By Anastasia Pantsios
On a Monday evening in May, Satan has come to Solon. Sun streams in through picture windows, bathing the crowd of 50 who have gathered in the community center meeting room to hear the impossibly dynamic speaker. He’s the type of guy — tall and well-groomed, with glossy black hair flecked with gray at the sides, an athletic stride, and energetic delivery — that you might expect to find peddling a scheme for getting rich on real estate investments.
But Wayne Pacelle is peddling something very different. He is the CEO of the Washington, D.C.-based Humane Society of the United States, better known to its very vocal enemies as the radical, out-of-state animal-rights group that aims to impose its will on Ohioans.
But for this group on this night, Pacelle doesn’t have to do much. “He doesn’t even have to say anything; I’ll do whatever he wants,” sighs one woman as she eyes Pacelle.
But even if he were fat and unsightly, Pacelle’s message would be lapped up by this audience of primarily middle-aged women from Cuyahoga and surrounding counties. Most have already signed on to the mission: gathering the 402,275 valid signatures needed to put a package of three issues on Ohio’s November ballot pertaining to the treatment of livestock animals.
The measures would end confinement practices like gestation crates for sows and cages for laying hens; they would bar sick or “downer” animals from entering the food supply, and they would prohibit strangulation and other inhumane types of euthanasia for farm animals. Pacelle’s on a whirlwind tour of Ohio to energize the volunteers. The Humane Society has put 27 issues on ballots in different states, he tells them, and he doesn’t intend to have Ohio be his first failure.
Pacelle’s smooth, tanned face and neat jeans and jacket contrast with the plainer dress of the four weather-worn farmers he parades before the crowd. Tom Harrison — who serves as the campaign’s treasurer — is a retired sheep farmer from Wood County, south of Toledo. He’s balding, with a raspy voice that recalls Senator Sherrod Brown’s. “I’m a meat eater,” he says. “I’ve raised sheep for 30 years. You ought to treat them with dignity. Animals aren’t a commodity, and that’s what you’re seeing on factory farms. I’m glad the Humane Society came into Ohio on this issue. It makes people more aware of the food chain.”
Kevin Fulton, a heavyset younger farmer with a toothy smile and self-confident manner, has flown in from Nebraska. (“There’s people in Nebraska, if they knew I was here my house would be burned down,” he quips.) He talks about his journey from assembly-line agriculture to chemical-free, open-pasture farming. Confinement farming, he says, is “taking dignity from animals, putting them in concentration camps.”
There’s a lot of such emotional language — and grisly pictures — being used to frame an issue that most Ohioans are remote from in this post-agricultural society. These plays on emotion are what worry the Ohio Farm Bureau, a group as demonized by animal-rights and environmental activists as the Humane Society is by livestock farmers. But the Farm Bureau is not averse to emotional appeals of its own.
Last year, Issue 2 — which called for the formation of a Livestock Care Standards Board — hit the November ballot seemingly out of the blue, catching a lot of people, including the Humane Society, by surprise. Unlike many issues, placed on the ballot by painstaking gathering of signatures by volunteers or armies of well-funded paid petitioners, the state legislature voted to put this one on the ballot.
The powerful Farm Bureau was all in. Teams of slick PR representatives attended community meetings and public forums, telling people that even though there were no problems with livestock agriculture in Ohio — animals were being treated well, and the food supply was safe from sick animals — we need this board as a preemptive measure. Against what? It seemed that legislators and voters in other states were passing laws to limit caging of animals, practices that enhanced the smooth functioning and profitability of huge factory farms, or CAFOs (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations), as they are known to insiders.
And if that happened in Ohio, they claimed, farms would go belly-up and jobs would be lost. When it appeared listeners were still sitting on the fence — many find the idea of CAFOs innately repugnant — the Issue 2 people played their emotional card: The whole thing is a plot by animal-rights activists to force everyone to become vegans, they claimed. They’re coming to take away your hamburgers and buffalo wings! (Pacelle’s enemies point out that he is a vegan, although he doesn’t make an issue of it.)
Issue 2 passed without significant opposition. There were rumors that the Humane Society was holding its fire, planning to come back the following year with its own package of regulations. And that’s just what happened.
“When Issue 2 was going through, we didn’t see it as a poisonous package but an empty one,” says Karen Minton, state director of Ohioans for Humane Farms, the campaign to pass the new regulations. “But Issue 2 was dominated by agribusiness. What the Humane Society was interested in was to ensure there were some common-sense minimum standards.” Issue 2 theoretically gives large factory farms the ability to regulate livestock farming practices — or not, as they choose — but until the 11-member Livestock Care Standards Board is appointed, its direction is impossible to discern.
