I don't think you will find a lot of people here that will argue that factory farming is a good or moral practice. However, sustainable and ethical animal farming is and it exists. I have a cousin that raises chickens, they have about 30 of them. They raise them, give them the best life a chicken will ever see and then humanely kill and eat them. It's a fast death at the hands of those that have cared for them. If, they were to be let free and in to the wild, the death that they would inevitably face would likely be far more brutal. I'm curious, what's your issue with this scenario? Please answer as it pertains to this scenario. Thanks.
The problem I have with this is that (as I have described before) although animal welfare is a step in the right direction, it is not the same as the right to life. In the end a well taken care off creature is killed for no good reason other than, it tastes good. It's the ultimate display of subjugation and abuse of the weak. Then we use wording such as "humane kill" to make it sound acceptable. Have you considered the blatant contradiction in this saying? Since when is killing a human like thing to do?! Which human would like to be killed in a "humane" way? It's a cop out to say that killing is ok as long as it's done painlessly. Furthermore have you killed any of your own animals? Were you ok with it? I have and although back then I loved meat, it still bothered me seeing the life of the animals I helped kill - chickens, pigs, rabbits - fade away. It still pains me today, to know I was ever able to cause so much harm to such helpless innocent creatures. But I was simply following the acceptable social convention.
I have killed my own food before a number of times. I've killed fish and I have killed chickens. The fish were quick and easy and I felt/feel no guilt for it. I did not enjoy killing the chickens, but then I didn't enjoy killing the fish either. They died at my hands, quickly and with very little pain. You do realize that these animals are GOING TO DIE regardless, right? Also, most of them would have never existed otherwise. Please tell me which of these two scenarios you think the chicken would prefer: Scenario 1: Chicken is born and raised on a family farm, is treated well and cared for for years. Then it is killed to be eaten by those that cared for it. They carefully break it's neck, quickly and with little to no pain or pre-anxiety. Scenario 2: The same chicken is released from the farm. It sees a fox approaching. The fox stalks it for about half an hour, pouncing at it repeatedly until it finally catches its wing in its mouth. It tears the wing off. Now, the bird can't move as easily but is floundering around on the ground. The Fox pounces again and grips it in it's teeth around the birds neck. It presses down firmly with it's teeth, careful not to kill it but silencing it's calls for help. The fox heads back to its den where it places the bird at the mercy of it's pups. They each take turns pouncing on the wounded and bloody bird until finally, it can no longer take it and with the last of it's fight or flight adrenaline, it attempts to burst out the opening of the hole. The mother fox tears open it's neck before it can escape. It bleeds out and becomes their meal. Also, I'm an organ donor. Why? Because after I die, I want my body to be useful.Which human would like to be killed in a "humane" way?
Many would. Death can be painful and brutal, but it doesn't need to be.
Yes, the question is would you prefer to die a premature life or to die an old life of natural causes? It is true that farmed animals of carefully selected breeds are a human creation. This selection was never made with the well-being of the animals in mind but purely based on how much flesh they produce and how quickly they can grow so they live the shortest lives for the largest profit. In fact some breeds have developed severe health of problems due to this type of horrible selection. Are you saying that farmed animals should be thankful to their owners for having granted them a short (even if in some rare cases kind) existence followed by dead? That's quite a twisted, even sadistic, view to have, to do as we please with other beings and then claim it's for their own good. For the record I never advocated for the release of farmed animals into the wild. This would be irresponsible after the thousands of years of species subjugation/domestication. A compassionate management of farmed animals would have to be thought out, perhaps in the shape of animal sanctuaries, I don't know. However, I don't think this will ever be an actual problem since it is unlikely that the whole world will become vegan overnight, leaving us not knowing what to do with billions of caged animals. I think it's a bit disingenuous to come up with a real life example and compare it with a highly hypothetical and unlikely graphic fox example just to support your views. I appreciate that you make an effort to buy meat from supposedly more ethical sources, however most of the animals don't have that luck. There's way higher likelihood that an animal is born in a factory farm, Scenario 3: chick is born in factory egg farm. If male, he gets minced immediately since he can't produce eggs; if female gets her beak painfully cut in half to prevent fighting due to crowded conditions and natural instinct of territorial disputes, lives half a life in a dark, cruelly small cage where she can barely move, before getting slaughtered. Depressingly similar stories exist for other farmed species. This is the reality of the largest majority of farmed animals today. Why not take the alternative compassion driven Scenario 4: Animal gets born in natural environment, animal gets to live freely with minimal human interference, animal dies of natural causes. Isn't this what you expect for yourself? Why do you have double standards for other species?You do realize that these animals are GOING TO DIE regardless, right?
Also, most of them would have never existed otherwise.
Scenario 1 vs Scenario 2
I have not. But I have killed many animals for science research. Specifically, I harvest brain cells to (hopefully) advance treatments for stroke. I don't talk about the specifics of the work I do around people I don't know well, because you get mixed reactions. Many people think that I'm a monster, but I'd say most think it's a better than even trade for humanity. My experience over the last eight years since I've been doing this work has been mixed. The strange part is that you really do get more used to the killing. What used to bother me a lot in a physical sense, now doesn't bother me at all. That it, I don't have a negative visceral reaction to killing, but I definitely did when I started. However, the flip side is that I feel less and less comfortable with the idea of animal research the more I do it. I wish there was a better way. Maybe one day there will be, but I tend to doubt it. These systems are complex enough that it's difficult to imagine that a computer program could ever replace a mammal. A bacterium? Sure. But a mammal is a whole 'nuther story. At least for the foreseeable future, I think if we want to march forward with medicine, animals are the only way. It does raise an interesting calculus about the value of a rodent, dog, or monkey vs. a human. How many dogs are worth saving a congestive heart failure patient? I don't know, and I think the assigned values are basically arbitrary. It's up to each of us to decide for ourselves whether research, or eating meat, or destroying habitat for a home to live in (something pretty much all vegetarians do just like the rest of us) is worth our comfort. I detest factory farming (which I see as a completely different topic than eating meat by itself), but as a moral judgement, I would never try to convince anyone on either side that their position is wrong. Too complicated for my small brain. (I am also an organ donor. I don't see any good reason as to why anyone wouldn't be. But it's also a topic a wouldn't debate, because people who are against it get surprisingly heated over it.)I have killed my own food before a number of times.
All life feeds on death. When I eventually need a new heart (barring advances in certain technologies of course) it will come from someone who died to give it to me. Not all deaths are wasted into the void, some manage to benefit a higher cause than maggot food. Because after I die, I want my body to be useful.