Do Farmers Deserve Praise or Condemnation?

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 Our farmers deserve praise, not condemnation; and their efficiency should be cause for gratitude, not something for which they are penalized.

-- President JFK

How true these words are! However, you will hear a much different story in a Raleigh courtroom. There, lawyers will tell you that farmers deserve condemnation, and what they do on a daily basis should be penalized in the form of a huge lawsuit.

What did they do to deserve such condemnation? They existed.

These farms have been here for decades. The farmers, along with their families, raised and took care of pigs throughout the years.

And now... now, they stand to lose it all.

All because certain people made a judgement and condemned them.

Here is where I get confused. I thought we lived in a society that was promoting a judgement-free zone. But, I guess there is an exception to farmers.

It is OK to judge and condemn them.

It is OK to bully them and attack them.

It is OK to assume who they are—greedy, careless villains.

It is OK to blindly believe what other people say about them—polluters and bad neighbors.

No, it is not OK!

It isn’t OK to give false and misleading facts.

It isn’t OK to sue farmers and take their entire livelihood.

It isn’t OK to judge them when you haven’t even tried to get to know them or understand their practices.

It isn’t OK!

I don’t know why farmers have a bullseye on their backs. I don’t know when it will stop. I don’t know how all the lies got started. What I do know is these farmers don’t deserve it. And I know that I, for one, will stand by them, praise them, and thank them for all they do!