Animal Writings

At at a "holiday party" for a rabbit advocacy group last December, I met a woman who was convinced she needed animal protein to be healthy. Unfortunately, probably most people in the country share her view. I pointed out that vegans as a group are quite healthy compared to their omnivorous counterparts even though they ingest no animal protein. I tried to explain how a varied diet of legumes, whole grains, fruits, vegetables provides ample high-quality protein, and that an excess of protein may contribute to kidney problems, gout, and other undesirable conditions. She wouldn't budge.

She said she bought the cheapest battery-cage eggs because she had heard there was no real difference between caged hens and uncaged hens.

I responded that there are significant differences: The cage-free hens can spread their wings, they can walk, they're on solid ground instead of wires, and they can engage in limited dust-bathing; many can lay their eggs in nests. Of course I agreed that uncaged hens still live in confinement, constantly breathe in immune system-weakening ammonia fumes, and are bred to lay an ungodly amount of eggs, which takes a tremendous toll on their bodies. I wanted to convey that cage-free was an upgrade from intensive torture to miserable. I also pointed out that commercial eggs are a violent and lethal operation: newborn male chicks are killed by barbaric methods and an agonizing death awaits all the laying hens before their second birthday.

If we convey that it makes no difference to a hen whether or not she spends her entire life in a wire box that leaves her no room to stand up straight, lift her wings, or take three steps, we not only defy common sense and hurt our credibility, we run the risk that some of the 275 million or so people in the U.S. and Canada who eat eggs and hear that incorrect message will support the most heinous animal agriculture cruelties.

Similarly, some activists claim that freeing a sow from a two-foot by seven-foot crate in which she would spend most of her life is the equivalent of letting a prisoner hear Mozart on the way to his execution. That's crazy. The analogy might make sense if freedom from the crate came on the last day of the sow's life. The gestation crate, which does not even allow a sow room to turn around, affects every minute of her life. The confinement is constant and unending. The accumulated misery of being denied practically all ability to move is almost beyond comprehension, and many pigs in those hideous circumstances simply give up. To imply that it makes hardly any difference to a sow whether she is confined in a tiny crate that barely lets her move is to trivialize the anguish she must feel from such severe restriction.

Basic physics and biology and sympathy tell me that freeing a sow from a device in which she's forced to spend months at a time stuck in one position would bring profound relief. By the same token, the group housing environment into which most non-crated sows are released is no country club correctional facility, an equally inept metaphor (although one that's not used nearly as much as the symphony metaphor). Large-scale pig farms are hell-holes, as described by this investigative story in Rolling Stone magazine:

Excerpts:

There is nothing to be gained by greatly overstating or understating the effect on quality of life when we free animals from highly restrictive crates and cages. The difference between being able to move your limbs and not being able to move them is profound. But the reality is that most farm animals, including crate-free and cage-free, are subjected to multiple, prolonged, and severe cruelties, and will suffer and die an early death at our hands.

In our advocacy, we should be honest enough to acknowledge that there are levels of suffering in animal agriculture, while at the same time clearly communicating that creating, manipulating, and killing animals for pleasure and profit is cruel, unnecessary, and wrong.

Labels: advocacy, battery cages, eggs, free-range, gestation crates, hens, pigs, sows, suffering