Posted in Farmed Animals

Serial killers’ worst crimes are done to farmed animals ‘on a mass scale,’ says undercover investigator

Undercover investigator ‘Andy’ worked in a slaughterhouse to gather video footage for HBO’s award-winning documentary ‘Death on a Factory Farm.’
Photo: HBO

By Katerina Lorenzatos Makris

The Humane Society of the United States’ (HSUS) annual Genesis Awards can be a lovely experience. At a glittering hotel in Beverly Hills, celebrities glow in their gowns and tuxes, banquet tables offer gourmet vegan delights, and applause thunders for quotes and clips from media projects that focus on animal issues.

The event can can also be disorienting. Amidst the glitter and glow, there’s the underlying awareness of why the awards are held: to spotlight the cruelty that HSUS says is perpetrated upon animals of all kinds, every day, around the world.  Continue reading →

Farmed animals might be the hardest-working Americans

Pigs, cows, chickens and other animals used for food might be the hardest working Americans. Most of them are on the job every day and don’t get time off or holidays. / Photo: USDA

Today, while the U.S.A. pays tribute to “the social and economic achievements of American workers,” as this federal holiday is described by the United States Department of Labor, there might be some irony in the fact that many citizens will celebrate the occasion by eating such items as hot dogs, hamburgers, chicken fajitas, and egg salad sandwiches.

Those Labor Day barbecue and picnic foods come from animals who, in light of the following quotes, might be considered to be the hardest-working Americans ever. Continue reading →

Is slaughterhouse abuse of cows surprising? Government agency has complained about it for years

Compassion Over Killing said their undercover video shows workers at Central Valley Meat Co.in California committing numerous violations of the Animal Welfare Act such as repeatedly shocking, shooting, and scalding sick and injured former dairy cows. Photo: Compassion Over Killing

By Katerina Lorenzatos Makris

An undercover video recently released by animal protection group Compassion Over Killing is difficult to watch, revealing horrific abuses of former dairy cows in a California slaughterhouse, such as killing them slowly and painfully, dousing them with scalding hot water, and using electric prods to repeatedly shock animals who appear to be ill or injured—one animal, the narrator says, more than 40 times. But these inhumane and illegal practices might not come as much of a surprise to some observers. Continue reading →

Want to defeat an animal protection law? Tea Party might help

United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) found that in some of Missouri’s puppy mills–the ‘Dirty Dozen– violations included ‘sick or dying puppies who had not been treated by a veterinarian; dogs found shivering in temperatures as low as 9 degrees; and dogs so emaciated that their bones were visible through their skin.’ – The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) / Photo: HSUS

By Katerina Lorenzatos Makris

If you’re trying to kill or modify a proposed animal welfare law—for example one that regulates high-volume commercial breeders or “puppy mills”—you might want to enlist the assistance of the Tea Party, according to the Missouri Farm Bureau (MFB).

“The Missouri Tea Party picked up that Prop B [the Puppy Mill Cruelty Prevention Act] was important,” said MFB’s director of marketing and commodities Kelly Smith, “and that they should be opposing it. They were a big help in doing that.”

Smith laid out a detailed strategy including other ways to fight animal welfare groups in his presentation “Protecting & Growing Agriculture Amidst the Activist Conflict – A Missouri Experience,” made to the Animal Agriculture Alliance “United We Eat” Summit in 2011. Continue reading →

Lobbyists to ‘pay the price’ for helping animal welfare groups in Missouri

Missouri demonstrators on the issue of Prop B, the “Puppy Mill Cruelty Prevention Act,” passed by voters but then replaced by Gov. Jay Nixon with a less stringent law / Photo: Missouri Farm Bureau and TruffleMedia

By Katerina Lorenzatos Makris ~

In this year’s election season, lobbyist firms who helped in the push for a law to regulate dog breeding in Missouri—condemned by animal protection groups as the “puppy mill capital of America”—might get punished.

“Those guys will be paying the price for doing that,” said Kelly Smith of the Missouri Farm Bureau (MFB). “There are several of those guys [lobbyists] that run rural state rep and state senate campaigns that will not be doing that in the future.” Continue reading →