-
I want you to imagine that one morning you
wake up and as you stretch in bed, your fingers
-
graze your oak headboard and suddenly, before
your eyes, you see the tiniest acorn fall
-
to the ground, sink into the earth, shoot
up into a great oak, get cut down by industrial
-
machinery, chopped into pieces, manufactured
into a headboard, packaged, shipped, displayed,
-
and purchased by you.
-
This all happens in the span of a few seconds.
-
You start thinking maybe you aren’t quite
awake it was just a particularly vivid dream.
-
But when you throw back your sheets, you’re
regaled with their entire journey from cotton
-
seedlings in a field all the way to adorning
your mattress.
-
By this point you’re understandably afraid
to move, so you yell for a loved one, instinctually
-
reaching out to them as they rush in.
-
And it happens again.
-
Only this time you’re not watching their
history, you’re seeing it through their
-
eyes.
-
Every moment in their life as they saw it,
every experience as they experienced it—all
-
in the blink of an eye.
-
It’s all so much at once you find yourself
unable to explain to them what’s happening—at
-
least not without sounding insane.
-
So you laugh it off—must have been a bad
dream—and thank them when they offer to
-
make breakfast.
-
Maybe getting something in your stomach will
settle things down.
-
You keep your socks on as you make your way
to the table to save yourself the life story
-
of your floors and carpets, and pull back
your chair with your foot before carefully
-
sitting down.
-
You decide to just use a single fork for everything
that you’re going to eat so that you don’t
-
have to learn more than you care to know about
utensil production.
-
Your plate is set before you and your loved
one or family member or roommate joins you.
-
You smile and thank them and say you must
have just been hungry.
-
And then you make the mistake of taking a
bite of bacon.
-
And it happens again.
-
What do you think you would see?
-
What would you hear?
-
Smell?
-
Feel?
-
What would it be like seeing through the eyes
of that pig?
-
Just imagine the full scope of this—every
item you pick up at the store, every piece
-
of clothing you put on, every person whose
hand you shake or hug.
-
How would your understanding of the world
and those around you change?
-
And how would it affect your food choices?
-
Hello, my name is Emily Moran Barwick.
-
I’m an animal liberation activist, an artist,
an educator and a vegan.
-
I created the YouTube channel and accompanying
website, Bite Size Vegan, where I educate
-
people about veganism through a wide array
of video styles covering a diverse range of
-
subjects.
-
In our time together today, I’m very likely
going to challenge some of your life-long
-
beliefs.
-
I’m going to ask you to set aside your preconceptions,
suspend any certainties, and try to see with
-
a fresh set of eyes that which you’ve never
questioned.
-
The everyday, ordinary, accepted aspects of
your daily life.
-
I am aware that this is a great deal to ask
of you, especially coming from a total stranger.
-
I’m asking for your trust when I haven’t
even earned it.
-
But believe it or not, I am not here to force
my beliefs upon you—to criticize your country,
-
culture, traditions, religions, or beliefs.
-
I’m not here to shame or shock you.
-
I’m not even here to make you vegan.
-
I won’t pretend to have that power.
-
And no one really makes any lasting change
through force anyway.
-
Today, I’m simply here to show you what
is really going on every second of every day
-
all around the world behind closed doors—including
here, in Ireland.
-
I’m here to present evidence—for your
consideration—that things may not be as
-
they appear
-
Undoing a life-long belief is no easy task.
-
But in order to make informed decisions, to
look ourselves in the mirror and ask if we
-
are truly living the values we purport to
have, we must know the truth.
-
We must educate ourselves about what is really
going on, not rely on what we’ve been taught.
-
We must make decisions based on facts, not
fantasy.
-
I’ll want to preface this talk by saying
that I’m going to be transparent with you
-
and I’ll even tell you if I don’t know
something.
-
I will be focusing rather intensely on the
situation here in Ireland.
-
Now I’m obviously not from here—and as
much as I strive to be diligent in my research,
-
it would be a grave misjudgment and incredibly
presumptuous on my part to come here and try
-
to tell you about your own country, especially
on something so incredibly central to your
-
country’s history, economy and culture,
as animal agriculture.
-
The facts I’ll present today are not of
my creation—I’ve sourced them from primarily
-
Irish governmental and industry documents,
the European Union, and many, many others.
-
You don’t even have to believe me—I will
be providing you with a link to a resource
-
sheet containing a full transcript of this
talk with detailed citations for every fact
-
I state, a full bibliography and additional
resources so that you can dig deeper.
-
We’ll only be able to barely scratch the
surface in this brief window of time we have
-
together.
-
So let’s get started.
-
For anyone unfamiliar with the term “veganism,”
vegans do not eat, wear, or use anything that
-
came from someone else’s body.
-
We don’t eat meat, drink milk or eat cheese.
-
We don’t consume eggs or honey.
-
We don’t wear leather, wool, silk, or down.
-
We don’t use products that were tested on
animals or contain byproducts from their slaughter.
-
And we don’t attend circuses, zoos, aquariums,
or any other event that exploits living beings
-
for our entertainment and pleasure.
-
Now you may think this is an extreme way of
life—most people do.
-
Maybe it seems unrealistic, unnatural, even
dangerous.
-
Perhaps a well-intended but misguided over-reaction
to isolated cases of animal cruelty.
-
After all, most people identify as animal
lovers—they don’t want to cause the suffering
-
and death of innocent beings anymore than
vegans do.
