, such a control point is absolutely necessary for food safety, because if the product/decision is allowed beyond that point, it is assumed that the product is safe. There is no way to recognize if the product is NOT safe pass these points. For instance, if a product is to be canned, then you want enough inspection so that you know that only beans are canned and not anything else. Inspection is a critical control point. Once the lid is sealed, there is no way to really know what is inside that can, except to open the can. </p>
<p>So the question for the USDA, State of CA, and Americans: If the cow(s) were sick, WHAT was the cow(s) sick of? If the animal was sick, would Management say, “Thankyou worker Jones. We will stop the processing line, remove the stuff, and clean the processing line.” OR would Management say, “Jones, you are new here. Your job is to get the animals up the ramp. We need to keep the line running because we got workers who got to work, people who want burgers, and ten trucks scheduled that are already on the road and cows in the pens. Move the cows, or we find someone who either has the experience in moving cows, or who has what it takes.”</p>
<p>Thisoldman, my first job out of college was as a production supervisor in an automotive plant. I can tell you that 25 years ago, the same tactics were being used on the worker. There was lip service given to quality, but the bottom line was that production was the most important thing. We did stop the line at times, but each time it happened … someone “above” showed his displeasure. It took people with ethics to stand up to the bullying & be brave enough to stop the line when necessary. Over time, the pressure from Japanese competitors prompted a change. Quality became more important, in response to consumer expectations. The situation on the production line became much more conducive to halting production in order to resolve quality issues. I see this as situational ethics, to be honest … and I think that situational ethics drive industry. I wish that humans would simply “do the right thing,” but I don’t think that will ever happen. It hasn’t happened yet (in terms of the general population … of course there are individual exceptions). History is full of abuses of ethics, including those named in earlier posts. Change seems to be driven by outrage over the abuses, not by the fact that the abuses are wrong.</p>
<p>It’s true there will always be human greed and frailty causing tragedies. And we can and should do our best to protect our society. But we cannot make a perfectly safe world.</p>
<p>being ethical can cost money, alot of money. A decision to say NO to an activity sometimes just means the person goes elsewhere. I have said NO to someone in my past professionally. So far, it has cost me close to a million dollars. Ethics s uck sometimes. Sometimes you wish you didn’t have em.</p>
<p>Ethical behavior can have a deep personal cost, however unethical behavior can have a widespread social cost. The fact that you acted ethically, Opie, cost you a lot, but by drawing the line on that person you perhaps impacted behavior that might have led to far worse costs on a societal level. </p>
<p>As social beings, we need enough people to act ethically to ensure our longterm survival. It’s the relatively few who act unethically and get away with it that maddens me.</p>
<p>There are at least two red flags concerning “ethics” in this article. The reporting , I am assuming is, factually correct. Can you find at least one of the flags that should alert you to danger? </p>
<p>Obviously with a Class II recall, there IS a concern about safety and ethically otherwise they wouldn’t be throwing away millions of dollars of food. She should have said something like “We are determined to get to the bottom of this problem and to make sure that this never happens again. Consumer safety is our number one goal, above profit or public relations. This instance of abuse and poor practices is not only not indicative of our industry standards but it is rightly to be condemned and rooted out.”</p>
<p>leads us to believe that since June 2004 until this year, that only two positive animals were found from 759,000 tested animals. Is this a reasonable interpretation that a reasonable person can deduce?</p>