Ohio voters didn’t approve or reject any particular livestock-care practices. But Ohio Farm Bureau senior director of communications Joe Cornely says, “The night of the election [the Humane Society] said, ‘Voters, you don’t know what you’re doing. Our ideas are better.’ That very night they promised they were going to come in and overturn the will of Ohio’s voters. They are now in the process of trying to put a measure on the ballot that would take their philosophies and beliefs and put those into the Ohio constitution. They want to dictate what this care-standards board would do.”
The Farm Bureau sees these new regulations not only as unnecessary, but as the very death of agriculture. Disallowing the confinement practices will be so costly, it claims, that many farmers will be driven out of business while food prices soar.
That’s the opinion of poultry farmer Tim Weaver, whose farm in Darke County (on the Indiana border, north of Dayton) was started by his grandfather and grand-uncle in 1929; he intends to pass the business on to his sons, one of whom already works with him. He calls the proposed cage ban “the death of a dream.”
“I’m not exaggerating when I tell you if this happens, in six or seven years I’m out of business,” says Weaver, whose farm houses four and a half million chickens and employs 300 people. “That’s not a comforting thought when you’ve spent since 1929 building a business, and an activist group puts you out of business. To destroy a family’s dreams, it’s really, really troubling.”
Weaver says sick animals in the food supply are not an issue.
“We have the safest food supply in the world. It’s…I would use the word ‘misguided.’ I don’t know their motivation. Some have a vegan agenda. Some are conceivably anti-capitalists. Some are truly concerned about welfare of animals. But no one is more concerned about welfare of animals than me; they’re my livelihood.
“I felt establishment of the [livestock] board was good,” says Weaver. “We were going to have input from a lot of people, access to a lot of research. They may tell me in time that I have to change my pens, but there will have been a lot of thought and research, not an activist group going, ‘We don’t like what the voters said last year.’ My concern is that activist groups are going to mislead them and use an emotional appeal.”
It’s hard to argue that emotional appeal is not part of what’s going on. Talk of regulating confinement practices might not be incendiary enough to motivate voters. But footage of a pig being strangled certainly is — and the Humane Society’s addition of that plank seems designed to make use of a video depicting exactly that, shot on a Wayne County farm in 2007. In Solon, Pacelle showed the image of the hanging pig, stamped “Legal in Ohio” in bright red letters.
The “ick” factor is very high, and the Humane Society clearly knows it.
Ken and Joe Wiles, the farmers involved, were tried and acquitted because such practices are perfectly legal in Ohio, a state known for its lax animal-protection laws. The acquittal — and the Farm Bureau’s support of the farmers — were fuel for animal-rights activists. But those who oppose the measures say that the incident was an anomaly and that banning the practice of strangulation is overkill.
“Sick animals is a marketing ploy,” says Cornely. “It’s already illegal to put sick animals into the system. Likewise, euthanasia of farm animals. There was the unfortunate incident of the sow [being strangled]. Those two specific items, I believe, were written into [the proposed regulations] to use the video they have in television commercials. No farmer I know believes that was the proper way to euthanize an animal. It was an aberration caught on video that is now going to be portrayed as standard operating procedure on hog farms.”
Cornely’s opinion is shared by Bryan Black, a pork producer who raises about 1,500 animals on his Fairfield County farm in central Ohio.
“Not to let downer animals into the food system is a nonstarter, because in federally inspected plants no downer animals go in,” he says. “It’s just a way for [the Humane Society] to use the video of a downed animal. Same with strangulation. No one I have spoken to since the incident at Wiles’ farm occurred has ever heard of it before or since. No one uses that form of euthanasia. By allowing that on the ballot, it allows [the Humane Society] to use the video in commercials.”
With a deadline of June 30, the Humane Society’s Ohio team is working hard to collect the signatures it needs, with more than 1,000 volunteers canvassing Ohio. The same sort of earnest women who attended the meeting in Solon have gathered in an upstairs meeting room at a church on the Brecksville town square on another Monday night to talk about how to gather signatures and report their progress. As they go around the room introducing themselves, many note that they rescue dogs or volunteer at their local shelter. But there are lots of first-timers. I’m not political, many of them say. I’ve never done anything like this.
Opponents demonize the campaign as driven by out-of-state activists — indeed, the U.S. Humane Society is providing the resources and organization — but these foot soldiers are from places like Wooster and North Olmsted.
At the early May meeting in Brecksville, the campaign was about halfway to its signature goal, and organizers reassured volunteers that the real push always comes in the final weeks.
Then on May 26, a story broke that threw the Humane Society’s petition campaign into a higher gear: The Chicago-based animal-rights group Mercy for Animals (which does, incidentally, envision a vegan world) held a Cleveland press conference to release videotape of cows and calves being beaten — some to death — at Conklin Dairy Farms in Plain City, a speck on the map northwest of Columbus. The horrifying footage, shot by a Mercy for Animals worker who went undercover at the farm, went viral, and the Ohio Farm Bureau leaped into damage-control mode.
