Do you know how hard you PETA nuts have to dig to find a farm that treats their animals like shit?I, of course, countered that he or she was wrong.
Anonymous, obviously animal advocates don't have to dig very hard. It seems like every month or so a new video is released that shows people in agribusiness abusing animals.In further support of my argument, Fox News today has aired an undercover video taken at a pig farm in Pennsylvania.
An investigator for Mercy For Animals recorded the footage, which shows "employees picking up baby pigs and tossing them like footballs," during his (or her) three-month stint at the "farm" earlier this year.
The video starts by showing CVFF employees picking up baby pigs by their ears and hind legs and throwing them between employees.The employees aren't doing this out of spite or for fun; they're simply doing their jobs. But it reveals how those in agribusiness view animals -- as objects, not as living, feeling beings.
Additional scenes from the video show injured pigs going uncared for, pregnant hogs being kept in very small pens, with several portions of the video so disturbing that Fox News will not show.This is Fox News we're talking about. This company loves sensationalism, but parts of the video disturb even them.
According to Mercy For Animals, here is what the video shows:
No caring, compassionate person could watch just two minutes of that video and decide they want to continue supporting such a cruel industry.
- Workers grabbing piglets by their fragile ears or legs and throwing them across the room and slamming them into transport carts.
- Workers tattooing sows by repeatedly driving sharp metal spikes into their flesh.
- Sows with untreated rectal prolapses and deep, infected sores and scrapes from constant rubbing against the bars of their stalls.
- Workers cutting off piglets' tails with dull pliers and castrating them by ripping out their testes with their bare hands - all without anesthesia.
- Thousands of pregnant pigs confined in two-feet wide metal stalls so small that they could only take one step forward or backward and could not turn around or lie down comfortably.
- Injured, sick and runt piglets being tossed into overcrowded gassing kill carts, slowly suffocating from CO2.
- Workers firing steel rods into sows' heads, sometimes as many as four separate times, before the sows fell and died.
The pig-breeding facility, owned by Country View Family Farms, is one of the nation's largest and "operates more than 100 pig farms across Pennsylvania, Ohio and Indiana."
'Pig farm' simulation
Pfizer Animal Health has created a video game of sorts about "pig farming."
In the computer simulation "Virtual Walking the Pens," you get to be the owner -- the game calls it "caregiver" -- of your very own factory farm -- or "family farm," as those in agribusiness prefer to call them. You're in charge of 2,400 pigs from "wean to finish." (I guess that's a euphemism for "from birth to murdered.")To make it easier for the player, 24 pigs stand in for the actual 2,400.
The first thing I noticed when I watched the demo was how much space these pigs have to move around.
In Mercy For Animals' undercover video we see females confined to gestation crates while they are pregnant. These crates, which are so small the animals can't even turn around, are standard in the industry.
Even when pigs aren't pregnant or nursing (in similarly small farrowing crates) the pigs are crowded into their pens.
But in Pfizer's game the pigs have tons of space to walk around. If an actual facility had all that empty space, the owner would buy more pigs. Empty space means untapped profit.
Pfizer's game is just another example of how those in agribusiness don't want to see how they are actually treating animals.
(Undercover video courtesy of Mercy For Animals. Photo of factory pig farm courtesy of Farm Sanctuary.)
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29 comments:
Of course this is no "rare" exception. It's cronic. And it's depraved.
At some point animal ag and the media are going to have to let go of their denial in the use of the word "alleged".
So sad for these unfortunate pigs born into a mad world.
ok the nut pulling part made me cringe a little but shut the fuck up you stupid vegans the world will NEVER go vegan deal with it and get a life nobody cares and people arent going to give up meat its AWESOME get your fucking priorities staight millions of HUMANS are killed a year through abortion and nobody gives a fuck why would they care about animals!!!! I got to get back to my burger!! MMMMMMMMM
I don’t know what made me cringe more: the Mercy for Animal investigation or this outrageous anonymous comment expressing a total lack of respect for, or compassion towards, animals and people.
Comments should be a place for serious reflection and debate. Sure, share an opposing view, but don’t go ugly on us.
We all care. I even care enough to wonder what could happen in someone’s life to make them talk with such nastiness and to wish that person well.
Oh my! In regards to the post by Anonymous - These incidences sure have a way of bring the "defenders" out of the woodwork!
That man was there for 72 days. That is about 645 hours. I think that what was shown was standard practice across the industry. Because one person chooses to abuse an animal it does not make everybody in agribusiness an animal abuser. Because one mother beats her children does it make every mother an child abuser?
"nikki" I never said I dont care about animal abuse people that do it have issues no doubt but why was this video only released now when it was taken back in July if mercy for animals TRULY cared they would have exposed it right away to stop farther abuse!! Seems more like a political agenda to me!!
Of course it is political. The government and the interests of agribusiness are one and the same: profit over the lives of those who cannot defend themselves against such exploitation. As we recently saw in the now-closed Vermont veal slaughterhouse, an official from a government agency turned a blind eye to the obvious suffering and cruelty that is rampant just beneath the surface of the PR-buffed image of the animal agriculture industry all just to keep the money machine rolling. If it had not been for the courageous efforts of the undercover investigator, the hideous torture of baby animals would still be going on because the USDA agent in charge of policing the facility in order to protect the animals against such acts of abuse did not raise the alarm when he himself is on tape stating that he could have the plant closed for such acts. He could have stopped the abuse but he did not. Is this the sort of policing you want in your community? Is this the sort of accountability you want from your local businesses/corporations/government agencies?
These kinds of investigations are in the best interests of everyone. It not only makes people and groups more accountable and responsible, but it spares untold numbers of animals further cruelty by informing the public of the horrors inherent but well-hidden in the typical American diet and lifestyle.
