Before you sharpen your pitchforks, let’s see what Mary Kay has to say.

   Yesterday, HumaneWatch.org made an announcement that the famous Mary Kay brand was supporting an HSUS fundraiser event in Dallas. Obviously, agriculture groups and people are up in arms. And it didn’t take too long before the word started to spread, just like the Yellowtail fiasco.

  But, before we clean our medicine cabinets of our Mary Kay products and stop our next orders maybe WE should ask some questions. Does Mary Kay really know how their name is being used, and what HSUS stands for, likely not. I guess I am maybe a bit too much of an optimist, but I would think there are just too many rural and agriculture women that sell and wear this brand to let their name be associated with HSUS.

 According, to several posts on HumaneWatch’s facebook page Mary Kay is already working to resolve a problem that they weren’t even aware of. It appears that Mary Kay has been involved in a case of fraud to be quite frank. I would hate to see agriculture women suffer because of lies that HSUS has spread.

  I am asking that agriculture does the same thing that we are asking corporations to do – research. Research what you see in the media, research where you are putting your dollars, and continue to research the moves that HSUS is making so we can fight against them.

  It looks like it is going to hopefully be safe to keep on supporting the pink!

   Update from Mary Kay - March 9, 2010

  Humane Society Concerns

  Some fans of Mary Kay® products and independent beauty consultants have expressed concerns over a recent sponsorship of a Dallas-area event. Thank you for bringing your concerns to our attention. We have heard you and want to clarify any confusion.

 First and foremost, Mary Kay is not a sponsor of this event. Mary Kay’s owner’s wife was approached to make a personal contribution towards a local event here in Dallas sponsored by the Dallas chapter of the Humane Society. This event specifically supports efforts to stop puppy mills and the organization’s stop puppy mills campaign. Out of caring and compassion for addressing puppy mills, our owner’s wife agreed to make a personal contribution. Mary Kay has contacted the Humane Society to clarify that we are not sponsors of this event and the company logo is being removed from the website.

  As a company, we sincerely apologize for any confusion or causing any offense to members of the Mary Kay community.

I turned the first draft of the last chapter of my Master’s thesis in today! I’m sure I’ll share more about my thesis project with you as I get closer to defense time. My project focuses on how beef producers can effectively communicate with an urban public. For now, I’ll share one of my recommendations and a bit of my personal experience.

In my tactical recommendations for producers, I encourage them to advocate for agriculture in a variety of communication mediums – from printed letters to the editor and news media to the online environment and face-to-face communication. Social media in particular is a place I think is a good fit for “agvocacy” (agriculture + advocacy).

In my personal experience, social networking advocacy works. The Humane Society of the United States is an organization that – despite its misleading name – does not operate any animal shelters or spay and neuter clinics but does spend a considerable amount of its time and money lobbying against animal agriculture. From time to time, I utilize my personal Facebook page to share this with others. Below is a screen shot of an interaction where my friend Craig’s opinion of HSUS changed based on my Facebook advocacy. Craig is a law student specializing in administrative law with an interest in politics.  

I had a similiar interaction recently with my friend Tina, a Wichita nurse.

If you have been following this blog then you know that I have been YPC's Public Relations Chair since last July.  Thank you to those of you who re-elected me to this position.  Part of the vision of the Public Relations Task Force was to start this blog.  I am fortunate to have Katy Groseta as the new Editor of this blog so I can focus on other efforts with the Public Relations Task Force.  Please let me know if you interested in joining YPC's PR Team -- I am compiling a list of people and I hope to have a conference call sometime in March.

My vision for the Public Relations Task Force is to focus on getting YPC members out to their local media -- newspapers, magazines, radio shows, news stations -- and help provide ample media and policy training to YPC members so they feel comfortable doing so.  I would also like the Committee to focus energies on other types of social media such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube.

Would love to have you on board if you are interested.  Please email me at cari.rincker@gmail.com or call me at 217/254.4997.  If you are interested in being a blogger for Cattle Call, please email Katy at katygroseta@gmail.com.

