FORBID ANIMAL CONFINMENT AND CRUELTY IN LIVESTOCK BREEDING AND SLAUGHTERHOUSES

Your Excellency:

Factory farms cram egg-laying hens into cages so tiny they can't even spread their wings. Breeding pigs and veal calves are stuffed into cramped individual cages barely larger than their bodies. They cannot walk or turn around!Science leaders have reached a critical consensus: Humans are not the only conscious beings; other animals, specifically mammals and birds, are indeed conscious, too." At this gathering, called The Francis Crick Memorial Conference, a number of scientists presented evidence that led to this self-obvious conclusion. It's difficult to believe that those who have shared their homes with companion animals didn't already know this. And, of course, many renowned and award-winning field researchers had reached the same conclusion years ago. Michael Mountain was as incredulous as I and many others about something we already knew. It's interesting to note that of the 15 notables who spoke at this conference only one has actually done studies of wild animals. It would have been nice to hear from researchers who have conducted long-term studies of wild animals, including great apes, other nonhuman primates, social carnivores, cetaceans, rodents, and birds, for example, to add to the database. Be that as it may, I applaud their not so surprising conclusion and now I hope it will be used to protect animals from being treated abusively and inhumanely.
Some might say we didn't really know that other animals were conscious but this is an incredibly naive view given what we know about the neurobiology and cognitive and emotional lives of other animals. Indeed, it was appeals to these very data that led to the conclusions of this group of scientists . But did we really need a group of internationally recognized scientists to tell us that the data are really okay? (http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/animal-emotions/201208/scientists-finally-conclude-nonhuman-animals-are-conscious-beings). So, the fact that we might be natural omnivores over millennia does not mean we have to mistreat and abuse animals as if they were mere lifeless objects! (the fact that we are natural omnivores is affirmed by some and denied by others, but I’m not talking about a diet here, or even animal rights per se, but animal welfare, let each person decide how to live).

The fact is that people around the world, at least in rich or western countries, are probably eating too much meat, this causes a problem since the more market demand there are from consumers for meat the worse this animals tend to live in suffering as ruleless and cold profit is intended, unless the consumers are stopped or the livestock breeders these Dantesque horrors will go on disgusting us and embarrassing us as human beings and sons of a God that was kind enough to create all this beauty in the world.

This is a list of all the horrors we know about, yes because even some banned practices still occur if without proper surveillance…

1- Close confinement systems (cages, crates) or lifetime confinement in indoor sheds.
2- Discomfort and injuries caused by inappropriate flooring and housing, and the poor animal if injured, stays injured, no treatment whatsoever, without any welfare concerns or is simply put to death earlier.
3- Restriction or prevention of normal exercise and most of natural foraging or exploratory behavior that leads to high levels of stress sometimes even expressed by stereotyped behaviors and strong frightened reactions to even the smallest unusual movements, animals literally go insane and still have to listen to other animals screams even their own offspring like in the case of leitão à Bairrada as they do in Portugal or Lechún in hispanic countries where the piglets are killed few time after being born or the case of other stupid, unnecessary and avoidable so called “delicacies” like persian lamb, or foie gras or bile bears as in China and Korea or other Asian countries where animals are used for their supposed (not even proved) medicinal purposes, others are confined for even more vain reasons such as their fur in fur farms or confined and filled with tranquilizers leading a terrible, nightmare life in science labs: all of this has to stop!
4- Restriction or prevention of natural maternal nesting behavior when an animal is barely even born and already goes to the slaughterhouse what else could you expect right? More than cruel, eating baby or very young animals in an unnecessary and recent luxury for a bourgeois society like our own. When my mother was young none of this was an habit and killing and eating an adult animal is what native americans and other tribal people do for millennia and they lived well as so!
5- Lack of daylight or fresh air and poor air quality in animal sheds once again turning them neurotic and that also has some consequences on human health since they gather up high levels of toxins due to stress in their bodies and have to take medicines for their low immunity due to stress and hormones to grow faster…and all of that ends up in our own body!!! What right is there to do this to them or to us, to our children?!
6- Social stress and injuries caused by overcrowding, they barely have space to even move! It is inhuman and unworthy of human beings to treat animals this way a shame, an embarrassment to us as modern society that should have gone a long way in terms of mentality!
7- Health problems caused by extreme selective breeding and management for fast growth and high productivity, animals are not even allowed to breed naturally, they just ejaculate into a tube without ever knowing females…
8- Reduced lifetime (longevity) of breeding animals (dairy cows, breeding sows) and absolutely miserable! a nightmare! 9- Fast-spreading infections encouraged by crowding and stress in intensive conditions (beak trimming or shortening) in the poultry and egg industry to avoid pecking in overcrowded quarters which is by the way another item of cruelty for the horror list…10- Forced and over feeding (by inserting tubes into the throats of ducks) in the production of foie gras that should be forbidden right away.
11- The feeling of being reduced to a small cog in a machine and they do feel it.
12- No mercy at the time of killing them, some were even pushed with kicks which is by the way a lack of respect for life itself. They are sometimes aware of the danger of where they are going and what was done to others before them and it should never ever happen at all. Total and absolute mercy is required and more than that: no more cubs should serve as food, adult animals are perfectly fine to eat, the rest could be even seen as an unnecessary luxury that not even money should be allowed to pay (rich people tend to find a way…).

