Archives for the month of: November, 2013

Some quotations on the climate crisis

November 15, 2013 //

This is a short post to present my recent slideshow of quotations from some prominent politicians and scientists on climate change. The slideshow is a work in progress, and will be extended over time. (To hold it steady, simply click the pause button, and use arrows to navigate.)

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The slideshow can also be downloaded here, from where it is best viewed by using the navigation arrows, rather than scrolling.

From the tragedy of recent events such as Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines may rise the demand of the masses that finally convinces politicians to treat climate change as the crisis that it is, implementing an effective state of emergency.

In referring to a state of emergency, I have in mind the type of scenario referred to in an interview from from 17th April 2009 on Beyond Zero Radio (3CR Melbourne) with Janet Larsen, Director of Research at the Earth Policy Institute in the USA. The interviewer was Scott Bilby. They were discussing the book “Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to save civilization“. Here’s an extract:

Scott: “That war-footing that’s been spoken about by a few people, and can you just basically tell our audiences about the kind of World War 2 analogy?”

Janet: “Well, certainly. Sometimes social change happens rather gradually, and other times it happens immediately. You go to bed one night and you wake up, and you’re in a new world and it’s that latter case that is what happened in the United States back in 1941, December 7th, when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbour. Before that point, most Americans were rather reluctant to get involved in a massive war being fought on the far sides of two distant oceans. They didn’t feel affected, and there was very little public support to get involved.”

“After Pearl Harbour was bombed, one month later, President Roosevelt could stand before the country giving his State of the Union address and in that address he announced this incredibly ambitious arms production goals. He said we’re going to produce 45,000 tanks, 60,000 planes, 20,000 anti-aircraft guns and 6 million tons of merchant shipping.”

“These are enormous numbers and after that he called in the leaders of the American auto manufacturing companies and he said,”

‘We’re going to need all your capacity to help us achieve these goals’,

“and apparently the leaders of these companies hem’d and hahhed and said,”

‘Well you know, Mr President, we will do our best. That will be difficult, but you know, we are making these cars, but we’re going to try’.

“And his reply was along the lines of,”

‘You don’t understand. We’re not going to be producing any cars. We’re going to be devoting all of our resources to this war effort.’

“And indeed between early 1942 and 1944, there were essentially no cars produced in this country, but instead they were churning out planes and tanks, and toy factories started manufacturing compasses, and spark plug factories were churning out machine guns. Those that made corsets were then making grenade belts.”

“So, we, in just a matter of months, we completely restructured the US economy. And this is the kind of massive and rapid scale restructuring that we’re saying we need to confront the challenges we’re facing today. Mainly, this is what we need to do to stop climate change from spinning out of control.”

Adopting this sort of mindset in relation to climate change may be our only hope, provided it’s not too late.

Blog Author: Paul Mahony (also on on Twitter, Slideshare and Sribd)

Image: The Earth © Pmakin | Dreamstime.com

Tags climate, climate change, environment, sustainability

Categories Climate Change

Relax, have a cigarette and forget about climate change

November 9, 2013 //

This article first appeared on the Viva la Vegan website on 7th August, 2012.

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It’s not surprising that many people are uncertain about the dangers of climate change. Much confusion has been created by groups with vested interests, who have successfully utilised sophisticated PR (public relations) techniques to influence public perceptions and opinion.

In this article, I consider the link between tobacco industry PR and that of the fossil fuel sector. The story is largely one of relationships between: individuals; their areas of expertise; and industries.

Edward Bernays was a nephew of “the father of psychoanalysis”, Sigmund Freud. Bernays himself is widely regarded as being “the father of PR”. Here’s an extract on Edward Bernays from the documentary “The Century of Self” [1]:

“Bernays was the first person to take Freud’s ideas about human beings and use them to manipulate the masses. He showed American corporations for the first time how they could make people want things they didn’t need by linking mass produced goods to their unconscious desires. Out of this would come a new political idea of how to control the masses. By satisfying people’s inner selfish desires, one made them happy and thus docile. It was the start of the all-consuming self which has come to dominate our world today. “

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Let’s look at some history of PR within the tobacco industry.