It condemned the acts in a statement that same day, adding, “We are also concerned that this incident will be manipulated for political gain by animal-rights activists. Any attempt to portray these horrific acts as commonplace on Ohio farms would be deceitful. Farmers take care of their livestock because it’s what decent people do and because comfortable animals are productive animals. Farmers should not be judged by this aberrant and disgusting event.”
Opponents of the proposed regulations insist that animal-rights activists won’t be satisfied until livestock agriculture is driven out of business. Given that the Humane Society’s Paul Shapiro heads up the group’s End Factory Farming Campaign, it would seem that eliminating CAFOs is indeed on their agenda.
“Seven states have passed these modest reforms,” says Shapiro. “We have done these type of ballot measures in three other states. All of them passed overwhelmingly, despite resistance from the agribusiness lobby.”
Florida’s passage of the measure has prevented large farms from coming into the state, Shapiro says, adding that it is the only state of the three whose law has taken effect. “It’s opened up the field for family farms. These laws are extraordinarily modest. They require that farm animals be able to turn around and extend the limbs. The agribusiness people claim it will lead to Armageddon, but you have to question their claims. These campaigns are endorsed by a lot of farmers themselves.
“These are the type of places that not only abuse animals,” he adds, “but are often major polluters and can devastate communities.”
Chef Parker Bosley, former owner of Parker’s Bistro in Ohio City, now focuses on helping educate people about sustainable, local food. He grew up milking cows on his family’s dairy farm in Trumbull County, and today he echoes Shapiro’s assertions about the impact of factory farms on rural Ohio.
“One of the reasons I was drawn to this campaign is I loathe industrial farms,” says Bosley. “The waste produced by these CAFOs is comparable to a small city. A cow in a confinement situation produces as much waste as 18 people.” Animals free to roam, on the other hand, merely fertilize their pasture. (Bosley wrote “Don’t Eat That,” an editorial on sustainable agriculture published in Scene in October 2009.)
Heated debate has surrounded a proposed farm of six million chickens in Darke County, where Tim Weaver’s large chicken farm is also located. According to a recent Columbus Dispatch article, the new farm would produce nearly 75,000 tons of manure a year. That’s a lot of manure to manage.
In addition, the shrinking number of farms in Ohio, even while farm output has increased, has had an adverse effect on rural communities, Bosley laments.
“Industrial farming has devastated rural America,” he says. “Instead of having 20 farms that buy from the local hardware store, send kids to local schools, join the local clubs, you have one huge farm owned by a corporation. And that money goes out of your community.”
So it looks like a battle of corporate farming versus family farming — but it’s not that simple.
Pork producer Black thinks there’s a lot of romanticizing going on by people who don’t understand farming.
“I have gone through the evolution of the pasture-raised system, what’s now termed ‘natural’ or ‘organic,'” he says. “I would never look to go back to that again. The public has absolutely no information on agriculture. The Old MacDonald view of what a farm is supposed to look like is pigs, cows, and roosters wandering around in a pasture outside in sunshine. That scenario only happens 30-40 days in Ohio. The rest of the time it’s too cold, too hot, or too rainy. The care we can give to individual animals is so much greater now than in a pasture situation.”
Poultry farmer Weaver points to the costs of moving away from a confinement system. “There’s no way I have access to the capital so I could change all my buildings and infrastructure to what these groups want me to. It would be $100,000,000 — $35 per chicken. Going from animals in pens to animals not in pens, it’s an emotional hook they use to get people.”
Weaver also carries organic cage-free eggs, but they make up only about 4 percent of his business.
But that could change as people become more acclimated to different ways of eating. The popularity of films like Super Size Me and Food Inc., books like Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma, and the rapid growth of farmers’ markets show that people are starting to think beyond the mass-produced food industry that CAFOs serve.
Bosley has been a constant presence in the campaign, gathering signatures with a bright green clipboard outside a recent event devoted to expanding the market for locally grown food. He came to the local food movement about 25 years ago when he was running the kitchen at Sammy’s in the Flats and realized that the quality of the food they were serving would be better if the ingredients were better.
That led him to think more about how food was being produced.
“Animal confinement is horrific in every way,” he says. “To keep laying hens in cages that are stacked up, they have to give them a lot of antibiotics or they would die. They never get outside, they never have a natural diet, so the eggs they produce are not good for us.”
He scoffs at claims that a vegan agenda is behind this campaign.
“What is the possibility of that ever happening? You want to see a revolution, you tell a guy at East 93rd and Union he can’t have meat anymore. It’s totally a red herring.”
Doug Katz, chef-owner of Shaker Square’s Fire Food and Drink, is another supporter of the ballot measure.
