Humane treatment
A Dec. 4 editorial indicated planning underway for producers to treat chickens more humanely.
Such planning is doubtlessly a response to consumer perceptions that factory farmers couldn’t care less about animal welfare. The upsurge in purchases of meat alternatives (and improvement in their quality) makes meat producers want to improve their public image.
Surprisingly, the editorial focused on whether kinder treatment of chickens would raise their market price.
Yet American families today spend a smaller percent of their income on groceries than ever before. We can afford to pay a bit more for chicken or to eat a bit less of it.
In today’s world, chickens have become production units. But they remain intelligent, sensitive beings. They have emotions; they can suffer. A civilized society is morally obligated to strive for a better balance between efficiency and humane treatment than currently exists.
Today, chickens are crammed into windowless buildings so crowded that moving about is difficult. Fed a diet full of growth hormones, they become so big so soon that sometimes their legs collapse under them. The air they breathe is toxic because they live in their excrement, typically not cleaned out until the birds go to slaughter, making way for a new “crop” of chicks.
There are about four times as many chickens as there are humans in the U.S. (We slaughter some 9 billion a year.) But they are “out of sight, out of mind.” Chicken factories are usually in remote areas, on private property; the public, including media, are denied access. We only see the birds after they are dead—at Chick-fil-A or the supermarket.
The birds exist in a legal void. The Arkansas anti-cruelty law excludes farm operations from coverage. Birds are also exempted from the Humane Slaughter Act (the only federal law providing any protection for farm animals).
There is reason for skepticism about prospects for reform. But Christmas is coming and we can hope for a start toward better treatment of our birds—something to celebrate this holiday season.
KAY OLIVER HODNETT
Little Rock