Thanks to that disturbing, horrifying video I'm giving up meat for good.
to the comment by Justin like the other person said why did the video not come out in July when it was taped if mercy for animals truly cared about these animals
@Anonymous: I think the timing is not something on which to fixate. When you have that much raw video, editing it down into any sort of coherent format, structuring and adding a narrative, obscuring faces of workers and such all takes a lot of time. I also assume there are certain protocols to be followed when releasing a video of this nature, so research and effort must be put in there as well. There are likely many more videos from this group and others that have yet to come to light; it just takes time to put it all together and get it out.
I appreciate all of the work that goes into pieces like this as it is essentially the only way that many people will ever get an honest look at how (in the case of this video) their bacon or sausage is made and it just might make them wonder about how much else in their life is a direct product of abuse and cruelty whether it is pigs being tortured and mutilated on factory farms or teenage workers in export processing zones in the third world being locked in firetrap sweatshops for 16 hours a day stitching up new jeans for the Gap and forced to have abortions all while being paid far less than a living wage. Videos like this remind people that their actions have consequences that big industry can't afford to let them know.
whatever Justin you and I both know it doesnt take 4 months to edit minutes of video I think the time frame is important but that is just an opinion just like your thoughts are!! If folks saw abuse happening to children it would be exposed right away and since we are putting animals on the same level humans why let the animal endure more abuse while you EDIT a video and add a narrative I think the video was self-explanitory!! Makes no sense!! Except the large business of any type they are here stay no matter of there practices thanks to a goverment that wants it that way
To the people saying MFA took too long to release the video: Are you vegan?
You feign such outrage at MFA's "response" time, saying the animals are suffering in the meantime, but I doubt you actually care about the animals.
You are simply looking for any excuse to criticize the video instead of recognizing the cruelty inherent in all animal agribusiness.
Tracy you ignorance in amusing but thats what you can expect from most americans if it wasn't for america the rest of the world would be boring their people are just stupid!!! How can you not get in your head that not reporting abuse shows that the mfa doesnt really care!! your a joke like most americans!!
The are you vegan part was exceptionally funny!! When hell freezes over I will become vegan
I know, right! Why are we talking about the response time on a video rather than what's happening IN the video?
We're complex beings and it's interesting to see the different reactions people take. The anger either seems to be directed at the cruelty (and inspires changes in diet) or is angled at those who are angry it's going on. Okay. I don't quite understand the second approach, but I appreciate that people are exploring the issues and their emotions surrounding it.
I just started reading Jonathan Safran Foer's "Eating Animals." It's so good. Ha, Ha. I said that on purpose because it seemed funny.
Whoops.
Tracy: Your blog might, unfortunately, be getting too popular to allow instant comments. I wonder if certain people would continue to read if they weren’t allowed to spew their nasty blatherings.
And, dude, seriously: you use the word “ignorance” and can’t even spell correctly.
Yep Nikki you continue to confirm what I said before Americans are dumb mispell one word and they jump on it RIGHT considering that the USA has one of the worst school systems in the world shocking you caught that!! You still didn't answer one simple question why hold the video for 4 months if you really care!! Like I figured nobody knows why!! Disable the comments on here that's what most people like you do when they need a easy way put you are American after aLl !!
Mike, unless you can figure out how to use periods, this is the last response you'll be getting from me.
All I'm so offended Tracy how will I ever cope with you not responding to me!! Still didn't answer the question that was asked and instead you will stop responding to me ALLLLL. Oh well go spend your welfare check or something since that how most jobless useless Americans get their money!
Don't ever shut this site down, I absolutely love it!! I come here and read how vegans think that they will turn the world off to meat, it won't happen!!But it's fun to watch you try!! It's a little bit like that show whale wars those folks waste all that time and money for what??? Have the japs stopped whaling??? Not even close!!! By the way any of you have pet dogs or cats? How do you feed them?? Just wondering.
Anonymous sickens me. I guess he's never watched "Meet Your Meat" or even the trailer for "Earthlings". Go back to your Walmart shopping and stop bringing such ugly hate to this blog.
Pandora, thanks for your comment and for reading my blog. :)
How do you feed your dogs and cats?
I was not going to reply, because you really are virulent and I don't want to feed the fire, but here goes. I feed our dogs a mix of rice, steamed carrots, green beans, kidney beans and other various veggies. They get their protien from beans mostly. They also get fed supplements to make sure they get everything they need. Our cats get canned food- cats are 100% carnivores. Do I like that? No. Do I force them to eat what they can't digest? Duh.
I also don't call myself vegan. I eat meat though it's infrequent from extremely select sources, none of the animals I eat are from agri-business, none of them go anywhere near a slaughterhouse, all of them live normal happy lives. I don't eat dairy though, because there's practically no way around the rampant cruelty that results from it.
Oh, and the dogs always get marrow bones (and sometimes ground meat) from bison from NorthStar Bison which is where we get most of the meat we eat (only the bison as the other animals go to slaughter). The other meat we get is from hunters that we know.
Yeah... guess I'll chime in too - My dog eats a variety of beans, veggies, rice, pasta & whole grain cereals. He weighs about 85 lbs - His coat is gorgeous... His eyes are bright & clear - And at 4 years old, he has the energy of a puppy. Yeah, Backus is beautiful -and he eats no meat! :)
Cool, didn't know dogs would consume just grain.And do not get all offened, I am not the only anonymous person on here I was just wondering!I like to understand things, and I just wondered how you can allow animal slaughtet for one side of the food chain, (cats etc.) but not for humans! And personally I don't hunt hate it, but I have seen enough aftermath of hunting (wounded deer) etc. doesn't seem very humane to me.I'm not going to get you to eat meat and you won't get me to become vegan, but whats wrong with debating the issue??
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