“The more you connect with your food, the more you respect it,” says Katz. “I have customers who say they won’t eat meat unless it’s humanely raised — not a lot, but occasionally. But it made me realize I need to look into it. I’m not one who debates whether eating meat is OK or not. But if you’re eating meat, you need to make sure it’s from sources who treat animals humanely. Factory farms have such a lack of connection with what they’re feeding people. They’re just trying to be as efficient as possible.”
Bruce Rickard, who raises hormone-free, pasture-feeding hens, cattle, and sheep at his Fox Hollow Farm in Knox County in central Ohio, is another speaker at the meeting in Solon. He looks like an aging hippie with his gray beard, rimless glasses, and T-shirt bearing the Gandhi quote “The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” But he’s not one of those militant vegans the Farm Bureau warns about. He just thinks people are ready for a healthier, more humane way of raising food animals.
“We face our customers across the table every day,” he says. “They tell us what they’re looking for. We have lots of former vegetarians because they have a place [to get meat] they can trust. They can tour the farm, go anywhere on the farm, see how the animals are raised. Farmers have to start listening to their customers.”
Send feedback to apantsios@clevescene.com.
This article appears in Jun 16-22, 2010.
Wayne is slick, like Peta in a suit. For those who ‘drank the kool-aid’, here is the Animal Rights 12-step agenda. It is still today’s agenda, as you easily see that the steps are being worked on today. You can easily see that HSUS is following this agenda, as an Animal Rights Organization.
The Animal Rights Agenda (Published in “Animals’ Agenda” magazine in
November 1987)
1. Abolish animal research by law.
2. End product testing on animals.
3. Encourage vegetarian diets and make them available at all public
venues (including primary and secondary schools).
4. Eliminate all animal ag.
5. Do away with ag chemicals.
6. Remove animal welfare legislation from the USDA.
7. Eliminate fur ranching.
8. Prohibit hunting, trapping and fishing.
9. Prevent rainforest destruction.
10. Stop the breading of companion animals (including pedigreed or
purebred dogs and cats).
11. Ban the use of animals for entertainment (including zoos, rodeos and
circuses).
12. Prohibit genetic manipulative breeding.
To learn more about the HSUS, I recommend http://www.HumaneWatch.org. Everything on that site is backed up by FACT, no matter how hard the HSUS tries to make everything think that is not so.
Ohio, please do not sign the petition, let’s not even get it on the ballot. We already spoke, we already voted. Who does Wayne think he is coming in and telling US what to do? We have a great committee with excellent members. Let’s let them do the job we voted them to do! We don’t need HSUS. Ohio farmers are by far, far majority following humane, solid animal husbandry practices. It is not in any farmer’s interest to abuse livestock on which their very survival is counting on. That just doesn’t make sense. I’d love to tell you about ‘staged’ videos, but this is already long enough. The person that shot that video is guilty of animal abuse, for letting it go on for a month!
Hmm.. the animals produce manure no matter where it is deposited.. there is no reason the manure cannot be used to fertilize pasture.. it just needs to be moved.? NO ONE STOPS farmers or ranchers from producing their product if they prefer to go “free range’..
You are mistaken in your comment that the signature collecters are “volunteers”.. they are not.. many of them are PAID out of state people.. paid by.. hmm the HSUS and their subsidiaries.. like .. hmm Mercy For Animals.. this smells worse than any manure..
Pacelle does not make an issue of being a strict vegan?? you bet he doesn’t.. why would he want to let people know that he and most of the HSUS support the elimination of meat from the family table.. the HSUS does not allow any meat products in their buildings. does that give you a clue?
HSUS pushed for passage of Prop 2 in California, phasing out battery cages state wide by 2015. Currently eggs are $1.99/dozen. If you want cage free you pay $3.99/dozen. When the price of eggs doubles state-wide, I wonder how many of the Californians misled into voting for Prop 2 will be complaining when food prices go up. Where will the extra money for school lunch programs and state welfare programs come from? And it won’t just be the cost of shell eggs. It will be the cost of everything that is made with eggs. Just today I picked up two egg sandwiches and two orders of hash browns from a nationally-known fast food restaurant = $8.00.
But don’t take my word for it. The study showing the economic impact of California’s Prop 2 on egg production only can be found here: http://www.unitedegg.org/pdf/Promar_Study.…
This proposed legislation is a most modest one… Merely allowing an animal you are about to kill and eat the “luxury” of being able to stretch his/her limbs is hardly a “radical” notion! And why is it that with every new investigation that exposes horrific abuse to a “food animal” it’s always a “rare exception”? Truth is the abuse is inherent in the “use”.
