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?

vulpes / but why don’t you just make the decision to live differently? Nobody is forced to be a cattle farmer.

I am not a farmer but I live rurally and walk the fields with the new lambs, stroke the calves (when they let me) and love seeing the new piglets. Cows have really scratchy tongues!! Chickens are funny little guys. I buy from local farmers in bulk (just had half a hogget delivered). Farmers generally care for their animals but it’s a rough and ready care. The sheep aren’t pets, they are sheep. You get then vet care, food, shelter etc..and you let them be sheep. Part of that is the knowledge that cull is at the end of their productive lives.

Empanadas why don't you choose to live in a wholly vegan society? Israel is good, Tell Aviv has the highest % of vegans.

Nobody is forced to live in the UK.

Maybe Vulpes doesn't want a different life?

She is providing a wanted product in an ethical way.

I have a lot more concerns about factory reared chicken and turkeys. Like others on this thread I would like to see very cheap meat removed as a option because I am concerned about animals ultimately paying that price.

Treating all livestock farming as though it was the same isn't very sensible.

The farmer I get my lamb from won’t take them to the abattoir before easter asit is too busy and the animals get stressed. She is organising a mobile abattoir in order to minimise the transport of live animals, and make their death as untraumatic as possible.

Hardly the actions of someone who doesn’t give a damn about the animals she rears.

I am more baffled by passionate dog owners who lavish so much care on their pets but are completely fine with eating lambs.

And the passionate dog owners who think it's completely fine to let their dogs off the lead near sheep. Not only do the sheep have a high chance of life-threatening injury and miscarriage, but (in certain circumstances) the dog itself can legally be shot for doing so.

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll

As has already been said, the basic choice we have is that we either have cows, pigs and sheep in the world - having a chance of a pleasant life before being quickly killed and making way for the next generation - or otherwise these animals go extinct - or at the very least extremely endangered.

To channel Tennyson, is it better for them to have lived and eventually died than never to have lived at all? I suppose you could take it to extremes and ask what's the point in us having babies, as they will only eventually die anyway.

Even if this argument is true (which I'm doubtful of), it always feels pretty disingenuous to me. As if claiming that we're doing these species some huge FAVOUR by breeding them by the billion just to kill and eat. If in some hypothetical situation everyone were to stop eating animals, conservation programs would obviously be put into place to stop the extinction of these species, as is done by humans for almost every other endangered species on Earth.

The traditional livestock industry is bad for the environment, consumes too much water, takes up too much land, causes too much cruelty and so on and so on to go on forever. Lab-grown meat is an inevitability. It's alreadybeen proven to work, once they can scale it and make it cheaper than raising animals, which will occur EVENTUALLY, whenever that may be, then the extinction debate will be put to the test anyway. I'm sure pigs, cows and chickens will survive it.

Ah. Back to Soylent Green.

We always get there eventually!

Are you vegan @Empanadas? If you're not you need to look closer to home before you worry about others' conscience.

"Living, breathing"... Technically plants are living, breathing creatures, too.

Personally, I'd have a hard time raising animals to eat without feeling guilty, but I know that's hypocritical, because I'm happy to buy the meat others have farmed. I also know that if I were unable to purchase meat, I'd most likely get over my qualms and start farming my own animals, because I like eating meat!

@CatherinedeBourgh your farmer sounds great.

My concern is that some radical vegans / veggies refuse to promote higher welfare farming because they so strongly believe meat should not be allowed. That’s naive in my view and is doing animals a disservice. I am allowed to privately believe meat should not be allowed, but until that day I want to see higher welfare for all animals and more farmers like Catherine’s.

Of course some meat production is more ethical and I don’t even want to get into battery farming as I find it too distressing.

But surely, you are dealing with life. It might not be human life, but it’s the life of a sentient being. You can do x,y,z during their short lives snd obviously this is preferable. But ultimately, you are profiting from death. Mass death is your business.

I really don’t mean to sound sanctimonious, but I genuinely wonder how people reconcile themselves to this. I’ve never been able to understand it at all.

Imagine if it all just stopped tomorrow, worldwide.

