Fall of a hero
It is difficult to report negative things about someone you saw as an exemplar, that in some instances you still see as that. In writing about a farmer-hero my intent is not to discredit him by reporting what others say. It is to try to make sense of recent events around him.
HEROES RISE, HEROES FALL. People we think exemplary turn out to be like anyone else. Adulation fades to disappointment.
The first I heard of it was from a prominent figure in the fair food/food sovereignty movement. “Perhaps the permaculture/sustainabile agriculture movement should think carefully about the people it puts up as its heroes”, he told me.
The comment was made in confidence, so I’m not going to reveal who said this. Sufficient to say that he is not without considerable influence in the fair food/food sovereignty movement in this country. His comment came as a surprise, considering the interest being shown in Joel Salatin’s farming system while on this, the latest of his Australian tours.
What was behind his statement? Wasn’t Joel an innovative and successful farmer back in the US? On his previous visits the approach he employed on his Polyface Farm attracted considerable interest among regenerative farmers in Australia.
It wasn’t his approach to farming that concerned the food sovereignty advocate. I recall that at the public presentation Joel told the audience he was a ‘Christian libertarian’. What this meant became apparent when he responded to a question during a later conversation with the food sovereignty advocate. Asked about his attitude to the advertising of tobacco and other harmful products, Joel responded that he didn’t favour any restrictions at all. I also learned that a woman attending the same event asked him about health policy. Joel resonded that he was not in favour of universal health schemes. The woman told him that here in Australia we actually like our universal health scheme.
Now, a few years later, a schism has opened in attitudes towards Joel Salatin. It is not his farming methods that are at question. Even one of his more-vocal critics trained with Joel and adopted his practices. It is his social attitudes and responses to the issues of the times. Namely, his public comments about the pandemic and the vexed question of racism in the US.
The racism allegation
Chris Newman is a small-scale farmer who was earlier inspired by Joel Salatin’s farming model and who adopted many of Joel’s practices.
Co-founder and Ehakihet at Sylvanaqua Farms, Chris describes the vision of the enterprise as an “employee-owned cooperative of farms, nurseries, mills, processors, retail outlets, and wholesale distributors (supplying) food available at greatly reduced prices without sacrificing ecological values, and agricultural opportunities open to more than just the most privileged members of society”. The farm operates a home delivery system.
Chris acknowledges the value of Joel’s farming methods. They are not the issue. His alleged character and politics is. The issue stems back to Joel’s response to one of Chris’ essays on small farming last year, after which Chris accused Joel of “racialized rhetoric toward people of color in both public and private”.
This followed Joel’s writing in an email “…that the BIPOC folks who feel America offers them no opportunity should give up all modern conveniences and return to their tribal locations and domiciles.” BIPOC is yet another Americanism spun around racial and social issues in that afflicted country. It means ‘black, indigenous and people of color’.
Joel responded. “Written by Chris at Sylvanaqua Farms, the post developed a narrative that individual family farmers can’t feed the world and can’t really make it as farmers. They need to form co-ops so somebody else can do the accounting, marketing, distribution, etc.”.
Joel’s piece elicited comments both supportive and critical. The number of critical comments was significant. One came from Chris Newman:
Chris Newman 3 months ago · 2 Likes. “The facts don’t care about your feelings, Joel. You inherited 550 acres, leveraged it into asset purchases that your business couldn’t succeed without, and have built a cult of personality that avails you of an army of a dozen barely-paid interns who sweat it out in your labor camp for five months in exchange for six weeks of education.
“You then took advantage of the rugged-individualist/personal-responsibility politics of your followers to make a living telling every wannabe farmer that they could be the next Joel, neglecting to tell them that your success is predicated as much on your multimillion dollar inheritance and your willingness to exploit your workers to the point of KNOWINGLY POISONING THEIR WATER, as much as your willingness to work hard (until you found someone else to work hard for you.)
“If Joe Kennedy and Donald Trump were fused into a single person and turned loose on a farm, you’re what we’d wind up with: a Gilded-Age ag tycoon exploiting his workforce behind a racist veneer of White-Identity Christian Libertarianism. Congratulations.”
Pretty powerful stuff. What about Chris’s upper case accusation of Joel exploiting his interns to the point of “KNOWINGLY POISONING THEIR WATER”? I found no posts explaining this other than that of an intern on a website where several interns document their experience at Polyface Farm.
The comment about water contamination followed an intern suffering a severe bacterial infection and allegedly being discouraged by a farm manager of seeking hospital emergency room treatment in favour of a doctor known to Polyface.
