Animal suffering

[spencelo]

The biggest problem with factory farming is the way in which we personify the animals being farmed. They aren’t people, they’re animals. They’re put to pretty good use.

So the torture and abuse that occurs in factory farming isn’t all that bad, in other words? Btw, people are “animals” too – we’re just human animals.

 

[Ridgerunner]

You can only say this because you don’t understand the factory farming system (I invite you to read the linked paper in the op).

I read this before on another thread, and it’s full of misinformation. Here’s an example; one of many:

“Cows. Over 33 million cows are slaughtered each year in America. These animals are also routinely mutilated without pain relief. American cows are hot-iron branded and castrated; their tails are docked; they are dehorned through sensitive tissue; and their ears are cut for identification. The weaning process is traumatic for them, as it is for pigs. A calf would normally suckle from its mother for six months, but in factory farms, mother and child are separated almost immediately. Cows separated from their calves will mope and bellow for days.”

-Almost no cattle are branded anymore. I live in cattle country and almost never see branded cattle.
-Cows, of course, are not castrated. Baby bulls are. I have seen it done many times. Some, but not all, evidence pain, which seems to stop immediately after the procedure.
-Dehorning is pretty rare anymore because few horned cattle are raised anymore. I have seen it done. There is evidence of pain, but it stops as soon as the procedure is over, by all visible signs. The tissue in the horn area is not particularly sensitive. Remember, when they have horns, they ram those horns into each other and into inanimate objects with thousands of pounds of force. How sensitive can they really be?
-Nodoby docks the tails of cattle of any age. I have probably seen hundreds of thousands of cattle in my time and I have never seen one with a docked tail.
-Ranchers don’t cut the ears of cattle. I have never seen this. What ranchers actually do is put tags in their ears for identification. I have done that myself. They show less pain from that than from a vaccination needle.
-A calf will suckle as long as the cow has milk and it has access. That could be for a year and more, though it’s rare. Normally the cow will start to dry up after about three months, and the calf has no choice but to seek other food, and increasingly so. Ranchers usually don’t wean calves until they are at least three months old, usually a bit longer.
-The calf will bawl for its mother off and on for a day or two. Not longer. But not all even do that. It depends on how much milk they have been getting. If their mother was dry or nearly so, they don’t bawl at all. Their mothers will bawl for no longer than that, and they don’t “mope”. Once the urgency of the milk supply recedes, they forget the calf entirely. If their calf dies, they forget it in minutes. They are in no way sentimental.

Just generally, now. Cattle battle each other for “pecking order”. They will butt each other with force that would instantly crush a human being. But they seem little affected by it. They will venture into briars no human would enter, and they do it without showing the slightest evidence of discomfort or distress. I have seen them go right through a barbed wire fence that would shred a human. They stand with bare feet in deep snow. They will graze under a sun that would give a person sunstroke.

They are not us, and we’re not them.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Another quick one, then i have to go do something else.

“From the article: Almost all of the chickens sold in supermarkets—“broilers”—are raised in windowless sheds, each housing 30,000+ birds. In these sheds, the chickens cannot move around without pushing through other birds. Nor can they stretch their wings or get away from more dominant birds. Also, the sheds stink of ammonia. “High ammonia levels give the birds chronic respiratory disease, sores on their feet and hocks, and breast blisters. It makes their eyes water, and when it is really bad, many birds go blind.” The chickens are bred for unnaturally fast growth, and so they cannot stand for long periods. Some cannot stand at all.”

-Chicken houses have very large windows, essentially the whole upper half of the long side walls. They are usually closed during extremely cold temperatures, open for ventilation in more clement weather. That’s standard. In hot weather, there are big fans that suck the outside air in to keep the chickens cool. There are “misters” in the more modern houses that spray a fine mist into the air for cooling.
-There is actually quite a bit of room in them for chickens to roam around, and they can certainly stretch their wings.
-The chicken houses do smell of ammonia because their manure is soaked up by wood shavings or rice hulls. But they don’t get respiratory diseases or go blind or get sores. For most of the year, the houses are aggressively ventilated. The farmers replace the whole floor after every flock, removing the shavings or rice hulls and replacing them, about a foot deep.
-The chickens can most definitely stand. That’s what they do in the houses. They move around. When it gets dark, they do go somnolent.

