TIME Ideas Culture Foie Gras Freedom Is Also a Win for Free Speech Sauteed foie gras lucydphotoGetty Images\/Flickr RF <\/p>\n
Nick Gillespie is the editor in chief of Reason.com and Reason.tv. <\/p>\n
The overturning of Californias idiotic and repressive ban on the production and sale of foie gras is a small but important victory for food freedom. The only down side is that the decision is open to appeal, so it might be temporary. <\/p>\n
The ban was passed in 2004 but only went into effect in 2012. The legislators responsibleincluding then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who hypocritically claimed to be pro-business and in favor of limited governmentsaid that they wanted to give producers and restaurants time to adapt to the change. But in fact the long lag time had everything to do with Golden State term limits. By the time the ban was in full force, you see, none of those responsible would still be in the legislature. <\/p>\n
As defined by the nonprofit Keep Food Legal, food freedom is the right to grow, raise, produce, buy, sell, cook, and eat the foods of their own choosing, including everything from raw milk to trans fats, hemp to soda, and foie gras to Four Loko (disclosure: I once served on Keep Food Legals board of trustees). In an age of artisanal everything and skyrocketing interest in all sorts of new and innovative cuisine, food freedom is every bit as important as rights to free speech and alternative sexuality. <\/p>\n
Indeed, what we cook and what we eat have become every bit as much an arena of individual expression as whom we vote for and whom we marry. Raw milk producers still labor under draconian regulations and federal raids despite strong demand for their products by impeccably informed consumers. In a world in which caffeine-enhanced Four Loko has been prohibited, its a wonder that Irish coffee is still available. <\/p>\n
In order to ban a choice that is as personal as food, government at any level should have extremely compelling reasons related to public health and safety for doing so. Simply finding something offensive is no more a warrant for prohibition than censoring art that you find disturbing. In the case of the foie gras, animal rights activists could only express concern for the birds that are traditionally force-fed in the production of foie gras. All animals that are ultimately slaughtered for human consumption may have our sympathy and our empathy. They do not, however, have rights that are equal to ours. The basic problem helps to explain why the California ban was written in a way that critics presciently called both constitutionally vague and impossible to enforce. <\/p>\n
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), one of the major players in the foie gras, has over the years tried to assert constitutional rights for Orcas. In this, they are joined by other activists who have done the same for chimpanzees, dolphins, and other animals. None of these suits have gotten far and they are not likely to because they are nonsensical. However much humans may or may not have an ethical obligation to treat animals in a humane fashion, animals simply do not have rights in any meaningful legal sense. <\/p>\n
Which isnt to say that people opposed to foie gras have no means of carrying the day. They can work to end the market for foie gras and other animal products through persuasion and informational campaigns. But they cannot and should not bank on using the coercive power of the state to force their subjective value judgements on the rest of us who have a taste for foie gras or other delicacies they find abhorrent. <\/p>\n
And they should assiduously make sure that tax dollars are not going to support food they would never eat. Thats a likely point of agreement between them and libertarian defenders of the right to cook and eat what we want. A central part of the food freedom agenda is freedom from subsidizing other peoples preferences. Keep Food Legals mission statement emphasizes that the group also support[s] ending agricultural subsidies, which distort the market and help lead to problems like obesity and environmental degradation. <\/p>\n
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