The comments describe the internship as both a positive and negative experience. One wrote: “What did I learn? How to kill and process chickens, herd cattle, use a sawmill, and drive a tractor? Sure. But the things I’ll never forget are the things I saw behind the scenes, behind the pristine curtain Polyface has woven around itself. I’m not asking Polyface or the Salatins to be perfect… but if they’re going to claim an organic (in the non-agricultural sense) soul, they should be real and honest with their patrons and audience. Beyond simply putting forward a good face, the Salatins directly lied to us about the water situation on the farm. The greatest showman is still nothing but a liar.”
“I’m stuck in the weird position of giving Polyface the recognition that they deserve for helping me find my farming direction while on the other hand offering accreditation to the interns who did have a terrible experience and are still being negatively affected by Polyface.”
The accusation of racism spilled into the publication in which Joel had his regular Pitchfork Pulpit column, the long-running magazine, Mother Earth News (MEN). MEN started life decades ago when it served the emerging alternative/hippie/organic growing movement in the US. It is the equivalent of the long-running Australian magazine, Earth Garden.
Pressure on the magazine started to increase. A letter “…co-signed by hundreds of other farmers (including a broad swath of MEN’s writers) to MEN publisher, Bill Uhler… combined with Joel’s even more appalling denial of systemic racism and racist, fact-free commentary on Black fatherhood in an email delivered to Bill… on August 20, effectively stripped MEN of any option but to drop him from their writing and events roster, which they quietly did,” wrote Chris Newman.
“This cancels the Pitchfork Pulpit column, the postponed MEN fair to be hosted at Polyface next summer July 16–17, and any appearances by any Salatins at future MEN fairs”, MEN wrote.
Joel commented on his Instagram account: polyfacefarm. Today on Joel’s blog. “This morning we had a heart-seeking conversation with the leaders at @motherearthnewsmag which unfortunately has been caught up in racial allegations against Polyface Farm and me specifically…”
Chris says that MEN is not the only magazine caught out by Joel. “Joel’s popularity is largely owed to glossy media coverage of his food gospel preached at the crossroads of agrarian nostalgia and chronic dietary anxiety. But most people haven’t read his books or his blog, which are full of racist dogwhistles, poor-shaming, homophobic screeds, full-throttle misogyny, science denial, and naked appeals to White ethnocentrism. For evidence that these themes are present throughout Joel’s personal zeitgeist, one need only peruse the things said in Joel’s defense when he’s challenged.”
The pandemic and Joel
As if the alleged racism wasn’t enough to push a dent into Joel’s reputation, this year Joel became embroiled in the arguments around the Covid-19 pandemic.
Let’s remember that Joel is a libertarian in the American sense of the word. American libertarianism promotes an individualism that is very critical of government and its institutions and often ascribes nefarious intention to it.
Writing in his blog, Joel said that farmers, politicians and others are not ‘in this together’ when it comes to the impact of the lockdowns introduced to stymie the spread of Covid-19. He writes: “We’re not in this together. The politicians and bureaucrats are not losing their jobs, losing their savings, losing their perks. They are in a special protected class, an elite place that is above and beyond the fallout they create.”
The sentiment might be that of an American libertarian farmer, however it pretty well sums up the attitudes of many Australians towards bureaucrats and politicians.
Joel talks about the loss of self-esteem and the stress of people losing their jobs because of the lockdowns. As I read his blog I thought that there is something to agree with in what he writes. So far, so good.
Then I came to a sentence that hints of an arrogance, not only towards media workers but to ordinary people too. Speaking of politicians and bureaucrats, Joe writes: “…their egos get stroked by the doting press and peasants waiting for edicts from on high.”
A ‘doting press?”. Joel has had his fair share of a doting press in the uncritical media stories about him and his work, including the media in Australia.
And what about his putdown: “Peasants waiting for edicts from on high?” Am I alone in detecting a whiff of superiority here? Insulting your readers by calling them ‘peasants’ is no way to get them to believe what you say. What comes to mind is nothing more than Covid-deniers calling everyone who doesn’t agree with them ‘sheeple’.
Is what stirred-up Joel more to do with the media’s saying things he disagrees with, such as the common sense of continuing the lockdowns and mask-wearing mandates rather than opening the cities and states to the spread of the pandemic? His ‘doting press’ accusation comes across as a fine example of the ‘shoot the messenger’ syndrome.