It’s a total myth that the “unnatural growth” or “extra large breasts” make them unable to stand or walk. Commercial chickens are a robust breed, and that’s true. But around the processing facilities, some chickens get away onto the grounds. The “rule” is that if a chicken gets out of the grounds, it’s free to anyone who can catch it. They’re not easy to catch, but people do, take them home and keep them. They’re just like any other chicken except that they’re bigger than some breeds, and people keep them just like they do any other chickens. They’re a lot like the “white rocks” we had when I was a kid.

When I was a kid and we raised chickens, they spent the whole day scratching the ground and eating. Now and then they would drink from a waterer or a nearby creek. At night, they would hunker down and roost. In the chicken houses of today, they spend the whole day scratching around and eating from big feeders. They have fresh water. When it gets dark, they hunker down and roost.

 

[10gr8kids]

I read this before on another thread, and it’s full of misinformation. Here’s an example; one of many:

“Cows. Over 33 million cows are slaughtered each year in America. These animals are also routinely mutilated without pain relief. American cows are hot-iron branded and castrated; their tails are docked; they are dehorned through sensitive tissue; and their ears are cut for identification. The weaning process is traumatic for them, as it is for pigs. A calf would normally suckle from its mother for six months, but in factory farms, mother and child are separated almost immediately. Cows separated from their calves will mope and bellow for days.”

-Almost no cattle are branded anymore. I live in cattle country and almost never see branded cattle.
-Cows, of course, are not castrated. Baby bulls are. I have seen it done many times. Some, but not all, evidence pain, which seems to stop immediately after the procedure.
-Dehorning is pretty rare anymore because few horned cattle are raised anymore. I have seen it done. There is evidence of pain, but it stops as soon as the procedure is over, by all visible signs. The tissue in the horn area is not particularly sensitive. Remember, when they have horns, they ram those horns into each other and into inanimate objects with thousands of pounds of force. How sensitive can they really be?
-Nodoby docks the tails of cattle of any age. I have probably seen hundreds of thousands of cattle in my time and I have never seen one with a docked tail.
-Ranchers don’t cut the ears of cattle. I have never seen this. What ranchers actually do is put tags in their ears for identification. I have done that myself. They show less pain from that than from a vaccination needle.
-A calf will suckle as long as the cow has milk and it has access. That could be for a year and more, though it’s rare. Normally the cow will start to dry up after about three months, and the calf has no choice but to seek other food, and increasingly so. Ranchers usually don’t wean calves until they are at least three months old, usually a bit longer.
-The calf will bawl for its mother off and on for a day or two. Not longer. But not all even do that. It depends on how much milk they have been getting. If their mother was dry or nearly so, they don’t bawl at all. Their mothers will bawl for no longer than that, and they don’t “mope”. Once the urgency of the milk supply recedes, they forget the calf entirely. If their calf dies, they forget it in minutes. They are in no way sentimental.

Just generally, now. Cattle battle each other for “pecking order”. They will butt each other with force that would instantly crush a human being. But they seem little affected by it. They will venture into briars no human would enter, and they do it without showing the slightest evidence of discomfort or distress. I have seen them go right through a barbed wire fence that would shred a human. They stand with bare feet in deep snow. They will graze under a sun that would give a person sunstroke.

They are not us, and we’re not them.

 

[10gr8kids]

Another quick one, then i have to go do something else.

“From the article: Almost all of the chickens sold in supermarkets—“broilers”—are raised in windowless sheds, each housing 30,000+ birds. In these sheds, the chickens cannot move around without pushing through other birds. Nor can they stretch their wings or get away from more dominant birds. Also, the sheds stink of ammonia. “High ammonia levels give the birds chronic respiratory disease, sores on their feet and hocks, and breast blisters. It makes their eyes water, and when it is really bad, many birds go blind.” The chickens are bred for unnaturally fast growth, and so they cannot stand for long periods. Some cannot stand at all.”

