Pinker documents the increasing ratcheting down of violence in humanity, perhaps not in absolute terms but certainly in percentage of population terms. Take modern Western Europe, it has statistically the lowest homicide rate compared to anywhere and any time.
The decrease in violence has occurred with what Pinker calls Rights Revolutions at two points in history, around about the time of the American and French revolution and mid-twentieth century onwards. So we have people asserting the rights of man in general leading to the abolition of chattel slavery, the rights of woman in particular, gay rights, the rights of children, and recently the rights of animals. In England the last blood sport (fox hunting) was recently outlawed in the teeth of much protest from the good old boys that think cruelty to animals is A OK.
These rights revolutions stem from ideas born out the Age of Reason and the Age of Enlightenment which led most famously the amendments to the US constitution but which have there parallel in most of the Western world. Forces that work against these ideas are thus called counter-enlightenment forces. Getting back to the issue at hand (I've got a point I tells ya!) these laws represent a back-sliding and we should take these counter-enlightenment forces very seriously - we are talking about a centuries long struggle to eliminate violence (of whatever type) from our societies. I guarantee you that future generations will look back at our times and recoil in horror at the way we treat animals in much the same way that systemic torture, bear-baiting, corporal punishment, domestic abuse and so on leave most of us (apart from the odd sadist and sociopathic outlier) sickened nowadays.
† I cannot recommend this book highly enough. Here it is on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1455883115
That is what this situation seems like. Animal cruelty is definitely not okay, but I have noticed a growing trend of reporting best practices, that attempt to minimize animal suffering as much as possible, as animal cruelty. And the solutions people are coming up with to improve on those best practices are as non-sensical as a non-industry expert suggesting that we write software in English. In a perfect world, sure, but the real world has real constraints.
I would like to see real awareness, not people who feel they are experts on all rural affair matters after watching a two hour documentary and a YouTube clip or two. A video ban is definitely not the way to do that, but I can see the other side. Google isn't going to be too happy if you go around filming their datacenter, lamenting that you could do the same with a server in your closet at home, either.
And I'm not suggesting animals enjoy being slaughtered, but if it is going to happen, do you not support doing it the most humane way possible?
The problem is that the people who come with concern tend to not take time to understand the situation. I recall a recent incident with a celebrity suggesting dairy farmers should breed their calves to not have horns. Great idea in theory. The genes do exist in some living cattle, but it is quite rare. Anyone with even a basic understanding of biology can see how that isn't going to work out so well, but we cannot even seem to find that level of understanding out there.
I'm not sure that still justifies it, and I am not in favour of it myself, but I don't think we want to go down the road of misguided analogies like comparing copyright to theft. Surely people should have some say over what happens on their private property, and if they are being prevented from doing so for whatever reason, perhaps a law of some kind (not necessarily this one) is needed?
Granted, I haven't read the actual wording of the law yet, or have any understanding who is behind it and what their motivation is, so perhaps the article is off base.
I've eaten: cow, chicken, pig, turkey, duck, frog, octopus, salmon, tuna, and I'm sure other meats too. All of them required to be killed, for processing.
Don't get me wrong. I eat meat. I've also done slaughtering as well and know what goes on when you do kill. I also strongly prefer eating humanely treated animals, before and during slaughter.
I think most farmers respect, and even often agree with, with normal animal rights activists, but they also have a real fear towards the "crazy PETA types", and with good reason. I think you'd find any industry trying to push for similar laws in the presence of similar activists, and we do have laws for similar cases that have come up.
Its unfortunate that those who have a real concern for the well-being of animals, and actually want to work with farmers to see improvements, get wrapped up in the spectacle that others bring.
We only focus on factory farm operations and the possible illegality of filming illegal actions. Yes, there are horrible practices in many parts of industry (I would say more horrible than not).
I just got done watching a documentary about plant communication on Nature (PBS). They also seem to be able to identify self, relative, and non-self. They communicate across species about predator information. They initiate active chemical defenses against organisms that attack them. They also respond to negative stimuli (pain). All things considered, they seem to be able to think and feel similarly to the animals.
Now.. I say this why? Most people would have no compunction about killing a plant for food, yet many I know would strongly object in killing a cow or chicken to eat meat.
My point is this: plants and animals seem to feel pain and seek to minimize it. Plants and animals are both living. I would not say that any specific plant is any more or less important than an animal (including us). However, for us to live, something must, inevitably die.
I make a thanks to the beings, plant and animal, I consume before each meal.
