Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: we have the safest, most affordable, and most abundant food supply in the world.

As this is the case, consumers may vote with their wallets. If you want to pay a premium for eggs from pasture chickens, you may. If you wish to pay a premium for organic vegetables and fruit, you may. If you wish to pay a premium for meat from cattle finished on grass or American lambs or hogs raised in a pastoral setting, you most certainly may. If you wish to pay a premium for plant-based proteins made with chemicals to resemble meat, you may. It’s the beauty of American agriculture.

What you ought not do is take that affordable, abundant and safe food supply away from Americans living in the margins, so they are no longer given the option to pay less for a conventionally raised product that you just don’t happen to agree with.

I stand by my criticism of the SCOTUS decision to uphold California’s Prop 12. It is driven by virtue signaling in an effort to leverage control of livestock production by people who know nothing of livestock production outside of some extremist narrative. Nonsense.

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The term “factory farming” continues to be thrown around and as someone with both feet in livestock production, I don’t understand what exactly the anti-livestock sorts are referring to. How many head of cattle need to be on feed before a small, family-owned feed yard is a concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO)? How many hogs need to be housed in temperature-controlled buildings away from potential disease carriers, extreme weather and predators before it offends?

The opportunity for consumers to purchase premium products based on their preference for management or production methods exists because conventional agriculture is able to feed the remainder of the world. There is absolutely room for organic produce because there is a market for it and because the efficiency of conventional produce allows a less expensive, often more abundant alternative.

I received a well-written email from a woman who said she was appalled by my critique of Gov. Jared Polis’s comments in support of the SCOTUS decision. It was not an unkind letter, and she is as passionate about her opinions as I am of mine. I’ll admit I haven’t responded to her email primarily because neither of us is going to change our minds. She encouraged me to “research the many negative health impacts of factory farming” and it’s frankly been on my mind all week.

I’ve thought about it while we’ve been breeding cows and heifers via artificial insemination in preparation for them to be hauled to summer pasture. We also have a segment of our herd that will be bull-bred and another few that will be recipients of embryos from our donor females. Had the PAUSE initiative moved forward, nearly all those tasks would have made me a sexual abuser. Had it moved forward, we would still be feeding cattle to slaughter once they’ve reached five years of age. With the wicked winter demanding an incredible amount of hay and the price of feed, we would likely no longer be in business. That would all translate to empty meat cases, which I realize is the entire point. Preventing people from feeding their children so someone can feel better about tasks so far removed from their experience, though, is asinine.

The portion of the letter that really made my stomach hurt was not her claims of greenhouse gas emissions or replacing meat with beans or the environmental costs of livestock production. She said, “it is alarming to me that you may be sharing such opinions with children.” With children, dear readers.

I allow my children to be children by not exposing them to video games and the ongoing narrative around gender transitions and pornography and disbelief in faith and gang violence. My children have been raised in agriculture because it’s not a day job. My recent preschool graduate owns a heifer and helps me feed the fat cattle that will be sold directly to a consumer as beef. My 10-year-old daughter raises livestock to show and spends a tremendous amount of time doing it well. I would be remiss if I didn’t explain why we do what we do. As an industry, we would be remiss if we didn’t explain why we do what we do. It’s not because we’re horrific people, I assure you.

I can’t imagine a world in which the story of agriculture wouldn’t be shared with children. It is a story rich in history and innovation. It is a story that fewer people can relate to, and it is a story that ought to be top of mind when legislation is brought forward by people who think children should be shielded from the story of their own food. It’s impossible to fight such a narrative when there’s so much work to be done to produce that pesky aforementioned food supply. Agriculture will have to defer to voters with common sense, a basic understanding of economics, and an ability to think for themselves I suppose.

Rachel Gabel writes about agriculture and rural issues. She is assistant editor of The Fence Post Magazine, the region’s preeminent agriculture publication. Gabel is a daughter of the state’s oil and gas industry and a member of one of the state’s 12,000 cattle-raising families, and she has authored children’s books used in hundreds of classrooms to teach students about agriculture.