1929: TOBACCO INDUSTRY PR ENDS THE TABOO ON WOMEN SMOKING

Here’s an extract from an article on the website of the American Psychological Association [2]:

“Manipulating behaviors: Intrigued by Freud’s notion that irrational forces drive human behavior, Bernays sought to harness those forces to sell products for his clients. In his 1928 book, ‘Propaganda’, Bernays hypothesized that by understanding the group mind, it would be possible to manipulate people’s behavior without their even realizing it. To test this hypothesis, Bernays launched one of his most famous public relations campaigns: convincing women to smoke.”

Here’s another extract from “The Century of Self” [1]:

“Every year New York held an Easter day parade to which thousands came. Bernays decided to stage an event there . He persuaded a group of rich debutants to hide cigarettes under their clothes. Then they should join the parade and at a given signal from him they were to light up the cigarettes dramatically. Bernays then informed the press that he had heard that a group of suffragettes were preparing to protest by lighting up what they called ‘torches of freedom’.

Pat Jackson, Public Relations Adviser and Colleague of Bernays: He knew this would be an outcry, and he knew that all of the photographers would be there to capture this moment so he was ready with a phrase which was ‘torches of freedom’. So here you have a symbol, women, young women, debutantes, smoking a cigarette in public with a phrase that means anybody who believes in this kind of equality pretty much has to support them in the ensuing debate about this, because I mean torches of freedom. What’s our American point, it’s liberty, she’s holding up the torch, you see and so all this there together, there’s emotion there’s memory and there’s a rational phrase, all of this is in there together. So the next day this was not just in all the New York papers, it was across the United States and around the world. And from that point forward the sale of cigarettes to woman began to rise. He had made them socially acceptable with a single symbolic ad.”

So, in 1929, the PR industry likened smoking by women to liberty and freedom. Decades of smoking by women since then have caused untold pain and suffering. It seems that the tobacco and PR industries were influencing people to act in ways prejudicial to those people’s own interests.

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1969: MEMO OUTLINING THE BASIS OF PR WITHIN THE TOBACCO INDUSTRY

A famous memo between tobacco industry executives in 1969 stated: “Doubt is our product since it is the best means of competing with the ‘body of fact’ that exists in the mind of the general public. It is also the means of establishing a controversy.” [3]

Naomi Oreskes is Professor of History and Science Studies at the University of California and co-author (with Erik Conway) of “Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming” [4]. Speaking at the University of New South Wales in 2010, she stated:

“Now this is an incredibly important memo. It’s been reproduced by many scholars in many different contexts, and it was a crucial piece of evidence in the US federal prosecution of the tobacco industry, because it showed that the tobacco industry deliberately worked together, conspired. The tobacco industry was found guilty of conspiracy under the Racketeering and Corrupt Organisations Act, because of documents like this that showed that the tobacco industry consciously set out to challenge the scientific evidence by manufacturing doubt.”

Professor Oreskes went on to say: “But one of the key insights the tobacco industry realised early on was that for this doubt-mongering campaign to be credible, for it to be effective for journalists who’d quote them, it wouldn’t do for tobacco industry executives to get up and say, we don’t really know if tobacco is harmful. . . . But if the tobacco industry could get scientists to say it, and particularly if they could get distinguished scientists, prestigious scientists, a president of the US National Academy of Sciences to say it, well that would have a lot of credibility. In particular, the documents show that the tobacco industry understood that it would have credibility with the media . . . So a key component of this strategy was the recruitment of scientists, was finding scientists who would be willing to participate in this activity.”

1993: CONTINUING THE TOBACCO INDUSTRY’S PR STRATEGY

In his ground-breaking book on climate change, “Heat: How to stop the planet burning”, Guardian columnist George Monbiot reported on the tactics of tobacco company, Philip Morris. Following the December, 1992 release of the U.S. Environment Protection Agency’s report on the adverse health effects of passive smoking, an internal memo between executives of the company in 1993 stated:

“Our overriding objective is to discredit the EPA report . . . Concurrently, it is our objective to prevent states and cities . . . from passive smoking bans.” [5]

For this purpose, the company hired a PR firm, APCO, to develop an appropriate strategy. The firm established a “fake citizens group”, The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition (TASSC).