Middle-aged women swooning over Wayne Pacelle?? Give me a break! This slight of hand phoney needs to be run out of the state on a rail. HSUS is a bloated propaganda machine that dedicates less than 5% of the money people send it to actually help feed/care for animals! This biased article really is amazing, but swooning over Wayne? Do these women you speak of not have a brain, or a life? Pretty sad.
The only reason Wayne is pushing these ballot initiatives is that after he successfully pushed for the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board (which makes sense) he was refused the option to select who compromised the committee. Wayne’s own suggestions for the committee were people who lacked the skills, formal education or science behind farms. He wanted AR’s people on the board so Wayne could push his agenda on Ohio via the Board. When the Governor told him “NO!”, Wayne and HSUS decided that they would then push it further to force their ideas and legislation on Ohio. No matter that the Livestock Care Standards Board is just getting started and will do far and away a better job of regulating Ag practices that a pro-Vegan, city slicked, Animal Right’s person.
I sure hope those middle aged woman want to start fund raising money for farmers who will have increases in injury and loss of animals when they are required to put pregnant sows together. Talk about vicious, aggressive animals.
If I lived in Ohio, I would be offended at outside lobby groups telling me and my state how to conduct their business.
Ohioans for Humane Farms is an Astroturf organization funded almost exclusively by HSUS and Mercy for Animals. Over 95% of the money given to Ohioan for Humane Farms came directly out of HSUS coffers. Very little support has been given by Ohioans.
http://www2.sos.state.oh.us/pls/cfonline/f…
Their organizers and a good number of their petition gathers are being paid by HSUS through Ohioans for Humane Farms according to records filed with the State of Ohio.
http://tinyurl.com/24u7225
These outside organizations want to enforce their vegan beliefs on people of Ohio, when there already is a Ohio Livestock Standards Board. Let the board and Ohioans decided what is best for the livestock and Ohio Farms.
If Doug Katz wants to pay a premium for “organic” and “cage free” livestock that is up to him, but not everybody can afford to pay his prices for dinner. The average person who buys meat at Giant Eagle or Dave’s does not want to pay outrageous amount of money for meat or eggs that are “cage free”.
This is HSUS’s and Mercy for Animals goal. Raise the cost of meat and it’s byproducts (eggs, milk, etc…) and people won’t buy it. In other words, if the costs are too high, people will eat less meat and their byproducts. (i.e. a vegan agenda)
If it was merely room to turn around and stretch being an issue many of the pictures used wouldn’t be used. Dairy cattle and beef cattle in a dry lot *have* room to move around and indeed do move around – but that is also not enough.
Have been working on setting up a farm custom raising for individuals – most say they can’t afford it. If they can’t afford it now…how will their income rise if the grocery stores don’t have the alternative – food that is less expensive produced in bulk?
As for it being alarmist to say it’s forcing veganism…if the meat isn’t produced and available to buy then eating it isn’t an option. Taking away the wings and burgers will happen if the chickens and beef can’t be raised in a manner that people can afford to buy it.
All of this will set great with me once we land as growing for myself and others already does this. It’s also not financially supported including even a $25 or $50 purchase to allow accumulation to afford it. So – action speaks louder than words. Think carefully Ohio. The number of “factory farms” is a minority in comparison to ‘ordinary farms’ but as it showed with the Conklin dairy – that, too is represented as a factory farm. And ordinary farms are the majority in the state and country. You already have the option of voting with your dollars and the agriculture industry WILL respond. Even existing operations – as noted – that have cage free eggs find it only 4% of their market. When it reaches 10%, 20% 50% then battery cages won’t be much of an issue – the market will change as it’s a financially beneficial way to farm. Until that happens, banning alternatives means hungry people where, like dairy products, it can be illegal to sell or give it to hungry people.
If you have room to grow it yourself as well as knowledge it may not make a difference. For the majority it’s a several times per day decision.
This article uses the term “factory farms” multiple times. I would like to know what a factory farm is then. Is it a farm that uses gestation crates, or confines their animals? My family is a 2nd generation family farm. My dad, mom, brother, sister and I all work on the farm and we hire almost no outside help. Our farm is our livelihood, without it we wouldn’t be able to make a living. However, our animals are kept in buildings out of the harsh elements of the weather, our sows are kept in gestation crates for their own personal protection. We are truly a family farm, but by this articles definitions we are called a factory farm. So we don’t care about our animals? Many times I’ve stayed up until the wee hours of the morning helping a pig give birth or nursing piglets back to health. So this ban on gestation crates would help our farm? More like put it out of business due to the cost it would take to revamp.
Now I’m not saying that the only way to raise livestock is in confinement. The great thing about agriculture is there are so many methods of farming and so many different types of products that we are allowed to choose. One method of farming shouldn’t be banned, or put above the rest. The consumers should have the right to choose to buy meat or products that were raised in cages, or that were in pastures. After all, isn’t America all about freedom?