-Chicken houses have very large windows, essentially the whole upper half of the long side walls. They are usually closed during extremely cold temperatures, open for ventilation in more clement weather. That’s standard. In hot weather, there are big fans that suck the outside air in to keep the chickens cool. There are “misters” in the more modern houses that spray a fine mist into the air for cooling.
-There is actually quite a bit of room in them for chickens to roam around, and they can certainly stretch their wings.
-The chicken houses do smell of ammonia because their manure is soaked up by wood shavings or rice hulls. But they don’t get respiratory diseases or go blind or get sores. For most of the year, the houses are aggressively ventilated. The farmers replace the whole floor after every flock, removing the shavings or rice hulls and replacing them, about a foot deep.
-The chickens can most definitely stand. That’s what they do in the houses. They move around. When it gets dark, they do go somnolent.

It’s a total myth that the “unnatural growth” or “extra large breasts” make them unable to stand or walk. Commercial chickens are a robust breed, and that’s true. But around the processing facilities, some chickens get away onto the grounds. The “rule” is that if a chicken gets out of the grounds, it’s free to anyone who can catch it. They’re not easy to catch, but people do, take them home and keep them. They’re just like any other chicken except that they’re bigger than some breeds, and people keep them just like they do any other chickens. They’re a lot like the “white rocks” we had when I was a kid.

When I was a kid and we raised chickens, they spent the whole day scratching the ground and eating. Now and then they would drink from a waterer or a nearby creek. At night, they would hunker down and roost. In the chicken houses of today, they spend the whole day scratching around and eating from big feeders. They have fresh water. When it gets dark, they hunker down and roost.

It’s nice to hear from someone else who knows the truth about agri.

 

[severus68]

Both animals and humans can suffer. That’ s true. But anyone who is truly familiar with animals knows that animals and humans do not suffer from the same things, to the same degree or in the same way.

With respect, I disagree. I think it is too painful to be aware that animals suffer like us - some exceptions like scallops perhaps not. Most people are good and do not want animals to suffer but many do not want to know. With awareness comes unpalatable decisions to be made like not eating delicious bacon.

 

[severus68]

Nor should it be. I have been in factory farms many times. I have also seen the videos of those who oppose them, supposedly showing the conditions on factory farms. They couldn’t be more different.

That’s not to say that there are no abusive factory farms anywhere. But I have been in a lot of them, and they don’t resemble the oppositionist films I have seen. Nor do they fit the verbal descriptions either.

When it comes to the Church opposing the eating of meat, it might be added that 1/3 of the earth’s temperate surface is grassland, unfit for any other agricultural use. Stopping the eating of meat would seriously curtail the human food supply. Of the grass-eating domestic animals, only cattle are ever fed grain. But they don’t need to be, and in most countries are not. Therefore, grass-eaters like cattle, sheep and goats are not inherently eaters of anything humans rely on for nourishment, but can be regarded as gifts from God capable of turning the inedible into edible, nutritious food.

A lot of land would b freed up for agriculture if meat animal grazing is ended. You could grow different plants in different soils. If Man can reclaim from the sea, I don’t see why Man can’t make most land arable. This has been done all over the world particularly in areas where people are starving. Many people in the world eat very little meat, if at all.

 

[severus68]

** It is likewise unworthy to spend money on them that should as a priority go to the relief of human misery. One can love animals; one should not direct to them the affection due only to persons. **

People seem to miss that part a lot.

Human > Animal

The biggest problem with factory farming is the way in which we personify the animals being farmed. They aren’t people, they’re animals. They’re put to pretty good use.

Then no one should have any hobbies, go out to dinner, all Catholics should just eat the minimum, have the smalllest possible home etc and all their other money should go to charities for humans. If anyone has a hobby that costs money, this section should not be quoted to support the argument that we should not bother about animal suffering. Even our Pope said we should treat animals like commodities.

On the part about affection, I would think that would mean that one should not indulge a pet at the expense of one’s child, as in neglecting your child while buying fancy clothes for your cat, for instance. I do not see how that provision can mean anything more than that as I am sure the Church knows well that you cannot force anyone to feel or not to feel.

