Slaugherhouse

[Aroura]

I tried becoming fully vegetarian, it didn't stick. However, my family has successfully reduced our intake of meat quite drastically. I buy one whole chicken or turkey per month, we get to eat it for 2 to 3 days, then it becomes soup for another 2 to 3 days. Other than that, we eat meat for holidays, and about once a month eating out. I buy from anow actual local farm now, too. No more mass produced meat or eggs. For milk and yogurt, I'm fortunate to live in a state with a lot of local dairies, though none are small, I'm doing what little I can as a consumer and talking with my wallet.

I've also helped slaughter some animals while I was younger, but it bothers me more now than it did then. I think there are some good moral arguments about cruelty to animals, but also human heath and environmental health that just point out its better for everyone and everything if humans stick to a mostly plant based diet. I think it's one of those things where moderation is key. Moderation in this doesn't mean just once a day either, lol.

Also, slaughtering your own animal is nothing on those slaughterhouses. If you raise chickens or cattle or pigs in the kind of setting you have in your head, grass fed open range etc, then pull one out now and then to feed the family and the neighbors, that's really not terrible. But that is not how 99% of the meat produced in America is raised OR killed. It's truly a horrendous ordeal. I am doing what I can not to support it, but most people just really don't give a fuck, so my impact seems pretty meaningless.

---

OUr modern form of industrial meat production is a mixed bag. Some of us have enough money to buy ethically raised meat. I buy my beef and lamb from a small local butcher who gets grass fed only. No feed lot. No crowding. No mistreatment. But I'm not going to pretend that this isn't a luxury.

Humans are biologically omnivorous. We eat meat. And industrial meat production, however unpleasant, allows more people to get access to meat. And I can't begrudge that.

When we can grow synthetic meat I will fully support the abolition of feed lots. Until then it's a necessary evil.

I'm not so sure this argument holds up, simply because Americans don't just want access to meat, we want it 2 or 3 times a day, which is also a luxury, but one we oddly take as normal.

Historically, humans get meat when they slaughter an animal all in a big burst, then maybe some dried or preserved here and there, but not 3 times a day every day. And although some things that were reserved for the wealthy, like basic Healthcare and clean water, are something that is good and right for everyone, this is one of the things we need to ditch. I've lived on foodstuffs alone, and I know how tight that can be I really do. If we thought about meat like we do about other food luxuries, like candy and cake, people would be more accepting of only being able to buy it maybe once or twice a week and buy the quality local grass food on range meats, instead of once or twice a day garbage factory crap.

[paulpablo]

I only eat chicken and fish and I'll eat pork or beef if it's in front of me.  Watching this definitely makes me want to actively avoid eating beef and pork though from now on. 


I think if I worked in a place like that I'd be suicidal with depression.

I'm not completely against hunting when it's done ethically though.

[Neo-Scholastic]

City kids are soooo squeamish...

[Natachan]

three times a day? I love meat and that seems excessive.

We could argue that american dietary habits need tweaking, and I can't really argue against that. But even if everyone only ate meat once a day we would still need a massive amount of meat. We can argue on if meat itself is a luxury (I don't think it is), but for the time being the amount of meat needed by our population still makes the industrial raising of meat animals a necessary evil.

[Cyrinistar]

That was shocking, but it makes sense for companies to do that crap because they're nasty.

[LastPoet]

I work in a meat processing plant. Although I am on the warehouse, I have seen the process. 1300 pigs in an hour O.o;  they cant effectively put them unconscious before dealing death.

The facility I work does 1500 a day. At full capacity.

[The Grand Nudger]

If there was significantly more demand for small farm produced beef, pork, chicken (ie, people are willing to pay for it) then there would be more.

There's such a demand for that product that factory farms go to astonishingly hilarious lengths to sell their products -as- small farm produced....and they still don't meet the demand.

[Aroura]

If there was significantly more demand for small farm produced beef, pork, chicken (ie, people are willing to pay for it) then there would be more.

There's such a demand for that product that factory farms go to astonishingly hilarious lengths to sell their products -as- small farm produced....and they still don't meet the demand.

True. Foster Farms is a great example.  I've noticed in the last year or so that actual local farms are showing up in local grocery stores as well, though there are usually only 4 or 6 pieces from them, they are still there.  I've noticed even Costco now carries things like cage free, organic eggs.  (My understanding is Organic can be a real lie in produce, but with eggs, it is the top guarantee that animals are actually raised outdoors).
Humane animal products are a growing thing, at least where I live.

This reminds me of how big beer companies are trying to make products that look like small brewery products.  A lot of people really do try and buy local and ethical, but it can be very tricky.

[The Grand Nudger]

Outdoors?  Nah.  Organic has nothing to do with whether or not a chicken is free range.  The crushing majority of organic eggs are produced in battery houses.  All they have to do is change the feed. The only requirement, btw, of calling something free range is that you leave the battery house doors open. The chickens never have to step foot into the world...and they won't..provided the pile of food is in the battery house.

Meanwhile, free range egss have no requirement to be organic, and are best (and most often) produced in concert with "conventional" products.

Neither organic nor free range have any legal or marketing status with regards to humane products. The same slaughterhouses are used for both, with some pretty amusing things (and arguments between producers) taking place on that end.

Long story short, "tricky" isn't even the word. What could have and should have been a set of guidelines that gave cnsumers a measure of confidence in a product become nothing other than an elaborate maze with which to con a mark. But, ofc that was going to happen, when a novel class of product was created and there weren't enough people to fill the need. Producers who were already making the old product founds ways to avail themselves of the new product designation with as little modification to their then-current enterprise as possible. That the consumers of the product tell themselves little white lies about the product is not specifically the fault of the producers...but so long as they do, the producers aren't going to upset such a profitable applecart.

[Aroura]

Outdoors?  Nah.  Organic has nothing to do with whether or not a chicken is free range.  The crushing majority of organic eggs are produced in battery houses.  All they have to do is change the feed.  The only requirement, btw, of calling something free range is that you leave the battery house doors open.  The chickens never have to step foot into the world...and they won't..provided the pile of food is in the battery house.

Meanwhile, free range egss have no requirement to be organic, and are best (and most often) produced in concert with "conventional" products.

Neither organic nor free range have any legal or marketing status with regards to humane products.  The same slaughterhouses are used for both, with some pretty amusing things (and arguments between producers) taking place on that end.

Long story short, "tricky" isn't even the word.  What could have and should have been a set of guidelines that gave cnsumers a measure of confidence in a product become nothing other than an elaborate maze with which to con a mark.  But, ofc that was going to happen, when a novel class of product was created and there weren't enough people to fill the need.  Producers who were already making the old product founds ways to avail themselves of the new product designation with as little modification to their then-current enterprise as possible.  That the consumers of the product tell themselves little white lies about the product is not specifically the fault of the producers...but so long as they do, the producers aren't going to upset such a profitable applecart.

I said organic eggs, go reread my post m'dear, and yes it is the only label that guarantees the hen laying eggs go outdoors.   Free range can still be outside cages but inside buildings, hence still factory farmed. 

But I agree, organic MEAT doesn't promise that at all. I did a lot of research about the lies on packages, so I know what you mean.  That is why I gave up and only buy one chicken or turkey per month from a local farmer.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organic_egg_production

But ugh to the beak trimming