United Poultry Concerns <http://www.UPC-online.org>
21 April 2020

Take a GIANT STEP: Go Vegan!

By Karen Davis, PhD, President, United Poultry Concerns

This article, excerpted from Life Can Be Beautiful – Go Vegan!
<https://www.upc-online.org/govegan.pdf>, is featured in
the April 2020 issue of *The Echo World: The Alternative Voice in the South*
<http://www.theechoworld.com>. The
Echo World appears in print and online.

*There’s never been a better time to switch to a diet free of animal
products.*

Animal-free eating gets easier every day as more and more people seek
healthy,
delicious vegan foods and restaurant dishes. More and more supermarkets
sell a
range of easy-to-prepare products marked Vegan. With today’s culinary
creativity
and technology, we can enjoy delicious textures and flavors without worrying
about the cholesterol, type-two diabetes and other health issues linked to
unhealthy, animal-based diets. Let’s look at the arguments.

*Why Choose Vegan?*

As the human population grows, food-safety and environment problems grow,
and
animals raised for food get treated worse. They suffer more cruelly, grow
sicker
and pass their sickness on to us. By choosing vegan, we refuse to support
the
suffering of billions of animals while enjoying the health benefits
associated
with plant-based foods.

Fortunately, the demand for animal-free foods is growing. People want meals
that
are healthy, better for the environment, and compassionate to animals.
Sales of
vegan meat and dairy-free products are rising rapidly in the United States
and
elsewhere in the world, according to food trend analysts.1 Plant-based
eating is
a path toward a healthier, more sustainable and caring way of life.

*The Environment*

Much of the destruction of our forests and wildlife is due to animal
agriculture. Our forests, especially our rainforests, absorb carbon dioxide
from
the atmosphere and exchange it for oxygen. When we slash and burn forests to
graze cattle and grow soybeans to feed billions of poultry and pigs, we
diminish
our ability and our children’s ability to breathe fresh air. Currently,
seventy
to eighty percent of the world’s soy goes not into tofu but into food fed to
farmed animals.2

A plant-based diet helps to protect our forests and our environment. In
“Saving
the Planet, One Meal at a Time,” American journalist and Presbyterian
minister,
Chris Hedges, writes: “With animal agriculture as the leading cause of
species
extinction, water pollution, ocean dead zones and habitat destruction,
becoming
vegan is the most important and direct change we can immediately make to
save
the planet and its species.”3

*Animals Raised for Food*

The Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production reported that of
all the
terrible things they witnessed in their investigation of farmed animal
facilities, “The most appalling was a facility that produces chickens for
eating. It was totally dark and the dust and ammonia smells were
overwhelming.”4

Animals raised for food are treated badly and they are very unhealthy.
Chickens,
turkeys and ducks are crammed in filthy, dark buildings loaded with
bacteria,
flu viruses, toxic funguses and poisonous gases that burn their eyes, their
skin, and their lungs. With no fresh air, sunshine, or normal activities,
the
birds develop painful skeletal deformities, soft watery muscles, stress
hormones
and heart disease.

Chickens and turkeys go to slaughter with rotting livers (necrotic
enteritis),
“wing rot,” pus-filled lungs, and ammonia-burned skin. Rotting intestines
and
ulcerated flesh are removed at the slaughterhouse. Corpses are drenched in
chlorinated water to conceal flesh sold falsely to consumers as “healthy.”5

Former Tyson chicken slaughterhouse worker Virgil Butler and his partner,
Laura
Alexander, described their switch to an animal-free diet: “We just couldn’t
look
at a piece of meat anymore without seeing the sad, tortured face that was
attached to it sometime in the past.”6

*”Free-Range,” “Cage-Free,” “Humane Farming”*

These terms sound reassuring, but the reality behind the scenes is
different. As
soon as they are born, most hens used for “cage-free” eggs are painfully
debeaked, and all male chicks are destroyed at the hatchery since they
don’t lay
eggs. “Free-range” turkeys are violently “milked” and inseminated by hand,
newborn calves and piglets are torn from their mothers, and baby chicks,
turkeys
and ducks are denied the comfort of their mother’s wings.

All animals raised for food – “free-range” included – are slaughtered,
trashed,
or trucked to live animal markets and rendering companies when their
moneymaking
life is over. Farmers do not keep “useless” animals. The idea that billions
of
humans can have billions of “humanely-raised” animals is untrue.

