Factory Farming Essay Example

The term abuse refers to the use or treatment of something that is harmful. Most of us are already aware of abuse in our society. Spousal abuse, child abuse and pet abuse are most commonly talked about and referred to. There is another form of abuse which many people have recently been raising awareness of, it is called factory farming. Many of us are not aware that the meat that we eat is produced in an abusive way.

In effort to grow food animals as cheaply and quickly as possible, farmers cram as many animals as possible into factory-like warehouses. Many animals spend their whole lives in cages, crates or pens and no consideration is given to their comfort or needs. These cages are small and severely restrict their movement and hinder their natural behaviors. For example, Egg-laying hens are crowded together into cages where each bird is given a space smaller than an 8 ½- by- 11” sheet of paper, is prevented from walking, and does not have enough room to spread its wings. Also, veal calves are normally confined inside 2 foot wide enclosures for their entire lives. They are usually chained by their necks and cannot turn around, stretch their limbs or lie down comfortably. Additionally, breeding sows live a continuous cycle of impregnation and are cramped in their 2 foot wide gestation crate (in which they cannot turn around in or lie down comfortably) or cramped in their farrowing crate in which they give birth and nurse their piglets. They are not provided with straw or any other type of bedding and often have sores on shoulders and knees.

Factory farmed animals are fed drugs to fatten them faster, and are genetically altered to grow faster or to produce much more milk or eggs than they would naturally. Today’s broiler chickens have been genetically altered to grow twice as fast and twice as large as their ancestors. They grow so rapidly that their hearts may fail as they try to pump blood around their huge body. Their legs often break