 

[10gr8kids]

Then no one should have any hobbies, go out to dinner, all Catholics should just eat the minimum, have the smalllest possible home etc and all their other money should go to charities for humans. If anyone has a hobby that costs money, this section should not be quoted to support the argument that we should not bother about animal suffering. Even our Pope said we should treat animals like commodities.

This may be more true than we would like to admit. We may very well have to answer for our over indulgence while we neglect the poorest people of the world. And I’m accusing myself.

As far as using our grazing land to grow crops, can you see any potential problems with this? We have many wild animals that share the land with our cattle. If we used this land to grow crops, they would become a problem. Whatever we had to do about that problem would make many people cry about cruelty to animals. What about the extra fuel that would have to be used to work the ground and plant all the crops then harvest them? Not to mention all the extra fertilizer it takes to grow crops.
What about when we suffer through many years of drought? Look at how the food prices are already soaring from the drought we are having now. Crops take much more water than your grasslands. What about all the extra insecticides we will have to use? Maybe we can grow all organic. Try feeding the world that way.

It’s hard enough for me to try to raise a garden for my family with all these problems, I suppose anyone who wants to try to do these things though can go ahead and start. When the rest of us see how well you make it work I’m sure we will want to follow suit.

I know I said I wasn’t going to post anymore on this but my will is just to weak.

 

[Ridgerunner]

A lot of land would b freed up for agriculture if meat animal grazing is ended. You could grow different plants in different soils. If Man can reclaim from the sea, I don’t see why Man can’t make most land arable. This has been done all over the world particularly in areas where people are starving. Many people in the world eat very little meat, if at all.

Not at all. As the Soviets learned in their “Virgin lands” project and as we learned during the Dust Bowl, some land is simply not suitable for crop farming and should be left in grass. There are very good reasons why the grasslands of the world have remained as grasslands for millenia or been returned to grasslands after abortive attempts to farm them.

As mentioned previously, fully 1/3 of the earth’s temperate lands are grasslands, suitable for nothing but grass. People cannot digest grass. Only certain animals can. And many of those animals are suitable for human food.

I am aware that many people in the world eat very little meat. That, in itself, is not an argument against meat-eating. Many people in the world do not eat plantains either. But that is not an argument against eating plantain.

It may be worth thinking about that certain peoples, most notably Indo-Europeans, spent thousands of years out on the Eurasian steppes living off their flocks and herds. It is a fact that, of all the worlds’ people, only Indo-Europeans retain lactose tolerance into adulthood in any significant numbers. It is generally accepted that those millenia of living off flocks and herds encouraged that capacity by “natural selection”. If so, can we really say that those people and others are something unnatural by consuming animal products?

Finally, it is known that before whites arrived in the Americas, the Indians on the great plains were few in number and were not well-fed despite being surrounded by billions of pounds of high-quality protein on the hoof in the form of buffalo. With the coming of the horse, that protein became accessible to them. The Indian population multiplied rapidly and enjoyed better health than previously, until the Indian wars, of course.

Since 1/3 of the world’s temperate land surface will produce no food if meat-eating is somehow prohibited, radical vegetarianism is a formula for human malnutrition and starvation.

For those who want to be vegetarians and who manage not to harm their children doing it, (which is a hazard) I say “do as you wish”. But they ought not to force the rest of us into it, and certainly not by maudlin and often misleading appeals to a sentimentality that is properly only applied to humans.

 

[Ridgerunner]

With respect, I disagree. I think it is too painful to be aware that animals suffer like us - some exceptions like scallops perhaps not. Most people are good and do not want animals to suffer but many do not want to know. With awareness comes unpalatable decisions to be made like not eating delicious bacon.

Farmers or ranchers who cause their animals to suffer are stupid. That’s a good way to go broke. Farmers and ranchers treat their animals far better than “mother nature” does. Far, far better. Every rancher who has ever seen starving deer come to share the generous feed they give their cattle (and every rancher has seen it) knows that. Every rancher who vaccinates his cattle against infectious diseases that ravage wild animals knows it. Every hunter who has seen coyotes or feral hogs tear a fawn or a weak deer apart knows it.

