The Slaughtering of Animals in Factories. Moral dilemmas in the modern world

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Amen and amen! Yes, much is asked of us–God has prepared a fairly lengthy “to do” list (reminds me of when my parents would go out of town when I was a teenager and they’d leave me a list of chores)–but much, much more has been given us.
 
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HelpingHands:
I posted a citation from the Catechism of the Catholic Church, and also quotation from our Holy Father. Why is there argument? Faithful Catholics are called to be considerate of God’s creation, period.

Does that mean we disregard the unborn? No! Does that mean we go out and fornicate? No! Does that mean that we exploit the poor? No! Does that mean we lie under oath? No! Does that mean we cheat our neighbor? No!

We’re supposed to obey all of God’s commands! That means:
  1. no abortion
    2)Treat animals kindly
    3)No fornications
  2. Help the poor
  3. No cheating or lying
  4. etc and so forth…
Get the drift? Therefore, our love of creation shouldn’t be limited. If we’re gentle with farm animals and advocate for kind treatment of them, it doesn’t mean that we think abortion is hunky dory, and visa versa. Right?
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Dear friend

:clapping: Well said, the left hand must be doing the same as the right hand in all things. In this case mine are both clapping everything you said.

God Bless you and much love and peace to you

Teresa
 
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seeker63:
[Many animals that are slaughtered for food purposes are in fact still conscious when the process starts. And many others are forced to live in miserable conditions beforehand.]
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I totally agree that the conditions under which many animals are forced to live, if you can call it living, are horrible. All animals are conscious when the process starts and all the commercial slaughtering that I have seen is done as humanely as possible. Large animals such as cattle and swine are shot in the brain with a steel rod. Poultry is gassed, electrically shocked, then decapitated. No death is pretty, but the commercial processors do try to make it as quick and painless as possible. If you have verifiable information to the contrary, please let me know.
 
I have heard of cases, for instance, where cattle are skinned while still alive, and that keeping the line moving and the process running efficiently is a greater concern than making sure the animals are all actually dead.
 
Hi everyone,
First, let me say that like our Holy Father, I’m not a vegetarian. So, I’m not an animal right fanatic by any rights. But, I try and buy free range chickens, I raise my own eggs, and do my best.

I love the internet because you can get info very quickly on any subject. I think we all ought to be as conciensious as we can, within reason.

Anyways, here is a link to some photos of a typical slaughterhouse scene. It sounds as if they try their best to be humane. Personally, I’m more concerned with the living conditions that these poor beasts have to endure while living. As geezerbob said, death is never pretty. My appeal is that, animals that serve humans by providing our food deserve gentle care.

Slaughterhouse photos
 
I’m not a vegetarian either, though I wish I was. I try to pray before eating a meat dish for forgiveness.
 
The reason why the meatpacking industry tries to stun animals as humanely as possible is that when animals struggle, they release hormones that cause the meat to acquire a foul taste and for the texture of the meat to require a lower quality grade (and therefore a lower price). As I recall, they used to use an expression called PSE, which describes the degraded condition of the meat caused by an animal that struggles. Some places had gentle showers to calm the animals and an animal psychologist recently started designing gently curving pens to keep the animals calm. An animal that is still conscious will struggle and because animals are so heavy, an animal that struggles could injure or kill a worker.

Keep in mind that in nature, predator animals hunt and eat prey animals all the time. A wolf-sized animal will kill and eat about one deer a week. The things that animals do to one another isn’t pretty. At least humans have learned to be (or try to be) humane when they kill animals for food.
 
Helping,
Thanks for the pics, it just reinforces my stand on this and that I will not partake in the eating of flesh/eggs or dairy, from a factory.

Al,
I never saw “gentle showers” when I went to butcher barns. Slaughtering an animal correctly, the animal won’t struggle. Butcherbarns usually fail in the stunning of animals and really don’t care. They just care on how many animals they can kill in a hour or a set period for profit. You have to realise these people go there day in/day out, doing the same thing. They get de sensitised to it.

Animals can’t help it on how they kill their prey in the wild. We can.
 
