(also heard as “Vegans focus only on the extreme cases.”)

This myth is an extreme example of convenience & comfort completely short-circuiting rational thought. It is an extremely well-documented and fully undeniable fact that the vast majority of animals killed for food around the world (more than 3000 of them every second) suffer immensely & horrifically for the entirety of their lives. Indeed, practically every single animal that is confined & enslaved – in order to one day inevitably be murdered in its adolescence to thereafter be processed into “meat” — suffers through a savage variety of practices that are nothing short of barbaric, and in many ways patently cruel … Feel free to consider the following examples – all of which are still standard practice in the meat & dairy and/or egg industries today:

*Chickens … Upon hatching, chicks are sorted by sex, with non-profitable male chicks being either immediately ground up by a macerator while still alive or slowly suffocated by the thousands in dumpsters or garbage bags … Female chicks have the sensitive tips of their beaks burned off without anesthesia, are generally over-fed to stimulate unnaturally rapid growth, are generally locked into tiny cages or overcrowded “free range’ hutches, have their eggs repeatedly taken from them (stimulating them to produce on average ten times more per year than they normally would – causing their bodies to prematurely “burn out” after only 1.5 to 2 years), whereupon they are literally crammed into transport trucks (where roughly 1.7 million of them die every year) and sent to a violent & terrifying death in a slaughterhouse.

Objective conclusion: over 99% of all farmed chickens suffer immensely during the entirety of their dark, short lives — with the remaining 1% maybe having better lives, but still dying brutally in their adolescence as well.

*Pigs … Shortly after birth (sometimes after only a few days – most often after only a few weeks), baby pigs are forcibly taken from their mothers. They are then castrated, have their tails snipped off and have their teeth cut out (all very painful procedures — all performed without anesthesia). They are then placed into quarters that are almost always dark, filthy and over-crowded. Healthy females will remain in these conditions until they are old enough to have babies of their own, whereupon they are forcibly impregnated (what civilized people call “rape”), have their babies stolen from them after birth just as they were stolen from their own mothers, and – after repeating this incredibly traumatic process 3 to 5 times over 1.5 to 2 years, their still young bodies “dry up” from reproductive exhaustion and they are sent away to become “pork” via a terrifyingly brutal slaughterhouse death. Male pigs (and females deemed ill-suited for forced reproduction) are over-fed to spur too-rapid growth until they reach the tender age of 4-12 months, whereupon they too are crammed into transport trucks and sent to the same premature, violent and bloody death at the slaughterhouse.

Objective conclusion: over 99% of all farmed pigs suffer immensely during the entirety of their filthy, short lives — with the remaining 1% maybe having better lives, but still dying brutally in their adolescence as well.

*Cows (& goats) … It can fairly be stated that no farmed animal knows greater suffering than the female dairy cow. Immediately after her birth, the female dairy calf is forcibly removed from her mother’s side (often never to see her again), placed in a tiny enclosure, and over-fed hormone-laced formula to stimulate her accelerated growth. After she has been de-horned without anesthesia, and as soon as she is deemed fit enough to produce offspring (and the precious milk that follows childbirth — often as soon as the tender age of 15months), she is tied to a cage known as a “rape rack” and forcibly impregnated by a dairy farm employee (via a most intrusive and certainly most-uncomfortable process that involves simultaneous anal & vaginal penetration). Roughly nine months later she gives birth and her baby is stolen from her to later join the milk-production “machine” (despite her baby’s cries of fear and despite her own plaintive wails of sorrow). The new mother then has her baby’s milk taken from her for the next ten months – often at ten times the amount she would normally produce for her calf. Once she starts to “dry up”, she is impregnated again, has her next baby stolen from her again, and is over-milked for 10 months – again. This cruel cycle generally repeats itself for a total of 3-5 times, until it becomes obvious that her udders cannot continue to produce milk at a profitable rate, whereupon she is sent to her own violent & brutal slaughterhouse death … And in case you were wondering, male calves far no better, as they are also stolen from their mothers immediately after birth, and are then either killed immediately – often with a hammer blow to the head (male dairy cows tend to have a meat-to-bone ratio that is too low to be profitable as adult beef cows), or are thrown into tiny enclosures called “veal crates”. Here they are over-fed hormone-laced formulas for roughly 8 months to stimulate their own rapid growth, whereupon they become “veal” — sent to the slaughterhouse to meet the same brutally violent & equally terrifying end as their mother will inevitably know. Know as well that no cow escapes this suffering; that all “grass fed”, all “organic” and all “humanely raised” cows all meet the same horrible end – they all die terribly and they all do so at a very young age.

Objective conclusion: over 99% of all farmed cows suffer immensely during the entirety of their traumatic, short lives — with the remaining 1% maybe having better lives, but still dying brutally in their adolescence as well.

In conclusion then, seeing as how all farmed animals have been proven to produce endogenous opiates (e.g. endorphins et al) to help alleviate pain when injured, and seeing as how all farmed animals have – like us humans – benzodiazepine receptors in their central nervous systems (receptors that cause them to feel fear, anguish and stress when exposed to death or danger), and seeing as how all farmed animals are clearly sentient (see the previous chapter for details), there can be no doubt that they endure immense trauma & massive pain when they are needlessly confined, abused, mutilated and eventually murdered by us humans.

Just as there is no escape for the vast majority of imprisoned & abused animals on this planet, there is no escaping the fact that those animals suffer greatly during their unnaturally short & unnaturally cruel stay with us.

My Friends, milk industry is meat and the meat industry is murder …
… Please stop being an active participate therein.

Thank you.

 

Current status of this Myth: Extirpated
Justification it provides for eating animals: NONE

“There are no magical slaughterhouses where animals are fed their favorite meal, make a last phone call to a loved one and voluntarily hold their breath until they die peacefully. The act of slaughter is violent, vicious, bloody and brutal. The animals do not sacrifice themselves for your pleasure, tradition or greed. They are dragged to their deaths, kicking and screaming until their very last breath. Don’t fool yourself for one minute into thinking that you can eat meat, dairy and/or eggs and remain disconnected from this abhorrent violence.” ~ inspired by Gary Smith

Filed under: Minimizing the Myths of Meat by Scaughdt