Entry #9: The Controversy of Animal Welfare

     Animal welfare has always been a highly debated topic, with people arguing whether or not it's inhumane to confine livestock to small lots and give them unnutritious feed made specifically to make them as large as possible before slaughter. Many don't care how the food gets to their plate; the one thing that matters is the cost and efficiency. They find it easy to turn a blind eye to what goes on before the convenient pre-packaged meat they pick out from the grocery store because of the modern-day disconnect we have from the animals we eat.

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    The debate over the humane treatment of animals in agriculture has always interested me. It's a discussion of morals and ethics, with opinions ranging from keeping things the way they are so we can sustain the consumer ease of mass production, to the idea that we should completely demolish the animal agriculture industry as a whole for the sake of the creatures being eaten. I believe there’s an equilibrium that can be reached between the desire for convenience and the concern for animals.

    The main culprit lies in the system we use to harvest meat. The Humane Society has a webpage dedicated to informing about the negatives of animal farming, showcasing the harm it causes to not just the animals in the system but the consumers who eat the things they produce. It sheds light on the methods used to mass produce meat and brings up a lot of things that most consumers don’t think about or know when it comes to the choices they make at the grocery store.

    However, the question still lingers; would people care if It was just the animals suffering? One of the biggest reasons people push for better living conditions for the animals we eat is because the way it is now makes it rife with diseases and unhealthy for us, but what if those things didn't affect us? Would people still be alright with the treatment of animals in industrial agriculture?

    I find these questions important to dig into the ethics of mass-raising livestock for slaughter, as well as the large disconnect consumers have from agriculture as a whole and the way it connects to capitalism. There's a good, however dark, book that I think works as a strange but decent commentary towards capitalism and factory farming called Tender Is the Flesh. It takes place in a world where cannibalism has been legalized after all the animal meat was contaminated. It replaces the animals in factory farms with people who are described as being 'specifically bred for consumption.' The novel gives reason to question the ethics of our current system, and I think it may change people's point of view when it comes to how we farm our animals.

    I believe it would be good for everyone to give this subject more thought. With more antibiotic-resistant diseases on the rise and the waste from these farms piling up, it's not something that can be ignored forever. I urge you to question things and look deep into yourself. The sooner you figure out where you stand, the sooner action can be taken.