That was because drowned, hung, shot, or electrocuted was considered inhumane. Even the first of 3 of the cocktail puts the prisoner to go unconscious.
Now, treat the animals that we eat similar. Nitrogen gas suffocation is known to be the least traumatic death yet. Some executing prisons are going to that as well.
If you want people, who have never stepped foot in an office and have never turned on a computer, to believe that programmers are treated horribly because they have to type "gobilty-gook" all day long, it would be a pretty easy sell. Likewise, you can easily make the optimum care we can give an animal given our current understanding look like the worst treatment possible to an outsider without domain-specific understanding.
And I wasn't really referring to slaughter specifically, or even at all. There are a lot of care issues too, which are more interesting to me having a farming background and not an abattoir background.
Not that it really matters, but I think this is a bad analogy. Code looks technical and mysterious to most people, not inane. You might be able to quote, say, code style guides that impose rigorous rules about formatting and make people think that the owners of those guides have rigid practices, but that would be nowhere near enough to convince people that programmers themselves are treated horribly, especially since you would have a hard time getting any of the programmers in question to agree.
(Now, if you look at working conditions, unpaid overtime, and the like, in environments like the game industry, you might be able to convince people quite correctly that some programmers are treated horribly...)
| biased reporting
Why would you assume mass-slaughter of living beings is going to continue happening?
I realize technology is on the horizon that could change things in the future, but we are talking about today.
If we are talking about today we should recognize that mass enslavement and slaughter of animals, mechanized and automated, is immoral and wrong, and act to bring an end to it.
| Most people only seek quality care while
| the animal is alive
That doesn't make you wrong, of course, but it leaves me wondering that if the barns/pastures you have spent time in are equally representative, perhaps you just come with a different metric for what is quality care? If so, who gets to decide what is acceptable? What is good for one animal rights activist isn't necessarily good for another, so who gets to be right when striving for the same goal?
But we weren't talking about factory farms anyway, we were talking about typical farms, free range, cage free, etc. and whether they are still providing a comfortable environment for animals, or not.
pyre, in the post I responded to, suggested that even free range farms that put focus on animal care were not providing sufficient care for animals, leaving them still tightly packed and stressed. And maybe that is true, but I am still left wondering how we measure which farms are providing sufficient care? If we want to strive towards a better life for animals, we need to start setting definitions and targets to work towards. Otherwise, every change towards the better will be met with equal criticism by somebody.
I agree with you that setting unreasonable or unrealistic goals is problematic. Although I personally stick to a 99% vegan diet, I've never been an abolitionist and I think setting reasonable goals and working towards them within the system is probably more productive, such as Temple Grandin's work.
Pushing for legislation like this doesn't make me very sympathetic towards the industry though.
I am reminded of Mike Rowe's discussion about castration and docking of lambs:
I really don't see the downside to greater transparency in most endeavors. Either there isn't an analogy here, or livestock farming is somehow special, which I'm also not seeing how that is.
Many large software companies develop some of their software in the open, recognizing the benefits of such transparency. You only have to peruse Github and other repo sites. The idea of developing software in the open is widely adopted, and practically a requirement for some kinds of software, like cryptography and other security software.
It seems more natural to draw the exact opposite analogy: If proper handling of livestock and meat is critical to one's safety, meat production should be as easy to monitor as "git log" for a repo of crypto software.
If you feel there is a lack of transparency, I would suggest it is primarily due to distance. When the nearest metropolitan area is hours away, you get a disconnect on several levels. If you don't already have connections to farmers, its difficult to find the connections to build the opportunities to learn more, granted. Especially when you consider that only 2-3% of the population are farming to begin with.
Although in many cases I can get away with selling the milk, if I were to butcher a cow an sell the meat (outside of a USDA approved slaughter house, etc) that would be pure unadulterated evil.
I would love to see a change in perspective that emphasized "local and small" = more self regulated, "farther and bigger" = more state oversight... oddly enough, in practice, it is the other way around.
Just let the small guys have more freedoms, and people will vote with their dollars.
This results in the rather brutal net result of "uncaring people will pay the least and demand the most abusive practices". But, honestly, I don't think we can get around this with legislation.
What are these best practices, and how do they get reported? I noticed the article said the same thing, but didn't give any examples.
No one is actually suggesting that animal cruelty is OK. But when documenting such (immoral, mind you) acts raises awareness that eventually harms business, in the meat and dairy industry in this case, then big money raises its head in the form of legislation that favors the $$$.
We see the same pattern when hackers are cast as the new terrorists.