“If the weather is sultry and there appearsIt is all excused with claims that they are
the least perspiration on their skins, there aresheltered from the elements in sound
two men attending with cloths to rub thembuildings, want not for food and water and
perfectly dry and another to give them a have the company of their own kind. It is the
little cordial.” farming equivalent of being “attended by
two men to rub them perfectly dry.”
Royalty threw its weight behind this
deceit with the Duke of Clarence, son of If a person did similar things to dogs, he or
George III, offering his personal endorsementshe would rightly be prosecuted for cruelty
of the trade: – and yet a pig is equally as intelligent as a
dog. Why the difference? Why are there
“I am an attentive observer of the state oftwo sets of rules, one for a dog and one for
the negroes and find them well cared for anda pig? There is no logical explanation
in a state of humble happiness”. except that we deny pigs our
companionship and eat them after we’ve
So long as people persuaded themselves thatben cruel to them, plus they are part of
black people were merely beasts, they couldthe largest industry on Earth, just as slaves
do to them as they wished – their actionsonce were. As with slavery, there is an
excused and disguised from people of inverse relationship between profitability
conscience by bare-faced deceit. Few posedand welfare – the less spent on welfare, the
the question of whether such barbarityhigher the profits.
should be handed out even to beasts.
Doesn’t it seem extraordinary that the
It does not require great perception to livestock industry can officially cram sheep
immediately recognise the stark similaritiesinto lorries three tiers deep, knowing that
between slavery and modern
livestock farming, including
It does not require
the determination to
camouflage barbarism withgreat perception to
ludicrous claims of high
welfare – for production
immediately
systems that deny animals
recognise the stark
almost everything that is
natural to them.
similarities between
slavery and modern
The argument these days, of
course, is not about souls but
livestock farming
about consciousness,
awareness, the ability to feel pain or the top tier will urinate and defecate on the
experience fear and it is motivated by entirelysheep below and that that tier will do the
the same morality. Pigs are placed in barrensame to the sheep below them? They can
stalls to give birth – for their whole lives in then be driven around Europe with little
most of Europe and the US – so deprived offood, water or rest whilst we talk endlessly
stimulation that they can degenerate intoabout a humane society and the best welfare
madness. They are forced to have more littersstandards in the world, even while bodies
of piglets than their bodies will tolerate butdead from thirst and heat stroke are tossed
are not allowed to mother them. from the back of transporters.
3
Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12