Tobacco industry communications stated that it was important ‘to ensure that TASSC has a diverse group of contributors’; to ‘link the tobacco issue with other more ‘politically correct’ products’; and to associate scientific studies that cast smoking in a bad light with ‘broader questions about government research and regulations’ – such as ‘global warming’, ‘nuclear waste disposal’ and ‘biotechnology’. APCO would engage in the ‘intensive recruitment of high-profile representatives from business and industry, scientists, public officials, and other individuals interested in promoting the use of sound science’”. [6]

Monbiot reported that, “TASSC did as its founders . . . suggested, and sought funding from other sources.” Those sources included the fossil fuel sector. He says, “The website it has financed – JunkScience.com – has been the main entrepot for almost every kind of climate-change denial that has found its way into the mainstream press. It equates environmentalists with Nazis, communists and terrorists. It flings at us the accusations that could justifiably be levelled against itself: the website claims, for example, that it is campaigning against ‘faulty scientific data and analysis used to advance special and, often, hidden agendas’. I have lost count of the number of correspondents who, while questioning manmade global warming, have pointed me there.”

He also stated that the tobacco and fossil fuel lobbies “use the same terms, which appear to have been invented by Philip Morris’s consultants. ‘Junk science’ meant peer-reviewed studies showing that smoking was linked to cancer and other diseases. ‘Sound science’ meant studies sponsored by the tobacco industry suggesting that the link was inconclusive.”

CONTRIBUTIONS OF PROMINENT DENIALIST, FRED SINGER

Professor S. Fred Singer is described by Naomi Oreskes as, “the bête noire of many climate scientists, who continues today to attack climate science”. He is a former director of the U.S. National Weather Satellite Service. According to Professor Oreskes:

“He often claims to be a climate scientist because of this connection to the weather service, but he was the director of the weather service not in his capacity as a climate scientist, which he was not, but as a rocket scientist who knew how to get those satellites up into space.” [3]

She says, “In the 1980s, Singer worked with the Reagan administration to cast doubt on the significance and severity of acid rain, arguing that controlling sulphur emissions was a billion dollar solution to a million dollar problem, so implying that environmentalists had exaggerated the significance of acid rain, and it wouldn’t be significant enough to justify what it would cost to fix. So this is an argument we hear again today regarding global warming.”

In challenging (with lawyer Kent Jeffreys) the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over the dangers of passive smoking, he wrote in 1993, “If we do not carefully delineate the government’s role in regulating dangers, there is essentially no limit to how much government can ultimately control our lives.” [6]

He was challenging the EPA’s conclusions: that tobacco was a proven carcinogen; that second-hand smoke was responsible for 3,000 additional adult cancer deaths each year in the United States alone; that second-hand smoke was responsible for as many as 300,000 additional cases of bronchitis and pneumonia in infants and young children; and that second-hand smoke was correlated with an increase in Sudden Infant Death Syndrome or cot death.

It appears that Singer was following and promoting an anti-regulation ideology. That view is supported by the background of various organisations linked to the work of himself and/or Jeffreys. They include (with descriptions from Naomi Oreskes):

Alexis de Tocqueville Institute: Published the report of Singer and Jeffreys. It is a think tank whose goal is “the extension and perfection of democracy and economic liberty and political freedom”.

Cato Institute: A think tank to whom Kent Jeffreys was affiliated. It is “dedicated to individual liberty, limited government and free markets”.

Competitive Enterprise Institute: Another think tank to whom Kent Jeffreys was affiliated. It is dedicated to “expanding liberty, increasing individual opportunity and strengthening free markets”.

Professor Singer is also on the “global warming experts” list of The Heartland Institute. [7]

Here are some comments on the Heartland Institute from an editorial in the journal “Nature”:

“Despite criticizing climate scientists for being overconfident about their data, models and theories, the Heartland Institute proclaims a conspicuous confidence in single studies and grand interpretations….makes many bold assertions that are often questionable or misleading…. Many climate sceptics seem to review scientific data and studies not as scientists but as attorneys, magnifying doubts and treating incomplete explanations as falsehoods rather than signs of progress towards the truth. … The Heartland Institute and its ilk are not trying to build a theory of anything. They have set the bar much lower, and are happy muddying the waters.” [8]

According to the institute’s web site, “it is a non-profit ‘think tank’ that questions the reality and import of climate change, second-hand smoke health hazards, and a host of other issues that might seem to require government regulation.” [9]

Professor Singer’s views about government regulation were also apparent in the following comments about regulation of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) in 1989:

“And then there are those with hidden agendas of their own, not just to save the environment, but to change our economic system. Some of these coercive utopians are socialists, some are technology-hating luddites, and most have a great desire to regulate on as large a scale as possible.” [3]

What if we had adopted Professor Singer’s position on CFCs?

