Letters to the Editor
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"all of the abuses occurred with USDA inspectors on the premises"
That pretty much says it all.
Sorry folks but this is how meat packing plants work. A downer cow that can be gotten on its feet is worth 4x or 5x (as meat on the hoof) what its worth otherwise (as material for a tallow plant). That's $100s per animal. It's incredibly naive to think that workers (or their supervisors) aren't going to do anything and everything they can to get a weak animal on its feet. Much of the time, the animal is a "downer" because it's old and weak or its hips split during the trip to the slaughter house.
That's why this kind of stuff occurs with inspectors on the site; inspectors who obviously aren't going to a lot of trouble to interfere with "business as usual." Now, there'll be a bit of noise with saber rattling by politicians. In a month or two, things will return to normal.
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cruelty knows no bounds
this is truly an ugly, twisted story. sick animals are tortured and killed to feed unsuspecting children from lower socioeconomic backgrounds.
people who are cruel towards animals tend to be cruel towards their fellow human beings. that's why we need better laws to protect animals. and how about sensitivity training for these violent, messed up men?
i am thankful for the gutsy investigator who brought this shameful story to light, as well as katherine mieszowski for writing about it.
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Extreme cruelty is the norm for the meat, dairy and egg industries
The sickening abuse of cattle at that slaughterhouse is only the tip of the iceberg. All animals suffer terribly in factory farms and slaughterhouses. If what you see on those HSUS tapes disturbs you, then please, stop supporting that kind of abuse with your dollars.
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VEGETARIANISM
Please.
There truly is no reason for us to feed ourselves from this cruel industry. It is brutal, wasteful, polluting, stupid and it is bad for us.
I don't mean just the meat. I mean our closing our eyes to the suffering of elegant intelligent animals with personalities, attachments, and lives worth living.
We do not have to feed ourselves with the products of factory farming. We could eat beans, nuts, dairy products from humane farms. We could grow some of our own food in our yards, and teach our children the same. We could have a few chickens for delicious eggs. That's all the protein we really need.
The oily fatty sensation and taste of meat is only that...a taste. We can unlearn it. We can loosen its attraction. It is no more necessary to our well-being than bottled water. And it's just as destructive to the ecosystem as to the animals.
It really is a moral issue. I'm so tired of people snickering about vegetarians and vegans as though they're silly.
To me, factory farming and the way old cows are treated is an enormous spiritual failure. We need to KEEP EVOLVING.
We could at least reduce the industry. We could have meat be something to partake of once a month, if someone doesn't want to give it up. And then kill the cows humanely on the farms on which they live. Even organically reared cattle, in my state, can't be slaughtered on the farm. They are ALL subjected to these terrifying long truck rides and their cells are suffused with desperate fear, pain and awareness. And then we eat this.
They are not dumb. They are not stupid.
We're the ones who nourish ourselves on fear and rub our bellies. Ugh.
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Typical
Abuses which clearly imply an industry-wide culture of abuse and dodging regulations are trumpeted as being the work of just a few bad apples. That way, a big stick can be wielded against one company by politicians eager to look like they're actually doing something, when in reality they're not taking any meaningful action. Five'll get you ten that there'll be big fines levied against this factory, a lot of hot air will be blown over it, much tsk-tsking will be heard, and in the end, it'll be business as usual.
Why? Because Americans in general simply don't want to know anything about how their food is produced. They want to believe that their food is safe, that beef is an excellent thing to eat every single day, that there are no bad men being mean to the poor cows. (Actually, they'd rather believe that beef doesn't really come from cows, but that it just comes in those little plastic wrapped-packages from the beginning.) They certainly don't want to face up to the fact that the kind of gluttonous ingestion of meat this country indulges in is unsustainable, hideously inhuman and extremely unhealthy. That's just too much reality for most people to stomach, so they'll be happen with a little hot scandal, some harrumphing and punishment to make us all feel good about Getting The Bad Guys. Then they can go back to their Big Macs.
(Don't get me wrong - I'm not against animal consumption per se. It's the ridiculous way the modern world goes about it that I find disgusting. Everything has to be to extremes! There's no moderation in our culture. That's why we're falling over from clogged arteries, heart attacks and hypertension while simultaneously torturing our bodies trying to achieve impossible physical goals. Gluttony, gluttony, gluttony, whether for food, toys or self-hatred.)
And arresting the WORKERS? Are you fucking kidding me? Arrest the OWNERS. Arrest the guys who SET COMPANY POLICY. Arresting the guys who make $8 an hour working 12-hour shifts is ludicrous. Do these regulators really think putting Joe Schmoe in jail is going to change a damn thing? Give me a break!
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Vegetarianism
What Lobelia said. I try not to be a self righteous vegetarian, because I'm not perfect, but there's no excuse, in my opinion, for eating meat in rich societies like ours. The innocent suffering of animals who have no words to express their pain is the most terrible fact I know about the world. It disturbs me more than the suffering of men and women, which I can sometimes make a kind of sense of because it is never completely innocent.
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@tamsax
and how about sensitivity training for these violent, messed up men?
*ahem* It's interesting that you assume these men are "violent" and "messed up." Are you aware that the average turnover rate in a slaugherhouse is less than four months? That the vast majority of slaughterhouse workers quit precisely because they can't stomach what they're required to do? The "messed up" people in this equation are not the guys on the killing floor, but the assholes who own these companies and encourage this kind of horror. THEY don't have to do it themselves, so they push those who have no choice into being monsters.
Luckily, very few people have the capacity for this kind of monstrosity. Unluckily, there's always a fresh supply of guys with mouths to feed and not enough opportunity for a good living, who'll take these jobs out of desperation or because they simply don't understand what's ultimately involved.
If you want to be judgmental, judge our society that encourages the profit motive above everything, including integrity, compassion, animal and human health and lives. THAT is where the real monstrosity lies. If our culture were less centered on greed and money, and more centered on moderation, common sense and living kindly, the opportunities for this sort of thing would disappear.