“big aanimla lovers’ say your headline?? REALLY? HSUS does not “love” animals.. the leaders ( not the minions that trudge daily to their cubicles at HSUS to eat their tofu sandwiches and follow their leaders and will eventually show up here) are all vegans.. Does the fact that the leader of this organization is a vegan not disturb you? Ask him if he OWNS a pet.. the answer is NO.. he does not.. how come?? Where is his “rescue dog”.. his “rescue ” cat? He has photos with animals but OWNS NONE.. eats none.. drinks no animal products.. no dairy, fish, eggs or any other product that comes from animals.. nor has the pleasure of petting his own cat or dog.. how come?? ask these questions.. WHY??? if less animals are raised what will happen to farm animals? if people are encouraged to “go vegan” as is stated on the HSUS website ( you won’t find any recipes even containing an egg) and do.. they why will anyone NEED a farm animal..as a “pet”..? I think not.
Wayne once said “one generation and out” about breeding animals.. he will try to weasel out of it and say he was “young and foolish” but we know better.. he IS older and wiser and certainly more clever and slippery..
as for any woman that “swoons’ over Wayne.. get a grip..what Wayne wants from you is what any prostitute wants.. MONEY
Where is the “model” farm run by the HSUS.. with their money you would think they would set up a “model” farm using “modest” ( their favorite word) farming methods that do not confine animals and allow them to “extend their limbs” . Their farm would be one that is an example to ALL people on how to run an exemplary farm, kill the animals “humanely” and show how it can be done and still feed all people for a “modest” cost. Every state would have an HSUS run farm where no animals are harmed.. and all are free to roam until it is time to kill them for food. All chickens would be free to free range wherever they felt like going and have room to “extend their wings without touching another bird” Pigs would be allowed to be loose and have their piglets wherever they felt “comfortable” .. and all cattle would be pasture fed unitl they are “humanely” slaughtered in a glass slaughter house that HSUS runs to show the public how their farming and ranching methods work to supply the populace with “humane meat, dairy and eggs products”
School children would be toured through the facility so they can see how the HSUS farming practices are superior to anyone elses..
“Farmer Wayne”would be the tour guide wearing neatly pressed jeans and a straw hat over his “glossy black hair flecked with gray at the sides” because everyone knows that HSUS farms are neat and clean with no manure ..
and that my friends is your fractured fairy tale for the day.. The HSUS want NO FARMS if they did they would lead the way in guiding people and showing through example how farms and ranches should be run..
you know .. you could call it “When Pigs Fly ” farm
I’m sorry to disappoint Alice, but the HSUS staff includes both vegetarians and meat-eaters, and employees eat what they choose when they’re at work. The study cited by Dogmom fails to assess any of the benefits of transitioning to cage-free eggs. According to one agricultural economist, “…although cage-free eggs do cost more to produce, educated consumers are more than willing to pay this cost” and “a study that analyzes the cost of a policy without considering the benefits will always be somewhat misleading.” (http://hamandeggonomics.blogspot.com/2009/…) There’s also some irony in claims by the egg industry that prices will skyrocket, given the ongoing class action lawsuit that alleges illegal price-fixing by the nation’s major battery egg producers.
It is likely that many supporters of the HSUS actually believe that they are doing the right thing in their daily lives while working for the goals established by the HSUS. What they fail to recognize is the actual agenda of the HSUS. It isn’t about animal welfare, or saving animals, or preventing suffering of animals. It is about CONTROL of the people of the US in terms of what they can and cannot do with animals. No pets. No meat. No hunting. No circuses. No zoos. No animal research. Not even conservation of rare and endangered species. What is wrong with this agenda? Well, for starters, the MAJORITY of people in the US do not support it. That is why the HSUS has cloaked their agenda in warm and fuzzy emotions as well as in videos and stories which arouse our compassion for animals. We need to ask ourselves…How is it that an organization of “city slickers” otherwise known as urban dwellers, have ANY clue about the actual management of animals of any kind? Well. They don’t. But, the HSUS does not let that little fact get in the way of their effort to CONTROL how farm animals will be managed. Consider that IF some city slicker decided to tell surgeons in hospitals HOW they would operate on people, that would be considered outrageous and even dangerous. Well, having the HSUS deciding about managing farm animals is just about as stupid. For centuries farmers have been doing a great job with animals. Let’s let them decide how best to manage their farms. They are the “experts” in this area, not HSUS.
That humanewatch website which the first poster on any HSUS articles seems to always mention, is funded a front group called the Center for Consumer Freedom which has it’s roots in lobbying for big tobacco, lobbying against mothers against drunk driving, and now they are big into protecting the image of animal industry:
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title…
But with that said, I’m vegan and I don’t like HSUS or PETA. Here’s a quote from a website I like that explains it best from a true animal rights perspective:
“HSUS is not an animal rights organization. What HSUS does, for the most part, is to identify economically inefficient agricultural practices and to launch campaigns to go after what is already “low hanging fruit” identified by agricultural economists.
