The Rape Coffee

I hear his footsteps,

My eyes go wide in fear,

And I cry for help,

I know what’s about to happen,

And I’m scared again.

This is not the first time,

But let me go, I plead,

Helplessly twirling

Around the rope I’m bound to,

Let me go, I would rather die,

I scream as he puts his fist into me,

The pain tearing my soul,

I stay still so that I don’t bleed,

As he inserts the rod into my vagina,

And I know the pain isn’t going to stop,

This has happened before,

And this will happen again,

I remember my first time,

The pain killed my body,

But I waited 9 months,

To see the baby I had started loving,

Carrying him around inside me,

I dreamt of feeding him,

And as soon as I saw him first,

I tried to touch him and bring him close,

And he was taken away,

I called out for him every day,

I lost my voice crying for him,

I never saw him again,

I lost him, forever.

And then I was groped,

And groped again and again,

Every single day,

They took my baby’s milk,

And let me live in agony,

The pain happened,

I bore it again,

As I carried a baby,

I dreamed again,

And this time, I fed her,

And then she was taken away,

Before I could protect her, 

But she was mine, wasn't she?

She was taken away far,

I could hear her all day,

And she heard my cries every day,

Asking her to come back,

And then they groped me again,

They took away all the milk

That I made for her,

I lived again in the dark,

And then today I’m in pain again,

I have stopped dreaming though,

The pain wouldn’t ever stop, would it?

Like all the other mammals in the world, cows lactate for the sole purpose of nourishing their babies.

Like humans, cows bear their babies for 9 months.

All dairy calves are stolen from their mothers within hours of birth in order to maximize profit by consuming all the milk that the mother produces. 97% of newborn dairy calves are forcibly removed from their mothers within the first 24 hours. The rest are removed in a matter of days. In many developed countries, the male calves are shot dead or tossed in trash. In the so-called humane dairy farms, cows are often taken within the first hour of birth as separation of mother and calf is considered less stressful when they have not been allowed to bond. Following that callous separation, the mother will bellow and scream for days, wondering where her baby is. Can you imagine this happening to a human mother? It’s as painful for the cow mother.

The female calves join the milking herd. They typically spend the first 2 to 3 months of life confined in lonely hutches, fed a diet of milk replacer while humans drink the milk intended for them. The male calves and surplus females are sold to be slaughtered for veal or cheap beef. Or they are chained all their life so that they can be sold for greater profits when they are big and heavy. The beef industry would not exist without the dairy industry. And India is the largest exporter of beef in the world.

To keep them lactating at maximum yields, cows are artificially and repeatedly and forcibly impregnated year after year. The actual insemination happens with the dairy employee inserting a gloved hand through the cow’s rectum to inject the semen of the male and manipulate the uterus through the rectal wall. Yes, that’s how cows get pregnant. This is what happens everywhere across the world. Funny, how we think this is rape when it happens to women, but not female cows.

Because of strong maternal bonds, the mother often stops lactating if the calf has died. Hence an effigy is made by stuffing hay into a dead calf to mimic the presence of calf, so that the mother can keep producing milk. That’s how cruel we humans can get.

And the constant cycle of forced pregnancy and birth year after year does damage to the cow, as it would do to a human mother. Her udder becomes so heavy that it makes her lame and she often develops an agonising infection called mastitis. Trapped in a cycle of forced impregnation, perpetual lactation and near constant confinement, most dairy cows’ overworked bodies begin producing less milk at around 4 to 5 years of age, at which point they are slaughtered.  In natural conditions, cows can live up to 20 to 25 years.

In short, the cow’s milk is full of grief. If you wouldn’t want this to happen to a human mother, why would you want it to happen to a cow mother?

Every cup of dairy, your daily coffee and tea, your cheese pizza, your ghee delicacies, your butter toast, your paneer and curd, your ice creams and milkshakes, they are all full of pain and suffering. Unexplained pain of a mother and her child. Cries that were stifled by pictures of happy cows on the pack of your dairy food.

But do you know that you can make a huge difference by quitting dairy?

Please be kinder to animals. Please. They are mothers too.