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California Leads In Movement To Ban Cruel
Factory Farms
Bonnie Erbe 10/15/2008
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Leave it to California to once again lead the way on one of the most important social issues of our time. This time it's animal cruelty in factory farming. Next month, Californians will have the opportunity to ameliorate conditions for the millions of factory-farmed animals in that state. At such mass-production farms, chickens, pigs, veal calves and other animals are crated in tiny spaces where some of them spend their entire suffering lives. (More on that later.)

California's Proposition 2 requires "that confined cattle, pigs and chickens have enough space to lie down, stand up, turn around freely and extend their limbs. Because there are few veal producers in the state and the largest pork producer here has already said it would eliminate small crates, the initiative would apply to the 19 million laying hens in California, according to the L.A. Times.

Doesn't sound horrendous, does it, to give an animal enough room to stand up and move around? Can you imagine spending your entire life tied to your bed, unable to get up and move around? Even if you don't care a whit
about animals, consider what type of food animals living in intolerable situations produce. It isn't pretty.

Animals living in horrendous conditions suffer from stress as do we. When their bodies are rife with stress hormones, so is the food they produce. Guess what: animals' stress hormones are not good for people, either. I have a saying: animals bite back. If you eat them, they bite back and kill you by raising your cholesterol level and contributing to heart disease.

Here's another question. What's the number one killer in America? The answer is heart disease. It's no mystery why.

Organic farming and free-range chicken production represent only a tiny percentage of all egg production in the U.S., for example. Why? Farmers can produce more eggs on much less space. But the eggs are cheaper for a reason. They are of lower quality than those produced by free-range hens.

California's egg industry is headquartered in Petaluma where reporter Robert Digitale of the Santa Rosa Press Democrat described what goes on in the typical factory egg farm:

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Hamburger Recall COLOR
By Bob Englehart - The Hartford Courant * Posted 2/20/2008 12:00:00 AM
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Hamburger Recall COLOR
© Copyright 2008  Bob Englehart - All Rights Reserved.

Posted By: dave  on Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Hooray! Yes on 2. It's a good thing. And you can avoid factory farming by looking for certified-organic products, as well as American Humane Association Free-Farmed certified products. Some of my greener friends may use this as an opportunity to yak about veganism, but IMO, vegan diets aren't especially healthy, and can be hazardous to some people.

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