The weather seems to be a reoccurring theme in everyone’s conversations right now.  I just keep waiting for a break in the snow and cold.  Just a few days ago, I got that break in the weather.  After I was finished feeding the cattle, I was enjoying some sunshine and my mind started to wonder.  Being the fifth generation on my family’s farm, I was wondering  how did the old timers survive these kind of harsh conditions?

As I sat there, looking at the piece of land my great grandfather spent his entire life on, I was thinking of all the changes that have taken place since he was my age.  Things like buying his first tractor, rural electricity, and milking the cows by hand each morning.  He lived to be an old man, and since he lived a quarter mile up the road from my parents place, I knew him well.  I was eighteen when he passed.  I remember his stories almost word for word.

Then I came back to the here and now.  I started to reflect on the challenges that are facing me.  While most are just the normal struggles of life, one stood out to me as totally uncalled for.  I live in an age where media biased is accepted.  I’ll quickly recap, what I am referring to.  In 2009 there was a terrible article in “Time” magazine and the movie “Food Inc.”

I felt so flabbergasted when each of these were released.  I was wondering why somebody that had never met me would spread lies about what I do.  Where did these lies about food production originate from and for what purpose?  I’ll probably never know.

I once heard somewhere that the word fear is an acronym.  It stands for False Evidence Appearing Real.  I guess that is about how I would sum the “Time” article and “Food Inc” movie.  I have been one to ask lots of questions.  So I pondered, why didn’t the outlets mention the Beef Quality Assurance program that so many ranchers participate in?  Why didn’t it mention how the beef industry spends millions of dollars of its own money on things like food safety, research and testing?  Why didn’t they point out how farmers and ranchers, like me, are good stewards of the land, and how our goal is to improve it for the next generation?  All I could do was shrug my shoulders and offer myself this simple answer to my own questions.  The truth about what I do wouldn’t fit the FEAR theme.

As I stood there looking off at the horizon, to where my great grandfather’s house once stood, I came to a realization.  His dad had the same goal I do.  To produce safe, wholesome, delicious food for the people around us.  At that point I had to grin and shrug my shoulders again.  Some things haven’t changed that much after all.

Recently, I spoke to the Five Nations Beef Alliance at their Young Rancher’s Round Table about telling our story to the consumer. The U.S. was represented by NCBA, the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association and the Australian Cattle Council represented their respected countries, and delegates from Mexico and South America were also in attendance.

Jill Harvie, Canadian Cattlemen’s Association, and I were talking before the event, and both agreed that is seems like at all these conferences and meetings we do a lot of talking. Great ideas are brought to the table, brainstorming happens, we feel empowered, we can change the world, and then we go home. We quickly get caught up in feeding cows, fixing fence or the office job and the ambition is lost.

This time we really wanted to prove that action could be taken. So Jill grabbed her camera, and sent me some footage and this was the result.

Now, I bet you can find a video camera laying around. And you probably know some techy kid, whether it is your son or daughter or the neighbor, that could do some editing. We need to put ourselves out in front of the public. The consumer likely has never seen a cow or a rancher for that matter, but they are curious. If we don’t answer their questions PETA or HSUS will.

So when we get home from NCBA, let’s put these ideas into motion.

Are you a YPCer that has joined the Twitter craze and will be attending NCBA Convention next week in San Anton'?  If so, please let me know your username.  I am making a master list of all YPC members who will be Tweeting from convention so folks who aren't there can be sure to follow convention happenings.  The official hashtag for convention will be #NCBA10.

If you are interested in learning more about Twitter, I posted a guide here.  Ohio Farm Bureau also has an excellent guide to social media that can be downloaded here.  I personally recommend downloading UberTwitter to your smartphone so you can easily tweet during convention.  I will be happy to help any YPC member that needs help figuring out Twitter as well.   

If you are on Twitter, you can follow me @CariRincker and @RinckerLaw.  See you in Twitterland!