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?

[Scrowy]

I disappeared to go and try and take a picture of my enslaved sheep happily grazing in the fields.

Then realised I couldn't because they are all miles away free roaming over 1000s of acres of common land.

The calves are currently playing hide and seek in the shade between the trees of a 40 acre wood so can't get a picture of those either.

Never mind

[Tubbs99]

@Backstreetsbackalrightdadada

I also think most consumers really never think “this was a living being, as much as I am, with feelings and friends and memories”. I grew up on a farm - I can tell you for sure animals have friends (cows definitely do!) and rich lives. And yes we cart them off for slaughter, and they have no idea what’s happening to them and their last days are often terrifying. Some slaughterhouses are ok and some are awful. The animals pick up on the smells and sounds. Slaughterhouse workers get terrible PTSD www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/stories-50986683.amp

But consumers don’t realise the work that goes into being a farmer, at the effort it takes to give an animal a healthy and safe life, at the skill to be a slaughterhouse worker and how that impacts you.

I get the joke about steak above, but I bet you wouldn’t/ couldn’t raise and kill that cow yourself. What you get is convenience - meat with no effort, no conscience kick. It’s easier to make a joke and brush the topic aside.

You don’t actually know what I have or haven’t done. As it is, I have slaughtered a chicken, it was a necessity and tasted delicious.

[Llamasally]

@Ozanj

Most farmers who rear animals for slaughter that I know (and I know many) love their animals to pieces, but they all believe in the circle of life too. These same people are often incredibly stoic about loved ones dying too - I guess they see so much death they become desentized to it and many just want to focus on the present.

Correct. And some of the posts here are unreal.

[Backstreetsbackalrightdadada]

FYI I can tell you all the farmers we know (and our family) raise animals beautifully. At best, to give them a lovely life. At worst, because without good condition to them they’re not worth anything. Eg the dairy industry - if the cow isn’t happy it won’t milk. Poorly kept sheep die easily/ won’t sell. It’s not worth keeping animals just to sell as dog meat or whatever, there’s no profit at all to it. So welfare is (at least where I’m from) very good. We had one family “try” farming new and were crap, they separated and lost care of the animals as part of that and were swiftly reported - we all take reputation very seriously, you can lose it in an instant and are quite a judgy bunch! You just wouldn’t sell to a bad farmer, wouldn’t deal with them - it’s a very personal business.

I imagine the farmer on that show was flippant because he couldn’t be bothered going into the detail of what it means to farm and send the animals off. That doesn’t make easy watching and consumers usually don’t want to know. And never judge a group from one example! You never would in other groups so why here?

[Llamasally]

@Scrowy

I disappeared to go and try and take a picture of my enslaved sheep happily grazing in the fields.

Then realised I couldn't because they are all miles away free roaming over 1000s of acres of common land.

The calves are currently playing hide and seek in the shade between the trees of a 40 acre wood so can't get a picture of those either.

Never mind

@Scrowy 😊😊😊

[Bitofachinwag]

:46ChangePart1

They don't see them as living, breathing, individual beings. They certainly don't see them as having any intrinsic rights or worth beyond financial
That's a unfair and untrue comment.

[Petalplucker]

@ChangePart1

They don't see them as living, breathing, individual beings. They certainly don't see them as having any intrinsic rights or worth beyond financial.

To them it's the same as if they were growing crops and then sending them off to distributers. They don't see themselves as having anything to come to terms with or reconcile themselves to.

And I agree, it definitely takes a certain sort of person. But I think it takes a certain sort of person to be able to eat animal products, work in an abattoir, or carry out animal testing too.

Quite a few totally incorrect assumptions here.

The farmers I know think their animals have many intrinsic rights as it happens; such as the right to live in safe, clean, surroundings that are as natural as possible, the right to good food and clean water, the right to decent treatment, high welfare standards, and access to good veterinary care. And all of the them without exception work very long hours, 7 days a week, to make that happen.

[Backstreetsbackalrightdadada]

Tubbs99 is that the extent of it? Over your lifetime you’ll eat millions of animals, one chicken kill isn’t the same as raising and killing your own. Killing a chicken is easy with a knife and rope, not comparable to a cow or sheep. At least you have that experience though, more than most.

[Backstreetsbackalrightdadada]

Also I used to have preconceived ideas about “industrial” farming and DO about eg chicken farms where it’s just a warehouse with half alive chickens but less so with dairy where it’s quite techie!

[TotorosCatBus]

There aren't many people performing ethical work.

I don't judge people who make money from plastic goods or bankers who make profit from people in debt either.

With regards to farming I am more concerned about the use of cheap foreign labour who live a poor quality of life in overcrowded lodgings but there are a lot of industries who use foreign people in terrible working conditions to produce goods for me.

[Tubbs99]

So @Backstreetsbackalrightdadada, I didn’t realise that there was a hierarchy. I haven’t had a chance a kill a cow or a sheep, because you know, we have people who do that for us. I also haven’t reared any because we have farmers for that, plus I don’t have the time or the land. I’m glad we have livestock farmers to do these very necessary jobs on our behalf.

[lakesummer]

They don't see them as living, breathing, individual beings.

Don't be so daft. They wouldn't get very far as livestock farmers if they couldn't grasp they were individual living beings.

It takes a lot of time and effort to successfully raise livestock. Care around feeding, shelter and veterinary services.

Personally I don't favor industrial methods and like another poster would like slaughter to take place closer to farms.

Farmers don't regard livestock as pets but that doesn't mean that they are soulless robots. Have you actually ever met a livestock farmer? Or spent time on a farm?

[KeepingTrack]

Not the case at @ChangePart1.
All the farmers I know are actually very careful about their animals, keen to ensure that they are comfortable etc…
They are as disgusted as anyone else at animal cruelty.

