Posted on 02/25/2012 12:37:19 PM PST by DogByte6RER
Is farming brain-dead chickens more ethical?
Architecture Student André Ford is proposing raising chickens for meat in vertical racks after severing their frontal cortexes, rendering them effectively brain-dead. It would be much, much more efficient, there's no doubt about that, but would it be any more ethical than current factory farms?
The images of the conceptual chicken racks are fairly disturbing- the chickens are suspended, completely immobile, with their feet removed. Tubes feed water and nutrients directly into the them while other tubes carry away waste. The chickens themselves, though, aren't suffering at all, since their brains have been surgically cut in half, rendering them permanently unconscious. Basically, what you're looking at aren't animals anymore: they're just pieces of meat that are being grown for consumption.
A system like this would significantly reduce the amount of space needed to farm chickens, raising productivity while cutting costs. And arguably, it's better for the chickens, too, since being factory farmed is a miserably inhumane experience. In an ideal world, chickens would roam free in the wild, and there'd be no factories at all. But this isn't how it works, and while you're perfectly free to buy only super happy free range organic chickens, demand is such that factory farms aren't likely to disappear.
The fact that this concept is a lot like The Matrix isn't lost on the artist, but in this case, the chickens don't have it nearly as good:
"The similarities are patent, although in The Matrix the dominant species were kind enough to provide the sub-species with a alternate reality, which was far better than the their 'real' post-apocalyptic world. This was a lovely gesture by 'The Machines', but the chickens in this system will not be privy to such a luxurious appendage to an already elaborate system, especially in this age of austerity."
What the chickens would experience might not be a fantasy world filled with the chicken equivalent of the woman in the red dress, but it's possible that no reality is better than the reality of a factory farm. We should be clear that this is just an art project, and as far as we know no chickens were harmed in the making of it, but it definitely raises some questions about some of the ways in which we get our food.
So, what do you think? Are brain-dead chickens in racks a more ethical way to manufacture food, or not?
That is a good one.
I hear that they’re working on a similar system for cows.
They call it the Mootrix.
[W/apologies to Scott Kurtz.]
“Surgically altering their brains so they are presumably unaware that their feet have been amputated, theyre immobilized and have a feeding tube shoved down their throat does not strike me as merciful, it strikes me as vile.”
Agreed.
I wonder what Frank Perdue would have to say about this?
“The morons who propose things like this obviously know nothing about chickens. No chicken has a thought in its head worth considering. Anyone with the slightest bit of concern for the welfare of chickens that are raised to be consumed is brain-dead themselves.”
How long ‘til the ObamaCare “panels” apply the same techniques to the elderly in nursing homes, with the goal of making them “easier to care for” at lower expense??
LOL! Ignorance on display.
Ill patonize local farmers or grow it myself.
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Dittos! Actually the mister and I have been kicking around the idea of raising some chickens with ups and downs to the idea.
The bad side, I worry if my crazy, hyper, mutts would cause a problem and the mister swears up and down I would get attached. Nope, nope—my family raised and butchered calves when I was a kid.
Having four dogs— sadly, two probably won’t live that much longer (they are pretty old for big pups). I think chickens at this point may be more than I want to take on.
But, the more I read about all this crazy petri-dish hamburger, people eating insects, brain-dead chickens...the more I think raising your own or finding a local small farmer is the ONLY answer.
God help us all.
“Ethical? We kill animals and eat them. Thats the way the world works. Chickens kill worms, insects and other living organisms to feed themselves just as we do. Chickens even kill and eat each other if one of them gets injured and shows blood”.
Exactly!!!!
I tend to believe that God prepared the non human species just as man was prepared for life here.
The animals have a destiny to be managed by man for man’s benefit. They accept that destiny willingly in most cases.
To say that mans efforts are contrary to some ethical construct different than what is found in the 28th verse of Genesis Ch 1 wherein man was to have dominion over every living thing that moveth upon the earth seems foreign to my mind.
The above in appearance like those who blame man for global warming, just another God isn’t smart enough to create or run earth. Man the great usurper just has to intervene, and make things right, after his image and not what the Almighty has ordained.
One escaped!
And, before anybody goes off, no, Im not vegetarian. I grew up around farm animals, and any decent farmer will care for his livestock, treating them well. That their ultimate fate was the dinner table mattered not, dont be cruel to them.
Amen.
Thank you, I agree. I am an animal lover and I love meat, too. God told us to subdue the earth, and He gave us the animals for food and to care for. Somehow I just don’t think this is what He had in mind.
Ignorance on display? Really? I knew several farmers who had commercial chicken farms, before Holly Farms was bought out. I also know what they had to compete with afterwards, and why just about all of them chose or were forced to pursue other farming interests.
You say ignorance, but don’t make any attempt to refute it. That says to me that you can’t.
I don’t like it. I like the idea of a chicken having spent some time in the sunlight, breathing the air, eating some insects off the ground.
No, this is.. kind of sick.
YouTumbe video ... Mike the Headless Chicken
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATz3AdbjyRI&feature=player_embedded#!
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