-
But all those undercover videos of abuse and
horror stories of cruelty you hear in the
-
news—those are in America, right?
-
Or China.
-
Or some far away land.
-
Or a case of one corrupt individual giving
all farmers a bad name.
-
Or the inevitable product of factory farms,
big agribusiness, and corporate greed.
-
But it’s not like that here.
-
Here we have smaller farms.
-
Higher standards.
-
Better conditions.
-
Stronger regulations.
-
Our farmers care about their animals.
-
Maybe your family or you yourself are involved
in some aspect of animal agriculture and find
-
the claims of many animal activists objectionable,
inflammatory, and completely out of line with
-
your own practice.
-
Or maybe the rolling green pastures you drive
past, with peacefully grazing cows seem to
-
be another world from the vegan arguments
against beef and dairy.
-
Or maybe you have a friend who raises their
own chickens for eggs and treats them like
-
family members, nothing like the tiny cages
in the media.
-
Certainly there’s a middle ground between
systematic abuse and the extreme measures
-
of veganism?
-
A way of farming animals that’s inline with
the inherent values of humanity: stewardship,
-
compassion, respect for life, humane treatment.
-
Assuming this is the case, how much do you
know about the exact nature of these higher
-
standards and stronger regulations—or even
the origin of the animal or animal product
-
on your table?
-
Where were they born?
-
Where and how were they housed?
-
How were they treated?
-
How were they killed?
-
Unfortunately—or, you may think fortunately—the
hypothetical exercise we started off with
-
is total fantasy.
-
The vast majority of people posses very little
to no knowledge of where their food comes
-
from and how the individuals from whom it
was taken were treated—including the Republic
-
of Ireland and the whole of the EU.
-
What we eat is such an accepted part of our
every day life that most of us have never
-
even thought to question what we’ve been
told.
-
This isn’t due to a lack of intelligence—this
information is deliberately difficult to find—and
-
even then, it’s couched in euphemisms and
dense legal language.
-
Which makes you wonder— if there’s really
nothing wrong with how we breed, raise, and
-
kill the animals we eat—if it really is
better here, why such make such an effort?
-
Today we’re going to decode this language,
look behind closed doors—we’re going to
-
take that figurative bite and see the history
of the animals we eat.
-
And this is not just about them, but also
the environment, our health, and the health
-
of our family.
-
You deserve to know the truth about what you’re
putting in your body—about what you’re
-
feeing your children.
-
And you certainly deserve to know what you’re
paying others to do to animals in your name.
-
Now I’m not even talking about instances
of overt abuse and neglect—which have and
-
do occur in Ireland— because we all know
such cruelty is unacceptable.
-
What we’re going to focus on are the standard
operating procedures and best practices.
-
You may already be familiar with some of what
I’ll cover—perhaps it’s even part of
-
your every day work—but remember today is
about seeing these accepted conventions through
-
new eyes—the animals’ eyes—and questioning
our mentality towards these beings.
-
To this end I’ll be using terminology you
may find objectionable when applied to non-humans—perhaps
-
overly anthropomorphic.
-
This is a perfect example of our completely
contradictory beliefs.
-
Humane regulations are an inherent admission
of animals’ ability to suffer and feel pain.
-
So how can we claim that our standards are
higher, our animals better treated, that they’re
-
healthy and happy—then deny that they even
possess these capacities when asked to see
-
from their perspective?
-
We cannot have it both ways.
-
So let’s see how the vast majority of Ireland’s
population lives.
-
The Republic of Ireland’s human population
is now over 4.7 million.
-
Of course this does not include the over 1
and a half million pigs, 5 million sheep,
-
almost 7 million cows, and 11 million chickens
and other birds.
-
As you most likely are aware, Ireland’s
main animal agriculture outputs are dairy
-
and beef, however the most highly consumed
animal products in the Republic are pig meat
-
and poultry.
-
In fact, Ireland has one of the highest levels
of poultry meat consumption within the EU
-
at 32.8kg per person in 2015, finally overtaking
Irish per capita pig meat consumption by over
-
a kilo.
-
And, believe it or not, at least according
to the respective countries’ statistics
-
from 2014, Ireland’s population consumed
almost 7 kilos more poultry per person than
-
the United States, and between 9 and 24 kilos
more red meat, depending on the measurement
-
parameters.
-
It just so happens that the most highly consumed
meats in Ireland are the most intensively
-
farmed, though this can be easy to miss as
the Agricultural Census groups pigs, poultry,
-
horticulture, fruit and mixed crops as “Other.”
-
Ireland’s pig industry states in its own
2015 report that “currently 99%+ of Irish
-
pigs are bred and reared in indoor, non-straw
bedded, slatted or solid floor systems.”
-
In 2003 the European Commission stated that
while “the majority of pigs for fattening
-
(81 %) are reared on units of 200 pigs or
more,”…[t]he industry in…Ireland is
-
characterised by units of more than 1000.”
-
Within the pig industry worldwide, it’s
standard practice to “process” piglets—a
-
perfect example of the euphemistic terminology
with which we reduce individuals to inventory.
-
It allows us to distance ourselves from our
actions.
-
During “processing” baby pigs have their
teeth cut or ground, their ears sliced or
-
pierced, their tails cut off and boys have
their testicles ripped out—all without anesthetic.
-
While the Irish pig industry seems to favor
raising intact males, the Republic’s laws
-
explicitly permit unanaesthetized castration,
along with teeth and tail cutting of piglets
-
under 8 days of age.