When Joel wrote that for “…every two or three private sector job losses there should be a corresponding one job loss from the government. And some ratio of legislative staff and security detail for politicians”, it started to make sense. Not the ludicrous statement, I mean, but the fact that Joe would say something like that. Why? It comes back to Joel’s libertarianism. His comments put him in the ’right-libertarian’ camp. What he says about government and his implied opposition to the lockdowns aligns with the libertarian concept of individual freedom. It’s the sort of ‘freedom’ in which we see images of unmasked, closely-packed, gun-toting Americans out on their streets with their placards proclaiming ‘freedom’. ’Sovereign citizens’, they call themselves.
The March statement
“Okay folks, enough is enough. I want coronavirus. I’ve been watching all the personal stories of the folks who have gotten it and the overwhelming testimony is pretty simple: a day of sniffles, another day of fatigue, then a couple of days of recovery, and life is back to normal. Goodness, the common cold often knocks people worse than that. It’s actually not that strong.” (https://www.thelunaticfarmer.com/blog/3/16/2020/i-want-coronavirus)
Given the reality that by 1 September, six million cases of coronavirus have been reported in the US and more than 184,000 people have died, Joel Salatin’s loud statement comes across as naive and irresponsible. Joel made it in March, however, when what he said appeared to be true. That changed as the extent and severity of infections and the ongoing health issues of many with only mild symptoms became apparent.
Joel echoes the feelings of both Americans, Australians and others when he writes that it is “…hard to watch aspiring young entrepreneurs in food trucks lose their dreams over a 2-month hysteria about a new virus that inconveniences the vast majority of people for a couple of days. Or struggling restaurant servers unable to earn an income. We have struggling restaurants that will go out of business over this.”
A disease that inconveniences the vast majority of people for a couple of days? Really? Sad, now that history has now proven Joel to be wrong. He talks of the plight of the restaurant business, yet the reality is that the entire hospitality industry is always an uncertain, risky business lightly poised on the edge of the viability of national economic wellbeing.
What about all the other jobs that have been lost? Aren’t there more important industries than restaurants and food trucks being affected? Would his comments have anything to do with Joel’s sales to restaurants? The misinformation about the severity of the virus remains uncorrected on his blog.
Commentators got busy on Joel’s blog. Nonya Dambidness… “ We’re six months on from your absurd screed. Hundreds of thousands of Americans dead. Screw you.”
DS… “Well, I used to be a fan of yours, but you just lost me… As long as you can get the virus already and get on with your life, the fallout doesn’t matter. Maybe you even think it would be a good thing to “cull” the physically weak from our ranks? A little good ol’ fashioned eugenics to improve the race? Go to hell. Remember that this virus doesn’t “ONLY” go after the immunosuppressed and the frail; it has indeed caused the deaths of previously strong, healthy folks. How ironic it would be if you were one of them.”
Get an education. 5 months ago… “boycottpolyface”.
The eggs
Then comes the statement that drew the ire of many readers: “We may throw away $70,000 worth of perfectly wonderful eggs over this,” wrote Joel in commenting on the demise of the restaurant and food truck businesses.
What’s this? Polyface, a farm resting on a reputation of sound environmetal management and spinning a glowingly-positive line about its solution to food issues saying it might throw away tens of thousands of eggs in some kind of massive food waste initiative? I found it a little difficult to believe. Was Joel just being hyperbolic to reinforce his comments about the impact of the pandemic? Would he be responsible for food waste on such a massive scale?
Comments on Joel’s blog quickly picked up on this: David Elkins… “What an ignorant, self-important, self-absorbed fool you are. I wish that I did business with you, just so that I could cease doing business with you.
“Apparently you have a following, but I believe that this is your Lord Jim moment, and you have shown your ass. I hope that your post goes viral and that you are ruined. If you can’t think of a good way to donate those 20,000 dozen eggs in these times of need, may I suggest you shove each of them up your ass — if you need any help, I would be glad to (but, sadly, as I am the lifeline for my 86 year old mother, I wouldn’t get that close to you at this time). F*** you.”
Joel then saw fit to criticise people for their response to the pandemic. “I’m beginning to get angry that people so quickly roll over and go into a helpless fetal position. Invest in vitamin C. I wonder how many people fighting over toilet paper have a stash of Coca-Cola in their house? How about taking this imposed quarantine to put in some garden beds and revamp the pantry so it can hold an entire larder’s worth of food?”.
Invest in vitamin C? Well, no. Here’s Healthline’s response: “You may have noticed the vitamin C section of the supplement aisle looking bare these days or seen the claims on social media that vitamin C can help with COVID-19. While physicians and researchers are studying the effects of high dose intravenous (IV) vitamin C on the new coronavirus, no supplement, including vitamin C, can prevent or treat COVID-19”.