@Empanadas because I feel quite strongly that we are contributing positively to the landscape as managers of the land here. The cattle and sheep graze the land throughout their lives before being slaughtered for meat production. They are sold locally and go absolutely nowhere near a supermarket, we have worked hard to build a brand through local community support.
If I "chose to live my life differently" it would be at the detriment to the landscape. The land needs to be grazed to ensure continued organic matter and soil fertility, the management benefits flora and fauna, bugs and wildlife which couldn't benefit if the land were "rewilded". Alternatively land uses around here are almost exclusively glamping/camping sites and yoga retreats. Of great benefits to humans but at the detriment to our wildlife whose habitats are encroached by humans and their dogs.
You can believe I'm pillaging the land as a livestock farmer but to be honest that attitude tells me more about you and your need for education over anything else. As you were.

I bet all the vegans on this thread either drive / use gas and electricity in their homes / own smart devices that have been made with precious minerals mined out of the ground / wear clothing shipped from countries abroad / eat fruit shipped from abroad etc etc etc...

ALL of which contribute to global warming that will have a much bigger impact on animal life that just meat consumption.

And? I bet all the farmers do the same and everyone else that eats meat. It’s very childish to think so black and white.

Animal products are unethical no matter how many cute stories you tell about them. You’re causing unnecessary pain and stress. Going on the defence and trying to poke holes in veganism isn’t going to change that.

1/3 of farm animal breeds are already facing extinction.
The current issue is export of animals from countries like the UK to developing countries in the name of efficiency.

Often these exported breeds struggle with the conditions in the developing countries.
But there arrival can cause the extinction of local breeds.

The loss of bio diversity in farm animals is already a significant issue and maybe a more productive cause to address than high welfare animals in the UK.

Animals to farmer are profit, they care for them because it makes more money, they look healthier and grow faster.
Now i am not saying thats wrong but any idea farmers "love" their stock is bullocks.

I love my dog, if it went lame i would nt have it shot but thats what happens to cattle.

Take a milker, the moment her yield drops/can't calve, she is off for pet food and glue, her normal lifespan cut short.

If it were any of our livelihoods would all do similar, farmers aren't any different to most people.

@Empanadas if we stopped livestock farming globally tomorrow, how would you propose generating organic matter to put back into the soil? (That's animal shit, to you).
We're moving away from synthetic fertiliser at the pressure of green lobby groups but you can't grow high yielding (vegan) crops without fertiliser. Honestly.

@CuriousaboutSamphire

Ah. Back to Soylent Green.

We always get there eventually!

Who was that even aimed at? My post??

@Bluethrough as the daughter of a dairy farmer I can confirm that you are lying. That is just simply not correct.

@Empanadas

vulpes / but why don’t you just make the decision to live differently? Nobody is forced to be a cattle farmer.

And nobody owes someone else a change in how they choose to live to suit some random on the net.

. They’re not running a charity and if they can’t make money on the animals there won’t be any more. I’m surrounded by sheep fields and buy local lamb and beef I’ve seen reared.

Yes, every year I see little lambs born in all the fields around us. I visit them every day when I walk the dogs and see new lambs arrive day after day. I show them to the children, then one day they drive past my kitchen window (well the farmer drives them) and I know where they are going and I go to the local farm shop and farmers market and buy local meats.

I'm not heartless. I know where my food comes from and I'm square with that.

I understand animals graze the land. We’re in London, but there is a wildlife sanctuary to the back of us and there are about ten cows and various sheep that graze the land around the edges. They come to the bottom of our garden to say hello. They’re the lucky ones I guess.

When you see them being loaded into the lorries, does this not affect you deeply? Do you sense their terror? Do you never have the urge to pull a few off and save them, just because you can?

@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.

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.

You have no clue what you're talking about.

@Empanadas

I understand animals graze the land. We’re in London, but there is a wildlife sanctuary to the back of us and there are about ten cows and various sheep that graze the land around the edges. They come to the bottom of our garden to say hello. They’re the lucky ones I guess.

When you see them being loaded into the lorries, does this not affect you deeply? Do you sense their terror? Do you never have the urge to pull a few off and save them, just because you can?

Are you a vegetarian @Empanadas?

Or actually even better a vegan?