*What About Fish?*

Fish are intelligent beings with feelings. When pulled from the water, they
suffocate in panic and pain, the same as humans and other land animals do
when
drowning. Being hooked in the mouth or caught in a net is torture for fish
that
are increasingly raised in huge aquatic factory farms as a result of human
overpopulation, overconsumption and ocean water pollution. They’re
subjected to
genetic engineering, drugs and diseases the same as their terrestrial
counterparts. *The Guardian* reports that “the oceans are massively
overfished,
with more than half now being industrially fished.”7

*Foodborne Diseases*

The U.S. Department of Agriculture reports that the major foodborne
pathogens –
viruses, bacteria, parasites, and fungi – occur mainly in “meat, poultry,
seafood, dairy products and eggs.” 8 Foodborne bacteria such as E. coli,
Salmonella, Campylobacter, and Listeria can migrate from people’s
intestines to
other body parts – blood, bones, nerves, organs, and joints – to cause
chronic
illnesses later in life, such as arthritis. Salmonella and E. coli
contamination
of plants such as spinach, tomatoes and melons comes from animal farming
operations. Fruits and vegetables do not generate this contamination.

*Antibiotics*

Farmed animals are fed massive amounts of antibiotics. Antibiotic-resistant
bacteria remain in slaughtered animals even on the dinner plate.
Urinary-tract
infections (UTIs) caused by E. coli affect millions of women. These
infections
correlate particularly with eating chicken. To reduce the risk, women are
encouraged to eat the plant-based chicken products available in stores and
fast-food franchises. These products taste just as good and do not present a
risk of UTIs.9

*The Good News*

When all is said and done, a plant-powered diet produces a legitimate
feeling of
wellbeing in people. In “The Evidence for a Vegan Diet,” James McWilliams,
associate professor of history at Texas State University, writes: “For me,
the
most persuasive evidence supporting a healthy vegan diet is the everyday
reality
that a dozen or so people with whom I eat have done extraordinary things as
a
direct result of intelligent veganism. They’ve conquered obesity, chronic
disease, depression, and a host of food-related disorders by exclusively
eating
an exciting diversity of plants. If there’s one lesson I’ve learned, it is
this:
the diet empowers.”10

*Notes*

1. Monica Watrous, “Plant-based foods go mainstream in 2019
<https://www.meatpoultry.com/articles/22399-plant-based-foods-go-mainstream>
,”
*Meat + Poultry*, December 27, 2019.

2. Farhad Manjoo, “Stop Mocking Vegans
<https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/28/opinion/vegan-food.html>,” *The New
York Times*, August 28, 2019.

3. Chris Hedges, “Saving the Planet, One Meal at a Time
<https://www.truthdig.com/articles/saving-the-planet-one-meal-at-a-time/>,”
*Truthdig*, November 10, 2014.

4. Robert Martin, executive director of the Pew Commission on Industrial
Farm
Animal Production interviewed in *E Magazine*, July-August 2008.

5. Karen Davis, “Chickens: Their Life and Death in Farming Operations
<http://advocacy.britannica.com/blog/advocacy/2018/10/chickens-their-life-and-death-in-farming-operations/>
,”
*Encyclopedia Britannica*, October 1, 2018.

6. Virgil Butler & Laura Alexander interviewed in “Slaughterhouse Worker
Turned <http://www.upc-online.org/fall04/virgil.htm>
Activist <http://www.upc-online.org/fall04/virgil.htm>,” *Poultry Press*,
Fall 2004.

7. Damian Carrington, “Avoiding meat and dairy is ‘single biggest way’ to
reduce
<https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding-meat-and-dairy-is-single-biggest-way-to-reduce-your-impact-on-earth>
your impact on Earth
<https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding-meat-and-dairy-is-single-biggest-way-to-reduce-your-impact-on-earth>,”
*The Guardian*, October 30, 2018.

8. Buzby & Roberts, *FoodReview*, U.S. Department of Agriculture-Economic
Research
Service, May-August 1995.

9. Martha Rosenberg, “Are Your Frequent UTIs From the Food You’re Eating?
<https://www.theepochtimes.com/are-your-frequent-utis-from-the-food-youre-eating_3019245.html>
”
*The Epoch Times*, July 27, 2019.

10. James McWilliams, “The Evidence for a Vegan Diet
<https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/01/the-evidence-for-a-vegan-diet/251498/>
,”
*The Atlantic*, January 18, 2012.

Order printed copies of:
*Life Can Be Beautiful – Go Vegan*
*UPC Merchandise* <https://www.upc-online.org/merchandise>

KAREN DAVIS, PhD <http://www.upc-online.org/karenbio.htm> is the President
and Founder of United Poultry Concerns, a
nonprofit organization that promotes the compassionate and respectful
treatment
of domestic fowl including a sanctuary for chickens in Virginia. Inducted
into
the National Animal Rights Hall of Fame for Outstanding Contributions to
Animal
Liberation, Karen is the author of numerous books, essays, articles and
campaigns. Her latest book is *For the Birds: From Exploitation to
Liberation:*
*Essays on Chickens, Turkeys, and Other Domesticated Fowl* (Lantern Books,
2019).

—
United Poultry Concerns is a nonprofit organization that promotes
the compassionate and respectful treatment of domestic fowl.
Don’t just switch from beef to chicken. Go Vegan.
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