Vegetarianism
Respect of Life

     There are several reasons why people should turn into vegetarianism. One of them is animal welfare which is our organization’s main concern. People still have the naive belief that animals in factory farms are treated in a well environment in “a happy farm” until the day of the killing. However, the reality is another. On today's factory farms, animals often spend their entire lives confined to cages or stalls barely larger than their own bodies (PETA). The death for these animals doesn't always come quickly or painlessly (PETA). The purpose of today factory farm is not to provide the animals an appropriate place to live in order to grow up as a healthy happy animal. The only purpose of today’s factory farms is to raise more money at the expense of the well-being of the animals. Each year, the meat and dairy industries commit unspeakable acts of cruelty on billions of chickens, cows, and other animals to produce meat, milk and eggs (Free the animals).

     Cows, calves, pigs, chickens, turkeys, ducks, geese, rabbits, and other animals are kept in small cages or stalls, often unable to turn around. They are deprived of exercise so that all of their bodies' energy goes toward producing flesh, eggs, or milk for human consumption (PETA). They are fed drugs and are genetically altered to make them grow larger or produce more milk or eggs than nature originally intended (PETA). Because crowding creates a prime atmosphere for disease, animals on factory farms are fed and sprayed with huge amounts of pesticides and antibiotics, which remain in their bodies and are passed on to the people who eat them, creating serious human health hazards (PETA)

Cattle
     Many beef cattle are born and/or live on the range, foraging and fending for themselves, for months or even years. They are not adequately protected against inclement weather, and they may die of dehydration or freeze to death (Free the animals). Injured animals do not receive necessary veterinary attention.
     Ranchers still identify cattle the same way they have since pioneer days, with hot iron brands (PETA). Needless to say, this practice is extremely traumatic and painful, and the animals bellow loudly as ranchers' brands are burned into their skin (PETA). Beef cattle are also subjected to waddling, another type of identification marking (free the animals). This painful procedure entails cutting chunks out of the hide which hangs under the animals' necks (free the animals). Waddling marks are supposed to be large enough so that ranchers can identify their cattle from a distance (free the animals).

      Most beef cattle spend the last few months of their lives at feedlots, crowded by the thousand into dusty, manure laden holding pens (PETA) . The air is thick with harmful bacteria and particulate matter, and the animals are at a constant risk for respiratory disease (free the animals). Feedlot cattle are routinely implanted with growth promoting hormones, and they are fed unnaturally rich diets designed to fatten them quickly and profitably (free the animals) . Because cattle are biologically suited to eat a grass-based, high fiber diet, their concentrated feedlot rations contribute to metabolic disorders (free the animals) . Cattle may be transported several times during their lifetimes, and they may travel hundreds or even thousands of miles during a single trip (free the animals). Long trips are very stressful and contribute to disease.
     Young cattle are commonly taken to areas with cheap grazing land, to take advantage of this inexpensive feed source (free the animals) . Upon reaching maturity, they are trucked to a feedlot to be fattened and readied for slaughter (free the animals). All of them will have as their final destination the slaughterhouse. At a standard beef slaughterhouse, 250 cattle are killed every hour. As the assembly line speeds up, workers are rushed, and it becomes increasingly difficult to treat animals with any semblance of humaneness (free the animals).

Chickens and Turkeys
     Record numbers of chickens and turkeys are being raised and killed for meat in the U.S. every year (free the animals). Nearly ten billion chickens, and half a billion turkeys, are being hatched in the U.S. every year (free the animals). These birds are typically crowded by the thousand into huge factory-like warehouses where they can barely move (free the animals). Chickens are given less than half a square foot of space per bird while turkeys are each given less than three square feet (free the animals). Both chickens and turkeys have the end of their beaks cut off, and turkeys also have their toes clipped (free the animals). All of these mutilations are performed without anesthesia, and they are done in order to reduce injuries which result when stressed birds are driven to fighting (free the animals).

     Today's meat chickens have been genetically altered to grow twice as fast, and twice as large as their ancestors (free the animals) . Pushed beyond their biological limits, hundreds of millions of chickens die every year before reaching slaughter weight at 6 weeks of age.
     Chickens and turkeys are taken to the slaughterhouse in crates stacked on the back of trucks (free the animals). The birds are either pulled from the crates, or the crates are lifted off the truck, often with a crane or forklift, and then the birds are dumped onto a conveyor belt (free the animals). As the birds are unloaded, some fall onto the ground instead of landing on the assembly line conveyor belt (free the animals). Slaughterhouse workers intent upon 'processing' thousands of birds every hour, don't have the time or the inclination to pick up individuals who fall through the cracks (free the animals). Sometimes the birds die after being crushed by machinery or vehicles operating near the unloading area, while in other cases, they may die of starvation or exposure after days without receiving their basic needs (free the animals) .

