When Animal Agriculture Sweats: Oregon, Bird Flu & Joyful Chickens | Rising Anxieties

Uh, don't forget, we're a podcast and we're on YouTube. Please subscribe and hit like wherever, uh, you can, wherever you can find. It's what we're supposed to do. Alright, let's see where we are.

Our first article is from Meating Place and it's by one of our favorite commentators, Hannah Thompson-Weeman, who is the president of the Animal Agricultural Alliance, and, uh, Eyes on Oregon.

She's, she, her anxieties are actually rising. Eyes on Oregon: measure criminalizing animal agriculture could make November ballot. You may think that she is exaggerating, she is not. It's really true. Uh, we actually had David Michelson from, uh, the Oregon Ballot Initiative, uh, on The Animal Law Podcast, uh, episode 76, which was a while ago, but they've tried this a couple of times.

They're collecting signatures once again. He said at the time that this was not gonna be a one act deal, like it was gonna take time. And, um, so it's this ballot initiative and, uh, it's called, they, they call it the, the new name for it is People for the Elimination of Animal Cruelty Exemptions. I like it, and, and the acronym comes out, peace. PEACE. The Peace Act. Really nice. Really nice. Who thought of that one?

Um, and she says it stands out as one of the most far reaching proposals the animal agriculture community has seen in recent years. Uh, yeah. No shit. Um, it is framed by proponents, she says, um, in order to strengthen animal abuse laws and, um, to quote, end animal cruelty. In practice, she says, it would criminalize animal agriculture and act activities such as hunting, fishing, and trapping and pest control because they involve killing animals.

And like, I think those are kind of the same thing. It is claimed that it would end animal cruelty. And she thinks that's like the the nice way of saying it like that they're hiding the real goal. But for her, in her mind, the real goal would be to, to criminalize animal agriculture and hunting, fishing, trapping, and pest control.

Yeah, those are the same thing. Uh, alright, so what, you can re listen to the episode. I don't think that the, the ballot initiative has substantively changed since they first introduced it a few years ago. Um, but uh, it basically removes the exemptions for all of these activities from the cruelty law. And they need exemptions because they're cruel and that's why you have to eliminate them.

And it would mean that you can't kill animals for food in Oregon, which is like, you know. I just love it. I really do. Uh, you know, if nothing else is gonna make people think, is it gonna pass? Who knows these days? Seriously, who knows? It's not on the ballot yet. They're, they're, um, gathering the signatures. They have to, um, as of March 30th, she said, uh.

They've got more than 105,000, they need 117,173. And they have to be valid. And in order to get all those valid signatures, you have to collect more signatures 'cause some signatures are gonna get thrown out. That's just inevitable. Uh, so they haven't until July 2nd. So, you know, sounds possible to me, and people in Oregon will be able to vote on whether they want, uh, exceptions to cruelty for the animals of Oregon.

It's, it won't ban eating meat. They can import whatever they want. It doesn't have anything to do with that. Um, but, you know, you can't, you can't do it in or... you can't create meat in Oregon. Um, it's not, I mean, as she points out, it's not limited to agriculture. Uh, the, the, you know, the other things are more obvious hunting, fishing, pest control.

I forget if we talked about pest control, but you know, there's probably, uh, uh, I wonder how they handle that. I'm sure there is a way they handle it, but I admit, I don't know off the top of my head. Um, she says that Oregon citizens would be forced to adopt a vegan lifestyle. What we would contend is the true intention of the proponents, or would become increasingly dependent on out-of-state or imported animal protein. Like that's kind of a big exception.

I mean, I would love it. It is my true intention and I am, well, I'm, I'm a supporter. I can't say I'm a proponent 'cause I haven't done any of the work, but, uh, but, but, uh, yeah, you can still get your meat from other states, but you know, it might make people think. That's the whole point of these things is that they might make people think, you know, if we could only get people to think.

I know that's a hard, a hard lift in a lot of different ways, but I, I think it's the coolest thing ever. I really hope they get the signatures. Like, it's just confronting people with what really happens. Yeah. Should we make exceptions to a law that prevents cruelty to animals in order so that you can eat a hamburger?

Um, so I just wanna reiterate because she does go on about it a bit that, um, that she's right. This is, uh, this is the ultimate goal. Well, I won't speak for the proponents 'cause I don't know, but my ultimate goal is that everybody should go vegan. And she acts as if the, all of these people, they act as if this is a sneaky way of making that happen.

