Slaughterhouses

Here are some things to think about the next time you take a bite of your hamburger, fried chicken, chicken nugget or ham sandwich.

Factory-farmed or free-range animals are slaughtered if they survive the cruel farm conditions or the cramped painful transport. Slaughterhouse animals can hear, smell and sometimes see the slaughter of the animals killed before them which results in them excreting a fear chemical which can be toxic to humans. We then eat the animals fear and terror. The human workers are pressured to move fast and frequently become impatient when the animals struggle for survival which can lead to further terror and pain.

Except for Kosher and Halal, federal law mandates that mammals be stunned before they are slaughtered. Some common methods of stunning are:

• Captive bolt stunning - A "pistol" is placed against the animal's head and a metal rod is thrust into the brain. Many times the rod misses the mark because shooting a struggling animal is challenging.
• Electrical stunning - The current produces a grand mal seizure and thereafter the throat is slit. Temple Grandin, PhD and industry consultant states that "Insufficient amperage can cause an animal to be paralyzed without losing sensibility."

For slaughter used in Kosher and Halal situations, the animals are conscious when their carotid arteries are cut. This is meant to cause unconsciousness within seconds, but blood flow in the neck arteries call allow the animals to stay conscious for minutes. In addition, Temple Grandin, PhD states that "Unfortunately, there are some plants which use cruel methods of restraint such as hanging live animals upside down." This procedure can result in the breaking of bones while the animal is hung by one leg attached to a chain.

In a Washington Post article is read that "Hogs, unlike cattle, are dunked in tanks of hot water after they are stunned to soften the hides for skinning. As a result, a botched slaughter condemns some hogs to being scalded and drowned. Secret videotape from an Iowa pork plant shows hogs squealing and kicking as they are being lowered into the water."

On May 24, 2000, King5.com new service in Seattle, WA, released a story about undercover footage taken at a slaughterhouse. According to their report, "The video shows fallen cows being trampled and dragged, others are tortured with electric prods. One cow has fallen and workers stick an electric prod on its head, then place the prod down its mouth. Still other cows are hung on chains, fully conscious, blinking and kicking. The worker who shot the tape said one cow was already at a station where legs are removed. 'It would be horrible if someone were to cut off your leg without anesthesia.'"

According to Steve Cockerham, a USDA inspector at Nebraska slaughterhouses, and former USDA veterinarian Lester Friedlander, some U.S. slaughterhouses skin live cattle daily, drop squealing pigs in scalding water, and abuse still-conscious animals in other ways to keep production lines moving quickly all because of profit and greed.

The men stated that the federal law requiring slaughterhouses to kill animals humanely has been increasingly ignored as meat plants grow bigger. Cockerham said that he often saw plant workers cut the feet, ears, and udders off cattle that were conscious on the production line after stun guns failed to work properly. "They were still blinking and moving. It's a sickening thing to see," he said.

In 2007-2008, a set of print and video investigations broke out about a widely-praised California slaughterhouse. The Des Moines Register stated that "The undercover videos were bad enough: packing-plant workers abusing sick or disabled cattle and dragging at least one of the cows to be slaughtered, a violation of federal food-safety standards. But consumer advocates say what's also disturbing is what happened within days of that video being shot at a California slaughterhouse. Independent inspectors from two auditing firms visited the Westland/Hallmark Meat Co. plant and gave it glowing marks."

In Gail Eisnitz's book, Slaughterhouse one story describes the slaughterhouse as "a plant where squealing hogs were left straddling the restrainer and dangling live by one leg when workers left the stick pit for their half-hour lunch breaks; where stunners were shocking hogs three and four times...where thousands of squealing hogs were immersed in the plant's scalding tank alive."

Birds

It is shocking to discover that federal law does not require birds to be rendered insensible to pain before they are slaughtered. It is almost like humans feel that since birds make up 95% of our land animal food, they do not feel pain which is far from the truth as they have pain sensors just like humans. To make birds easier to handle, they are usually electrically stunned. However, it is not known if stunning renders the birds unconscious or whether the shock is simply an extremely painful experience. Every year, millions of geese, ducks, turkeys and chickens are boiled or drowned to death in scalding tanks.

In February of 2007, a Mercy For Animals (MFA) undercover investigator took a job at one of the largest poultry slaughter plants in the country. There he found workers:

• Ripping turkeys heads off whose feet were stuck in the transport truck cages.
• Throwing turkeys.
• Hitting live animals for entertainment.
• Allowing birds to lie on the helplessly flapping their wings in misery for long hours.

MFA's investigation comes right after a February 2005 People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals undercover investigation at a large Tyson plant in Alabama, where the investigator found:

• Workers ripping the heads off birds who had missed the throat-cutting machines.
• Birds frequently mutilated by throat-cutting machines that didn't work properly which results in birds having their skin torn off their chest. Imagine the pain you would feel if this was done to you without anesthesia.

A PETA undercover investigator took footage at a Pilgrim’s Pride chicken slaughterhouse in Moorefield, West Virginia where workers were filmed jumping up and down on top of live chickens, violently throwing them repeatedly into walls. This was documented in the New York Times ("KFC Supplier Accused of Animal Cruelty," July 20, 2004), and the video can be viewed at PETA.org. Sadly, even when violations are reported by inspections, the government frequently ignores them.