-
Ear tagging, notching, or other “lawful
application” of identification are permitted
-
at any age on any animal.
-
Baby pigs are killed before they’re 6 months
old—a decade before their natural lifespan.
-
The brief time they get to spend with their
mother is through the thick metal bars of
-
her farrowing crate.
-
Nursing mothers are tightly confined, unable
to turn around or interact with their babies.
-
Pigs are highly intelligent and incredibly
social, ranking with primates in their level
-
of social cognition.
-
Mothers can recognize their piglets by sound
alone, and sing to their babies while nursing—referred
-
to in studies as “nursing vocalization.”
-
But despite their scientifically recognized
array of complex emotions, piglets are separated
-
from their mother within days or weeks of
their birth, with Ireland specifying no earlier
-
than 21 days.
-
The sooner her babies are taken, the faster
she can “re-enter production.”
-
At her “time of service,” the astounding
term for forceful penetration of her vagina
-
with an instrument full of boar semen, she
may legally be chained in place, one of the
-
number of exceptions allowing the tethered
restrained of pigs.
-
Tethering stalls as a whole, where pigs were
chained in place all the time were outlawed
-
by the EU in 1995, but as we’ll continually
see with all regulations, this came with ample
-
exceptions, loopholes, and a 10 year window
for implementation.
-
In 1998 91% of Ireland’s mother pigs were
still confined to sow stalls or tethered.
-
And when sow stalls, also known as gestation
crates, were subsequently outlawed through
-
a 2001 EU decision, again with ample fine-print
exceptions and only for a certain portion
-
of their pregnancy, Ireland was one of nine
member states found to be non-compliant in
-
2013, with the European Commission stating
they’d “had twelve years to ensure a smooth
-
transition to the new system and to implement
the Directive.”
-
Later that same year, the organization Compassion
in World Farming released an undercover video
-
from their investigation into five pig farms
in Cork, Waterford and Kerry, with one investigator
-
stating, “These are the worst pig farms
that we have seen in Europe, and the worst
-
conditions that I have seen in years,” finding
pigs covered in their own excrement, relegated
-
to filthy pens, cannibalizing dead pigs left
in their pens out of boredom, bins full of
-
carcasses, weak and emaciated pigs left to
die, open wounds, among other violations.
-
Fearing their findings were an indication
of conditions within “a large section of
-
Irish pig farming,” the organization noted
how “Ironically, as these investigations
-
were taking place, Ireland held the EU Presidency.
-
During their tenure, the Irish Government
made a show of taking the lead on animal welfare.”
-
Humane regulations do not equal humane treatment.
-
As I mentioned earlier, there’s a tendency
to dismiss these kinds of investigation as
-
isolated incidents—five isolated incidents
in this case.
-
That’s why I’m laying out in such detail
the exact nature of the highest standards
-
available—standards that reduce intelligent
beings to machinery.
-
That allow the repeat sexual exploitation
and confinement of mothers, the mutilation
-
of babies, the separation of families in order
to churn out the next round of living products.
-
If we look at Ireland’s own portrayal of
ideal conditions, images printed in welfare
-
guides, pig farms featured on Ear to the Ground,
and make the effort to see with a fresh set
-
of eyes, how can we call this treatment humane?
-
If this is the highest standard, what’s
happening when the camera’s not rolling?
-
This particular episode of Ear to the Ground
perfectly illustrates our true motivation
-
for enhanced welfare—allowing a few pigs
to access to the outdoors for the first time
-
in their lives to see if this improves the
flavor of their flesh and the price their
-
carcasses will fetch.
-
Ireland’s Pig Industry Stakeholders in their
own 2015 report cite animal health and welfare
-
as major challenges, and propose a financial
incentive of €200 per sow for depopulation—meaning
-
payment for killing and “restocking” their
“inventory.”
-
In 2015, 3.2 million pigs were killed in export-approved
plants in Ireland.
-
When we add in the estimate for non-export
approved plants and the 181,000 Irish pigs
-
shipped alive to other countries, the body
count climbs to 3.6 million (3,575,737).
-
This does not include pigs “destroyed”
for disease or depopulation, nor the worn
-
out mother sows killed with their “production”
declines.
-
Deemed unfit for human consumption, even in
their death’s these serially abused beings
-
are denied any recognition of individuality.
-
If we are capable of treating these social,
intelligent, emotive beings—who show affection
-
and play in many of the same ways as our beloved
canine companions—with such malicious, selfish
-
disregard, imagine what we’re capable of
doing to beings with whom we’re less able
-
to relate, 2015 was a banner year for the
Irish Poultry and Egg industries, with rising
-
global demands and domestic consumption.
-
Along with poultry surpassing pig flesh as
the most eaten meat in the country, Irish
-
egg consumption and production are also rose,
with the nation’s 240 egg producers churning
-
out 281 million more eggs in 2015 than five
years prior.
-
By sheer quantity alone, chickens are the
most severely exploited of farmed land animals.
-
the mothers of the pig industry, layer hens
are imprisoned, used up, and thrown away when
-
their bodies give out prematurely from the
extreme demands of production.
-
Hens lose vital nutrients every time their
body forms an egg.
-
Every aspect of their lives is regulated to
ensure maximum output.
