Welcome to Healthy Thoughts

October 2009

Farm Sanctuary

Who are they? What do they stand for?

This brief introduction is based on the organization's own publications

THE PROBLEM

"Our inhumane treatment of livestock is becoming more and more barbaric." - Senator Robert Byrd

In recent decades, farm animals in America have been subjected to increasingly inhumane conditions - including cages so small that the animal in question can barely move - while a growing number of consumers are speaking up about this. According to polls there is widespread opposition concerning the treatment of calves, pigs and hens, and yet many in the U.S. are so confined.

Prohibitions on cruel farming practices are now being adopted by the entire European Union, and in the U.S. large corporations are responding to public opposition.

While consumer and industry attitudes are beginning to change in the U.S., legal protection remains grossly inadequate, and animal suffering abounds. Agribusiness can treat living animals as commodities, subjecting them to grossly inhumane conditions with impunity. Farm animals have feelings and should be protected from cruelty.

The hens:

Every year in the U.S. approximately 300 million hens provide Americans with their eggs. More than 90% of the eggs eaten in the country come from hens housed in confining battery cages - given just a half square foot of living space. The hens can't stretch their wings or legs, or fulfill normal behavioral patterns or social needs. They suffer from severe feather loss, and their bodies are covered with bruises and abrasions.

Practically all laying hens are debeaked (a painful procedure) and, due to abnormal breeding, osteoporosis and weak bones (leading to broken bones, paralysis, and even death) are rampant. After a year of heavy egg production they are "spent" and then are either "force molted" (starvation in the dark) or slaughtered.

The pigs:

"The breeding sow should be thought of, and treated as, a valuable piece of machinery whos (sic) function is to pump out baby pigs like a sausage machine." - L.J Taylor, export development manager for Wall's Meat Company, Ltd

"At one location, female breeding pigs were forced to live in metal gestation crates just two feet wide. Standing on hard, slatted floors, the sows were confined so intensely they could not walk or even turn around. Sores were visible on the pigs' bodies and faces from scraping against the bars of their crates. As I walked through the warehouse-like building, pigs began screaming. A desperate, pleading chorus rose, and the bars of the metal crates rattled and clanked against each other and against the animals' bodies. I felt like I was in a madhouse - one from which the pigs had no escape." - A Farm Sanctuary investigator

The calves:

"The windowless warehouses looked more like storage buildings than 'barns.' Inside, in the dim light, there were hundreds of calves in the building, each one tethered into a small crate. The crates of calves were organized into a series of rooms in the warehouse, according to size and age. The older, larger calves had difficulty standing up in the cramped space, and when they lay down, the back section of their bodies hung uncomfortably out the back of the crate. All the calves were tied so tightly that they couldn't turn around. The floors consisted of slatted wood and metal mesh, and the calves struggled to gain their footing on the slick, diarrhea-coated flooring. The calves' hindquarters were caked with dried excrement, and a stench filled the air. Mucus dripped from their nostrils and their eyes were tearing." - A Farm Sanctuary investigator

Months later the investigator returned to the same farm, this time finding the barns empty, except for one "downed" calf lying in an alleyway. He was too sick to walk onto the slaughterhouse truck, and he was left behind.

A SOLUTION

Farm Sanctuary - rescue, education and advocacy for farm animals

Rescue:

When Farm Sanctuary's investigative and advocacy campaigns uncover cruelty at factory farms, stockyards and slaughterhouses, our Emergency Rescue Team helps bring the animals to safety. At our 175-acre shelter in upstate New York and 300-acre shelter in northern California, Farm Sanctuary provides lifelong care and rehabilitation to farm animals rescued from cruelty and neglect. We also have a Farm Animal Adoption Network.

Education:

By opening our barn doors to guests at our New York and California shelters, Farm Sanctuary provides visitors with the unique experience of seeing the world through the eyes of farm animals. A shelter tour enables individuals to understand the abysmal realities of today's factory farming conditions. After coming face to face with a rescued chicken, nuzzling up to a gentle cow and rubbing a grateful pig's belly, many Farm Sanctuary visitors are forever changed. Our activities include: Visit the Farm Program; Volunteer Internship Program; Walk for Farm Animals; Farm Animal Forum; Adopt-a-Turkey Project; 4th of July Pignic; Country Hoe Downs. We also publish a free Guide to Veg Living (available at newsstands), and have a Veg for Life Campaign.

Advocacy:

Farm animals are specifically excluded from most state anti-cruelty laws and from the federal Animal Welfare Act. But we are working to change that. We also have: No Downers Campaign; No Veal Campaign; No Foie Gras Campaign. And we publish a detailed Farm Sanctuary Reports, citing scientific and empirical evidence.

Just as callousness and apathy can be contagious, so too can compassion and the will for a better world.

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