And yes, animals can suffer. But they don’t suffer in the same ways we do. Every farmer and rancher knows that as well.

 

[Angelsflight]

I have been a vegetarian for 20 years. And that is just right for me personally. I could not care less what the rest of the world eats. Eat the meat! Who cares? I would not dream of trying to convert anyone to be a vegetarian.

My biggest argument is how animals are treated while waiting for slaughter. I believe it is our **duty **to take care of God’s creatures as He commanded. To stand back with the attitude of “It’s only a pig” or “Its just a cow” is disgusting. What if God said that about us? “It’s only a human!”

One thing that happened to me just this morning: my friend had taken a trip out of town. She asked me to feed her cat for the week and I agreed. She also has a snake, and she said she would feed the snake before she left, since it only eats once a week. Then this morning before i went to her house, she calls and tells me that the snake wasnt hungry when she tried to feed it a few days ago… And would i mind checking on the rat that was sitting in a hot stuffy laundry room to see if it was still alive. Ugh. I went in there and the whole room stunk to high Heaven. I found a good sized dead rat in a small tupperware with a few airholes punched into it. No food, no water…in that hot room. I was livid. Ok, its food for the meat-eating snake, I get it. But until the day that rat is scheduled for dinner, it has the **right **to food, water, an adequate place to stay with room to move around, and fresh air. Anything less than that, is inhumane. Period.

As for the “nature” of things…put a 2 year old in a playpen with an apple and a bunny. If the kid plays with the apple and eats the bunny, I will buy you a new car. (taken from the book Fit for Life: by Harvey and Marilyn Diamond

 

[Ridgerunner]

As for the “nature” of things…put a 2 year old in a playpen with an apple and a bunny. If the kid plays with the apple and eats the bunny, I will buy you a new car. (taken from the book Fit for Life: by Harvey and Marilyn Diamond

Well-turned and clever, but it doesn’t mean anything. Put a full baby bottle into that playpen and the child will go for it if he/she is hungry. He might or might not be afraid of the bunny, but he won’t be afraid of the apple or the bottle. Remove the bottle, cook the bunny and chop it into little bits, and the kid will probably eat the bunny and play with the apple all right. Meaningless.

 

[tabycat]

Another quick one, then i have to go do something else.

“From the article: Almost all of the chickens sold in supermarkets—“broilers”—are raised in windowless sheds, each housing 30,000+ birds. In these sheds, the chickens cannot move around without pushing through other birds. Nor can they stretch their wings or get away from more dominant birds. Also, the sheds stink of ammonia. “High ammonia levels give the birds chronic respiratory disease, sores on their feet and hocks, and breast blisters. It makes their eyes water, and when it is really bad, many birds go blind.” The chickens are bred for unnaturally fast growth, and so they cannot stand for long periods. Some cannot stand at all.”

-Chicken houses have very large windows, essentially the whole upper half of the long side walls. They are usually closed during extremely cold temperatures, open for ventilation in more clement weather. That’s standard. In hot weather, there are big fans that suck the outside air in to keep the chickens cool. There are “misters” in the more modern houses that spray a fine mist into the air for cooling.
-There is actually quite a bit of room in them for chickens to roam around, and they can certainly stretch their wings.
-The chicken houses do smell of ammonia because their manure is soaked up by wood shavings or rice hulls. But they don’t get respiratory diseases or go blind or get sores. For most of the year, the houses are aggressively ventilated. The farmers replace the whole floor after every flock, removing the shavings or rice hulls and replacing them, about a foot deep.
-The chickens can most definitely stand. That’s what they do in the houses. They move around. When it gets dark, they do go somnolent.

It’s a total myth that the “unnatural growth” or “extra large breasts” make them unable to stand or walk. Commercial chickens are a robust breed, and that’s true. But around the processing facilities, some chickens get away onto the grounds. The “rule” is that if a chicken gets out of the grounds, it’s free to anyone who can catch it. They’re not easy to catch, but people do, take them home and keep them. They’re just like any other chicken except that they’re bigger than some breeds, and people keep them just like they do any other chickens. They’re a lot like the “white rocks” we had when I was a kid.

