The Dumberest Question Ever

Being a vegan, I get my fair share of dumb questions, but today truly topped the cake. Now, by dumb questions, I mean some dumb questions! Can vegetarians eat animal crackers? Can vegans eat fish? And aren't we meant to eat meat? But this one was by far the most dim-witted question I’ve gotten in a while:

Both plants and animals are alive, so what’s the difference between the two? You’re no better than the rest of us.

We’re going to school at Penn State. Do we really not know the difference between plants and animals yet? Perhaps we can find the difference in these next two pictures:


and this


Still looking for a difference? Yeah, me too.

Now don’t get me wrong, I know it wasn't a serious question and it was at best a poor excuse as to why he eats meat, but come on, come up with something that shows you thought logically for a second. Hell, even make something up! But the point of all of this is not to show how dumb the question was, but to show that most people haven’t given it any thought as to how poorly we treat the animals we call meat. Most people can’t even think of a reason to care! But surprisingly, there are reasons to care....

When I was a child, my friend down the road would catch bee's and use insulation foam to permanently stick them to the ground so they would squirm around and eventually die. He didn’t see any problem with this. When I went back to my house and told my mom how disgusted I was, she agreed and made a big deal out of it saying I probably shouldn't hang out with him anymore if he does things like that. I now know why it was such a big deal. If a child abuses an animal, or insect in this case, there is something physiologically wrong with them.

And the end of this story brings me to a question: why is it when a child abuses something as small as an insect there is something drastically wrong, but when we abuse animals daily without ever second guessing, it’s perfectly acceptable? Do we have to mistreat animals like that? At what point is it wrong?













Uh Oh! I better have not just hear another excuse!

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More Shams from Environmentalists

From time to time you hear various environmentalists expressing their distain of the government subsidies towards biofuels which totals around 6 billion a year. This is certainly worthy of attention as these fuels are counterproductive in solving our environmental problems, but I find it particularly funny that environmentalists still have not questioned the government subsides on animal products, something that is exponentially worse on the environment.




Currently, the US government subsidizes meat directly however in very small amounts( around $300 million). The real way the meat industry gets all of the government subsidies is from other sectors of agriculture (corn, soybeans, wheat, oats). Since the livestock sector consumes unreasonable amounts of vegetables, 80% of the US corn and 90% of soy meal crops, they use the subsidies from vegetables to feed their animals. To give you an idea of how much the US government subsides these crops, between 2000 and 2004, an average of $4.5 billion to corn and $2 billion to soy was given out to the agriculture sector. Nearly all of government subsides initially intended for vegetables went to livestock feed instead.

With this being said, when environmentalists start to complain about these subsides on biofuels, I question their sincerity. These subsides have only been around for a few years, yet meat subsides have been around since the early 1970’s. Both subsides are around the equivalent monetarily, yet the subsides for meat are far worse on the environment. Has anyone heard a main-stream peep out against these meat subsidies? I know I certainly haven't. I have however heard meat-eaters who ironically call themselves environmentalists(Al Gore) voicing plenty of disdain towards biofuel subsides(Mr. Krugman). The subsides on meat have already contributed to more environmental devastation over thier 40 years of existence than subsides on biofules could ever realistically contribute, yet environmentalists still haven't picked up on it. It's time that changed.

I know I've said this plenty of times, but the single best thing you can do for the environment is go vegetarian. And as the UN claims, "the livestock sector emerges as one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global”.

For those who consider themselves environmentalists, I strongly urge you to reduce your consumption of animal products. It's the best thing you can do to mitigate your carbon footprint.

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The Unreliability of Animal Testing

As some of you may know, Animal Testing is one particular area which I take great interest in, so last week, when I came across an article which claims scientists may have found a cure for diabetes, I wanted to dig deeper into the study.

In short, these scientists from Baylor, used a process called Gene Therapy where they take a gene called neurogenin3, attach it to a virus which then delivers the gene to the adult stem cells in the liver of the mouse. The mouses liver, within a week, brought the blood sugar levels back to normal.

There's a catch though: The virus they use to deliver the gene could be deadly in humans.


For anyone who is up on animal testing, this is not a surprising finding. The anatomy of the animals we drug test on and humans are drastically different and because of this, countless drugs pass in lab animals, yet need to be withdrawn from the market a few years later. One of the many classic examples, VIOXX, passed drug testing in six different species yet a few years later, needed to be withdrawn cause it was found to cause heart attacks. By the time it was recalled, it was estimated by the FDA that it killed around 28,000 people.

This example above is shocking, however it does not capture how poor the results of animal testing truly are. And actually, many people, even vegetarians, aren't aware of is how poor the predictability of animal testing is.