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seeker63:
I’m not a vegetarian either, though I wish I was. I try to pray before eating a meat dish for forgiveness.
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I’m a vegetarian, but a co-worker of mine isn’t. As a kid, he was raised on a farm, very poor. They slaughtered their own animals. His take on eating meat is that it’s OK, but if we take a portion of meat to eat, we’d better eat the whole thing, b/c something died for us to have it on our plate. I liked that way of looking at it; most meat we eat is so far removed from the animal that it looks nothing like the living creature it was.

Seeker, if you’d like to be a vegetarian, just try to slowly eliminate meat from your diet. It’s not an all or nothing thing, you don’t have to go cold turkey. Maybe try one meatless dinner a week and see how you like that. Then, two, then three, etc. There are some good resources on the internet. If you’d like a discussion group, I’d recommend www.veggieboards.com
 
Your argument on how to treat animals based on consciousness is the same argument used as to whether to abort babies due to their consciousness
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You aren’t understanding what I mean by conciousness. Aborted babies may not have developed enough THOUGHT or SENSE organs…but they have a soul, and are human life.
Then explain why most mother animals defend their young to the death. Or explain when animals save humans from being harmed like saving them from fires, natural disasters etc.
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Because they are programmed to do such things. They defend their young to the death to pass on their genes. But it has nothing to do with a soul. That is a completely material program in their physical brains. A soul has nothing to do with that in animals or even humans, necessarily. They rescue humans because of similar motives. Perhaps the humans are the ones who care for them. This is not a spiritual issue.

Animals are conscious of their environment, so to speak, but they aren’t conscious of their consciousness, or conscious of their consciousness of their consciousness etc. An irreducible soul is needed for such things. There can be no “evidence” for it even in humans. Animals are like highly complex robots. They are a wonderful organic creation of God, but ultimately they are sort of like organic robots. Pre-programmed, though taking in data through sensors to effect their actions, and ultimately unconscious and unsouled.
 
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springbreeze:
Dear Fergal

I see your logic here, but if people cannot respect animal life what hope is there ever of respecting human life.
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Yes Teresa I understand you. what I am getting at is that most of the exreme animal welfare activists (and notice I say most, not all) are radically pro choice and pro-abortion. This has been my experience to date. Maybe its an unfortunate experience but nevertheless and very real one.

Sorry for going off topic folks, I just cannot understand this at all.
 
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batteddy:
Animals are conscious of their environment, so to speak, but they aren’t conscious of their consciousness, or conscious of their consciousness of their consciousness etc. An irreducible soul is needed for such things. There can be no “evidence” for it even in humans. Animals are like highly complex robots. They are a wonderful organic creation of God, but ultimately they are sort of like organic robots. Pre-programmed, though taking in data through sensors to effect their actions, and ultimately unconscious and unsouled.
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What about the gorillas and chimpanzees who learned several hundred words of sign language? Seems like more than organic robots to me.
 
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springbreeze:
Dear friends

I worked many years ago for an animal rescue centre. I’ve seen alot of needless animal suffering. Animals do and can suffer displaying behavioural reactions and problems due to suffering cruelty and neglect. I have seen animals kept in close confines without natural environments become extensively violent to themselves and to other animals. All manner of behaviour and psychosis ensues, eg, plucking of own feathers, self-harm, habitual repetative movements, lack of appetite, excessive in-fighting/ increasing violence, severing of own limbs, eating own excrement, cannabilism and the list varies for different species.

Animals are not spiritual, but they are like us in their basic needs and require love and kindness to thrive as well as their requirements of food and water.

It simply is not justifiable for humans to treat animals as they do based on supply, demand and profit margins.

I am no animal rights activist, this is just plain common sense to me.

God Bless you and much love and peace to you

Teresa
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I couldn’t help but notice, that if you replaced the word animal, with human in y our post, how accurately you have described much of the human condition as well.

blessings,
cheddar
 
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Fergal:
what I am getting at is that most of the exreme animal welfare activists (and notice I say most, not all) are radically pro choice and pro-abortion. This has been my experience to date.
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Fergal,

I agree with you, as I said below. I have the same experience. Perhaps humans and animals are seen as equals, in some sense, or in most senses. Thus, what goes for one, goes for the other. If you can kill an animal to relieve suffering, so too with a human (a tiny baby), etc.
 