-
From breeding them to produce eggs at an alarmingly
unnatural rate, to controlling their laying
-
cycles with days and days of persistent light
followed by long periods of complete darkness,
-
to starving them for weeks at a time in an
effort to force yet another egg cycle from
-
their worn out bodies, a process benignly
referred to as “induced molting.”.
-
Of course, the EU essentially banned the complete
removal of food and water in 1999, so instead
-
of suffering through up to 3 years of this
brutality, European hens whose production
-
has declined have the good fortune of being
slaughtered around their first birthday.
-
The vast majority of the world’s more than
7 billion layer hens spend their abbreviated
-
lives in cramped battery cages, unable to
even extend their wings.
-
Now you may have heard the big fuss about
the European Union’s groundbreaking directive
-
set in 1999 banning “barren battery cages”
by 2012.
-
From the media coverage, you’d think EU
layer hens are living in luxury.
-
But as we’re seeing with humane regulation,
the devil is truly in the details.
-
In reality, the directive merely replaced
barren battery cages with “enriched,”
-
meaning furnished, battery cages.
-
Reports extolled how hens would now be afforded
750cm2 each, neglecting the legislation’s
-
clarification that only 600 of these would
be usable due to “furnishings”—meaning
-
this most “revolutionary” advancement
for the rights of layer hens granted them
-
each an additional 50cm2.
-
Understanding the true impotence of this legislation
makes its pathetic implementation all the
-
more baffling.
-
In 2012, nine countries told the European
Commission that their farmers would not meet
-
the deadline for conversion, with four additional
countries saying it was unlikely they’d
-
be ready.
-
These thirteen countries had over 12 years
to grant the laying hens they enslave a meager
-
50cm2.
-
And all the while the media celebrates the
victory for animal welfare, the public eats
-
more and more eggs, reassured by their higher
standards, and the individuals this entire
-
charade is supposed to be for, remain just
as exploited.
-
This is readily evident if when we put a face
to the figures.
-
Meet Alice and Joy.
-
They were both liberated with a few of their
sisters from Irish egg farms and brought to
-
Eden Sanctuary just outside of Dublin, where
they walked on grass and saw the sky for the
-
first time in their life.
-
Alice came from a battery cage farm.
-
Joy came from an enriched cage farm.
-
Eden’s founder, Sandra Higgins, described
in a report on the EU Directive the conditions
-
in which Joy and her friends were imprisoned.
-
“A large number of them had extremely inflamed
and swollen bodies, obviously stressed to
-
the limit by the human demand for eggs.
-
One hen was barely able to walk, her legs
unable to keep her body upright because they
-
were forced so wide apart from the swelling
in her abdomen.
-
Some had prolapsed from the effort of laying
eggs.
-
Some died of egg peritonitis.
-
Joy, like the others, was exceptionally light,
with a mere covering of skin and feathers
-
over her sharply protruding keel or breast
bone.
-
She had ammonia scalds on her skin.”
-
Apparently they hadn’t seen the news to
know how fortunate they were to be living
-
under the highest of standards.
-
Confronted with this reality, most people
propose a shift to free-range and cage-free
-
facilities.
-
But as we’ve seen, the only comfort these
labels bring is to our own conscience.
-
Cage-free birds are crammed into tiny sheds
and have twice the mortality rates of battery
-
caged hens.
-
They still have their sensitive beaks cut
or burned off, and as they still suffer the
-
same predisposition to osteoporosis from their
inbred overproduction of eggs —which, with
-
their increased opportunity for movement,
results in an increased incidence of fractures.
-
Their bodies are their prisons.
-
The most horrifying consequence of our perverse
genetic manipulation, is the fate of male
-
layer chicks.
-
We’ve optimized our machines, you see, and
designed one kind of chicken for meat and
-
another kind for eggs.
-
Because of this, the egg industry produces
billions of unwanted male baby chicks every
-
year.
-
To “dispose of”—as it’s termed—these
baby chicks, they are either painfully gassed,
-
slowly suffocated in plastic bags, or they
are ground up alive.
-
This is standard practice all over the world,
regardless of cage-free, free-range, and organic
-
labels.
-
The EU regulation under which Ireland operates
lists maceration as the preferred method,
-
specifying that chicks must be less than 72
hours old when the are killed –they are
-
not even granted three days of life.
-
Now you won’t find any mention of this barbaric
practice in Ireland’s newly implemented
-
Animal Welfare Act, or anything specifying
methods of confinement and slaughter.
-
And even if you manage to unravel the convoluted
language and trace the overly complex changes
-
in legislation enough to find what eventually
became part 7 of Schedule 5 of the Welfare
-
of Farmed Animals Regulations, you’ll find,
amongst a myriad of disturbing details of
-
legalized murder, “The permitted methods
for the killing of chicks,” cleanly laying
-
out the proper way to grind up conscious,
living, feeling, day old babies.
-
Of course if you happen to look deeper and
find that Schedule 5 was deleted in its entirety
-
in 2013, you may understandably assume chick
disposal was abolished.
-
In reality, the reason Ireland’s new Welfare
Act seems so sterile is that it simply defers
-
the gruesome details to the EU Regulations,
and Ireland-specific supporting statutory
-
instruments.
-
I hope by now my initial claims that we can’t
trust what we are told are sounding slightly
-
less like a conspiracy theory.
-
If you’re wondering why this hasn’t been
exposed on the news, it has.
-
And every time it’s people are appalled,
outraged, disgusted.
-
They wonder how anyone person or industry
could be so barbaric.