You can't like, have a sneaky, I mean, people have to vote for it. And if it, if it was gonna make people go vegan they, unless they wanted to go vegan, they wouldn't vote for it. It's not, they always act as if we can sneak these things in. And one of the reasons is they just want, they want no regulations.

So they claim that every single regulation is this sneaky way of like eliminating me. Oh, you know, you know this, but, uh, it can be, it can be very, um, frustrating. Uh, she's, she's a little exercised about it. She says, The stakes are not limited to one state or one ballot. How this conversation unfolds will help help shape how animal agriculture is understood, valued, and governed moving forward.

Yeah, I'm with her. Well, I'm not with her, but you know what I mean. Uh, it so often is the truth that, that, you know, we see things sort of the same way as the animal agriculture industry, even though we take the opposite position on it. We see the stakes as sort of the same. Whereas everybody in the middle is like, just like, oh-de-doh-doh-doh. Oh, I have Hamburg. Oh I'll rescue dog.

Um, alright, sorry. Uh, egg industry invests $1 million to expand school breakfasts nationally. Yeah. This is the kind of thing that we should all be aware of and all be fighting, especially if you have school kids. Of course I don't have school kids, so, you know, I'm putting the onus on other people, but it, it is true.

Uh, 'cause, I mean, between RFK Junior and Brooke Rollins, who's the, um, Secretary of Agriculture, they're just gonna like, no matter how disastrous the egg industry continues to be because of bird flu and all the other problems, it's not like there were no problems before bird flu. They just, it's eggs, eggs, eggs.

And, you know, the, the farmers are all on board because they just get paid with our tax money when anything goes wrong and loads of things go wrong. Alright. So they recently had this meeting and the, um, the American Egg Board, on behalf of America's Egg Farmers, announced a $1 million investment in innovation research and partnerships that expand access to egg-based breakfast options in schools nationwide.

You know, uh, a million dollars. Do you, do you know how much money they'll make back for that, that investment of a million dollars? Uh, we wanna support our children in having a protein packed breakfast... protein, protein, protein... that fuels them all day and promotes their brain development. Eggs are the solution and we are putting our money where our mission is.

Uh, yeah, you know, uh, this really convinces me more than ever like the, the greatest, the, the greatest argument we've got at the moment is, is fiber. 'Cause, 'cause people are starting to catch on that you need both protein and fiber and you don't get that from eggs, you don't get any fiber, but they think they're just great.

Um, so Brooke Rollins, uh, you know, who's just one more disaster out of this administration says, Eggs are as real as food gets. Like, what the hell does that mean? Farm Fresh. Has she been in a battery cage facility? Completely natural. Minimally processed. Well, you know, in case you count the fact that the, it's grain that's processed through the body of a chicken to turn into a very unhealthy food. And a source of eight essential nutrients.

Uh, you know... all right. I'm sorry. Um, the $1 million investment will fund a comprehensive effort to make eggs more accessible, convenient and affordable for school meal programs across the country. You know, if they're talking about not powdered eggs, but real eggs, and I don't know which they're talking about, like, eggs are an expensive food to handle.

They need to be refrigerated. They need to be handled carefully. Like they're gonna, using foods like that just increase the costs of, of school lunch programs for and for nothing.

All right. Um, animal activists won't stop at fur bans. This is from Rona Johnson at the Fence Post. If you are a hunter or fisherman... I guess there are no fisher ladies... You may feel like people are coming for you. They are.

This is Colorado. Colorado. Um, the wildlife commissioners there just voted to move forward a petition that would ban the commercial sale of wildlife fur. Even though this was tried before and failed, animal activists are not giving up. Yeah, we don't give up. That is true. We don't give up. Uh, and this is exactly the, what I was just talking about before, how they can't let you have anything because they wanna get their whole industry on board. And like they can't have one single product, one single regulation because they think that it's gonna bring the whole house falling down on them.

And I kind of think it's true every time, even though it sounds ridiculous, and even though obviously people aren't gonna get on board until they're ready to get on board. These kind of things help people start to see. They start, they start out seeing an individual use of animals and for some people... and that's what happened to almost everybody listening to this podcast, I think. For some people it gets broader and I think that's possible for everybody. And she does too.

Once animal activists get a foot in the door, which they have already accomplished with the wolf re-introduction, they will continue to erode the rights of hunters and anglers. From there, they will come for the food we eat.

