Live Meat

 

   Annually in the U.S., more than 41 million cows are subjected    to a painfully horrific journey before they are slaughtered to    meet the demands of the meat and dairy industries. (Cattle    Facts).

 

   The Cattle Range 

   Cows live the first year of what would be a natural lifespan of    25 years on a cattle range. Without receiving pain killers,    the cows are branded with hot irons that leave third degree    burns and lesions on their skin. If the animal is male, it is    castrated and his horns are cut or burned off.

   Feedlots 

 When the cows are old enough, they are sent to live on  feedlots where they are given food with hormones,  antibiotics, and excessive amounts of carbohydrates and  proteins that will fatten them up before they are  slaughtered or sent to dairy farms.

 

   Dairy Farms 

   At the dairy farms, a female cow will be repeatedly    impregnated by artificial insemination in order to keep    her milk flow constant. The offspring is immediately    separated from its mother. Without the mother's    nutrition, the calf grows weak, cannot walk and often    dies. Males are sent to the slaughter house to become    veal and some of the females are cared for and later    become dairy cows like their mothers. After only four or    five years (Factory Farm), a dairy cow's body can no    longer produce milk. It is then sent to be killed and    turned into soup, companion animal food or low-grade    hamburger meat because their bodies are too "spent" to be used for anything else.

   Transport 

 The trip to the slaughter house itself is life threatening.  The cows are stuffed into cargo trucks where they barely  have enough room to move and are not given any food for  the entire journey; which could sometimes take days. In  hot weather, many cows collapse and are trampled by the  others. In the cold, the cows on the edges become frozen  to the sides of the truck and are later torn off by workers.

   The Slaughter House 

   Once off the truck, cows are forced into a single file and shot between the eyes with    a steel bolt gun that sends compressed air or a blank cartridge directly into the brain.    If done correctly, it will stun and render them unresponsive to pain. Unfortunately,    poorly trained workers often miss or miscalculate, leaving the cow to feel extreme    pain. The cows are then strapped and lifted by chains attached to an overhead trolley.    At the first station, one worker will slice into the throat with    a long knife in order to cut the aorta and bleed the animal.    Since this creates a bloody mess, the next few stations are    designated to clean and later skin the carcass.

   One of these stations is designed to clean off the caked on    droppings the animals obtained from having spent the    majority of their lives lying in their own manure. Many steps    are taken to make sure that the manure doesn't infect the    meat. The next stations are difficult to bear, especially if you    consider that some cows are still conscious. Names such as    the "belly ripper" send a shiver down the spine. This stage is    a slice through the stomachs. The "tail ripper" then pulls the    tail off so violently that it slashes open their rectums. After    all of this, whatever is left of what was once a cow, can still    be alive when the "first legger" removes their hind legs and    severs their feet. These steps are considered standard    operating procedure in the meat industry.