Healthline is described by Media Bias/Health Check as: “Analysis/Bias: In review, Healthline provides health and wellness information that is scientifically based. Most articles are written in an easy to understand format and sourced to medical journals… Overall, this is a pro-science medical information website that scientifically sources its information. (D. Van Zandt 2/23/2018) Updated (7/17/2020)”
What about Joel’s asking whether “people fighting over toilet paper have a stash of Coca-Cola in their house”? Well, it’s spurious. Implying that people who drink Coca-Cola fight over toilet paper is a false analogy, a false equivalence. One thing has nothing to do with the other. They are not actually similar or equivalent in any relevant respect. It’s just a rhetorical device designed to discredit both people who fight over toilet paper and those who drink Coca-Cola.
As for Joel’s suggestion of building “some garden beds and revamp the pantry” during the lockdown, well, that is exactly what people have been doing here in Australia at least, the evidence being the shortfall in supply of non-hybrid vegetable seed, among others.
Joel goes on to say that goverment response to the virus makes it easy to control people and “whip people into paranoia.” Both are statements echoed by the far-right and since heard at rallies against wearing masks and lockdowns. Dangerous company, Joel.
Progressive farmer, conservative right-libertarian
Now, Joel is entitled to identify with any sort of political leaning he likes. He is free to oppose the lockdowns and his government. That is not the issue. As a public figure wielding influence, the issue is how what he writes is likely to influence others. As a public figure he knows he is up for criticism. That is what he has received as people see beyond the farmer-hero image to the libertarian below.
There is no denying that Joel Salatin had done much to promote regenerative agriculture. The question is whether in putting him up on a pedestal we ignore his political philosophy. Do we accept the farmer-figure by itself or do we see Joel in his personal entirety?
Here’s the premises of the argument postulated by Joel’s critics. Joe Salatin:
- is an exemplary regenerative farmer with international influence and an international reputation
- is given international hero status for his innovative farming system
- has a valid concern for the future of the restaurant and food truck industry
- has a political philosophy with questionable value to social wellbeing and promotes individual freedom instead of regarding freedom as a social phenomenon in which the freedom of one is contingent on the freedom of the majority
- has beliefs about the Covid-19 pandemic and the severity of the disease that deviate from reality
- promotes behaviour during the pandemic that is detrimental to personal and public health
- appears to oppose the lockdowns introduced to slow the spread of Covid-19.
The premises offer probable but not conclusive support for the argument that Australians should not position Joel as a hero and exemplar.
Understanding Joel
How do I feel about Joel now? When I attended his public address in Sydney I was impressed with what he said about farming, but when he described himself as a Christian libertarian I thought some of his attitudes and beliefs might be s bit out of kilter with prevalent Australian attitudes.
I guess I’m like many others in recognising his contribution to regenerative farming but recognising that his social attitudes and response to the pandemic leave a lot to be desired and are not in the best interest of public health. As for his alleged racism, I leave that to Americans to deal with. Being a right-libertarian does not imply Joe cannot be a regenerative farmer at the same time.
I guess it brings up back to what that Australian food sovereignty advocate said: regenerative agriculture and permaculture people should be careful about whom they promote as their heroes.
Sources:
Musings of a Lunatic Farmer (Joel Salatin’s blog)
https://www.thelunaticfarmer.com
Everything I Want to Do Is Racist — How America’s favorite farmer lost his way.
https://medium.com/@cnative100/everything-i-want-to-do-is-racist-3ff6a6bb5e01
Whining and entitlement
https://www.thelunaticfarmer.com/blog/11/22/2019/whining-and-entitlement
Chris Newman
https://medium.com/@cnative100
Sylvanaqua Farms. https://www.sylvanaqua.com
Author note: The author has been involved in and written on Australia’s fair food/food sovereignty movement. He was one of the four who started the Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance, was active with Sydney Food Fairness Alliance and made presentations at food-issue-related conferences. A past local government community garden and Landcare coordinator, he was a member of a Sydney teaching team offering the Permaculture Design Certificate courses, taught permaculture at TAFE and was Development Education Officer and Program Manager for food security/farmer education programs in the Solomon Islands.
UPDATE 29.9.20
Joel Salatin apologises
Joel Salatin apologised today for his comments that have been interpreted as racist.
His apology received a mixed reception.
Read Joel’s apology here: https://www.facebook.com/Polyfacefarm/photos/a.209769651104/10157498547781105/
Permaculture 3.0 facebook: https://www.facebook.com/permaculture3.0/?modal=admin_todo_tour
More Permaculture 3.0
Food waste: what to do about it?
HOW WOULD YOU go about reducing food waste in restaurants?
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