Factory Farming Affects All Life
by : Devan Beimler
posted : 07/26/2006
The following essay contains information and facts that effect vegetarians and non-vegetarians alike, so please take into consideration that I'm not writing this to tell you that I think you are wrong for eating meat, I just want to establish the fact that factory farming is killing animals, humans, and our environment alike.
First, a brief summary of what factory farming exactly is.
Factory farming is the most popular and efficient way of meat and bi-product distribution known to the world. The basic principle of it is - more animals, less space. Animals are treated beyond inhumanely because meat means big bucks from businesses and corporations around the world.
Factory farms usually inject animals with steroids and growth hormones. For each animal this has a different effect. For cows, per say, the hormones make the cows produce a ridiculous amount of milk - more than their bodies (specifically utters) can handle. The utters are beat up to the point of extreme swelling and irritation, sometimes so painful to the point where the cow can now longer stand or move on its own. They are then dragged over to a pile to starve to death or be slaughtered, whichever happens first. For chickens, the steroids injected into their systems makes them produce an unnatural amount of eggs and makes their body grow with more substances that aren't necessarily making it more "meaty". These steroids are still in the animals systems when they are slaughtered and fed to humans around the world.
As far as environmental effects go, factory farming is second only to power plants in terms of emitting the world's largest amount of pollution. In terms of human health we can study such past events as mad cow disease which came about due to improper treatment of live animals i.e. letting them eat their own waste while they starve in crammed pens and cages together. We could also take a look at obesity, especially in America.
For those of you with concerns that the animals not being killed will over-populate our world, consider this; maybe if our government (God bless them!) didn't cut funding for organic/natural farms and press for factory farms to be the dominant suppliers of meat and bi-products we'd have a little more land to keep animals on (and treated humanely). It would also probably be good if the government stopped destroying as much privately owned farmland as they do. Oh, but you know what? It’s probably worth it. They need that little cash they save to put towards that unjust war in uh.....erack or something? I don't know....Or perhaps they need it to build more malls, starbucks and mcdonald’s for our youth to consume….Or maybe they can spend it on pornography, I mean c'mon, we only spend as much on sweet sweet porn as we do foreign aid...pfft...what are we, a bunch of queers? Or maybe they'll invest in the CIA so they can find new ways to monitor our intelligence and knowledge of our sick nation's horrifying truths through new-wave Patriot Acts. Or maybe the CIA can create more drugs to release on the streets of our major cities so cops can make a profit off of arresting victims of drug abuse living in absolute poverty (or so major corporations like those invested/involved with/belonging to the tobacco lobby can profit off of human death and internal decay)…..
The truth behind factory farming is sickening, and I hope it inspires more people to speak out against it. Learn more about factory farming at www.factoryfarming.com and find out the truth for yourselves. And lastly, thank you for taking the time to read my essay (assuming you have).
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