-
And they continue to eat eggs, not realizing
they’ve just answered their own question.
-
The European Commission estimates that the
EU kills 330 million chicks every year, with
-
global estimates at 3.2 billion.
-
The chickens of Ireland’s raises meat industry
aren’t any better off, bred to grow at such
-
alarming rates that they collapse under their
own weight before being sent to slaughter
-
at only 5-6 weeks old.
-
In 2015 Ireland killed a record 80.3 million
chickens in approved export plants alone.
-
Ireland’s SafeFood review not only describes
in detail how Irish chickens are hung upside
-
down and dragged through electrified water
baths, but also addresses the health impact
-
on the human population.
-
Campylobacter is the most common cause of
bacterial gastroenteritis in Ireland, with
-
“the highest burden…seen in children under
five.”
-
In 2008, of the broiler chicken carcasses
inspected from Ireland, 98% were contaminated
-
with Campylobacter.
-
That same year, Ireland had the most outbreaks
of Cryptosporidiosis and E-coli in the entire
-
EU and EEA.
-
And I’m sure your familiar with bovine spongiform
encephalopathy or mad cow disease—which
-
brings us finally to most iconic and the most
profitable sectors of Ireland’s animal agriculture:
-
dairy and beef.
-
Ireland is home to over 6.3 million cows.
-
1.7 million were slaughtered in factories
& abattoirs in 2015, with total “disposals”
-
as it’s termed, reaching nearly 2.1 million.
-
But these numbers say little about the lives
of these beings.
-
We all know milk comes from cows.
-
We may think they have a constant supply of
milk and even that they need to be milked
-
to relieve the pressure.
-
But cows are mammals, just like us.
-
They produce milk for one reason: to feed
their babies.
-
Cows carry their babies for 9 months, just
like we do, they lactate to feed their babies,
-
just like we do, and after weaning, they stop
producing milk, just like we do.
-
So in order to have a constant supply of cow’s
milk for human consumption, we need a constant
-
supply of pregnant cows.
-
In the dairy industry, as we’ve seen with
mother pigs, cows are repeatedly subjected
-
to what we call artificial insemination.
-
But were we to awake in the condition of our
imaginary scenario, take a sip of milk and
-
see the same experience from the cow’s perspective,
we’d not hesitate a moment to call it rape.
-
Cows are restrained, anally penetrated by
the inseminator’s arm, and vaginally penetrated
-
by the semen-containing rod.
-
Aside from the trauma of this experience,
cows often sustain internal injuries, which
-
is why AI training on female cows at slaughterhouses
is gaining popularity.
-
After all, any damage to working cows would
slow down production, and what’s another
-
violation when they’ll be dead soon anyways?
-
No matter where she’s raised or how she’s
housed, when a dairy cow gives birth, her
-
baby is taken away.
-
Can’t have them sucking up all the profits,
after all.
-
Animal Health Ireland’s handy CalfCare guide
advises that “dairy calves should be removed
-
from their dams,” meaning mothers, “immediately
after birth and hand-fed colostrum,” which
-
is the very first milk all mothers produce,
containing important antibodies.
-
They go on to explain that “the dairy calf
is going to be separated from the cow anyways”
-
as “dairy cows are not bred for their mothering
abilities,” citing the low quality of their
-
colostrum.
-
Not only does this negate the emotional devastation
of having child after child taken away, but
-
it even uses the consequences of our own exploitation
as a means of justification.
-
Cows bond intensely with their calves and
will cry for days when they are taken.
-
A former cattle rancher friend of mine turned
vegan when she witnessed her cows chasing
-
the trailer as it took their children away.
-
She says they cried for days and only stopped
when they lost their voices.
-
This is not anthropomorphizing.
-
It is a mother’s grief and it’s utterly
heartbreaking to watch.
-
If her baby is male, he is sent to a veal
farm where he is tied down, unable to move,
-
or locked in a cage where he cannot even turn
around until he’s slaughtered while still
-
only a few weeks old.
-
Veal, an industry that even many meat-eaters
oppose, wouldn’t exist without dairy.
-
Every cup of yogurt, every scoop of ice cream
and every glass of milk is directly connected
-
to the deaths of those baby calves.
-
Of course the dairy calves of Ireland are
shipped to other countries to meet their fate.
-
Female calves are doomed to suffer the same
fate as their mothers, whose worn out bodies
-
give out around 4 or 5 years of age, despite
their natural lifespan of 20 years or more.
-
They’re sent to slaughter for cheap meat
and pet food, deemed unfit for human consumption.
-
At the slaughterhouse, many of these mothers
face their final and most brutal separation
-
from yet another child.
-
While formal statistics are difficult to obtain
as most studies focus on the economic cost
-
of “fetal wastage,” accounts range from
approximately 10% to 70% of cows arriving
-
at the slaughterhouse pregnant.
-
Ireland’s welfare laws allow the unanesthetized
castration of cows up to 6 months of age with
-
a burdizzo, or a rubber ring around their
scrotum up to 8 days of age, as well as the
-
painful removal of their horns up to 15 days.
-
Of course Ireland’s Farm Animal Welfare
Advisory Council recommends these procedures
-
not be carried out simultaneously with the
weaning of beef calves, stating that, “Weaning
-
of the suckled calf from its mother can be
particularly stressful for both the cow and
-
her calf.”
-
Their dairy brochure offers a single bullet
point, that “Weaning of calves should be
-
done with the minimum of stress.”
