Animal Emotions

It's baffling that many of my so-called environmentalist friends, especially in the academy, consider themselves environmentalists while consuming factory farmed animals. Not only is it ecologically destructive, but how is it that animals are rarely considered to be a part of the environment? How did the "environment" become a term that does not include creatures? Wendell Berry, who is actually not a vegetarian, makes some of the finest points on this very subject. He's worth checking out if you're unfamiliar with his work.

I've been a vegetarian for 26 years, but I'm acutely aware that most people simply don't want to listen if I try to convert them, so these days I go out of my way not to try. Even a very well argued case such as the one Mark makes here is unlikely to to break the resistance systems and rationalisations most have built over their lives; and in any case most adults don't like being told what to do!

I agree with Mark the best approach is to attempt to go around people's wall of resistance rather than trying to drill through it, and I think many will be much more amenable to the argument that meat is an extremely wasteful way of producing food compared to that derived from plants. I agree the best start is just to subtly encourage people to eat less meat, of a better quality that's been produced by traditional farming methods instead of intensive production.

I think that these days at some deep level everyone has some degree of awareness of the horrors of intensive meat & egg production, & learning they can get by with less meat may well start them on the path to becoming vegetarian. Even if they don't, the drop in demand for intensive meat products would be a very useful start. Like it or not most food is bought in supermarkets whose sole aim is to make profits and are therefore extremely aware of what their customers want.

Lastly, as Mark says, for most people a slow transition is more likely to lead to permanent changes in their eating habits.

I enjoyed this article and I completely agree that there is no need for factory farming. Here in the UK, fortunately animal welfare is much better generally, with even McDonalds only using cage-free eggs (although the same can't be said for their meat products but we'll get there eventually). However, even over here a factory farm was proposed in Lincolnshire - I'm not sure if that's still in the pipelines or not.

What I don't agree with is the suggestion that the world should become vegan. Even in Western societies, there are many people living on a low income and unfortunately vegan products are expensive and processed meat products are cheap. What's more, although I haven't read the scientific evidence suggested in this article, I don't believe a completely vegan diet is healthy - our hominid ancestors lost their complex digestive systems with the invention of cooking and their largely meat-based diets and therefore we are no longer well-adapted to vegan diets even if they involve cooked vegetable products.

What I think we should strive for is the elimination of low welfare farming and the gradual ban of products from such systems. Then a cap must be placed on the price of higher welfare meat, dairy and egg products to ensure they are affordable for all. Supermarkets such as the Co-op already sell free range products at relatively affordable rates and even sell free range eggs as part of their value range. I think the future is in methods such as this.

I think you're quite correct when you say the overall welfare of farm animals is quite a lot higher here in the UK than it is in the USA, and the proposal for an indoor Dairy Unit with 4000 cows in Northampton has been turned down. I very much doubt if the UK planning authorities will allow anything approaching that monstrosity in future.

But we do still have a lot of low-welfare farming. Almost all the pigs in the UK spend their entire lives crowded in completely bare indoor enclosures. Male piglets are castrated without anaesthetic at 5 days old, and I believe all the animals are docked (ie have their tails cut off) to stop other pigs biting them out of sheer boredom. A lot of the UK has heavy soils that aren't suitable for outdoor pig-production. A small one I knew had literally a foot of mud over the whole area in winter due to the pigs rooting.

UK chicken production is also similar to that in the USA, with the birds spending the entire 16 weeks it takes them to grow to slaughter-weight in crowded barns with no daylight at all. I imagine Turkey-production is very similar.

Battery egg production from chickens has now stopped as far as I'm aware, and the whole European Union is due to phase it out by 1st January 2013. Unfortunately this may lead to large scale imports from non-EU countries in Eastern Europe. Even on the best run free-range egg farms, male hens won't lay so they're sorted from the females immediately after hatching. I don't know if this video reflects current practice, but the male chicks have to be killed somehow:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJ--faib7to (or search Utube for "Hatchery")

Black & white Holstein cows grazing contentedly in grassy fields are probably taken for granted as a pleasant part of the lowland UK scenery by just about everyone, & their quality of life then is probably quite high. But these are the cows that have been bred to produce 5 or 6 times the quantity of milk of a normal cow, and they're kept constantly pregnant to ensure they continue to produce. Their calves are separated from them immediately after birth, and those that aren't needed to replace their mothers are raised for beef production. At least the appalling practice of raising these calves in tiny stalls for veal has now been banned in the UK, but the cow's lives are still very short as they can't produce so much milk for more than a few years. And according to Compassion In World Farming one in five UK dairy cows suffer from lameness in their legs or hooves:

http://www.ciwf.org.uk/

The cows are only in the fields for 6 months of the year. In winter they're kept in barns, fed on silage or artificial foods, and suffer the same crowding as in the USA. The problems with slurry run-off are similar, but better controlled here & I understand most is spread on fields.

All these animals are still routinely fed antibiotics to prevent serious diseases breaking out, and though by law the antibiotics should be stopped a specified time before slaughter, it's hard to believe some isn't present in the meat & chicken almost everyone eats.

The big supermarkets have such buying-power that they're able pretty much to dictate what their producers do, and as I said they're acutely aware of what people want - cheap food.

Meat is the most expensive part of most people's shopping baskets, so by eating less meat produced by more humane means everyone would save money - and the supermarkets would lose! I feel this is the only incentive they could have to begin to stock more humanely produced meat, and as demand increased more & more farmers would turn to this way of production, so the prices should fall as the process continues. I think it would take years but be worth it in the long run, which is why I said I feel the solution is for people to eat less, but more humanely produced meat & chicken.

If you want to learn more, there's a wealth of information on th CIWF website, and for a wider view of animal issues my favourite is Animal Aid:

http://www.animalaid.org.uk/h/n/AA/HOME/

Each farm animal is equivically equal = companion pet animals. They have marvelous personalities if given a chance to show them to us and in a free-living form give far more pleasure in companionship, then a momentary gustatory taste of dead flesh.
Okay, humans want to eat animal products, so let's tally ho forward with lab grown meat, which most likely will reduce food born illnesses. In the meanwhile, folks cut the animal products out of your life. And, that means also leather, did you know the water usage to tan leather is horrendously high, let alone all aspects of live animal to final carnage use of water. So those who aspouse to being environmentalists and use animal products, flesh for food, diary products and other animal products- what is the matter with you. Wake up! For all else, wake up, save yourself, the planet and the animals.