A Murderers Mind
Confined Animal Factory Operations
(CAFO’S) are exactly what they’re called, a factory filled with confined
domestic animals. It’s corrupt, harmful and wrong. We all know that when we eat
beacon, it came from a pig that was once alive and then killed. When we eat
steak, it came from a cow that was later on killed. CAFO’S process aren’t just
killings. They torture and murder these innocent animals. There are many
reasons to why the mind of the managers, worker’s and animal’s in the CAFO’S
are exactly like a murder case. Managers plan, workers are the action and
animals are the victims.
Managers in a CAFO’S slaughterhouse
are responsible for certain things. They are the eyes of the top bosses,
supervise the workers and make sure that their goal of a certain amount of
slaughtering is reached. Managers have a great influence on the workers. A
manager can be compared to a murderer in the sense that they allow many things
to happened. As though killing animals isn’t tough enough they make it tougher.
Gail A. Eisnitz the author of “Slaughterhouse”, gives a deep detailed
description when he states from one of his many interviewee’s “If an employee
complained, a supervisor would put him on a much harder job-usually in the hide
room, where they’d have to take hides off the rail, spread them out and put
salt on them. It’s a terrible job. Instead of firing someone who complains,
he’d put them down there and they’d quit pretty quickly” (Eisnitz 47). Managers
allow brutality and cruelty. They do not tolerate weakness or complaints.
Managers priority is to make sure as much slaughtering are done. Based on David
Imhoff author and editor of “The CAFO Reader: tragedy of industrial animal
factories” I’ve came to the conclusion that origin of this type of mentality
comes from people like the French philosopher Rene Descartes, who assures us
that “ all of nature existed as a toolbox for human industry. Animals,
Descartes wrote, are ‘soulless automata’: merely complex machines, because they
do not possess consciousness, they cannot feel pain or suffer. Their cries and
writhing are simple reflexes. Under the banner of such modernist thought,
livestock, raised for both food and clothing, eventually became soulless
commodities on the assembly lines of a global industrial revolution.” Yet in comparison
people like Robert Higgs, who demonstrates the same form of mentality, though
on slavery. Higg’s argues, “Slavery is natural. People differ, and
we must expect that those who are superior in a certain way—for example, in intelligence,
morality, knowledge, technological prowess, or capacity for fighting—will make
themselves the masters of those who are inferior in this regard”. A major part
of our country came from slavery. We now know how evil, disgusting and horrible
slavery was. Slavery came with no freedom, murder and rape. Who’s to say our
food industry isn’t the same. The only difference is animals can’t speak up,
and managers will continue to enforce such murder.
Workers in the CAFO’S slaughter the
animals on a daily bases. They are paid minimum wage and work long hours. According
to Imhoff “Most of the workers are African American or Hispanic, commonly
immigrants and even children. Eisnitz interviewed former workers Betty Jane and
her daughter; Betty witnessed Hispanic immigrant children working in slaughterhouses.
Betty confirms “One little boy couldn’t speak English, and they gave him a
smock big enough for a six-foot tall man. He couldn’t work with his hands in
the sleeves so I rolled them up and put rubber bands on them. His little arms
were about this big… ‘Making a circle with her thumb and forefinger the size of
a silver dollar”(Eisnitz 262). Also according to Betty reasons why most
immigrants are preferred to work in slaughterhouses are because they aren’t allowed
to speak up, they have no right. If you thought I was exaggerating when I claim
these workers are murderers well you thought wrong. They literally are former
violent criminal offenders. Some even still wear they’re jail clothes to work.