The FDA found that if a drug works in animal trials, 92% of the time it will not work in humans. It doesn't take a scientist to understand that is an unacceptable rate, but we must keep in mind, the reason it's only 92% and not closer to 99% is because the pass rate of many skin drugs is very high(this is attributed to "fake skin" rather than animal testing). Many of more serious drugs, such as cancer drugs, have an attrition rate closer to 98%. Lastly, of that 8% that passes in clinical trials, half of those drugs will be recalled from the market or relabeled because of unknown side effects.

These numbers are extremely interesting to look at especially on the pharmasutical side. Why on earth would these pharmasutical companies, which are entirely profit driven, continue to use procedures that are outdated and have terrible success rates? The answer is both politically and profitability oriented.

These companies could use there immense lobbying power on the government to change the FDA's policies on animal testing, however they would much rather stay on the FDA's good side.

In another angle, the FDA strongly suggests passing the potential drugs in two or more animals before approval. Since the variability from animal to animal is so high, if the drug doesn't work in a mouse or rat, it may work in an amphibian or rabbit. These additional outs prove to be beneficial to the pharmasutical companies when applying for drug approval.

Both of these factors, staying in the good graces of the FDA and the availability of different animal tests translates to one thing, faster and better chance for approval of drugs. Why is this so important? Just imagine passing a blockbuster drug such as Lipitor, which makes $13.7 million a day. A week or two faster in the drug approval process means millions more in profit. Even if the drug is recalled years later, the company still made hundreds of millions to billions in profits from the drug.

Animal testing is often times misunderstood as beneficial, yet in reality is holding science back. With a 92% attrition rate in animal testing, we need to use alternatives. The Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Validation of Alternative Methods, funded by the US government, has looked at slightly under 200 alternatives to animal testing and recommended where to properly use them but the FDA still requires animal testing. Animal testing will not be thrown out overnight as alternatives must be approved on a test by test basis, however with increasing pressure from the public, the FDA will likely change it's policies on drug development. As a Pro-Science and Pro-progress supporter, I strongly urge the FDA to get rid of the animal tests that don't work and use alternative tests which yield better results.



Note: Before my inbox is flooded with e-mails regarding Genetically Engineered animals, I would like to be clear that these GE Animals mealy give a false hope to Pro-animal testers. These animals are going to come with the same and possibly additional problems that normal animal testing comes with. Humans and Animals are vastly genetically different, it's time we throw out the old technology(animal testing) and bring in something a little better that will bring out cures.

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Peoples Have Crazy Idea's on Where our Meat Comes From

This last week was Meat-out week at Penn State. Meat-out is a national event where Vegetarians and Vegans encourage people to give up meat products for one day out of the year. Since Penn State is a huge Agriculture school, many of the Ag and Animal science students took offense to the event as their job depends on people consuming animals/animal bi-products. As a resuly, they held a "Meat-in" day where they passed out information on the benefits of eating meat and Beef Jerky. As a counter, the Vegetarian Club at Penn State passed slightly over 1,100 pamphlets on factory farms out. The Penn State Collegian, the student newspaper, covered the story. After the article came out, a couple articles came out denouncing Vegetarians and Vegans along with the other side.

This first is the Letter to the Editor that started the whole ordeal:

Practices of meat farmers ensure safety of livestock


All of the practices that farmers do are for
the safety of the animal with production in
mind. PETA argues that animals are being
treated inhumanely and spread stories of how
mother sows are penned in stalls so that they
cannot turn around.This is a true fact but
what PETA neglects to tell the public is that
that is for the safety of the piglets.

This living arrangement is for the ultimate
good of the animal, when penned this way
they are less likely to kill their piglets by lying
on them then when they are just left to roam
free. In addition young piglets, just like babies,
are not very good on their feet, and would find
it very difficult to chase after their mother
when it came time to eat and the small piglets
would ultimately die.

If PETA would remove its ugly head from
an industry it does not understand every ani-
mal would be better off.

The other major issue PETA argues is the
ingestion of animal meat. If humans did not
eat meat there would be an over-abundance of
animals in the world and they would become
obstacles on roads like the over populated
deer herds in Pennsylvania. The consumption
of animal flesh is not only just something we
do because of tradition, but it is a direct stim-
ulant to the US Economy. The U.S. meat
industry is the largest sector of agriculture
and agriculture is the largest sector of the
U.S. economy.

Meat industry sales in 2003 were nearly $90
billion, according to the U.S. Department of
Commerce. With the current status of our
economic system who would want to pull that
chuck of change out of the equation? For
many rural communities, livestock production
and meat processing are economic corner-
stones and cannot be replaced or compro-
mised!