When I was a kid and we raised chickens, they spent the whole day scratching the ground and eating. Now and then they would drink from a waterer or a nearby creek. At night, they would hunker down and roost. In the chicken houses of today, they spend the whole day scratching around and eating from big feeders. They have fresh water. When it gets dark, they hunker down and roost.

 

[Angelsflight]

Well-turned and clever, but it doesn’t mean anything. Put a full baby bottle into that playpen and the child will go for it if he/she is hungry. He might or might not be afraid of the bunny, but he won’t be afraid of the apple or the bottle. Remove the bottle, cook the bunny and chop it into little bits, and the kid will probably eat the bunny and play with the apple all right. Meaningless.

LOL. You gave me my first laugh of the day…thank you!

 

[tabycat]

Well-turned and clever, but it doesn’t mean anything. Put a full baby bottle into that playpen and the child will go for it if he/she is hungry. He might or might not be afraid of the bunny, but he won’t be afraid of the apple or the bottle. Remove the bottle, cook the bunny and chop it into little bits, and the kid will probably eat the bunny and play with the apple all right. Meaningless.

I always thought that God gave humans the wrong type of teeth to eat only vegies! BTW.Bunnies are yummy when cooked the right way.

 

[JaneGrey]

I have been a vegetarian for 20 years. And that is just right for me personally. I could not care less what the rest of the world eats. Eat the meat! Who cares? I would not dream of trying to convert anyone to be a vegetarian.

My biggest argument is how animals are treated while waiting for slaughter. I believe it is our **duty **to take care of God’s creatures as He commanded. To stand back with the attitude of “It’s only a pig” or “Its just a cow” is disgusting. What if God said that about us? “It’s only a human!”

One thing that happened to me just this morning: my friend had taken a trip out of town. She asked me to feed her cat for the week and I agreed. She also has a snake, and she said she would feed the snake before she left, since it only eats once a week. Then this morning before i went to her house, she calls and tells me that the snake wasnt hungry when she tried to feed it a few days ago… And would i mind checking on the rat that was sitting in a hot stuffy laundry room to see if it was still alive. Ugh. I went in there and the whole room stunk to high Heaven. I found a good sized dead rat in a small tupperware with a few airholes punched into it. No food, no water…in that hot room. I was livid. Ok, its food for the meat-eating snake, I get it. **But until the day that rat is scheduled for dinner, it has the **right ****to food, water, an adequate place to stay with room to move around, and fresh air. Anything less than that, is inhumane. Period.

As for the “nature” of things…put a 2 year old in a playpen with an apple and a bunny. If the kid plays with the apple and eats the bunny, I will buy you a new car. (taken from the book Fit for Life: by Harvey and Marilyn Diamond

Well said.

 

[severus68]

I always thought that God gave humans the wrong type of teeth to eat only vegies! BTW.Bunnies are yummy when cooked the right way.

Try catching, killing, and eating prey with your teeth and nails.

 

[Angelsflight]

Try catching, killing, and eating prey with your teeth and nails.

Exactly! Thats what i meant about our “nature”…if it were in our nature we would be able to do as the animals do…pounce on our prey and eat it live right then and there.

The 2 year old in the playpen would not do that. He would not attack the bunny and rip its flesh off with his teeth, because it is not in his nature. He would eat that apple instead.

Just my thoughts.

 

[10gr8kids]

Exactly! Thats what i meant about our “nature”…if it were in our nature we would be able to do as the animals do…pounce on our prey and eat it live right then and there.

The 2 year old in the playpen would not do that. He would not attack the bunny and rip its flesh off with his teeth, because it is not in his nature. He would eat that apple instead.

Just my thoughts.

This doesn’t make much sense to me. A 2 yr old is still dependent on his parents. A lion cub is still dependent on the pride. Just because a lion cub will not attack and take down an antelope does not mean it’s not in it’s nature to do so.