Betty Jane adds, “ Most of them are in jail for rape, murder, robbery, you name
it. There was one prisoner I worked with, I found that he had murdered one
woman, raped and murdered another. I read about it in the Bladen journal after he escaped-after he walked away from the plant
one day”(Eisnitz 263) This is the reason why there so much cruelty in this
industry. A system that can allow murderers to slaughter animals is a careless
system. Joel Salatin owner/farmer of Polyface Farms in Virginia, who
feeds his livestock grass, the way nature intended. Couldn’t speak my mind any
more perfect about the way this system and these workers disrespected and
murdered our food system. Salatin accuses “ A culture that can use a pig as a
pile of plastic inanimate structure, to be manipulated by whatever creative
design that human can force on that critter will probably view individuals with
in its community and other cultures in the nation with the same type of
distain, and disrespect, and controlling type mentality” (Salatin food Inc.). I
fully agree with Salatin argument. We consume these animals, its in the fast
food restaurants its in our supermarkets. We can’t run from where our food
comes from. A system allowing child labor, murder, slavery as the root of our
food system. Is a system I see as carless.
Do animals really have feelings? The
way innocent animals are treated in the CAFO’s you would believe they were just
objects. According to Julianna Kettlewell,
a science reporter for BBC news, “ animals should not be dismissed as simple
automatons – cows take pleasure in solving problems and sheep’s can form deep
relationships.” It’s a great example of how humans aren’t the only ones that
think thoughts and feel feeling. According to our food system they act on the
complete opposite. CAFO’S treat their animals as If they were objects. The have
no remorse and no conscious towards what they do to these innocent animals. A
great example is when Eisnitz interviews a former supervisor, Billy Corbet, of
a CAFO, who states, “you can get frustrated when your moving a cattle along,
sometime you have to prod them a lot. But some of the drivers like to burn the
hell out of them. The five or six hot shots [electric pods] by the lead-up
chutes are hooked directly to a 110-volt outlet. Run them along the floor metal
grates and they split sparks like a welding machine. Some drivers would beat
cattle with hotshots until they were so wild and panicky you couldn’t do a
thing with them, right up to into the knocking box, then they’d just stand
there and laugh” (Eisnitz 46). Gaining pleasure out of someone
else’s pain is the reaction of a psycho killer in my opinion. What interested
me the most was when Eisnitz interview’s this young man named Tommy Vladak. Who
has 9 years of experience in food industry. Reading his interview, Vladak
gained pleaser from viciously slaughtering hogs. He states the adrenaline he
would gain by sticking hog’s with electric shocks, made him feel like he can go
ten rounds with mike Tyson and whooped his ass (Eisnitz 66). As much power
hunger as Vladak took in his job there was an incident that really stuck out. Vladaks
interview he describes one memory that will forever stay with him. “There was
one night I’ll never forget as long as I live, a female hog was coming through
the chutes. She got away and the supervisor said ‘Stick that bitch!’ I grabbed
her and flipped her over. She looked up at me. It was like she was saying,
‘Yeah I know it’s your job just do it.’ That was the first time I ever looked
into a live hogs eyes. And I stuck her” (Eisnitz 74). It shows how many
feelings an animal can have, even though humans might have power over innocent
animals we should treat them with the respect they deserve. After all they are
the reason why we survive.
There should be a stop all types of
murder whether its with humans or animals. The way our food is processed isn’t
the way nature intended and there should be a stop. Food industry has a big issue
in realizing whether it’s reflexes or do domestic animals actually have a soul?
Is this feeding the world or is it really plain old murder?
Bibliography
Eisnitz A. Gail. Slaughterhouse: The Shocking Story of Greed,
Neglect, and Inhumane treatment inside the U.S Meat Industry. 59 John Glenn Drive Amherst, New York 14228-2197: Prometheus
Books, 1997. Humane Farming Association.
Imhoff, Daniel. The CAFO Reader: The
Tragedy of Industrial Animal Factories. Los Angeles, California. Watershed
Media, 2012. Foundation for Deep Ecology.
Higgs, Robert. Ten Reasons
Why Not to Abolish Slavery. Dec 2009. [Print]. Volume: 59. Issue: 10. http://www.thefreemanonline.org/columns/our-economic-past/ten-reasons-not-to-abolish-slavery/
Kenner, Robert. Food INC. [film].
2008. United States. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnfE721NKDw
Kettlewell, Julianna. Farm
Animals Need Emotional TLC. 18 Mar 2005.
[Print]. BBC News. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4360947.stm
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