Cars & Cows

Cars and Cows

When travelling through the United States, one frequently encounters old cars, which inevitably make you assume that they must have been beautiful once. Some of them are nothing but wrecks, rusting away in dried-up front yards. Others are lovingly maintained. In their parked state, they tell of a supposedly ideal past. Despite their nostalgic beauty, the most wrecked ones also have a dystopian air about them. It’s as if humanity disappeared after a catastrophe, and its remnants are now forever subjected to decay. And only we, as the last survivors, can imagine what it might have been like in the face of this analog scrap.

You also frequently encounter cows, these living and intriguing beings. When you look at them, they often look back with interest, as if contemplating whether we could be useful to them. With their apparent innocence, they evoke my sympathy, and I feel guilty, immediately thinking of factory farming and calves not being allowed to be with their mothers so that we can drink milk and eat meat and cheese.

Time and again, one encounters rare and beautiful breeds of cattle. The first cattle brought to America by Europeans were Longhorns. At some point, they fell through an economic sieve and are now kept by conservationists and enthusiasts to prevent their complete disappearance. A bit like the cars whose upkeep is no longer worthwhile, as they consume too much gasoline and have become prone to repairs.When you think about it further, you realize that there are even more similarities. Both cars and cows are equipped with license plates and trademarks, and both produce significant amounts of climate-damaging gases during their lifespan, which are emitted into the atmosphere. Within one year, one cow produces 100 kilograms of methane, equivalent to the CO2 emissions from driving 18,000 kilometers. Owning and driving cars, as well as keeping and consuming cattle, is becoming increasingly questionable both in terms of health and morality. But it seems hard to move away from it.

Our emotional attachment to the lovable cows and the old cars comes from the same era: a time when one could dream of social ascent and the possessions that go with it without guilt. The American dream, whose tentacles may haunt us with a romanticised past for a very long time to come.

Ute Behrend