-
An EU audit encompassing only a fraction of
Irish dairy farms between 2012 and 2014, found
-
up to 70 welfare violations per year, stating
that “the most frequently detected in bovine
-
animals is mutilation.”
-
And that despite corrective measures, “the
number of mutilation non-compliances detected
-
from 2012 to 2014 remained stable.”
-
Living beings aren’t meant to be production
machines.
-
Dairy cows are prone to infections from frequent
milkings, and are often pumped full of antibiotics
-
and growth hormones, all of which seep into
their milk.
-
Even here in Ireland there’s an official
number of pus cells allowed in milk, euphemistically
-
referred to as the “somatic cell count.”
-
In the United States, 750,000 pus cells are
allowed in every mL, with the EU specifying
-
400,000 cells/mL and Brazil allowing 1,000,000
cells/mL].
-
Yes, Ireland’s dairy and beef cattle are
largely pasture raised and on much smaller
-
farms than industrial production.
-
But even that’s changing.
-
With the end of the milk quotas, Ireland’s
largest dairy farmer said that in order to
-
compete, “the dairy farm of the future is
going to have to be bigger.”
-
And for the cow, the pig, the chicken, duck,
turkey, for the lamb or sheep—they don’t
-
know the name of the company or person enslaving
them.
-
They don’t know what size the farm is or
in what country.
-
They are just as robbed of their rights and
their lives regardless of location
-
Our rationalizations and justifications are
of no use to those whom we exploit.
-
With some of our most impressive mental gymnastics,
which would be admirable if it weren’t so
-
horrific, we say this barbaric mutilation,
this conversion of living beings from someONES
-
to someTHINGS is for their own good.
-
Because if we if we don’t clip their teeth
or cut their beaks or slice off their tails,
-
they’ll attack and chew on each other.
-
What we fail to mention, is that these behaviors
are stress responses to confinement in overly-crowded,
-
insanity-inducing conditions.
-
If we didn’t put them in these abusive conditions,
they wouldn’t react the way they do.
-
But we humans love to play the role of savior
in the disasters of our own creation.
-
We swoop in to milk the cow and relieve the
painful pressure of her swollen udder.
-
Pressure that wouldn’t exist had we not
taken her child away.
-
We’ve spent all this time looking at the
treatment of animals in Ireland, but the truth
-
is, Ireland exports the vast majority of its
outputs, including 90% of beef and around
-
85% of dairy.
-
In addition thousands of live pigs, chickens,
sheep, lambs, and unweaned calves—babies
-
we’ve stolen away from their mothers—are
shipped out of Ireland on extended, terrifying
-
journeys to other countries through all manner
of weather extremes.
-
If they manage to survive the journey, they’re
either fattened up for slaughter, or in the
-
case of veal calves confined and slaughtered,
or simply killed immediately.
-
Ireland’s transport reports show regular
violations of animal welfare regulations,
-
with Ireland as a whole receiving a Formal
Notice from the EU in 2011.
-
And when these beings arrive at their final
destination, the nature of their treatment
-
and their deaths are out of Irish hands.
-
Undercover investigations continue to expose
brutal abuse of these imported animals.
-
Ireland ships living beings across the EU
as well as to destinations like Tunisia, Libya,
-
Morocco, Kosovo, Albania, Rwanda, China, and
the Ukraine.
-
But what about the animals that you eat?
-
How are they treated?
-
Looking again at what’s eaten the most,
60% of pig meat and 90% of chicken consumed
-
in Ireland are imported.
-
Another SafeFood report found the majority
of Ireland’s population had very low awareness
-
as to the actual source of their food, illustrating
how a single slice of Hawaiian pizza processed
-
and packages in the Republic of Ireland, would
have ingredients from at least 19 countries.
-
Ireland is home to multiple multinational
corporations with the world’s largest beef
-
producer, JBS, recently relocating their headquarters
to the Republic, amidst criminal proceedings
-
for violating Brazilian laws.
-
In surveying and observing Irish consumers,
they found that “While many aspired to be
-
healthy, economical, and to support the domestic
market, this did not follow through to their
-
purchasing behaviour.
-
It was observed … that there is a marked
difference between consumers’ attitudes
-
and their behaviours.”
-
This finding was echoed in an EU study on
awareness of slaughter regulations, with the
-
majority of Irish consumers unaware of the
details or even whether regulations exist,
-
and just two of the 13,500 respondents from
across the EU citing animal welfare at slaughter
-
as a consideration in their meat purchases,
with the main driving forces being quality
-
and price.
-
Once again money trumps ethics.
-
Yes, the industry keeps the truth deliberately
hidden, but to be honest, most of us prefer
-
not to know.
-
We say we love animals, but it’s impossible
to love someone and profit from their death.
-
Of course farmers take care of their animals.
-
But we only need to look at the language to
see it’s not compassion, it’s maintenance
-
of inventory.
-
We even limit the parameters of their so-called
legal protection by the bottom line of cost.
-
We amass mountains of paperwork, conduct thousands
of studies, spend untold amounts of money,
-
form governmental, institutional and industry
panels, all to decide, define and decree the
-
right way to rape, confine, mutilate, kidnap
and kill.
-
I mean it really is absurd when we step back
and think about it.
-
Do we have manuals on how to humanely rape?
-
Or how to compassionately kidnap?
-
Or ethically rob?
-
Of course not because those are oxymorons.
-
They cannot coexist.
