Oh god, I remember this. My mom sent it to her sister who was outraged — frothing at the mouth, practically — that someone could do something so cruel. It was hard to convince her that it was a fake, and then of course she said that such things should be banned.
I also know that she enjoys veal, so as usual, human hypocrisy WRT animal exploitation knows no bounds.
I dunno — torturing a sentient being to to death for your own amusement is fucked up no matter how you slice it. A calf is about as smart as a cat, has an emotional life, and cares about its family. Eating meat is not necessary for survival; we do it for convenience or entertainment.
The primary difference between a cat and calf in Western culture is that we view one as a pet, and the other as protein on legs. If you subjected a dog to what a veal calf goes through you’d be hauled into a police station.
That article does a great job of further explaining why the practice is cruel, by also showing how the ducks are left in an albeit not as typically cramped, but nonetheless dank, large shed.
The quote seems to make people think it could be ethical, because the prior treatment is slightly better than average?
One of my favorite (!?) FBI anecdotes is that one of the cartoonists who was syndicated in the original print version of The Onion, managed to have one of his characters make a joke about bombing the WTC get published the same week a bomb went off in the parking garage. Dumbest luck. He got to have a nice chat with some men in black about that one.
I totally understand why they would need to dot some i's and cross some t's on that one but the bonsai kitten thing is just inane.
I also know that she enjoys veal, so as usual, human hypocrisy WRT animal exploitation knows no bounds.