PETA exposes animal cruelty at Pilgrim's Pride Chicken farms

[Gman]

in West Virginia. The story was just on the CBS Evening News.

I thought this was noteworthy because the owner of Pilgrim's Pride is Bo Pilgrim who lives in Texas. Pilgrim is best known in Texas for personally handing out $10,000 checks to Texas state senators on the floor of the Texas Senate while the Senate considered comprehensive workers compensation reform legislation. If memory serves correctly, this was in 1989.

Yes, $10,000 checks on the floor of the Texas Senate. I know he still has operations in Texas, but it looks like he's gone outside Texas to where he can find the most lax regulations.

[Kanary]

1. poor, poor lil chickies.......

Never mind the human CHILDREN dying in Iraq, Somalia........ the US.

:crazy:

[UdoKier]

10. Nobody's minimizing that...

Okay, so kids are starving around the world. Do you go and stomp on live chickens when you hear about it? How is that not sick? I'm not vegetarian and I'm no animal rights nut, but I'd prefer for the animal products I eat to not be TORTURED before I eat it. And STOMPED on - that's just symbolically offensive.

[Kanary]

14. Not minimized?

Where is the outrage over kids here in the US homeless because of cuts?

Where?

Haven't seen it.......

Certainly not on CBS.........

"OK, so kids are starving around the world"

Nice discount.......

Thanks for caring.

Kanary

[UdoKier]

24. I'm pretty sure EVERYONE here cares about the welfare of children.

That's why we are LIBERALS. I don't see an ounce of concern on your part for these abused animals. Are you going to continue patronizing KFC, knowing that the meat you're eating was STOMPED on?

You're right about the media's total blackout on homelessness and poverty. They just treat it like it's a "fact of life". But why do you use that to excuse brutality?

Like I said, I'm no vegetarian, and if this had been an isolated thing, I wouldn't care all that much. I don't expect abbatoires to have trained pet psychologists on hand to address the soon-to-be-slaughtered animals' anxiety issues. But it was clear from the video that these guys do this ALL THE TIME. There is a certain minimum of humane treatment for livestock, and they have made going WAY over that line the norm.


Because one problem exists doesn't mean that another one doesn't deserve attention. Hell, the media gives way more attention to Scott & Laci Peterson or Britney's new beau than homelessness OR KFC's brutality. If you'rre going to complain about irrelevant nonsense garnering undue attention, why not start there?

[Shakespeare]

20. Is it okay with you if I'm outraged about BOTH?

Jesus Christ, some people...

[mtnester]

2. Horrible video

raise your own, that is the only way you know what you are getting and how it is treated.

We have not done fast food since the McDonalds nugget fiasco. I make a darn good pizza at home.

[depakid]

3. This was the KFC "Supplier of the Year."

which is one of the reasons that PETA targeted the facility.

http://www.peta.org/feat/moorefield/

[lazarus]

4. it's very strange

because every one of those chickens is worth money. That sort of abuse of product wouldn't be tolerated from a business standpoint, if nothing else.

FWIW, I agree with PETA on the "controlled atmosphere" method of killing IF it can be made economical. Too many broken wings, etc., when dumping the chickens into live hang.

However, I seriously doubt any chicken is still concious when scalded in the feather room. They go through a kill room where they're stunned, then their throats are slit. In the plant I worked at, someone was on station in the kill room to ensure that the chickens' throats were cut, as they need to be bled out before they reach the next stage.

A problem with controlled atmosphere is that one can't be sure if the chicken is dead ahead of time. In a live hang/stun/kill set-up, dead chickens are discarded. (That's likely the pile in the first image seen on the video. That sort of sloppiness was never allowed at my plant, btw. They should have someone on the job cleaning the carcasses up, they're a safety violation.)

[Gman]

6. At least you would think that this would be considered damaging

the product. That may be what gets these guys fired. But, I can guarantee you, based on when we fought Pilgrim (and others) on that workers comp bill, the absolute least of Pilgrim's concerns is the welfare of the animals much less the workers. Bo Pilgrim is a complete animal that only cares about money and what something might cost him. That's why its a good thing that KFC drops Pilgrim. That will really hurt him in a way he will understand. But he won't get it. He'll just be pissed because he won't see anything wrong with what these guys did, except hurt his product.

[lazarus]

22. All of 'em are like that

I could tell you horror stories about the plant I worked in, both the feed mill (Con Agra) and the processing plant (Wayne Farms). The people are treated as badly as the animals.

[plurality]

7. no they arent...

the food animal industry relies on volume to support sales, not quality, and they cut corners when ever possible. of the 6 billion animals killed every year for food the large, large majority are chickens, turkey and other fowl. chickens are fed the lowest quality food - mostly rendered chicken bones, feathers and other animal waste - when they are fed at all.

it costs more money NOT to abuse animals.