-
But when it comes to our treatment of animals,
we will bend over backwards and create massive
-
paper trails of regulations to feel good about
what we are doing.
-
We turn these living beings into data points,
flowcharts, and percentages—calculate to
-
a decimal point’s certainty the exact cost
of every aspect of their lives and details
-
for their deaths.
-
We relegate the annual mass murder of over
3 billion day-old conscious, innocent babies
-
to a footnote.
-
A footnote in a study conducted for the welfare
regulations we’re so graciously creating.
-
We deem them legally sentient, deserving freedom
from hunger, thirst, discomfort, pain, injury,
-
disease, fear, distress and mental suffering—then
use this very recognition of their capacity
-
to feel the same emotions and sensations as
we do to design—in language so disturbingly
-
detached it’s nothing short of sociopathic—the
exact manner in which we may legally violate,
-
imprison, cut, burn, alter, and murder them.
-
This is how profoundly illogical our thinking
is when it comes to animals.
-
It goes against all basic human understanding.
-
Knowing better but doing wrong anyway is worse
than having no knowledge.
-
Yet we have the audacity to hold this legislative
recognition of non-human sentience on high
-
as a giant step forward for the rights of
animals.
-
As if systematically exploiting individuals
with fully admitted knowledge and comprehension
-
of their capacity to suffer is something to
commend.
-
Look what we offer ourselves as evidence of
progress: one news report extolled the reduction
-
in animals slipping and falling on their way
to slaughter in one abattoir in one country.
-
When we look at our actions from the other
side, the perverse absurdity of our deluded
-
self-congratulations is astounding.
-
If you were in the place of these beings,
how grateful would you feel if your captor
-
laid down a bathmat on the ramp to your execution?
-
Is this really the best we have to offer?
-
Being the most courteous murderers?
-
The most considerate rapists?
-
Pouring untold resources into these convoluted
laws and regulations, all the while completely
-
blind to the fact that there’s another option
entirely.
-
One we don’t have to manipulate our values
to justify.
-
One we don’t have to couch in euphemistic
terms or bury beneath incomprehensibly dense
-
legislation.
-
One that allows us to finally align our actions
with our values and become the people we believe
-
ourselves to be.
-
Good people.
-
Kind people.
-
Animal lovers.
-
Stewards to this earth and its inhabitants.
-
Before we address—very briefly—issues
of the environment and health, I’m going
-
to play a short video.
-
While I’ve included footage on your resource
page of the undercover investigation into
-
Irish pig farms and the brutal abuse and prolonged
slaughter of live exported Irish animals,
-
I decided to take a different approach here
today.
-
The video I’m going to play only includes
footage of government-sanctioned conditions
-
and practices, all completely legal here in
Ireland.
-
If it really is better here, we should have
no objection to watching.
-
If you feel you must turn away, I’d just
ask you to think on the question: “If I
-
can’t watch the process, do I have a right
to eat the product?”
-
VIDEO
-
In my years of being vegan and speaking with
many, many non-vegans, I have yet to ever
-
hear one reason that even comes close to justifying
putting a sentient being through what we just
-
saw.
-
Not one.
-
You cannot watch that and say that the animals
we kill for our food don’t know any better.
-
That they die peacefully and humanely.
-
They can sense the fear.
-
They can smell the blood.
-
And they fight.
-
They fight to the end.
-
And you can’t say that it’s happening
in some far away place because it’s happening
-
all over the world.
-
The CO2 chambers you saw - those were the
medieval devices lowering pigs to an extraordinarily
-
painful death of burning from the inside out
– that is seen as the most humane method
-
of slaughtering pigs.
-
It’s employed worldwide, including here
in the Ireland.
-
The EU, in its groundbreaking legislation,
recommended phasing out the use of carbon
-
dioxide, but said “the impact assessment
revealed such recommendations were not economically
-
viable at present.”
-
Interestingly enough, Butina, the company
that manufactures the very chambers you saw
-
in that video—and the ones operating here
in Ireland—was one of the stakeholders involved
-
in that assessment.
-
It’s the absurdity of murderers deciding
how they’re allowed to murder.
-
As we saw with the disease outbreaks, it’s
not just the animals’ welfare that’s compromised.
-
In Ireland, just like the United States, heart
disease is the number one killer.
-
We’ve long had proof that a balanced vegan
diet can prevent and even reverse heart disease.
-
74% of men and 57% of women in Ireland were
overweight or obese in 2010, with the World
-
Health Organization designating Ireland as
the leader of Europe’s obesity crisis, with
-
almost the entire adult population predicted
to be overweight or obese by 2030.
-
More than 1 in 4 children in Ireland are overweight
or obese, with a SafeFood study finding 61%
-
getting insufficient dietary fiber, 40% exceeding
recommendations for dietary fat, and all exceeding
-
salt intake by 50%, specifying that “processed
meats … made a major contribution to the
-
salt content of all children’s diets,”
the very kind of meat that the WHO has designated
-
as a class one carcinogen.
-
We’re taught that animal products are necessary
for protein, vitamin D, B-12, iron, and other
-
nutrients, but these “foods” are a package
deal—inseparable from their disease-promoting
-
components.
-
I’ve included more in-depth information
on health and nutrition on your resources
-
page, as well as a link to a free comprehensive
guide to going vegan from Eden Farm Sanctuary’s
-
Go Vegan World campaign—but I want to speak
very briefly to fishing and the environmental
-
impact of animal agriculture.