So if you like eating steak, shrimp, eggs, and other animal-based food, you'll be out of luck. All this is, this is fur. This is a regulation about fur. So, uh, I rest my case. They just like to put it all together.

Um. Alright. Some of the groups behind this legislation and have donated to the cause include PETA, World Animal Protection, and Friends of DXE. Friends of DXE, what the hell is that? Um, or Direct Action Everywhere. Is, is that a, a label for people who donate? I don't know. Um, you can bet these bad actors are behind the potential fur ban in Colorado. Make no doubt about it, animal activists will not long be satisfied with a fur ban. It is just a gateway to their ultimate aim, which is to abolish any activity involving the killing and consuming of animals.

Like, yeah, couldn't have said it better myself. It also is not very, I mean, it's not very appealing. Killing and consuming of animals does sound kind of ugly. Uh, and then she notes, I, I, I just think this is interesting, she recently wrote about PETA's recent paper, which. Criti criticizing very vigorously cage-free production, which, you know, cage-free production is very, uh, controversial in our movement.

And some people think it's not an improvement over battery cages or it's so bad that, that it's kind of six of one and a half a dozen of the other. Other people think it's a step forward. Um, and she thought the whole thing was hilarious. 'cause, you know, animal abuse is the kind of thing these people think is hilarious.

All of these egg producers thought if they didn't cage their laying hands, the animal rights people would leave them alone. Not a chance. Well, yeah, I mean, they're called animal rights people. Did they really think...? i mean, they're looking for the place where they can draw a line that the general public won't get on board, but they gotta know there's no line they can draw where animal rights activists aren't gonna criticize them. Like, that's just not like, are they stupid? Yeah they are.

Um, in this latest letter, uh, so she got a letter from PETA thanking her. I don't know whether it was sarcastic or they just didn't realize that, you know, she was being sarcastic.

Um, but so in their latest letter, they also included some helpful information that she could use to avoid eating eggs, which is, you know. Really, really great list of, uh, of eggless egg salad, and, uh, Just Eggs and Hellmans mayo like. And, uh, so her conclusion about all of this very useful information, which she did not find useful, is, This folks, is their end game.

Absolutely right. Like, unfortunately, as I just said, like, like it's not the animal activists that they have to convince. They're not gonna convince the animal activists. They have to convince the general public and the, so far, the general public is all too eager to be convinced, but they're scared nevertheless.

Even though the general public does not get on board with any of this, they know the real story. They know how vulnerable they are. They know if people find out, uh, things are gonna change the general public.

Uh, now is the time to vaccinate US dairy cattle against bird flu. Uh, bird flu. Bird flu, I would say bird flu is back, but it never really went anywhere. I mean, it's still killing enormous number of chickens. They've just learned to manage it and learned to compensate the industry adequately with our tax money so that, you know, they don't care that much. Uh, but there this article, which was an AG Daily.

Uh, it's talking about the, the cow connection. And, you know, last year and, you know, several articles made the point that cows got it, you know, more than they thought would get it, but not all cows, at least as far as they know. And most of them, they just got sick and then they got better. So, you know, no biggie.

Well, according to this article, uh, yeah, biggie. This is a big deal. Um, it's no longer just a poultry problem in Asia. And it points out that, uh, in Asia they're really, really worried about, about dairy cattle, where it's spreading a lot. And, um, it's raising new concerns about food security, the economy, the health of farm workers, and the potential for future human outbreaks.

And this writer, which is not an individual writer, it's by Ag Daily reporters. Um, they take the position that vaccinating dairy cattle is the way to go. Vaccinating is very controversial, as you probably know. Um, and there are, there are a lot of issues. I don't know what specifically what the issues are regarding dairy cattle, whether it's as controversial for export reasons, but, um, I know it's, it's in general controversial. But uh, this guy, Gregory Gray, that's hard to say, who's a professor at the University of Texas, um, says this virus has changed and now seems to have become entrenched or enzootic in North American Wildlife.

And, uh, the article goes on to say that viruses like this evolve. You know, we all know that viruses evolve. The more they spread and the more species they infect, the more opportunities they have to change. Dairy cattle may now be acting as what researchers describe as a kind of training ground for the virus to adapt to mammals, including humans.

So they're just creating this, um, this petri dish where they can, uh, eat this huge, huge nationwide petri dish where the virus can just try to kill us all, try to evolve to a place where it can kill us all. Um, and the article points out that human cases so far have, there haven't been a lot of them, they haven't been serious, most of them.

