Warning: Graphic Video of Pig Abuse in Factory Farming

I only eat Jamaican pork; even the ham or bacon must be Jamaican.

have you been to the factories, though?

At the Jamaican one I visited, the pigs arrived dead. I've lived on or visited a few Jamaican pig farms. None of that abuse happened on any of them and they killed the animal before sending it to the factory.

The farmers I know never kill the animals themselves. They hire someone with the training and experience to do it according to the accepted procedure.

that does sound better.

A sad testimony to the handling of animals.

Yes, and it is in all our factory farming. All our meat products. Probably not Kosher meat, but all the rest. The cattle are shot in the head. The pigs hear the squeals from the slaughterhouse. All of it is horrible. And dirty. And ... pink slime... crud from the cattle slaughterhouse floor that is swept up and put in with the meat... and the way the chickens and cattle are fed... is causing prions that cause the human variant of mad cow...

Not to mention that the pig is one of nature's most intelligent creature. They are very aware of their surroundings.

Yup, there is no kosher pigs that I know of.

Yep, no kosher pigs. Yes, pigs have the intelligence equivalent to a three year old child.

Unfortunate abuses indeed. Even though I'm a meat eater, I still see no reason to mistreat live animals. My parents, grand parents, and now my nephew next door were farmers, and I've killed my own food many times, but abusing the animals had never been on the menu.

Yes, that is an important distinction to make.

How awful!

Truly!

We never raised a pig. My husband knew I'd make a pet out of it.

I always wanted a pig, too...

Hi, Kathryn,

The film clip was utterly Frightening!!!! Thank you for bringing awareness to this issue. Hope you have a great rest of your week! Hope you have a Happy Mother's Day!

Same to you! This made me utterly ill and my other post.

Don't name it if you're going to eat it.
I've been on pig farms and in a slaughterhouse and have never witnessed something like this. Most breeders understand that the sweetest meat comes from animals raised humanely. But they are meat... Not pets. It's ironic that we have bleeding hearts for animals we are going to carve up into pork chops. These farm hands were cruel by our standards, but you face a wild pig in the bush, it won't be worrying if you're comfy before it tears you in half.
I raised chickens once. Had a romantic notion of how " cute" they'd be, until I saw they're heartless toward each other and merciless to the weak among them. I had no problem chopping off their heads after that.
David is right...no such think as kosher pork. :)
Btw... Pigs are stunned with electricity... Cattle are knocked out with a sledgehammer or a power-actuated tool like a Hilti gun that knocks them out. They are strung up upside down and they stick the jugular. You want the heart beating so it will pump out all the blood from the carcass. Pass the meatballs, please!

Thanks for posting to Gathers Luminous Writers and Artists.

Everything has become so much worse than in the middle decades. Sinclair Lewis' time, things were worse.

In MA, Drumlin farm asks if you want a turkey they will kill for you. That is a quality bird. However, we have always declined. Yes, don't name the animals that will be on your table.

But the animal industry is so much worse than in the 50s.

I was referring to other animals, not stating that pigs are kosher. Growing up in a Polish household, I certainly know that Judaism does not eat pork.

Yours is an elitist argument...preached from the head of a dinner table that lacks nothing. I wonder if you were a handful of rice between you and death if you would grumble so.

I was on my own after my father died when I was 20. Kicked out of the house by my stepmother who did not want to support me. She made me sign a paper saying she had no responsibility for me and that she would not pay me a dime. I worked 20 hours a week and went to school full time and worked full time in summers for years. I had no one to rely on but myself. Was not a spoiled college student. Nor a spoiled high school student. Took care of the house for an entire family and the kids - my family, while still a minor. Took out loans and got grants. Typed, filed and sold books. I went through a 25 pound bag of rice in a year. Went from a size 5 to a size 0. I've lived it all. When your father is a brilliant scientist and a drunkard and your stepmother is a brilliant scientist and bipolar out of her mind and nearly set the house on fire and running up and down the house all night and your mother is schizophrenic that you're getting into the hospital to save herself, you grow up real fast. I parented myself from the time I was a teen. At home, as a teen, I paid for everything I had with my working money, except for food. And at 20, I lived in the poorest neighborhoods in Montreal, Chicago and Boston. I did not have a vacation for 10 years. Worked and went to school; worked, worked worked. Typed, filed, edited, was a reporter, etc. Still in debt and in debt for my kids, too. We do not own our home.

I have the advantage that few have: I've lived by my own strength with only myself to buck me up. I have confidence that few have.

That is admirable. What does it all have to do with the discussion of humane treatment of animals destined for slaughter?

um. I was responding to your comment to me:


stephen berwaldt May 10, 2012, 11:41am EDT

Yours is an elitist argument...preached from the head of a dinner table that lacks nothing. I wonder if you were a handful of rice between you and death if you would grumble so.

Kathryn...as challenging as your life may have been , you can't possibly compare it to the life of someone starving to death. You are deluded if you do. I had a rough life growing up, too, but I believe it was a cake-walk compared to those who face malnutrition and starvation in this country and across the world. My point was someone at the point of starvation does not have the luxury of worrying about how warm and fuzzy the food they are desperate for is treated. Your argument is an issue. A flag to wave. The video you posted is inflammatory and meant to be so...to support a cause. I doubt the film is the case with every hog producer out there, but the very worst to rally bleeding hearts to the cause of cruelty to animals. The fact remains, those hogs...every one of them, are born and bread to grace our dinner tables and we are going to carve them all into pieces to facilitate that. How much more cruel could that be? That is cold...but that is true.

Things that happen down on the farm huh - somethings are of nightmare proportions - of how some folk are in real life is just incredible - how wreckless and stupid behaviour

Thanks for sharing and submitting to
The Surreal Circus.

So very, very true, and so very unfortunate.

Welcome to the USA. This type of crap is not tolerated in other Democracies because these other governments actually care more about helping their citizens than using them like pink slime.

Exactly. My biggest beef with the USA is that it allows capitalism in many - in all forms - to take precedence over human welfare, animal welfare and over the welfare of the planet...

ethical violations are the norm in factory farming~ factory farming itself is in direct ethical violation of the human moral compass~

exactly. it has been spelled out so many times by so many people in recent decades and it has gotten worse. Fast Food Nation and others.