[achtung_circus]

12. Wrong

Farmers are businessmen. Poultry rations are carefully balance to maximize growth. Sometimes the growth required from fragile genetics results in birds that outgrow their legs.

There's no need to spout nonsense like "lowest quality feed".

[radwriter0555]

5. AUSTRIA has banned caging all poultry, as well as mutilating dogs for

vanity; the first such country to enact such stringent animal protection actions.

[Obamarama]

8. Hey, I take great PRIDE in the fact that I belong to PETA.....

PEOPLE EATING TASTY ANIMALS

[Forkboy]

9. hey,only 8 posts til we got that tired old joke!

[Obamarama]

13. Sort of like PETA is an old joke, huh?

I mean seriously. This organization has turned itself into a big, ridiculous caricature of itself with some of its past stunts. I'm sure they mean well, but based on some of their past stunts, I just sort of ignore anything they come out with now.

[Forkboy]

15. Ignorance is bliss

[achtung_circus]

18. PETA does not mean well

They are a group advocating complete veganism, ignore the physiology of man. Anyone existing on a vegan diet will requyire supplemental vitamins and especially B12. They lie, manipulate and misrepresent.

No I am not a farmer, Colonel Sanders and my name is not McDonald. Animal welfare is what I do. You need to tell the truth, call a spade a spade (or a fucking shovel) and work to improve things.

[SOS]

23. The physiology of primates

does not require meat. All primates, other than humans, exist on a plant diet.
The requirement for B12 is 1/1,000,000 of a gram a day. B12 is the only nutrient not found in the plant kingdom, but it is very easy to get the needed microgram. The dirt from head of lettuce would suffice, but a teaspoon of brewers yeast is plenty.

George Bernard Shaw was a vegetarian for 66 years. He died at age 94.

After 40 years of a strict vegetarian diet he was interviewed in 1924 by Archibald Henderson for Henderson's three volume biography of Shaw:

Henderson: So be a good fellow and tell me how you succeeded in remaining so youthful.

Shaw: I don't. I look my age; and I am my age. It is the other people who look older than they are. What can you expect from people who eat corpses and drink spirits?

How could Shaw have remained in excellent health to age 94 without the "truth"?

The subgroup (in the US) with the longest life expectancy is the Seventh Day Adventists. The do not smoke or drink, but do practice strict vegetarianism.

Yes, vegan and vegetarian are different, but, other than the easily acquired B12, a vegan diet is no problem health wise. Personally I went from McDonalds and beer to a vegan and no-booze lifestyle 12 years ago and my doctor says she is amazed at the improvement.

Actor Joaquin Phoenix has been a vegan since he was weaned from his mother and I'd say he looks alot better than Cheney, Hastert and Limbaugh.

[UdoKier]

26. Ummm...

Cheers to you on your vegetarianism, but...

I should hope Joaqin Phoenix would look better than those repugli-pigs you named. He's 25~30 years younger!

And his brother, also vegan from infancy, died at 24 from a suicidal OD. Who's to say his hunger for drugs wasn't caused by his vegan diet or his parents' hippy-dippy childrearing techniques?

I think it's quite possible to have a healthy diet with some meat (although less is certainly better) and as for booze - leave us SOME fun!

By the way, I don't really think that Phoenix's death was a result of his veganism, but that's how silly you sound when you imply that by including meat in your diet, you have to become a pasty tub like the Limbaughs...

The thread's about animal cruelty. KFC deserves to be roundly condemned for it. Why not stick with that and save the dietary sermons for another thread?

[UdoKier]

25. I wouldn't become a member, but they do perform a service.

Thanks to their whistleblowing, MAYBE something will be done, at least about conditions at this particular supplier. Even rather extreme groups can do a lot of good at times.

[Liberal Veteran]

17. I'm sympathetic to their cause...repulsed by their methods.

Fundamentalism attracts a lunatic fringe no matter what the cause.

Environmentalists have ELF.
Abortion foes have Operation Rescue.
Christians have the SBC.
Animal activists have PETA.

[Nomad559]

11. Direct link for streaming video

http://63.241.29.231/7/805/9135/0012/peta.download.akamai.com/9135/pilgrims_web_med.wmv

[Mr_Spock]

16. ...Interesting I think as I take a bite of my McDonald's Chicken sandwich

lol

[UdoKier]

27. In other words...

"I put it out of my mind and continue to eat, and make some joke to change the subject."

If you really thought about it, really IMAGINED it, it would put you off your sandwich.

[Deja Q]

19. I wish they'd shove their pride back up their proverbial pilgrim...

If the repukes say all this is ancient history because it's 1989, then we can use the Saddam chatter back at them. Saddam's gassing his own people and all was pre-1991 and we helped him get some of those WMDs too.

[Gman]

21. Here's a Google link to stories about the $10,000 payments

http://www.google.com/search?q=workers+compensation+bo+pilgrim&sourceid=mozilla-search&start=0&start=0&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8