Ethical eating - life at the markets

Ever thought about your food's life before death?

Driving to work the other day I saw a chicken truck – one of those horrible big crate pack trucks loaded with meat chickens on their way to slaughter. I was stuck in bad traffic so got a good look – I was able to focus on each individual chicken. I didn't just see the big blur of white and feathers - I SAW the chickens. A few were looking right at me, scared eyes, confused expression. A few were on their back - clearly already dead from the stress and rough handling. Brethern pressed up against the carcass, awaiting their turn.

Now, I’m not against eating meat. I’m just against the thoughtless slaughter, suffering and consumption of ‘meat’ without any real understanding of where it comes from. The way I see it, if an animal dies so I can feed myself, my loved ones and my pets, then it deserves a lot of respect – both in life and death.

Buying your meat from a supermarket is so, so convienient. It's all there, right at your finger tips. Neatly wrapped in lots of non-biodegrable plastic and styrofoam, the packaging the only remaining relic of the animal it contains... the only way the animal will ever be remembered will be the trash forever sitting in the landfill. It's little plastic gravestone. How f****** sad is that?

I understand supermarkets are easy. But they aren't usually ethical.

Factory farming is an abomination. That much is clear. Animals living and dieing on a production line. Barely scraping through a horrific life so they can be slaughted one after another. A giant line of death. We kill them as though they did something wrong - punishing them for giving up their lives so we can eat.

A lot of us are now skipping past the cheapest meat... and our eyes pass over to the 'ethical' isle. The free range options. Maybe even the organic.

The issue here is, even the products stamped with "FREE RANGE" typically come from massive farms. ORGANIC. ETHICAL. What do these words even mean? The life of the animal may have been better, and YES they ar a better choice, but the death... how was the death?

A chicken may be raised 'free range', but if it is then stuffed onto a truck with thousands of other chickens and driven for days on a rough road in the back of a truck, that kind of undoes a lot of the free range feel-good vibes. If cattle are herded off their beautiful grazing pastures and onto a train, jostled for days, and then spends a week milling around in a slaughter house awaitng their turn, how is that ethical?

These animals know what is coming. They can smell and see and feel. They can think. They sense the death and hear the distress. They feel the pain. It isn't a suprise - they are are terrifed.

This is how we thank them for dying for us.

Supermarket meat is cheap. Their range is vast. The convienience is unrivaled. Same goes with their milk, eggs... it's all right there, on sale, ready for purchase.

But at what cost? Someone pays for cheap meat. For the convieneince. Sometimes it's the farmer that pays, sometimes its the consumer. More often then not - it's the animals.

Supermarkets surely offer some good options. But when it comes to meat, I am all for supporting the small farmers. The little guys who know their animals, who care about them. Are they raising them to be killed? Often. But they do care.

We buy our meat from small scale ethical producers. Our chicken and pork from places like Marylee May Farms, who raise all their meat themselves and slaughter in small scale products. Our beef comes from Bonnie Beef - a lovely couple who source cattle from their own farms and from friends. Animals are processed two at a time. They are used to the trucks. They don't die stressed.

These farms know their animals - they care if they suffer.

There are other bigger produces, like Benedale Chickens, who are organic chicken farmers. They process more birds but them do them ON SITE. A huge benefit! There is no transport.

Dying is not without its sacrifice. There is always a degree of suffering - to die isn't painless.

But the least we can do is care, and minimise it as much as possible.

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