This is what happened at the Agriprocessors slaughterhouse in Postville, Iowa. As usual, it's always the exploitation of the lowliest people hired to do the lowliest of jobs... These people, like the animals - are all "disposable".
From the accounts of one of the employees: "Americans want to go to the supermarket and find their meat neatly packaged. They don't want to hear about the 14-year-old girl from Guatemala who worked 12 hours a day, or the woman who was raped by her supervisor at the meat packing plant. They don't want to hear about the mothers who have "kill" water thrown on them or hear a young girl crying from the pain in her hands from operating power meat cutting shears."
And yes, the management of the slaughterhouse were arrested. Some serving prison time for bank fraud and others on probation for aiding and abetting a pattern of hiring undocumented aliens and violating child labor laws.
So there were human rights violations... as well as animal "abuse" ... But hey, it's a slaughterhouse! Does anyone really think these animals get romanced to the kill floor?
See Courting Dairy Cows - Then Eating Them - Rapacious Husbandry
And so to the consumer of these products... The flesh had from murder and made from the toil of the destitute - Do you understand now what the cost "cheap meat" is?
We each can feed ourselves just as economically - getting all the necessary calories, nourishment and "protein" from a plant based diet. For these reasons... And so many others -
Please, Go Vegan.
22 comments:
A very true thing people don't want to know anything that takes them out of the norm of what they want to beleave verses the truth
Ahhh... The old "ignorance is bliss" line of "logic". Gottcha!
Thanks for dropping by! :)
Hey there,
Great blog. I have recently gone vego and i am not far from going vegan.
I keep chickens at home. They have a great life and seem pretty happy to share their eggs.
Hi Nicholas! This is great that you are on your way to veganism!!! Hooray for you!
I too have a rescued flock of chickens... I give most of their eggs back to them --- Or give the eggs to neighbors.
I know this probably departs from most vegan ideology... But I do think in rare, exceptional circumstance eggs from "pet hens" -isn't all that big a deal! I am certain you won't "dispose" of them once they're no longer "productive"... No. I'm sure you wouldn't do that! :)
Thanks for dropping by! And good luck to you! :)
According to a study by Cranfield University, commissioned by the environmental group World Wildlife Fund, becoming a vegetarian may do more harm to the environment than eating red meat.
The study found that many meat substitutes consumed by vegetarians were produced from soy, chickpeas and lentils that were grown overseas and imported into Britain, reports The Times Newspapers in London, England. Switching from beef and lamb reared in Britain to meat substitutes would result in more foreign land being cultivated, raising the risk of forests being destroyed to create farmland.
Hello - Yes, I'm familiar with that "study"... There have been dozens of rebuttals and it has been discredited, because much of the data was "cherry picked"... Here is this from Dr Donal Murphy-Bokern one of the authors of How Low Can We Go
"Dedicated meat-eaters who might have got the impression from The Times on 12 February that recent research is an environmental green light for meat eating will be disappointed. Anyone who studies the research report will see that the Times article was cleverly written but very misleading.
The research showed that the carbon footprint of UK food accounts directly for one fifth of the total footprint. This rises to nearly a third if account is taken of indirect connections to deforestation. It is dominated by emissions from the livestock sector. Livestock products directly account for nearly two-thirds of food greenhouse gas emissions while providing less than a third of food energy. Contrary to the impression in The Times, the research results and the authors’ conclusions clearly show that reducing livestock consumption offers the single most effective way of reducing the carbon footprint of our food consumption. Removing meat from the diet and replacing it with plant foods with similar protein contents reduces the carbon footprint of diet by one fifth. Removing all animal products remove nearly a third. For consumers, the desired direction of travel for helping the environment is clear – eat less meat and dairy products. Combining this with other measures, including using science and technology to improve farming, adds to the benefits.
The Times article ignored the report’s main results and conclusions and focused on a minor part of the study that looked at some potential but unlikely consequences of reducing meat consumption for land use. A low impact diet is a balanced diet – lower in livestock products than the average UK diet today, with more of a wide range of plant based foods – cereals, fruit and vegetables."
BTW - This is not a "vegan" or "vegetarian" organization:
http://www.murphy-bokern.com/
But on a personal note --- I very rarely eat "analogs" or "processed" foods... I prefer dry beans, peas, lentils, etc. Which also require absolutely no refridgeration either in transport, in stores or in storage in my home. This alone is said to use a quarter of the energy used in transporting and storing of an equal amount of "meat". I also supplement with as much locally grown fruits and vegetables as possible...
And to conclude... You might wish to see the latest release of this study: The State of Food and Agriculture.The FAO says that the livestock sector is running out of control with rapid growth causing environmental and health problems. Biodiversity, water, and land and forestry resources have come under major pressure from livestock production growth in recent decades – and this will get worse.
According to the FAO, in order to meet rising demand, global annual meat production will have to expand from 228 million metric tons (now) to 463 million by 2050. Global production for coarse grains for animal feed is forecast to increase by only half a billion metric tons by 2050.
