How do farmers reconcile themselves to the volumes of animals they send to slaughter over the course of their lifetimes?

[Empanadas]

Hi, this is something I’ve always wondered. However, I was watching that Netflix series about Prince Charles and the Duchy of Cornwall and there was a farmer showing a whole barn of cattle he has obviously reared from birth, but quite blithely saying, “oh they'll all be off next week.”

AIBU to think being a cattle / sheep / chicken farmer takes a certain type of person and to wonder how they deal with their conscience in this depressing business?

You have absolutely no idea what my husband is currently involved in and if you did you would shush it with the sarky comments, frankly. No idea.

Empanadas you told us what he was involved in… so yes it is total hypocrisy. From one vegan to another have a vegan biscuit that wasn’t bought with dirty money

In fact, 'to thine ownself be true'. . . and don't expect/require or try to guilt trip anyone into living according unto your own self, as opposed to their own. It just ends in tears.

I'm a huge animal lover. I also know that livestock are born with a purpose.

We used to raise lambs knowing where they were headed. They had names and were tame. But even as children we knew why they existed. It's just being practical.

I know not all vegetarians, vegans and pescatarians live in a commune because I count all three groups among my friends and family.

That said, they are reasonably well informed about basic farming practices and are just making choices that work for them. They not lecturing me about subjects they appear to know nothing about.

What he did in his 20s and 30s is not the same as what he does now. His business interests have always been very diverse. Presently he’s involved in something which will have a significant global impact within the next two years, environmentally and in human terms.

@Throckmorton

The animal doesn't care about motive though - it has no impact on their life and more to the point their quality of life. Quality of life is everything to an animal and we owe them all the best we can provide

Yeah we provide them with a few days of terror as they travel to a slaughterhouse and line up waiting for their turn to be stunned (or not in the case of Halal) and be hung up to have their throats slit.

It's like something out of a Sci fi horror novel.

Halal meat in the UK is stunned and I know of no animal that goes through days of terror before slaughter. You don't want frightened animals, nevermind ones that have been in a state of terror. Scared meat doesn't taste so good.

Plants do have a form of a nervous system.
We’d just don’t understand it.

They move in a controlled thought out manner (like beans and peas finding something to cling and climb) also join roots with other plants, share resources, have an interconnected relationships with soil microbes and fungus, send chemical messages to other plants and trees around them to warn of danger such as insects predication and are about to create complex chemicals to control the world around them.
(citrus nectar containing amounts of caffeine which gets bees addicted. Bees then actively seek out citrus blossom above all others even at detriment to themselves)

So all in all it’s complicated and poorly understood because and because it’s not Understood we thinks it’s lesser than us and other animals.

Empanadas so what is this big change? Will he be keeping the IP or share to spread the good ideas? And does it make up for what he did, have you run the numbers? How do you feel about spending money from dirty industries now, how do you feel about the animal testing pharma companies do and the regulation around that, how they often do the testing abroad to circumvent our regs? Are you asking him why he’s not vegan?

The thing is you want to query an industry you know very little about and we’ve answered your queries. Now you are VERY sensitive about your own background and spending dirty money. It’s hypocritical, and in an intersectional way (unless you’re against industrial farming alone) you’re punching down. Never say people should be economically adaptable when your main household income is from a NED, if you’re even saying that you have no idea how hard it really is for most people and saying upthread maybe all the farming workers can change to doing “something online”. Like seriously

But then we all have different ideas as to what’s acceptable, clearly

Norked I want more accountability on slaughterhouses too but they don’t keep them there, they pass through at pace.

42% of UK halal is from animals who have had their throats slit while fully conscious. hundreds of millions of animals in the UK go through this at the end of their lives every year.

People are paying for this practice without even knowing it because the food is not labelled as non-stun slaughtered.

Backstreetsbackalrightdadada - please could you just accept you have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about here or the overall context. I can’t give away the nature of the recent business. That’s really not me trying to be all mystic. Its highly classified at US govt level.

“I'd be a lot more ashamed of being a swiss banker or a property developer than I am of eating a steak.”

Good for you. I would not. But, as you know full well, this thread wasn’t ever simply about people who eat meat. Carry on misunderstanding though if it makes you happy.

We’re not misunderstanding - you asked how do farmers reconcile raising animals for
meat and we answered. Then the discussion went to where do you draw the line including on diet/lifestyle on all animal produce. Then you said your family’s money comes from Swiss banking, pharma and travel.

It seems to me you’re turning a huge blind eye to your own way of life by pondering farmers, who took a lot of time to answer your queries

@Empanadas

“I'd be a lot more ashamed of being a swiss banker or a property developer than I am of eating a steak.”

Good for you. I would not. But, as you know full well, this thread wasn’t ever simply about people who eat meat. Carry on misunderstanding though if it makes you happy.

It's not us misunderstanding - it's you heaping judgement on people when you are in a no more moral position than they are. Some people eat meat, some are Swiss bankers. Or as someone up thread put it, you're in too much of a glass house to be lobbing stones about the way you are.

Yes I’m off now. To mingle with my “circle of bigots” - a.k.a those terrible militant mums of Putney / Barnes

You will probably feel better in your echo chamber, yes

@Empanadas

Backstreetsbackalrightdadada - please could you just accept you have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about here or the overall context. I can’t give away the nature of the recent business. That’s really not me trying to be all mystic. Its highly classified at US govt level.

I'm quite happy to accept that I know little of the inns and outs of Swiss banks and property development.

Just so long as you too can accept that you don't actually have a clue about food production.

@Empanadas

Backstreetsbackalrightdadada - please could you just accept you have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about here or the overall context. I can’t give away the nature of the recent business. That’s really not me trying to be all mystic. Its highly classified at US govt level.

That being the case, surely he shouldn't have told you. My DH used to work on classified stuff and didn't tell me a damn thing about it. I didn't have a clue.

Some people gave relevant and reasonable answers to the question, yes. Answers such as, “It’s a practise I was born into,” or “I believe they are cared for during their lives and the death is painless.” Some people believe animals don’t anticipate. I don’t agree, but I can understand how that belief would make it easier to send an animal to slaughter. Some people believe that cattle don’t feel pain as humans do. Again I don’t agree, but I can see how such beliefs mitigate against the reality of slaughter. Some people argue that these animals only exist to be slaughtered. Well true, but for me, this is the very crux of the reason I do t eat meat!

Unfortunately, a lot of the thread has been the usual random nonsense - “ooh you’re a vegan. How dare you drive a car / wear clothes / work in x industries / eat avocados yadda yadda yadda. All the usual defensive, binary nonsense. The “where do you draw the line” argument came out of that. Because obviously, a chicken and a stick of celery are hardly the same thing. To me, it’s perfectly acceptable to cut out one type of meat, if you want to. I would never call someone a hypocrite because they eat chicken, but not red meat, for instance, it’s their choice. But vegetables are not the same thing as fish and fish are not the same thing as mammals. Clearly and using that type of nonsense to obfuscate is pointless.

My being a vegan is my choice, just as eating meat is other peoples business. I have never even tried to persuade my own children to be vegetarian - so hardly an extremist. But if you’re a vegan, you must be an extremist on MN, so it seems..

“You will probably feel better in your echo chamber, yes”

Except it’s not an “echo chamber” because most of them probably eat meat. Actually, I would not even know because we never discuss it. Some of them grew up in rural areas, perhaps from farming families?

But yes, it’s a certain demographic, I guess? As are farmers. So if you want to refer to people as an “echo chamber” based on lifestyle, then go ahead.