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posted by martyb on Friday July 21 2017, @01:45PM   Printer-friendly
from the say-"cheese!" dept.

NPR visits a prison goat farm that was the subject of an activist's ire back in 2015:

Whole Foods loved [Jim Schott's] cheese. His company [Haystack Mountain] grew. It also changed. Ten years ago, Haystack Mountain started buying milk from a farm in a prison. Schott doesn't recall telling Whole Foods or his other customers about that change in the Haystack Mountain story. In any case, Schott felt that it was a good thing — "a model of good prison management."

Then, in 2015, a prison reform activist named Michael Allen sent a letter to John Mackey, the CEO of Whole Foods. Allen demanded that Whole Foods stop selling Haystack Mountain's cheese because it was made, in part, using the labor of prisoners earning pennies per hour. The way Allen sees it, Haystack was "taking advantage of helpless, powerless individuals. They're fair game for corporations to make money off of. And I just told [Mackey] that we wanted him to get out of that business."

Many things besides cheese are made in prisons. Across the country, tens of thousands of inmates work for businesses that have set up operations inside prison walls. They make flags and furniture. Most of the time, they attract little attention. People may feel differently about something they eat, though, especially a boutique food like goat cheese. To Allen's amazement and delight, Whole Food caved to his demands. In a statement, the company said that some of its customers weren't comfortable with products made by prisoners, so it would no longer sell them.

The inmates are still milking those goats, though. I was curious about this farm, and set up a visit.


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  • (Score: 0) by fakefuck39 on Friday July 21 2017, @02:19PM (7 children)

    by fakefuck39 (6620) on Friday July 21 2017, @02:19PM (#542368)

    yeah, having taxpayers spend over 100k per prisoner as they sit there, eat, look at the wall, and work out is a much better way to go. sorry bud - I don't give a fuck about the "incentive" crap. learn about the separation of powers (I recommend finishing 5th grade for that) - specifically the executive an the judicial. and if there's a problem where the judicial gets money from corporations administered by ties to the executive, well that problem needs to be fixed.

    In the meanwhile, my opinion is this: we put you in a prison, you work for free, every day, or you don't get to eat and you die. good thing this is a step in that direction.

  • (Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Friday July 21 2017, @03:37PM (6 children)

    by hemocyanin (186) on Friday July 21 2017, @03:37PM (#542416) Journal

    How do you explain China with 4x our population, have a half million FEWER prisoners than we do. You can go on blaming the prisoners, but maybe the problem is our government and those who support it. http://www.prisonstudies.org/highest-to-lowest/prison-population-total?field_region_taxonomy_tid=All [prisonstudies.org]

    • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday July 21 2017, @04:39PM (3 children)

      by tangomargarine (667) on Friday July 21 2017, @04:39PM (#542442)

      China executes a lot more people than we do.

      The People's Republic of China executes the highest number of people annually, though other countries (such as Iran) have higher per capita execution rates.[1] Watchdog groups believe that actual execution numbers greatly exceed officially recorded executions; in 2008, 2009, and 2010, the Dui Hua Foundation estimated that 5,000 people were executed each year in China – far more than all other nations combined.[1][2][3][4] The estimated number of executions fell to 2,400 in 2013.[5] The number of death sentences is a state secret.[6]

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_China [wikipedia.org]

      From 1976 to January 1, 2017, there were 1,442 executions, of which 1,267 were by lethal injection, 158 by electrocution, 11 by gas inhalation, 3 by hanging, and 3 by firing squad.[44] Executions rose at a near-continuous pace until 1999, when it peaked at 98. After 1999, the number of executions lowered nearly every year, and the 20 executions in 2016 were the fewest since 1991.[6]

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_the_United_States#Lethal_injection_era [wikipedia.org]

      --
      "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
      • (Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 21 2017, @06:43PM (2 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 21 2017, @06:43PM (#542498)
        • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday July 21 2017, @07:09PM (1 child)

          by tangomargarine (667) on Friday July 21 2017, @07:09PM (#542508)

          Note that that 5000 is in a single year...3.5x as much in one year as the U.S. executed in the last 41. But sure, the U.S. locking up drug offenders for a few years is exactly commensurate to China executing thousands of basically yoga practitioners [wikipedia.org] for their organs to transplant.

          --
          "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
          • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 21 2017, @09:32PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 21 2017, @09:32PM (#542586)

            You're right, the U.S. executes far fewer people, and for far better reasons: mental illness, mental retardation, poverty, and race.

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Friday July 21 2017, @11:39PM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Friday July 21 2017, @11:39PM (#542634) Journal

      How do you explain China with 4x our population, have a half million FEWER prisoners than we do.

      Underreporting their number of prisoners. It's not like there are any consequences to the Chinese to lying about how many people they put in prison.

    • (Score: 0) by fakefuck39 on Saturday July 22 2017, @01:23AM

      by fakefuck39 (6620) on Saturday July 22 2017, @01:23AM (#542678)

      I don't. I and other people are talking about something else - not your topic.