On Friday, the New York Times ran a front page story about chicken slaughter; the paper's quote of the day comes from a farmed animal researcher for the RSPCA, Marc Cooper, who says about chicken slaughter, "people don't want to know too much."
Indeed, slaughter is something meat-eaters don't want to think too much about. One needn't look further than their name to know that slaughterhouses are gruesome places. And just the term "factory farm" conjures up (correct) images of animals cruelly-crammed into filthy, polluting warehouses. But farmed animals endure abuses far worse than even the most horrific things we might think of when we hear "slaughterhouse" or "factory farm."
Some years back, PETA documented workers at a Smithfield supplier ramming gate rods into the anuses and vaginas of pregnant pigs, while laughing and bragging about it. One of the offenders was eventually given six months in jail, because he had (small wonder) spousal abuse charges in his past.
Since then, animal protection organizations including PETA have conducted dozens of undercover investigations into the largest meat, egg and dairy corporations in the world. These include companies like Tyson and Pilgrim's Pride, which combined, slaughter more than 4 billion (yes, with a b) animals every year. These animals are abused in ways that would result in felony cruelty charges were these cats or dogs, rather than chickens, pigs, and cattle (see www.Meat.org).
What is even more surprising to most people is the amount of bestiality (defined by Webster's as sexual activity between a person and an animal) we find on our nation's factory farms and in slaughterhouses. There's the type of disgusting, sick, and impossible-to-defend (or even comprehend) bestiality (like the Smithfield worker ramming the gate rod into pigs' anuses and vaginas), and there's the routine bestiality that is standard industry practice in our nation's meat supply.
In addition to the Smithfield example (which you can see here, narration courtesy of James Cromwell), in the first category we find the following examples:
In the second category (with ample photos and videos available by searching "artificial insemination" and then picking your animal--turkeys, pigs, cattle, etc.), we find that:
One could go on and on with similar discussions of all farmed animals. In Animals in Translation, Dr. Temple Grandin tells the story of one pig farmer who, in discussing his masturbating of his pigs, says, "I have to stick my finger in his butt, he just really loves that" (105).
Americans eat the corpses of about 10 billion land animals every year--which is neither hyperbole nor sentimentality; it's just true. Every one of those animals was made of flesh, blood, and bone--just like us. Every one had eyes, ears, nostrils, a mouth and limbs, just like we do. They have the same five physiological senses that we do. And as Dr. Grandin notes, they "have the same core feelings people do" (88). And, of course, every one of those animals started with a mother and a father, just like we did.
The thing is: None of these mothers and fathers mated naturally. Human beings stepped in and manipulated the process--masturbating male pigs and, cramming their arms into animals' rectums, and turning the entire process into something out of a surrealist horror novel.
Bestiality is defined by Webster's as "sexual activity between a person and an animal," and all meat in the United States comes from precisely that relationship. Why is it illegal, deviant, and cause for imprisonment for some farmer to engage in bestiality inside a barn if he's doing it for personal enjoyment, but perfectly legal for that same farmer to do it as part of "standard agricultural practices" used to put animal corpses on our nation's dinner tables? It's a glaring contradiction that just doesn't add up.
So the answer to the title question is, clearly, yes: If we eat meat, we're paying people to have sex with animals. Whether we personally do something or pay someone to do it for us, it's done in our name and we are responsible. Each time someone chooses to eat meat, s/he is saying to the people who rape animals for profit: "Yes, do it again. Yes, do it again. I approve."
But we don't have to. In addition to vegetarian staples like beans, grains, fruits and vegetables, there are soy, rice, almond and all kinds of other "milks" that don't necessitate a person shoving their arm into an animals' rectum or vagina. Most grocery stores carry vegan BBQ "ribs" that aren't a product of a person masturbating a pig. And there are all kinds of meat-free "chicken" and "turkey" products that are delicious, cheap and easy-to-prepare...without the rape.
I'm sure the meat industry (and some meat eaters) might argue that I'm simply trying to gross people out, so that they'll stop eating meat. Actually, I'm simply pointing out what's true. So sure, people don't want to think about how animals are raised or slaughtered, as the RSPCA's Cooper notes. And, I'm guessing, people also don't want to think about sex with animals--but if you're eating meat, you're participating in it.
Oppose bestiality? Go vegetarian. Check out www.VegCooking for great recipes and shopping tips.
