Shouldn't we act towards animal cruelty?

Rajashree Das

(The writer is from Gauhati University. She can be reached at ruchadas98@gmail.com)

The theory of naturalism says, "nature knows the best, the highest value is to respect the natural order of things. Human alteration of nature is bad, trying to improve nature will only bring destruction."

The prevailing situation complies with the theory that exploitation of nature is, in turn, the destruction of mankind itself.

We can take examples from the ongoing Covid-9 pandemic. The virus turned out to be man-made destruction that is disrupting the ecosystem as a whole. It's a message from the higher power that we should start to fear nature and rather save it for our own existence. Human destruction of biodiversity and the ecosystem has reached a level that is already threatening climate change on earth, and now human-made disasters are on the verge of wiping out the human way of life on earth.

From time to time it has been shown that naturalism precedes humanism as humanism has transcended all limits of exploitation of nature, but exploitation never ends. Nature knows best, the highest value is to respect the natural order of things, human change in nature is bad, trying to improve nature will only bring destruction.

We have seen people recently been stepping out to talk about the protection and conservation of wildlife, keeping in our companion animals and giving them a safe home. However, we find the least being talked about the farm animals basically which are only used for business purposes. They are regarded as consisting of no life and emotions by business persons.

Today, industrialized facilities are used in the rearing of livestock most dominantly.

These establishments are known as Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations or CAFOs (often referred to as "factory farms") that maximize profits by treating animals not as sentient creatures but as units of production. In such narrow spaces, they could hardly move, let alone behave normally. Four or more laying hens are packed in a battery cage, a wire pen so small that none of them can spread their wings. Hens pick each other's feathers and bodies. Can we imagine the same happening to our humankind?

Sows develop abnormal behaviours and suffer from limb problems and skin lesions, biting and injuring pen mates. In factory dairies, cows live in concretes all their lives. To boost production, some cows are injected with the expansion hormone rBGH, causing lameness and mastitis, a painful udder infection, to accommodate these animals in stressful, cramped, unsanitary and painful mutilated conditions such as udder isolation. Rearing cattle, isolating the beaks of chickens and cutting the tails of sheep, pigs and dairy cows are all routinely performed.

It doesn't have to be like this.

They deserve freedom from unnecessary pain and suffering and thus the possibility of exhibiting normal behaviours could be imagined.

Compliance with hygiene in farms and slaughterhouses promotes greater company credibility from time to time, which reduces the levels of contamination, also eases production costs and the loss of consumers can be prevented. So why not give the animals a much better-conditioned shelter?

Management and Welfare of Animals Raised for Direct Feed Intensive farms, housing tens of thousands of animals in confined spaces, serve as ideal breeding grounds for disease. Several important human health concerns are related to intensive farming, including increased transmission from infectious agents from animals to humans, antibiotic resistance, food-borne diseases and thus the development of new viruses such as H1N1 (swine flu) in pigs.

Antibiotic resistance, resulting from the use of antibiotics for market growth and disease suppression in prisons, is a significant health concern. The handling of animals and manure in prisons, animal transport conditions, and meat processing can also lead to food contamination and food-borne diseases such as E. coli and salmonella contribute. Association between living near high-density pig farms or manure-fertilized fields, also high-density pig farms can cause methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, commonly referred to as "MRSA".

The practices don't get a halt because, in spite of having animal welfare laws, the suffering doesn't stop because the fine and punishment degree is very negligible.

In spite of it, we can somehow set a model of change to such practices by speaking out on these issues, social media can act as a form of revolution as it has been a tool of bringing change in the past with enough examples, talking about it can somehow lead to amendment of strict punishment by law if such inhumane farm practices are observed by anyone and being produced with proofs. This is how we can stand for our other living beings, our other families of the ecosystem!