Houellebecq: "Show me though, don't tell me."

I doubt you'll bother looking at these (of hundreds available - I just grabbed the first few) and I doubt that kindness is something that can be taught this way. If you, Col and others need to have the WHYS of compassion spelled out I'm not sure if or how that can be inspired at all, especially in this medium. Anyway, give it a try:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJ--faib7to&feature=channel

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dOauM9LNTc

Col's theory about ovulation:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bd_pCS9N5Vg&feature=channel

Women stopped menstruating because they were starved - like a female with anorexia will stop menstruating. Athletes with low body fat and high energy demands will sometimes stop menstruating too.

Chickens, on the other hand, have ample feed available and little opportunity to move enough to burn up energy.

Excellent article, George, we need more Humans to be 'human'.
On the question of morality, if I was going to emulate someone, I think I would choose someone I admired. I can't think of any reason to say, well chooks do it, so it must be alright...
What sort of idiot would copy a chook?
On the question of economics, eggs have no more intrinsic value than anything else. The law is there to create a level playing field between all people; including one would hope, business competitors.
In other words, battery hen production came into being to gain a competitive edge against more humane forms of production. If the practice was made illegal, competition would still exist, and I think even some battery producers would breathe a sigh of relief; inasmuch as they feel forced to do it, in order to be competitive.
It is interesting to note that many (if not all) hunter gatherer cultures had a great respect and empathy for their prey; adopting animals as totems, etc.
Is it possible city living, and plastic wrapped foods has cost (some of) us a certain 'humanity'?

Houellebecq, no question that you'll find plenty of inconsistency and unjustified moral superiority amongst "greenies and animal liberationists". but i think there's an element of cheap shot there.

first of all, you're lumping a lot of people, with hugely varying beliefs, into one big basket.

secondly, though of course you're right that the food chain is not humane, humans of course *are* humane. though we are part of nature, that does not negate the clear fact that we *do* in general feel concern for other humans, and at least some other animals. which species, and why, and how, that's obviously very far from clear.

thirdly, though inconsistency can be a sign of wooly thinking, it can also be a sign of grappling semi-successfully with real, difficult moral issues. moral sense develops. that can be true of an individual and of a society. to say "there's no moral issue here" makes it easy to be consistent, but probably only by being wrong.

fourthly, your quotes for the "show me, don't tell me" bit are made up, and your response is too harsh even if they weren't. yes, we shouldn't anthropomorphise, but it's a fine line between that and empathy.

fifthly, your talk about the relative endangerment of species, dolphins versus manatees etc, is really quite a different point to the ethical treatment of animals. (by the way i think you're wrong about the rat).

sixthly, for all that, i appreciate your posts. col rouge, you ain't.

Bushbasher seems to be selective in his responses and has, in replying to Houllebeqc in listed point form and added a derisory comment regarding myself. Yet he has completely failed to actually challenge anything which I said. Maybe he has been bashed with a bush too many times….
And get this there is only one Houllebeqc… one unique individual

And only one Col Rouge… another unique individual

But to bushbashers… wooly minded sentimentalists seem to be as common as chooks around here.

Pynchme.. the point I was making and you are confirming was initiated by nalood1 00 with the comment “. Because humans build concentration camps and practise genocide is not a justification for the needless abuse of innocent humans. Does one logic apply to humans and another logic apply to other sopecies?”

Which was nalood100 cheap shot attempt to sensationalise battery egg production by placing it on a par with concentration camps.

Thankyou for your observation to starving, which confirms the point I was making, that the processes of battery egg production are the antithesis of concentration camps.

Nalood100, please note you are being contradicted by someone on your own side of the debate.

Btw regarding your comment on exercise… go back and read my original post… given a choice chooks choose to sit near the food supply than run around the pasture…. A bit like many modern children

Come back and try again when you can scratch up some thing else I can so easily invalidate.

This topic has become surprisingly entertaining. Must be because Col is in the house.

pynchme,

How will I know that the chook snuff video links you put up are taken at the same location where my eggs come from? How will I know my hen is involved? I didn't watch them obviously, I assume that kinda stuff is grief porn for greenies? I generally make it a rule not to bother reading people's links. It encourages people like Fractelle to get a wet spot, and I wouldn't want you to get aroused by my recognising your googling skills like Fraccy does.

bushbasher,

'i appreciate your posts. col rouge, you ain't.'
It was no trouble. Oh I wish I was Col Rouge.

Col,

'given a choice chooks choose to sit near the food supply than run around the pasture'

COl you sound to me like a chook liberationist. I'm sure the communists would like to stifle the chook's free choice to sit and eat and get fat if it so wishes. You're a beacon of consistency.

All,

I think cornflower has nailed it...

' to raise them in optimal growing conditions, disease free, low stress and with a ready supply of excellent food and clean water.

This is the sort of environment the Left would wish on whole populations: housing and food for free, everything 'sorted' and controlled by big brother (big sister these days!) and you don't even have to see the kids, who are taken at an early age and raised by the State. Paradise for a Left-wing chicken I would have thought.'

Houellebecq, (Col and Co): You demanded to be shown rather than just told; I wondered why you didn't bother Googling it or whatever and suspected it was the 'head in the sand' strategy to remain happily ignorant.

As I guessed, you didn't have the courage of your convictions to watch the Utubes, but at least it's a fair bet that you have a conscience, otherwise you wouldn't feel compelled to hide from it.

Col if you knew anything about chickens you'd know that they like to wander and browse (chicks in tow sometimes - they show the chicks how to scratch, forage and take dust baths). They don't sit on their feed dish all day - but go about pecking grass and insects and the like. They don't sit in their own droppings, unless they have no way to escape that. The idea that they are kept or that eggs are produced hygienically would be hilarious if I didn't think you were serious. Look at the utubes - ordinary egg production.

Someone was going on about big brother or communism or something causing animal rights campaigners/ zealots. I see it as quite the other way. For one thing; not everyone that is pro-kindness is a zealot; vegan or vegetarian. I see those who pooh-pooh concerns about the egg industry as followers waiting for rationalist economics and $ justification to tell them what is right and wrong. Can't get much more unimaginative or unoriginal than that.

If we all created a demand for creatures to be farmed and dispatched as kindly as possible, there'd be an industry for it (like when my uncle used to farm) and we'd get better eggs anyway.

Btw: If you saw a youngster torturing a chook - doing something gross to it - would you approve? Would you stop it happening? Please explain why you would or wouldn't.