Dangerously inadequate to continue on this pace as you can see... Unless the population dramatically decreases or eliminates it's meat consumption, we will eventually "overgraze our range".
http://www.fao.org/publications/sofa/en/
Even Einstein knew the inevitable: "Nothing will benefit human health and increase chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet. "
Despite the unsubstantiated allegations by activist groups, there is no conclusive scientific evidence that
shows the use of antibiotics on farms contributes significantly to an increase in antibiotic resistance in
humans. In fact, a growing body of evidence shows just the opposite.
And this has what to do with the post I wrote about???
But since you brought it up, I think there's enough clear evidence that warehousing thousands of animals in window-less sheds, requires a lot of drugs to keep them "healthy enough" to slaughter. And it is no wonder that this is having an effect on human health as well.
I'd rather my food not require anti-depressants because of the miserable "life" it leads... Never heard of a "sad" bean yet! :)
As with the trend to replace cow's milk with soy milk in your baby's bottle, the replacement with almond milk is equally dangerous. Almond milk is not an adequate source of nutrition for a baby; if either breast milk or formula is replaced with almond milk, the baby will suffer from malnutrition and likely develop health complications for life.
Even the occasional feeding of almond milk (altering with breast milk or formula) is dangerous and not recommended. Journal of the American College of Nutrition studies have shown autoimmune thyroid disease in babies who drink almond milk. The concentration of goitrogenic chemicals in ratio to an infant's body is much higher than when consumed by an adult. Therefore, even in moderation, goitrogenic foods such as almond milk should be avoided during infancy. So if we no longer can benefit from the use os animals,like god intended,what will happen to our babies?
I am not a nutritionalist... But everything I've googled on almond milk and infants seems to be fine... Some sites also recommend rice milk, or oat/hemp milk as well. The short of it is - is that there are many alternatives to "cows milk".
But my best personal advice? As you mentioned what "gOd" intended... Was to feed human babies their nourishment from mother's breasts. What a concept huh?
yes, breast milk is best by far and some mothers are unable to do that so the best alternative is formula. but you obviously only read what you think will agree with you. Research your almonds a little better and not on a vegan site please.
I am a mother of two small boys and I do steer clear of soy for them because I am not totally convinced that it is good for them. All of my family has lived healthy into their 90's for many generations drinking dairy, so I do tend to lean this way for my family's health!!
I recently did a cleanse through a local wellness center. I decided to limit my dairy and used 1 cup of soy milk three to four times a week with my whole grain cereal. I didn't realize it at the time, but it affected my mentrual cycle and gave me tender, sore breasts continuously for four to sex weeks. Once I removed the soy milk, my sypmtoms cleared.
Isn't it interesting that the Soy industry promotes Soy for babies - claiming the estrogen/like hormone issue doesn't exist, and turns around and promotes it for post menopausal women because of the estrogen/like hormone effects??
Soy protein will cause me to have very painful fibromyalgia flare ups. I wonder if the growing consumption of soy is a contributor to this disorder that so many suffer from.
Hello Anonymous @ 6:28, 7:26,
7:30, 7:33 and 7:44 --- Of course you are all one and the same --- Almond milk is bad - Please cite your source... I looked through 5 pages of google and could find nothing substantial to validate this claim. But it bares repeating --- There's rice milk, oat milk, hemp milk, etc. That goes for all the other negative comments about "soy"... I don't drink soy milk. And I only eat soy products once or twice a month... So I'm not advocating soy at all.
As for monopause and dairy??? That I can address because I've been there. Ingesting the milk from a nursing cow - who's milk was saturated with hormones made my symptoms unbearable! Within a few months of removing dairy from my diet --- All the issues surrounding "the change" went away. I have never taken any medication for menopause... BUT, was very close to having to do so -UNTIL I ditched dairy.
Of course everyone needs to consult their own physician... But speaking for me - Dairy did more harm than good. And I feel my health has greatly improved since I've replaced cow's milk "foods".
There is nothing you've posted that has convinced me otherwise... And if it were only me, I'd say it was a fluke --- But I've heard countless others say the same negative things about dairy. So sorry you wasted your time... Enjoy your life! :)
Journal of the American College of Nutrition, Vol 9, Issue 2 164-167, Copyright © 1990 by American College of Nutrition
Almonds are a goitrogenic food, as well as soy.
WoW! That's a stretch... The study was done in 1990 - Research compiled from 59 children... And not one mention of "almonds".
Regardless - almonds and soy may not be the dietary answer for infants. Human breast milk certainly is. And there are other alternatives to cow's milk too...
Now, I know you will be busy digging up ancient "science" about rice milk, oat milk, etc. But you are wasting your time here. I never intend to consume dairy again for as long as my healthy bones are on this earth. Nor will I ever stop telling people how MY BODY has changed for the better after eliminating it.
I appreciate your efforts though...
thank you
I don't care what you eat, just don't be spreading lies.
And I don't care what you eat either, just don't kill animals needlessly! Deal? ;)
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