HSUS and PETA are great allies of animal agriculture. These groups make modest demands (and ones that are for the part economically efficient). Industry portrays these demands as “radical,” and when industry does make changes, or some ballot resolution passes, the animal groups go on a fund raising frenzy claiming “victory.” The animal groups praise industry and industry reassures the public that it has made “substantial” changes and really cares about animals. This makes the public more comfortable about the consumption of animal products. “
Anyone interested in a more logical approach to animal rights may want to stop by the website for a slide-show explaining true animal rights theory:
http://www.abolitionistapproach.com/video/
http://humanemyth.org/happycows.htm
so Hillary the HSUS “guide to vegetarian eating’ found on your website is a farce?? Anyone can bring a huge roast beef sandwich to your cubicle and “woof it down”.. sorry I could not resist.. ?? I think not.. why did your leader serve only VEGAN foods at the latest fund raiser in the Sonoma Valley? Home to some of the best lamb and free range chickens on earth.. Happy cows also come from Sonoma.. but their was no dairy on that menu..
“Educated consumers” may want to pay more ( I don’t and I have a masters degree plus some) so let them.. poor people do not wan to pay more.. and in fact cannot pay more.. so thye will have to STOP eating eggs.. and Viola…. there you have it HSUS agenda met.. fewer eggs sold.. more people out of work.. more poor people.. less chickens though.. and that is a good thing for the HSUS.. who really don’t give a damn about people but really do care about chickens..
speaking of lawsuits. how’s that RICO thing going for the HSUS?? and really Hillary.. when will the HSUS open the “model farm and ranch”.. if the HSUS is so sure they know best for farm animals.. why aren’t they showing the rest of us how to do it the “right’ way?
Those interested in learning what this petition will do to Ohio Farms need to go here
http://www.ohiolivestockcare.com/
Alice, maybe HSUS (and again I’m vegan and generally disagree with the practices of this Org) choose not to serve dairy because the whole “Happy Cows come from California” is dairy marketing for which they have been sued over. In fact cows in CA don’t enjoy being units of production — living their lives in stalls with often ZERO access to the out doors (unlike the commercials). They are selectively bred for and repeatedly impregnated so they are optimal milk machines, never getting to be with their babies — which end up in the veil industry (if male) or as the same fate as their mothers (if female) and become milk machines themselves until they start to fall under quota and are then killed for cheap fast food burgers. Think about it, drinking the lactations of other animals is not natural. It’s completely unnecessary. Choose rice, soy, hemp, oat, hazelnut, almond or other plant based milks. Furthermore, dairy is increasingly tied to cholesterol problems, chrones disease, and common milk allergies. Instead of ice cream — try some coconut icecream — it’s fantastic. Keep in mind that America and other countries with the highest intake of dairy products also have the highest incidence of bone disorders like osteoporosis. Other cultures with little to zero dairy use have the lowest. Look it up.
The findings of MFA’s latest egg facility investigation are similar to those documented at numerous egg farms across the country in recent years – illustrating that animal neglect and abuse are the egg industry standard, not the exception.
As consumers we can choose to support kindness over cruelty at each meal. Purchasing humanly farmed meat and dairy products is one action we can take to prevent needless animal suffering and end the conditions documented during this investigation.
Yes, it may cost a bit more, but can you justify animal cruelty just because its cheaper???
Farm animal cruelty never existed as it does today because animals were outside where we could see them. Now they are behind closed doors and the public is not permitted. They even want to prevent undercover investigations because they are exposing the truth to the public. A truth we as consumers have a right to!!!
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Re: “Having a Cow”
The findings of MFA’s latest egg facility investigation are similar to those documented at numerous egg farms across the country in recent years – illustrating that animal neglect and abuse are the egg industry standard, not the exception.
As consumers we can choose to support kindness over cruelty at each meal. Purchasing humanly farmed meat and dairy products is one action we can take to prevent needless animal suffering and end the conditions documented during this investigation.
Yes, it may cost a bit more, but can you justify animal cruelty just because its cheaper???
Farm animal cruelty never existed as it does today because animals were outside where we could see them. Now they are behind closed doors and the public is not permitted. They even want to prevent undercover investigations because they are exposing the truth to the public. A truth we as consumers have a right to!!!
Are free range eggs more of a health hazard than traditional egg collection???? Studies are showing that free range eggs may have more pollution (such as dioxin) than eggs that are gathered by more traditional methods.
http://tinyurl.com/23fb3ku
Let’s get a few things straight!
