[Cap]

Not for the squeamish...

http://www.petatv.com/tvpopup/video.asp ... ruelty_usa

And btw, it's just footage, there's no commentary, so I don't want to hear any "oh those PETA whackos" nonsense...


Cap

[Jesse]

....ummm... They're animals?

They're below us - there's a reason we're the dominant creature on this planet. We've created mathematics, physics, art, literature, architecture, medicin, law, everything.

[unPerson1]

They are chickens bred for slaughter. I don't approve of mass slaughters of animals in their natural habitat, but these chickens were never meant to live.

[Visage of Glory]

They are meant to be food... I do not think that you should hurt animals without a good reason, but providing sustenance is a good enough reason for me.

[Cap]

So then you all believe this is ethical?


Cap

[Comrade Ogilvy]

This is terrible I don't think I will ever feel the same when I pass KFC now..... poor chickens.

[Jesse]

Its neither - they're animals. Ethics don't apply to them, as they're not human. A Great-White Shark doesn't ponder the ethics of eating a surfer - its too inferior to be able to.

[Der Freiheitsucher]

Its neither - they're animals. Ethics don't apply to them, as they're not human. A Great-White Shark doesn't ponder the ethics of eating a surfer - its too inferior to be able to.

What you're saying is that it's ok to murder another fellow animal because we've discovered things that are more usual to... us?

[Cap]

Its neither - they're animals. Ethics don't apply to them, as they're not human. A Great-White Shark doesn't ponder the ethics of eating a surfer - its too inferior to be able to.

But we're superior enough to be able to; is that what you're getting at?

But since we're so able to understand ethics, they needn't apply to animals, Jesse?

So if I see a stray dog, and I'm a little hungry, I should have the right to beat it to death with a baseball bat, and take it home and fry it up... because it's beneath me, and I'm so ethically superior, and hey it's for FOOD, who cares if the animal suffered!

I didn't realize morality only applied if it went both ways... why don't we just cull all the mentally handicapped then, since they don't have the mental capacity to understand these advanced human ideas of right and wrong?

http://www.realdictionary.com/e/dir/ethics.asp


Cap

[Jesse]

So if I see a stray dog, and I'm a little hungry, I should have the right

Not the right, but the ability to do so. You're higher than it on the hierarchy of existance.

And don't get me started on eugenics and euthenasia - it'd just get off topic

[enLight]

I believe factory farming to be highly unethical because it devalues the worth of life. This is not to say that other animals must be held as equals to humans. No, they are our food. But something like this is unecessary. Nature provides all prey a chance to escape their predators. Since we already violate this with domestic farming, we should at least let the animals live normally until they die. It is our obligation as the caretakers of Earth.

[1skull2hands]

PEOPLE! just because we can do something does not mean that we should do it!

livestock and chicken's are living creatures, and should be treated so, untill their time is up!

We are living in a new age of new disease, mad cow, bird flew, on and on....

Its time we start getting back to basics, mankind has lived with and raised domesticated animals for thousands of years, to raise animals in these conditions for mass slaughter, force feeding, and poor living conditions will undoubtably alter these creatures, deformities and disease will eventually be passed on to us...........

[Maxim Litvinov]

Jesse - can I get your opinion on bestiality then? I mean the two arguments normally invoked against it are - it is just wrong, and the animal doesn't consent, but I can't see you believing either.

As on the abortion thread, I think the morality of killing a living thing comes down to two matters. The first is the sentience/consciousness of the animal, and the second is to what extent pain/trauma/death are being minimised.

In terms of consciousness I think it is slightly immoral to kill a chicken for the hell of it. I think it is even more immoral to torture that chicken to death. And I think that battery hens are tortured through life and into death. That their bodies give us food to eat somewhat addresses the scales of morality, that battery hens cost less to farm and thus buy is also a factor to consider. But, overall, I think the argument goes in favour of free-range farming, at least in developed countries.

One further factor is this: most urban Westerners are only not troubled by battery hen conditions because the first they see of their chicken is at KFC. If more people were exposed to the conditions of these animals, then I'm sure the compassionate nature and/or natural morality of humans would push many more to the belief that that there is something 'wrong' with battery farming.

[clownboy]

Maxim - unfortunity I don't believe the thinking process rises to that level when the average consumer goes shopping for chicken. For most, it's about price. They (rightly or wrongly) depend on the FDA to make sure the meat won't KILL you outright.

So, to recap - the chicken meat won't kill me AND it's cheaper than the locally small farm grown - score!

They don't WANT to know why it's cheaper, or how it's grown, or even how it got to the store. If you show them, they'll remember it only until the next sale at Albertson's.

[Todd D.]

Chickens being killed for nothing more than the pleasure of the one doing to killing is immoral. However I do not feel that this was the case. These chickens are being bred and killed for their use as foodproducts. In that sense I see nothing wrong because at the end of the day, despite what some people choose to believe, we are omnivores. It's this or running around breaking chickens necks with our bare hands. I dare say that the way that we kill chickens and cows is far less painful to them than the way that lions kill zebra, or the way that ants kill other bugs.

[Maxim Litvinov]

First - clownboy: my suggestion is that divorcing people from the direct effects of the killing, means that they are more likely to sanction it. Which is simply commonsense. If I had to handpick my cow or chicken, and then watch it being slaughtered, then I would be far less likely to ever eat meat. Which suggests that one of the only reasons we sanction battery conditions is that we aren't fully *aware* of what is happening.

In the end it is up to individual consumers. Anti battery-farming advocates do as much as possible to try to raise consumer awareness as to how the animals are treated and slaughtered. And it seems, at very least, that people should at least be informed how their food is provided, just as they should be made aware of how the staff who manufacture their goods are treated. If the consumer can still conscientiously promote certain products, then I guess there's nothing to stop them.

Todd D. - I think you over-simplify the issue. Even if chickens are being 'used' and there is a 'moral' justification for killing them, the question is the moral justification for killing them and treating them as horribly as we do.

If there is an option of free-range chickens, who live a relatively peaceful life and are slaughtered in a relatively humane manner, which cost 45 cents each, and battery-hens, who are genetically-modified blobs that can't move, trapped inside, injected with antibiotics, slaughtered while still as conscience as ever, which cost 40 cents each, then there is a real moral quandary. To what extent is a happy chicken worth 5 cents?

[enLight]

I'd agree that free ranging is the way to go, if one wishes to be morally justified. But, Todd D. is correct in saying that the method of how they are killed doesn't matter - as long as it's fast and relatively painless.

[Jesse]

Jesse - can I get your opinion on bestiality then? I mean the two arguments normally invoked against it are - it is just wrong, and the animal doesn't consent, but I can't see you believing either.

It is wrong not because the animal doesn't consent - but because its not adhering to the requirements of being human - reproducing. It is necessary to reproduce so that our species may continue to hold sway.

[Maxim Litvinov]

I'm just curious - not trying to bait you, by the way.

Of course, bestiality doesn't result in reproduction. But either does playing soccer or drinking beer. In fact, as leisure activities, the latter two are probably more likely to stop people having sex with each other, than bestiality.

So, if you accept that bestiality doesn't impact seriously on people's desire/ability to reproduce with each other, what is your problem with it as a leisure activity?


Oh - and generally... Much of the problem of battery hens is not that they are killed, or how they are slaughtered, but how they are treated while alive.

[MrCackle]

Well, if not from a moral standpoint then at least look at it from a health-related one. These chickens spend their entire lives in cages and get next to NO exercise for the entire time that they are alive. Thus, because they do not have developed muscle tissue then, by eating the chicken, you do not get proper amounts of protein and instead consume more and more fat.