-
Whether you eat fish and marine life or not,
this matter impacts all of us.
-
The ocean, or rather the phytoplankton within
the ocean, provides somewhere between 50 and
-
80% of our oxygen and the oceans ecosystems
store carbon in massive quantities—we are
-
destroying the very lungs of our planet with
the delusion of sustainable fishing.
-
Setting aside all arguments for animal ethics,
the destructive nature of animal agriculture,
-
the environmental crisis at hand should be
on the forefront of Ireland’s agenda—too
-
protect and preserve the incredible landscape
of this country, in which its citizens take
-
well-deserved pride.
-
And while Ireland is the first country to
implement a nation-wide sustainability program,
-
it unfortunately mirrors all of the major
green initiatives and government panels the
-
world over, proposing and celebrating symbolic
gestures, essentially applying media-friendly
-
Band-Aids to a severed limb.
-
Animal agriculture accounted for 34% of Ireland’s
greenhouse gas emissions in 2013, the single
-
largest contributing sector.
-
It’s responsible for 97.5% of ammonia, 89.2%
of methane, and 94% nitrous oxide and a greenhouse
-
gas that is 296 times more destructive than
carbon dioxide and which stays in the atmosphere
-
for 150 years.
-
Ireland had the 4th highest greenhouse gas
emission per capita in 2011 The National Competitiveness
-
Council reported in 2008 that the ROI was
“one of the highest carbon emitters on a
-
per capita basis in the OECD,” utilizing
less than half the OECD average of renewable
-
sources, with no waste to energy conversion,
stating “the least preferred waste solution
-
from an environmental perspective, dominates
in Ireland.”
-
Their subsequent 2015 Scorecard, showed Ireland’s
environmental performance (EPI score) and
-
rate of improvement still lagging behind OECD
average, with particularly poor performance
-
“in relation to biodiversity and protection
of habitats, fisheries and water sanitation.”
-
Keep in mind this is the impact of the iconic,
grass-fed, pasture-raised Irish agriculture.
-
As it is, EPA documents show time and again
the waste lagoons from pig and dairy farms
-
and wastewater from rendering plants contaminating
Ireland’s protected waters, and mislabeled
-
or non-compliant handling of SRM materials,
meaning remains at risk of containing mad-cow
-
disease, directly threatening the public health.
-
The Irish Times reported the increasing environmental
devastation of New Zealand’s dairy practice,
-
saying how that country was “often held
up as an example of what Ireland could have
-
been if the milk quota regime had not pulled
the handbrake on our growth.”
-
Twenty days later, the quote was lifted.
-
Even if this approach was the ideal we hold
it up to be, we simply don’t have the land
-
for the number of animals we eat every year.
-
The amount of land that it takes to produce
37,000 pounds of plant-based foods will only
-
yield 375 pounds of meat.
-
You can grow 15 times more protein on any
given area of land with plants versus animals.
-
We have environmentally reached the point
beyond personal choice--beyond “you eat
-
how you want to eat and I’ll eat how I want
to eat.”
-
This is a global crisis and it’s not about
you and it’s not about me anymore.
-
We say that children are our future but what
future can they have when we are eating the
-
planet to death?
-
The world cannot sustain meat, dairy and egg
production.
-
It simply can’t.
-
We have to start aligning our actions with
our values.
-
I understand that animal agriculture is more
deeply rooted within Irish culture than I
-
can possibly comprehend—an enormous source
of pride for your country, which is all the
-
more reason to take action.
-
Far from contradictory, offensive, disrespectful
or extreme, the principles and practices of
-
veganism are the best hope for healing our
planet, and of preserving the beauty and history
-
of countries like Ireland.
-
And in making this shift, we’ll need farmers
more than ever—those who know the land when
-
so many of us find it foreign.
-
We’ll rely on them for our food as much
as we ever have.
-
We cannot justify what we do to animals out
of tradition.
-
Our traditions do not alleviate their suffering.
-
And our customs do not dictate the value of
someone else’s life.
-
Traditions can be wrong.
-
And customs can be cruel.
-
There are many atrocities in the history of
humanity that we now look upon with disgust
-
and disbelief at what used to be commonplace.
-
And you don’t have to give up taste or even
giving up our favorite foods.
-
These days there exist vegan alternatives
for virtually every meat, cheese, dairy creation,
-
even eggs.
-
And you can find recipes online for making
your own versions if the readymade alternatives
-
aren’t available in your area or are too
expensive.
-
Veganism, far from being an extreme lifestyle,
a threat to tradition, is the most sane and
-
rational way to live.
-
It’s the most powerful tool we have for
saving our planet, for improving our health
-
when we eat health-consciously, and for regaining
our compassion- for becoming the people we
-
believe ourselves to be: Good people.
-
And good people don’t destroy the planet,
leaving our children without a future.
-
Good people don’t throw newborn babies into
grinders.
-
Good people don’t rip day old babies away
from their mothers.
-
Good people don’t rape, torture and murder.
-
Yet “good people” everywhere are doing
all of these things with every bite of every
-
meal.
-
But that’s the beauty here.
-
You no longer have to buy into the lie.
-
You decide what goes into your body.
-
You decide whether you want to continue to
have others kill for you.
-
You decide whether you want to continue consuming
death, terror, and heartbreak.
-
You have the information at you feet.
-
The responsibility now lies in your hands.
-
You decide.
-
And my hope is, you’ll decide to go vegan.