So upon reading the comments the main concern out there seems to be the fear of a slight increase in price for eggs and meat in Ohio when this initiative gets voted in. How selfish. So 95% of the animals in Ohio produced for food should suffer for this reason? Wow that makes sense.
This initiative is all about the humane treatment of Farm Animals while they are alive in their mostly horrific environments. It has nothing to do with anything else. It is really that simple.
The general public has no idea that when they eat a egg or piece of veal or a pork roast….the pain and suffering they are putting into their body. The general public does not think about where their meat is coming from or how it was raised/produced or slaughtered. This is all changing.
Thankfully there are thousands of Ohio volunteers statewide gathering signatures and spreading awareness about the Humane treatment of Farm Animals. I am one of them. Go! Ohioans for Humane Farms!
By the way fellow posts, my family is not Vegan. We like Wayne and the HSUS. We don’t like animal abuse.. do you? Let’s keep the focus on the real issue. The Humane treatment of animals that are raised for food.
No, Satan has no come to Ohio, he has been in here for a long time flourishing within the factory farms where innocent animals suffer everyday. The Wiles pig farm and the Conklin dairy farm are not just isolated cases of animal abuse. If this were so, there would not be such an uproar about the efforts being made to help assure that the animals were at least spared a life of abject misery while waiting to be slaughtered. If there were already standards of care in place these incidents may not have happened in the first place.
To personally criticize Wayne Pacelle reveals the mentality of those who oppose this measure. When there is nothing valid to say character assassination is always employed. What he eats or does not eat matters not nor does whether or not he owns a pet. These accusations are just deflections used by the opposition to sway the public to their side.
The issue is the reduction of the suffering of farm animals. I am privileged to be among the thousands of Ohioans to be gathering signatures for this ballot initiative and, like the others, I will continue to do what is necessary to speak for those who cannot speak for themselves.
This is unbelievable! I understand people get afraid when their income is threatened, but really ohio, you’re going to condone animal abuse for your paycheck! I ate meat & dairy until May 27,2010, when I saw the video of the Conklin Dairy (Farm?). That was it, I’m done condoning this torture at these animal concentration camps! I don’t care what kind of farm you have, or how big an animal is to move, etc. When my dog doesn’t want to do something, I do not smack her in the head with a bar, or poke her with bar b que fork! And as far as the calf is concerned, no baby animal should be dragged from their mother, pulled by their feet or tails or ears, and under no circumstances should be hit in the head! You can see on the calf’s face, the look of “why did you just hit me?!” “I didn’t do anything you f***ing creep of a worker!” If I had been the mfa investigator, that is when I would have been discovered, cuz that is when I would have grabbed the bar and started beating the worker over the head! I congratulate the mfa investigator that he was able to keep his cool and finish the investigation! People that are mad because the HUMANE SOCIETY is trying to help animals, need to get real! What do you think these organizations are for, idiots! For the HUMANE Treatment of animals! So DUH, like they are not going to try and help abused farm animals! Just because they are animals, does not give humans the right to abuse them. I am so sick of this! Come on abusers! Get an education! It is 2010, I think it is time we start to live the right way. Maybe if everything wasn’t based on greed, we would also have a lot better life on earth! Sorry you want to make a buck farming Ohio, but we are not going to let you earn it torturing animals! Stop saying these are isolated incidents, this is normal practice for these big farms, or there wouldnt be so many videos showing it. More and more people are not going to put up with this, Ohio, so change your ways, morons!
What is most surprising here is that people who are seeing ONE video and reading these articles actually BELIEVE that most farm animals are being mistreated. Well, if you folks see a newspaper article about a child being beaten or tortured by its parents, do you believe that ALL parents are mistreating their children? Or even that many are doing so? I doubt it. Why? Because you have some familiarity with families and child rearing. However, I doubt most of those supporting the HSUS have very little actual experience with farms, farm animals, or farming. You have been away from farming for too many generations so you have very little concept of animal husbandry, whether practiced at the highest standards or not. So, before you run out and get all those signatures from others who are likewise ill informed, you really ought to VISIT a REAL FARM and then think twice about what you are doing. Right now, you are simply reacting like puppets managed by the HSUS puppet master! HSUS is not about animal care, it is about abolition of animal contact, whether for meat or for pets. WAKE UP. Try a read at http://www.bewareanimalradicals.com and learn more about HSUS.
WHY??? if less animals are raised what will happen to farm animals?”
“Farm” animals are a human creation, intentionally domesticated from wild stock.
There was a time when they didn’t exist, and under today’s awful factory farm conditions it would be better if they were allowed to disappear by natural attrition.
If we can’t treat them humanely we shouldn’t have them at all.
Stop the breading of companion animals (including pedigreed or
purebred dogs and cats).
Ask the millions of dogs and cats we kill in shelters every year how they feel about it. By the way, it’s “breeding”, not “breading”.