Follow Bruce Friedrich on Twitter: www.twitter.com/brucegfriedrich
So are people who support wind turbines participating in the killing of birds? Are people who support vegetable farming and storage participating in the destruction of pest animals? Are people who support having prisons participating in sexual abuse and deviancy?
"But we don't have to. In addition to vegetarian staples like beans, grains, fruits and vegetables, there are soy, rice, almond and all kinds of other "milks" that don't necessitate a person shoving their arm into an animals' rectum or vagina. Most grocery stores carry vegan BBQ "ribs" that aren't a product of a person masturbating a pig. And there are all kinds of meat-free "chicken" and "turkey" products that are delicious, cheap and easy-to-prepare...without the rape."
So the killing of pests (everything from insects to birds to mammals) during the process of creating those non-animal milks is somehow less offensive than the abuse of animals?
This is just idiocy. The argument makes no sense at all. The process of producing food for millions of people is not an easy task. It takes a lot of work and a lot of resources. It needs to be controlled in such a way that made to provide a reliable consistent supply of food. So instead of allowing nature to control reproduction man takes care of it.
The difference between the meat industry and the examples you offer is that meat isn’t in any way necessary. It gives us something to eat, a few moments of pleasure, and that’s it. Prisons keep our streets safe. Wind turbines give us power. Etc. What does the meat industry give us? “Food” we don’t need, that is environmentally catastrophic, and that supports horrid abuse. And as I’m sure you know, non-animal milks require far fewer crops than milk from cows (so far fewer pest animals are harmed). You didn’t even try to address the central argument of the post, other than to call it idiotic; I think that’s because there’s nothing you can say to refute it—eating meat really does entail paying people to masturbate and rape animals. And there is no moral difference between doing something and paying someone to do it for you.
Thanks for weighing in though,
Bruce
Instead you bring out strawman arguments like the amount of 'pests' that die when harvesting vegetables (neglecting the fact that it takes far more grains/vegetation to feed animals and so the more of the 'pests' you care about while die in this scenario) to somehow justify eating animals. Again, people are literally fornicating with your dinner. What else do you need to stop eating meat?
Pain is a human concept. It is not known if animals feel pain. Nociception is not pain. Pain happens with and without nociception. Read up about science.
Why do you hate science so much? What did it do to you? I really want to know.
Your arguments against meat are sensationalism and morality, neither offers a good reason to stop doing something. Especially something that is wholly a result of economics (vegetarianism is only possible post-surplus). Humans are opportunistic feeders. They eat whatever is available. That is how our species works and why we did not go extinct (brain power helped, but all the brain power in the world cannot help a species that cannot digest what is around it).
I guess I will just never understand your position. I deal in science and rational though, not naivety.
Thanks Susie.
How do you think laying hens get impregnated? Think dairy cows have sex the old fashioned way?
If you truly want to make a different, going vegetarian is simply not enough, going vegan, cutting out all animal products is the only way to minimalize the suffering. It may seem drastic, but really it's easier than you would expect it to be.
I couldn't quite understand this: "cutting out all animal products is the only way to minimalize the suffering." Surely you agree that going vegetarian is a great first step, though, right? If you demand all or nothing, often you get nothing. A vegan saves 1-2 more animals than a vegetarian, who saves about 100/year. That's important, but a vegetarian diet is a great first step.
23 years vegan,
Bruce
Stop with this moral garbage. Morality is complete and utter BS. It is human emotions. Your emotional response to a situation does not trump science or social science. It cannot.
Animals are a commodity if people use them as such. Nature is not nice (which is why you try to raise yourself above it). Nature has no plan or no desire to protect itself. It just is. If a species dies out that is what happens. Eventually--this is from science, so you would not understand it--all life in the universe is going to die (possibly forever). Nature does not care about species. It is a fight for survival. It sucks that it is a losing fight for every individual and species, but it is.
But it does not matter. you will not even consider science. Science to you is the enemy. Emotions rule your life. To you humans are the pinnacle of existence and they must control nature in a good way, because that is how things are supposed to be.
Cheers,
Bruce
You make the case for the bestiality connection with irrefutable logic.
Bruce
I hope that everyone who reads this article fully comprehends that they directly contribute to these practices every time they eat animal products. It is not enough to say, "That is so horrible; what sick people," and put all the blame on the workers and farmers who are doing these things. These acts are inherent in the mass production of animal products.