Why factory farming breeds animal cruelty

First let me start of by saying that factory farming, or industrial farming, is by all accounts cruel to animals, people, and nature alike, regardless of whether or not someone is found playing foul...

Now I am not by any means against the raising of animals for consumption, as I believe that humans are by nature far more carnivorous than vegetarian.  However I am absolutely against the chauvinistic viewpoint that human society as a whole portrays towards all other beings.  And that is that humans are above all others on this planet, and only those few creatures that portray some human like quality either in the realm of  intelligence or compassion deem saving.  And only then do we make it our responsibility to save them from our cruelty, for the good of humanity of course...

So with that off my chest, let me get to the heart of my post.  Factory farming made headlines the other day with another animal cruelty charge... Butterball farm worker guilty of animal cruelty.

The point I'd like to make is that when we treat our food industry with a factory mentality, we diminish the animals to nothing more than widgets (whatever the factory is producing).  Once we take this precious living quality away from the animal, and once we dull our (the workers) senses to this life that is being taken by making it a robotic repetitious act, we open up the door to cruel unthinkable things.  We confine them into overcrowded cages or feed lots depriving them of their natural surroundings (earth and sunlight), and then we genetically modify them to better cope with conditions that would otherwise violate the Geneva Convention in every possible way.  We alter them physically by clipping beaks and clipping tails in order to prevent them from harming each other in the overcrowded jail cells that they call home. We force them to eat cheap unnatural food (GM corn and soy) depriving them of their natural diet (pasture and forage), and then pump them full of antibiotics in order to keep them alive long enough to slaughter.  We continually rape the land of all its nutrients killing trillions of organisms that would otherwise occupy healthy top soil, with the constant chemical warfare (synthetic fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides) that are used on the majority of the farm land (mono crops of soy and corn) that blankets this country.  We dam rivers for irrigation and plow over otherwise pristine untouched prairie land and forests, destroying the many ecosystems that would otherwise call these places home, for our own selfish need to plant and harvest more (corn and soy) in order to feed this ever hungry demean of a machine that we created (the industrial food industry).

And all of this is done every day within the laws that society has created.  And with the help of the constant ignorance (I don't want to know attitude) that people of this industrialized society portray, this "behind the scenes" cruelty that is the norm goes unstopped until some fool (a product of our own doing) makes headlines.

Take responsibility for your actions and choose to know where your food comes from. 

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