Breastmilk in Ben & Jerry's

Alright PETA I get that you are saying that cows milk is for baby cows and human milk is for human babies, but this is taking it one step too far.

They have suggested to Ben & Jerry's that they use breast milk in their ice cream instead of cows milk. The reasoning is that cows are needlessly suffering because they are forced to produce milk. I am not arguing with this fact. What I am arguing with is the idea that women sell their breast milk.

Why is Peta's suggestion of selling breast milk so wrong? That answer is easy. Every day in America babies are born prematurely. these babies mothers may be unable to produce breast milk for them and are fortunate enough to receive donated breast milk from one of several milk banks throughout the United States.

Milk banks unfortunately operate on a shoestring budget. The donors are just that, moms who have an excess of breast milk and want to help babies in need. Sometimes the donors are mothers who have lost their children and are still producing breast milk, sometimes the donors are mothers who are fortunate enough to be able to overproduce. The milk bank screens potential donors and works hard to make the process as easy as possible so that they can donate as much milk as possible to these babies in need.

Let's say a company starts offering these mother money for their breast milk. It is very likely that some of these mothers would no longer donate and instead sell their milk. It is also very possible that some mothers who were not donating will begin to sell their milk to make a profit, while not realizing that they are no longer producing enough milk to provide for their own babies. We would also of course have moms who would switch their babies to formula and sell their breast milk if the price is right.

As you can see the opportunity to sell milk openly will greatly decrease the amount of milk available to babies in desperate need. Milk banks might end up having to compete with the market by paying moms for the milk just to keep up. There is no way this is a good idea.

PETA clearly did this because it had an attention getting headline written all over it. This story clearly causes controversy on so many levels. If they really want Ben & Jerry's to save the cows they could have simply suggested a soy milk or rice milk ice cream. That of course would not stir any controversy so they went the human milk route. To that I say shame on you PETA.

Ben & Jerry's commented to PETA by saying, "We applaud PETA's novel approach to bringing attention to an issue, but we believe a mother's milk is best used for her child."