However, they also raised them to be slaughtered and the way they see that’s part of life.

FWIW

• I think wondering how farmers can kill the animals they’ve raised if you’re not vegetarian/vegan is hypocritical.
  
• the farmers I know have this attitude of ‘that’s part of life’ that they actually also apply to their own life. It’s not just about animals. It’s humans as well.

[Chamonixshoopshoop]

Does anyone on here actually know any farmers?! The ones I know care a lot about making sure their animals have a good life.
One of my farmer friends always makes a point of 'chatting to the cows' whenever we pass a herd as they love human interaction apparently! Not the actions of a psychopath who doesn't give a shit.

[AlternativePerspective]

Well, how do these sanctimonious vegans reconcile the fact that they eat so much processed crap that they’re killing the environment? That they are actively campaigning for the extinction of various species of animals, and that their diet is so unhealthy that they need supplements to balance it out?

Oh, and is a cabbage only ok to eat because it’s not breathing?even though it’s alive?

[Writersblock2]

I don’t understand how vegans can be sanctimonious when the creation of their preferred food also kills animals, in a significant number. Do they honestly think someone goes picking through the fields to make sure all of the rodents and bunnies and birds and insects and goodness knows what have packed their cases and gone on holiday before they harvest grains/vegetables etc.?

[fourquenelles]

They don't see them as living, breathing, individual beings. They certainly don't see them as having any intrinsic rights or worth beyond financial

I am old enough to remember seeing beef and dairy farmers crying their eyes out at having to destroy their animals due to the foot and mouth outbreak. Big burly people in bits. Not due to the lack of income (they were compensated) but due to losing animals they cared for before their time was due.

[BrightYellowDaffodil]

And yes we cart them off for slaughter, and they have no idea what’s happening to them and their last days are often terrifying. Some slaughterhouses are ok and some are awful.

It's important to recognise the 'OK' though - people I know raise animals for slaughter and they're killed humanely. They don't know anything about it. That's why it's so important to support producers who not only give their livestock a good life but a humane death. I would completely agree that there's a significant number of meat consumers who either don't care where meat comes from or don't realise that labels like 'Red Tractor' mean very little in terms of animal welfare (Compassion in World Farming is a good place for more info on this front).

I have no issue with eating animals as long as they've been treated well but - and I know this comes from a position of privilege - I believe cheap meat is wrong because it's almost always the animals that pay the price. However, meat eating and the animal husbandry is not as black and white as the OP (a newly converted vegan?) would make out.

[Tubbs99]

If people don’t want to eat meat, that’s their right. It’s also my right to eat meat. What I can’t stand are sanctimonious idiots like the OP.

[UhtredRagnarson]

@Backstreetsbackalrightdadada

Tubbs99 is that the extent of it? Over your lifetime you’ll eat millions of animals, one chicken kill isn’t the same as raising and killing your own. Killing a chicken is easy with a knife and rope, not comparable to a cow or sheep. At least you have that experience though, more than most.

They tend not to let Joe bloggs off the street pop in and slaughter the odd cow for “the experience” because it’s kind of an important job that takes training and skill and if done wrong can cause extreme suffering to the animal. So yeah, hardly something to beat a person round the head with if they haven’t managed to fit in an animal slaughter. As for raising our own meat, that’s simply not possible for most of us.

[WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll]

To them it's the same as if they were growing crops and then sending them off to distributers. They don't see themselves as having anything to come to terms with or reconcile themselves to.

Crops are also living things. They don't 'breathe' in the same way that we do and they probably don't feel pain when cut down, but they're still living organisms whose lives are cut short so that humans (and animals) can eat them. Does a crop plant have a conscious desire to keep on living as long as possible? Does it understand the concept of death? How about farm animals: what are their philosophical musings about their own future plans and ultimate death?

[VettiyaIruken]

It's not true they don't care. My uncle was a farmer. Small scale, nothing big. He had about a dozen cows, probably the same in pigs, with their litters in these heated pens. Plus a huge number of chickens.

He cried whenever his pigs were sent to slaughter. Every time. We'd go visit them and ask aunt where he was and she'd nod to the bedroom and we knew he'd sent some pigs off.

I think he was probably on the more emotional end but I don't believe farmers don't care about their animals. Maybe they mostly don't cry in their bedroom like my uncle did, but they care about their animals welfare.

But at the end of the day these animals are food. They need to be treated well and given a good life but compared to how other animals catch, kill and eat their meat, the human way is least painful!

[Chloemol]

It’s a business, there is no emotion involved

They are not pets to be cuddled, they live in fields and are on this Earth simply to provide food

[Backstreetsbackalrightdadada]

Honestly veganism is a lot of turning a blind eye - I say that as a vegan! I like the idea of everyone trying to improve things, it can be a messy process and im realising that veganism might not be the answer to what I find problematic. My siblings and parents still farm btw :) We need a farming board on MN! I like talking to others about farming - if they’re just interested or want to get into it

[vulpesfoxtrot]

If you want to be concerned about UK agriculture practices, consider this OP-

Our policy now is looking to environmental credentials in this country which will see us take viable land out of agricultural production in order to rewild or sequester carbon as a box ticking exercise.
But whilst we all need to eat, the job of growing food will be outsourced to countries with much less conscience for the environment and this is when you get malpractice such as destruction of rainforests for farming.
But it's fine because little England is green and pleasant and it's not as though we all breathe the same air...
Do you feed yourself entirely on seasonal produce like my livestock farming family do here? Or is your very green carbon footprint muddied with the beans you're flying in from Egypt and the avos from Spain?
And soya production, I mean that is just brilliant in terms of green credentials.