Um, but you know, you give the virus enough chances to, um, to get it right and it will, it will. Yeah. Unfortunately it, it's really annoying that we can get it too, uh, but we can.

Alright, that's one for everybody's anxieties. Um, this one is insane. I like, I don't even know what to make of this article. This is from Watt Ag Net, which is poultry site. Study, human handling triggers joy in chicks. Uh, this is by Elizabeth Doman. Some research at the University of Bristol, the vet school, found that slow, calm, stroking, and soft speech don't merely reduce stress and fear responses in chicks, they actively trigger positive emotional states. And she thinks it's a finding that could reshape thinking about poultry welfare. Really, Elizabeth? And how are we going to do that?

First of all, joy. I think it was last week, I was saying that it might take some time before, or it might never happen, that people will acknowledge that, uh, that birds such as chickens, unlike mammals, can experience happiness. 'Cause I was talking about, you know, uh, the pursuit of happiness as a, as a theory for animal rights.

Apparently Elizabeth's on board, she thinks that chicks can experience joy. Um, all right. So gentle human contact can trigger positive emotions and, um, and they have the shape, a potential to shape the human animal relationship from fear inducing to positive. Now, we're going to do this in every broiler house, in every battery cage facility and, and every, um, cage free facility?

Is somebody gonna go around and pet the chicks? What, what are they talking about? It's, and they, she describes the test they use, which, you know, I mean, it made sense, like there was one chamber in which the chicks experienced this contact and one in which they experienced no contact, and they preferred to keep going into the one where they had, where they had experienced joy.

Um, after these sessions, the chicks consistently chose to spend more time in the chamber linked to gentle handling. And it's not like it was gentle handling as opposed to brutality. It was gentle handling as opposed to none. And she says, this study obviously has several welfare implications. Yeah, well, what are they, Elizabeth? Like, what are you gonna do about this?

So, first, I just wanna say that I love the positivity this brings. How cool is it that we can now go to consumers... this is unbelievable... and tell them another of the many ways we work to make animals lives better? Well, what are you going to do that was going to make these chicks joyful? I can't figure it out.

And I kept reading and she, she actually never got to that part. Um, she says, it shows the potential value of gentle handling and, uh, and this study is a good reminder that the best technologies and innovations will augment that oh so necessary human touch. So, like I said, they're gonna go around the broiler house and pet all the chickens?

I... I.... I'm these... I dunno what to say. I really don't. All right. My last, my last one is just kind, it's not really a rising anxieties, it's just kind of, I mean, funny in a gruesome way, of course, it's, there's always something gruesome, but, but it is kind of funny. It's just about, um, this is from Watt Poultry and, um.

And there was a social media video that the charming, um, USDA is putting out. They're trying to promote products of USA and, uh, promote them, not require them or anything, so they think it's legal. Um, and for some reason, even though they're talking about, uh, meat, poultry, and egg products that were born, raised, harvested, and processed... harvested. You know how they can't say slaughtered? It's unbelievable. They can't say slaughtered. That's like it, it's slaughter. That's what it is. That's what it's called. And I, I digress.

Um, alright, so the in, in spite of the fact that that's what they're doing, like, and it's supposed to be about these products, a lot of the video is apparently of rodeo. Uh, 'cause you know, that's what they like and I'm sure it's brutal. But he points out, this is by this guy, uh, Roy Graber, that in one of them, and that he has a still from the video and it says product of USA and it's some, uh, you know, asshole on top of a horse, like making him torture him some way. And on the front of the horse's face, there's a big sign that says Calgary.

Roy points out that Calgary is not in the United States, so this isn't a very good promotion for United States products. I thought it was pretty funny. I mean, as I said, in a sad, gruesome way, because that's all I got, you know? That's all I got in, in the, in the way of humor. Uh, so apparently Brooke, uh, and the USDA just think Calgary's now in the US. I, you know, I mean, it is the goal to make Canada the 51st state, so maybe they're thinking that already happened. Anyway, I am being sarcastic.

That's it for this week's Rising Anxieties. Thank you so much for being here. Don't forget to, forget to subscribe, like, and comment on your pod catcher on YouTube and tune into our other podcasts, The Hen Report, and the Our Hen House interview. The last week's interview with Rose Patterson, absolutely must see or hear, don't miss it. We'll see you soon.