The responce:

Making profit trumps safety
as farmers’ main concern

In Nicholas Wingert's letter to the editor
(“Practices of farmers ensure safety of live-
stock,” March 19), he states "All of the practices
that farmers do are for the safety of the animal
with production in mind." He has one part right:
With production in mind. The only time corpo-
rate farmers treat the animals with safety is
when it is economically beneficial to them.

According to the United Egg producers,
which is funded through egg producers in the
United States, 95 percent of the eggs we eat
are from caged birds; it recommends giving
each bird anywhere from 67-86 square inches
of room.

That is slightly less than a sheet of paper.
With these recommendations, chickens aren't
able to spread their wings for all of their adult
life. Keep in mind, this is what the Egg pro-
ducers are telling you: You can use your own
mind to interpret how badly they really treat
them.

In Mr. Wingert's opinion, farmers treat ani-
mals with care. I suppose this is why we have
videos of cows and pigs being hoisted into the
air by forklifts, piglets being thrown 10 feet
into the air, farm animals unable to turn
around in their stalls, and chickens being
recklessly thrown into transport trucks before
slaughter.

These videos are not the exception. There
are dozens of investigations highlighting the
largest animal producers such as Tyson,
AgriProcessors, Butterball, and Perdue, just
to name a few, committing countless atroci-
ties. These few producers supply a vast
majority of our meat.

As the San Francisco Chronicle pointed out,
18 beef processors account for 80 percent of
the market share.

Every time we go food shopping, we are
voting with our dollar. I would hope people
choose to consume less animal products and
byproducts in turn reducing animal suffering.
And lastly I hope that people aren't hood-
winked by the propaganda that Factory farms,
where we get a majority of our meat from,
treat their animals humanely.

And the response to that:

Ignorance of meat's critics visible in uninformed views

This is in response to the many letters to the editor that talk about Meat-In Day and Meat-Out Day.

I have many friends who are vegetarians and many who aren't and either way I completely respect their decisions. My vegetarian friends, however, also respect those of us who eat meat and never call us ignorant because the decision to eat meat is not solely based on knowledge, but on personal beliefs.

I know that I am not ignorant as I grew up surrounded by farms, my roommate is a farmer, and I am a food science major. I know where my food comes from and how the animals that produce my meat products are raised. The majority of farmers focus on the safety of their animal and treat them with care.

Yes, I do realize that there are exceptions and animals are mistreated in some cases, but they are exceptions. I know all of this from my education.

Those of you who claim that you know otherwise from videos online are the ignorant ones. I actually take classes here at Penn State about where my food comes from. You look up videos on the Internet. Let me ask you which source you think is more reliable?
e

This letter was not published, however it was submitted:

“Ignorance of meat's critics visible in uninformed views”, echo’s an argument made by many. They use completely anecdotal information to claim that a majority of the animals we eat come from producers who treat animals with care. This is completely false. A majority of the animals we eat do not come from traditional farms.

According to president of the U.S. National Farmers' Union, the top four cattle producers account for 80% of the market in the U.S. In addition, the WorldWatch Institute found that 74% of the worlds chicken and nearly all of the U.S. chicken comes from factory farms. Keep in mind, medium CAFO’s (factory farms), may contain anywhere from 37,500 to 124,999 chickens at a time(EPA).

It doesn’t take much to understand there are very few practical ways to raise thousands of birds on one farm humanely. It shouldn’t come to a surprise there aren’t any pictures of the birds living or slaughter conditions on Perdue’s, Butterball’s, or Tyson’s websites; they would go bankrupt overnight.

The author also cited personal beliefs as a reason to justify killing animals for food. I would hope, in a world with a growing number of nutritionists recommending keeping animal products off your plate, some form of the golden rule could be applied here as I’m sure most would not want to be killed simply because they taste good.( I’m not comparing humans with animals, I’m merely mentioning they deserve consideration.)

I would encourage those who believe that the animals we eat are raised and killed in a humane manner, to do additional research. The farms in our neighborhoods are by no means a true depiction of how we treat the animals we slaughter. Instead, the packages of meat from the supermarket contain an animal’s abused life which we support financially every time we purchase meat. I would encourage those who eat animal products to understand how cruel those products truly are and think twice when buying their food.

Though this letter did not make it into the newspaper, there is a moral to the story. These letters are evidence that a majority of people are not aware of how much of our meat comes from factory farms. When they see a scenic farm, they think, wow they treat these animals just fine. This misconception truly subtracts from the Vegetarian/Vegan arguments validity.

Vegetarians and Vegans need to keep showing people how badly we treat animals. So long as we kill 10 Billion animals a year in the US alone, I think we can do better. For every person that goes vegetarian, over 100 animals are saved a year-- I think thats something worth working for.

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