     Once inside the slaughterhouse, fully conscious birds are hung by their feet from metal shackles on a moving rail (free the animals) . The first station on most poultry slaughterhouse assembly lines is the stunning tank, where the birds' heads are submerged in an electrified bath of water. Although poultry is specifically excluded from the Humane Slaughter Act which requires stunning, the practice is common because it immobilizes the birds and expedites assembly line killing (free the animals). Stunning procedures are not monitored, and they are often inadequate (free the animals). Poultry slaughterhouses commonly set the electrical current lower than what is required to render the birds unconscious because of concerns that too much electricity would damage the carcass and diminish its value (free the animals). The result is that birds are immobilized but are still capable of feeling pain, or they emerge from the stunning tank still conscious (free the animals) . After passing through the stunning tank, the birds' throats are slashed, usually by a mechanical blade, and blood begins rushing out of their bodies (free the animals). Inevitably, the blade misses some birds who then proceed to the next station on the assembly line, the scalding tank. Here they are submerged in boiling hot water (free the animals). Birds missed by the killing blade are boiled alive (free the animals). This occurs so commonly, affecting millions of birds every year, that the industry has a term for these birds. They are called "redskins" (free the animals).

Pigs
     Ninety percent of all pigs are closely confined at some point in their lives, and 70 percent are kept constantly confined. Sows are kept pregnant or nursing constantly and are squeezed into narrow metal "iron maiden" stalls, unable to turn around. Although pigs are naturally peaceful and social animals, they resort to cannibalism and tail biting when packed into crowded pens and develop neurotic behaviors when kept isolated and confined (PETA). Pork producers lose $187 million a year due to dysentery, cholera, trichinosis, and other diseases fostered by factory farming (PETA). Approximately 30 percent of all pork products are contaminated with toxoplasmosis (PETA).

Fish
     Worldwide, approximately one third of the wild fish caught are considered to be 'by-catch'. An agribusiness publication, Feedstuffs, states, "...under current management strategies of commercial harvests in open-access fisheries, such as oceans or Great Lakes commercial fisheries, increased production is possible only in the shortest runs . Every new seafood fad leads to the decimation of another species of fish... Any major increase in seafood consumption can be sustained only if the seafood is grown on farms or in other managed environments" (Free the animals). The quantity of farm-raised fish has doubled over the past decade and is "one of the fastest growing food producing sectors" according to the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) (Free the Animals).
     Today, approximately one in five fish consumed worldwide is raised in captivity. The life of a farm-raised fish begins in temperature-controlled hatching tanks (Free the animals). From here, small fish (called "fry") are transferred to rearing areas where they grow to maturity (Free the animals) . The fish may be raised in highly controlled tanks or raceways (rectangular concrete enclosures up to 20 acres in size) constructed inland, or they may be raised in artificial enclosures in coastal estuaries (free the animals) . Fish crowded into small areas are susceptible to disease and suffocation, as an article from the Cornell Countryman states, "...growing 2,500 pounds of fish in 2,500 gallons of water doesn't give the fish much room to breathe..." (Free the animals).
     Raising fish in crowded, excrement-laden water necessitates the broad use of agrichemicals (Free the animals). An "FDA Veterinarian" article explains that fish farmers "...use chemicals as disinfectants and to kill bacteria; herbicides to prevent the overgrowth of vegetation in ponds; vaccines to fight certain diseases; and drugs - usually combined in the feed - to treat diseases and parasites" (Free the animals). In addition, the fish industry insists that "access to spawning and production hormones is one of the 'essential and critical' needs of the U.S. aquaculture industry" according to "Food Chemical News" (Free the Animals).

All the information written above was found in PETA http://www.peta.org/ and FREE the ANIMALS http://www.freetheanimals.homestead.com/index.html.

What YOU can do

* Factory farming is an extremely cruel method of raising animals, but its profitability makes it popular. One way to stop the abuses of factory farming is to support legislation that abolishes battery cages, veal crates, and intensive-confinement systems.

* The best think to do is become vegetarian or better, become vegan. Stop supporting the animal factories and respect life.

* For a free vegetarian starter kit go to http://www.goveg.com/vegkit/

* For the VSEP dinning guide go to http://utminers.utep.edu/vsep/Restaurant

* To learn more about vegetarianism in our community go to the Vegetarian Society of El Paso at http://utminers.utep.edu/vsep/ and become a member.