FoxNews features Smithfield hog cruelty front and center

[robert]

FoxNews features Smithfield hog cruelty front and center on its website 12/12 -- 12/13/07

 

Egregious animal abuse in the human food industry is nothing new. What was new yesterday, December 12 2007, was that a major media outlet, FoxNews.com, put it front and central on its website.

 

The shocking story, by Catherine Donaldson-Evans, is headed "North Carolina Authorities Investigate Alleged Pig Abuse by Supplier for Largest U.S. Pork Producer" and is now on line at

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,316624,00.html

 

It opens:

"A local prosecutor in North Carolina is investigating allegations of animal cruelty by a pig farm supplying Smi thfield Foods, the nation's largest pork producer. The investigation comes after an animal rights activist secretly videotaped workers beating and dragging swine, gouging out their eyes and cutting out their testicles."

 

We read:

"In the black-and-white video, a supervisor can be heard bragging to the undercover PETA investigator that he brutally beats the animals.

 

"'I ain't going to lie to you; I've done it,' he says. 'My temper is about that long. I get f� frustrated and I have knocked the s� out of them. Like that one bit me the other morning, that mother f�.... I cut the s� out of his G�d� nose with a f� gate rod.'

 

"In other segments, pigs who have the word 'KILL' spray-painted on their backs screech in apparent pain as they're dragged to slaughter with a heavy metal prodder attached to their legs, ears and snouts, and women laugh as they castrate one piglet after another without anesthesia or painkillers."

 

The FoxNews site asks you to "Click he re to see the video," with the link taking you to http://getactive.peta.org/campaign/smithfield_investigation

At that link you can watch the shocking video, and hear the horrible screams, and, most importantly, you can send a message to Smithfield. Please visit the link (you do not have to click and watch the video if you cannot stand to) and lodge your complaint.

 

And please, send a huge thank you to Fox News for featuring this story. It is vital that stations learn that the public appreciates coverage of animal issues.

 

Send your comments to [email protected]

 

Yours and the animals',

Karen Dawn

 

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)

[Guest]

Awesome...Fox is the last news network I'd expect to show this. What a surprise.

[finbarrio]

Great stuff. I admire the work PETA's undercover investigators do. They are hardcore.

[Laura]

Thanks for posting this. God I hate the meat industry. What is so wrong with some people that they have so little empathy for other living beings? I couldn't bear to watch the video but I did email Fox and Smithfield Foods.

[Zack]

What is so wrong with some people that they have so little empathy for other living beings?

 

Have you been vegan your whole life? If not, what was wrong with you before being vegan?

[Laura]

No, but I've been vegetarian since I was 4, when I made the connection between meat and animals. Maybe my comment sounded a little extreme but I don't think so. I got really angry reading the description of how the workers were torturing the pigs and piglets. I wasn't bashing the average omni.

[Zack]

No, but I've been vegetarian since I was 4, when I made the connection between meat and animals. Maybe my comment sounded a little extreme but I don't think so. I got really angry reading the description of how the workers were torturing the pigs and piglets. I wasn't bashing the average omni.

 

No it was fine, I'm just saying a lot of people grew up eating meat, and only later came to veganism. A lot of the time it's just about education. There will always be some people that just don't care though.