I’ve noticed one thing the Left likes to scoff at is that the Right will be in favor of the death penalty, but opposed to abortion, essentially in favor of the right to life at the beginning, but not at the end. One of the things that continually impresses me about Catholicism is that its positions are consistent. What goes for one goes for all. Charity, love, the right to life, and so forth must be applied across the board.
 
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seeker63:
I’ve noticed one thing the Left likes to scoff at is that the Right will be in favor of the death penalty, but opposed to abortion, essentially in favor of the right to life at the beginning, but not at the end. One of the things that continually impresses me about Catholicism is that its positions are consistent. What goes for one goes for all. Charity, love, the right to life, and so forth must be applied across the board.
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Excellent point, seeker!!! đź‘Ť
 
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HelpingHands:
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seeker63:
I’ve noticed one thing the Left likes to scoff at is that the Right will be in favor of the death penalty, but opposed to abortion, essentially in favor of the right to life at the beginning, but not at the end. One of the things that continually impresses me about Catholicism is that its positions are consistent. What goes for one goes for all. Charity, love, the right to life, and so forth must be applied across the board.
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Excellent point, seeker!!! đź‘Ť
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It would be an excellent point if it was true.

First off, abortion and the death penalty are not on the same moral level and they are not as seeker has described them.

That is abortion/death penalty are not “essentially in favor of the right to life at the beginning, but not at the end”.

That would be abortion/euthanasia.

The Catholic Church does not have an absolute prohibition against the death penalty but it does against abortion and euthanasia.

Here is the relevant paragraph from the Catechism.

2267 Assuming that the guilty party’s identity and responsibility have been fully determined, the traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude recourse to the death penalty, if this is the only possible way of effectively defending human lives against the unjust aggressor.

If, however, non-lethal means are sufficient to defend and protect people’s safety from the aggressor, authority will limit itself to such means, as these are more in keeping with the concrete conditions of the common good and are more in conformity to the dignity of the human person.

Today, in fact, as a consequence of the possibilities which the state has for effectively preventing crime, by rendering one who has committed an offense incapable of doing harm - without definitely taking away from him the possibility of redeeming himself - the cases in which the execution of the offender is an absolute necessity “are very rare, if not practically non-existent.”

Now I have to ask, what does this have to do with the processing of tasty animals for us to consume?

In case you wondered, I am a member of PETA, that is People Eating Tasty Animals.
 
I can’t believe that this is such a major issue with people here. Look, and animal does not have a rational soul it cannot suffer because suffering properly speaking is contingent upon having a rational soul. Yes they can feel pain and we are not to try to harm animals but give me a break it is like everyone here is from California or something.

BTW I firmly believe that being a vegetarian is contrary to the faith and I will explain why if I am challenged.
 
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Fox:
Helping,

Al,
I never saw “gentle showers” when I went to butcher barns. Slaughtering an animal correctly, the animal won’t struggle. Butcherbarns usually fail in the stunning of animals and really don’t care. They just care on how many animals they can kill in a hour or a set period for profit. You have to realise these people go there day in/day out, doing the same thing. They get de sensitised to it.

Animals can’t help it on how they kill their prey in the wild. We can.
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The location was a large meat packing plant in Sioux Falls, SD, as I recall. Besides numbers of animals, there is also a quality of meat issue. A lot of factors are involved including for example, the percent fat in sausage, the recovery of as much product as possible, the preparation of premium products that command a premium price (pre-cooked bacon, and other meats, for example). If the hog singers don’t work properly, for example, then the little hairs will need to be manually shaved off, thereby increasing costs. Certain organs must be carefully removed intact for high-value medical use. The hides need to be carefully removed for resale to the leather industry.

It’s more than just kill rate per hour.

P.S. We used to jokingly call the machines “hog singers” instead of “hog singe-ers”. They were great big giant gas jet burners that took the hairs off of 225 lb butcher hogs and 600 lb sows. Just that variation alone (in weight of carcasses) caused challenges in production. It’s more than just knocking or electrocuting an animal. (Gassing by carbon dioxide back then didn’t work out because it would cause the heart rate to increase which in turn would cause the quality of the meat to deteriorate.)
 
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