Of course, as is all this wasn’t enough there are the effects of hormones (for quick growth), toxins and antibiotics (for and as cause of stress) that end up in our plate, endocrine disruptors are sickening a lot of young girls and boys and it is time for all of this to stop. I hate the thought of eating pain, suffering in my plate…and like me many others are building a conscience; some go extreme to vegan and others simply refuse this kind of meat and both are growing.

The undersigned (and many, many more that didn’t know about the petition I’m sure) require:
A- Forbid everywhere the use of animal confinement in such cruel ways as referred and others without concern for animal welfare and natural instincts or awareness.
B- Livestock breeders should be informed of the new laws and all those who break them should be warned that in case they are caught breaking the law they’ll have to close business at once! No more fines, they have been warned...
C- Tax benefits and financial incentives to free range and organic free range livestock breeders.
D- Awareness campaigns using every legal and peaceful (of course) means to publicize the message that eating to much meat is not healthy not just because of cholesterol (most people know and just don’t care) but because animals will suffer much, much more, and believe me; this will dissuade a lot more than cholesterol, and that evil effects of antibiotics and growth hormones could have consequences on our health. It should start in schools and happen simultaneously in public places and mass media (the government of each country should pay the publicity helped by worldwide funds and institutions.
E- The bigger mercy possible at the time of killing them, some were even pushed with kicks which is by the way a lack of respect for life itself. They are sometimes aware of the danger of where they are going and what was done to others before them and it should never ever happen at all. Total and absolute mercy is required and more than that: no more cubs should serve as food, adult animals are perfectly fine to eat, the rest could be even seen as an unnecessary luxury that not even money should be allowed to pay (rich people tend to find a way…). The same care should be taken in the way the transportation of animals in long and short distances is made.
F- No animals sold at horrible third worldly fairs by the eat of the sun in the summer with no water or shade, pilled up as things, it should be prohibited and also foie gras, persian lamb, leitão à Bairrada or lechún as said in number 3 above as well as bile bear farms in Asian countries, KFC restaurants must stop their frantic demand for meat while raising animals as objects aswell as MacDonalds as well as Burger King and others that also use pig meat like Pizza Hut, no more fur farms, they are totally vain, unnecessary luxury, why should rich people’s vanity rule the world? It makes international organizations credibility look so bad…as they are seen as not bothering the powerful, raising awareness should be public also because of this. Science labs use the same animal time and time again and fill them up in tranquilizers and make their lives miserable, alternatives have already been found and many studies say that testing in animals doesn’t prove anything or not always: http://www.dosomething.org/tipsandtools/11-myths-about-animal-testing
http://saraalgoe.hubpages.com/hub/Animal-Testing-medical-experimentationhttp://www.aavs.org/site/c.bkLTKfOSLhK6E/b.6456997/k.3D74/Problems_with_Animal_Research.htm#.UbzYRd5dYb0

Alternatives: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternatives_to_animal_testing
http://altweb.jhsph.edu/ (very good). Animals used in races lead a life of from racetrack to the box and vice versa like it happens in Hong Kong with horses or everywhere with dogs, this causes high peaks of stress and it is causing also stereotyped behaviors in horses (and might not be different with dogs) as if you do a little research you will find out, veal calves, battery hens, chicken cells, zoos with no good conditions whatsoever, many circus still use animals and have them strictly confined only leaving to training that they do not feel like doing or is unnatural to them, bad petshops, baby monkeys raised in America and taken away from their mothers to be adopted as substitutes to human babies…true…the mother screams and the baby monkey is forcedly turn into a humanized unhappy creature unable to live as what it is: a monkey! The natural mothers are raised in small cages pilled up with other monkeys this should be forbidden today! I you ask me, the author of this petition, even birds, tough I like them a lot and even had some, but always on the lose around the house, even they should not be traded as they need to fly and many never leave the cage. Also many wild animals are kept in cages and used in street shows instead of being where they should and belong: nature. If the owners are poor let us help the owners. All forms of animal confinements should be banned even those people who have dogs by a short leash and stuck the whole day to a dog house, they also get nervous and sometimes, perhaps, maybe it is why some become aggressive.
G - This petition, tough it focus mainly on cruelty towards livestock breeding and cruelty in slaughterhouses and several kinds of farms for several kinds of products, requires changes in all sorts of animal confinement, all those referred and others where animals are treated as mere lifeless objects with no concern for their welfare and safety. Changes in legislation are required but also in terms of constant and strong/effective surveillance that should have better conditions to function all around the world and in every country and if financial help is required it should be given or good ideas to get it. Those who, so far, made high profits at the expense of all referred as banning material should pay a high fund/fine, or whatever you chose to call it, today!
H- Supermarkets should always have free range and organic free range options for every kind of meat in the meanwhile (while total banning doesn’t go ahead as fast as it should and many people wish for).

The people around the world are raising awareness and wishing for a world with less suffering: human, animal and environmental, there is a lot of social contestation being felt already against severe capitalism or market liberalism or even political despotism, the world is changing and these small/big changes help make social peace and a better concept/belief in democracy systems worldwide and international peaceful/pro-peace organizations.

Thank you for your attention, the undersigned;

Time to stop treating animals as mere lifeless objects and restore respect for life.