Pimping My Life Away.....

Every once in a blue moon, which seems to have been shining brightly this July, a vendor, manufacturer, or publisher will offer me an item to review. My standard response is to thank them for the offer and tell them that I'll accept it and write about it, but my opinion will be my opinion. If I like it, I'll say it. If I don't, well that goes up too. Most vendors are OK with that, but there's been a few who shied away.

A couple of weeks ago, I received an email from the American Lamb Board offering me a package of lamb to try out. I accepted and the results were posted here. Well, it seems that Tana Butler over at I Heart Farms has some issues with the American Lamb Board and all the bloggers who accepted their offer.

Ms Butler's blog is dedicated to the small farmer and "people who are smart support sustainable agriculture, and do not support the pinheads and reptiles who make policies that hasten the destruction of our fragile environment."

So what's the problem with The American Lamb Board?

1. Ms Butler is appalled that the American Lamb Board is in it for the money. From her blog, "Remember that ".org" in the web address? How disingenuous is that? From Wikipedia:

   In the US and the UK, the .org TLD is mostly associated with non-profit organizations (in the latter '.uk' is usually but not always added after the '.org'). In addition to its wide use in the charitable field, it is often used by the open-source movement, as opposed to the .com domains used mostly by companies.

   This isn't NPR we're talking about, folks. The American Lamb Board folks are all about the profit: they have an advertising budget that is nearly $1.5 million! Non-profit, my ass." - Gee it's a trade organization. What a surprise. Just because they have a large advertising budget doesn't make them non-profit. I wonder what that advertising budget of PBS or The Red Cross is.
   
2. That the lamb was not produced "cleanly, humanely, and sustainably." I don't remember seeing anything in the package claiming it was. One blogger (Stephencooks) stated that his lamb came from Superior Farms who's website states, "Superior Farms lamb is raised naturally, which means it is minimally processed with no artificial ingredients. They now raise Pure lamb, which is grown with no antibiotics or hormones. The company also supports many small farmers who are excellent stewards for the environment." Sounds good to me. Mine wasn't labeled, but I'm not sure who produced the meat. The only claim I saw was that the lamb was American.
   
3. And finally the true crux of the matter - Ms Butler doesn't like lamb. Again, from her blog, "I'm not saying what these people cooked and wrote about on their various blogs wasn't very tasty indeed. (As for me, with rare exceptions, lamb tastes very dead to me. I've only had it a few times that it was good, and that was because it was very fresh, very clean, pastured lamb. But eat lamb, if that's what you like!)".

I support Ms Butler in her effort to promote the small farmer and meat that is produced "cleanly, humanely, and sustainably," but it's wrong to condemn the bloggers and the American Lamb Board for shilling their product.