According to the journal “Australasian Science”, the ozone layer would have almost disappeared by 2007, and CFCs would have been by far the most significant contributor to global warming:

“If you express CFCs in CO2-e [CO2-equivalent], and if you look at the growth of CFCs prior to the 1987 Montreal Protocol, you can estimate the amount of CO2-e emissions that Montreal has saved. This calculation shows that, by 2012, the Montreal Protocol will have prevented the equivalent of between 9.7 and 12.5 billion tonnes of CO2 being pumped into the atmosphere every year. On the other hand, if all countries meet their Kyoto targets by 2012, we will save the equivalent of only about 2 billion tonnes of CO2 per year. You can also show that, if CFCs had continued to grow at their 1970s growth rates, they would be the gases having the biggest impact on global temperatures today (they would have also almost completely destroyed the ozone layer). Were it not for their other stratospheric side-effects, perhaps we would be setting up deodorant-trading schemes to control them!” [10]

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CONCLUSION AND FURTHER THOUGHTS

In summary, some important aspects of the PR industry’s influence on cigarette smoking and climate change can be summarised as:

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The concept of the “all-consuming self”, as referred to in respect of the early achievements of Edward Bernays, seems relevant to ideas on climate change that have been considered by Clive Hamilton in his book “Requiem for a Species” [11].

Commenting on the book, La Trobe University academic Robert Manne said:

“Perhaps it is the character type that flourishes under the conditions of consumer capitalism that presents the primary obstacle to taking action on climate change. Faced by an apparent choice between the continuation of our lifestyle and the wellbeing of our planet, perhaps it is the continuation of our lifestyle that in the end we will decide to choose.” [12]

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Let’s hope for the future of our planet and its current and future inhabitants that we choose more wisely than indicated in that comment.

Blog Author: Paul Mahony (Also on Twitter, Scribd and Slideshare)

Footnote:

In 1960, the efforts of Bernays to inform the public of the dangers of smoking earned him praise from Action on Smoking & Health. He said that, had he known in 1928 what he knew in 1960, he would have refused the offer to be involved in the smoking campaign. [13]

References:

[1] “Century of Self – Part 1 – Happiness Machines”, An Adam Curtis film, broadcast on BBC TV in 2002, http://pialogue.info/books/Century-of-the-Self.php (Accessed 3 August, 2012)

[2] Held, L. “Psychoanalysis shapes consumer culture. Or how Sigmund Freud, his nephew and a box of cigars forever changed American marketing.”, Monitor on Psychology, December 2009, Vol 40, No. 11, Print version: page 32,
http://www.apa.org/monitor/2009/12/consumer.aspx (Accessed 3 August, 2012)

[3] Prof. Naomi Oreskes, co-author of “Merchants of Doubt” on The Science Show, ABC Radio National, 8 January, 2011, http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/scienceshow/naomi-oreskes—merchants-of-doubt/3012690 (Accessed 3 August, 2012)

[4] Oreskes, N. & Conway, E.M. “Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming”, 2010, Bloomsbury Press, http://www.merchantsofdoubt.org/ (Accessed 3 August, 2012)

[5] Monbiot, G., “Heat: How to stop the planet burning”, 2006, Allen Lane, p. 31 http://www.monbiot.com/2006/11/07/heat/ (Accessed 3 August, 2012)

[6] Singer, S.F. & Jeffreys, K. “EPA and the Science of Environmental Tobacco Smoke”, cited in Prof. Naomi Oreskes, co-author of “Merchants of Doubt” on The Science Show, ABC Radio National, 8 January, 2011

[7] Source Watch, http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Heartland_Institute/Global_warming_experts (Accessed 3 August, 2012)

[8] “Nature”, Volume: 475, Pages: 423–424, 28 July 2011, DOI: doi:10.1038/475423b (2011-07-28). “Heart of the matter”. Nature : Nature Publishing Group. Retrieved on 14 August 2011, cited in http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Heartland_Institute#Exxon_funding

[9] Source Watch, http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Heartland_Institute#Exxon_funding (Accessed 3 August, 2012)

[10] Anon., “The global warming potential of deodorants”, Australasian Science, Nov/Dec, 2007, p. 39

[11] Hamilton, C., “Requiem for a Species: Why we resist the truth about climate change”, 2010, Allen & Unwin, http://www.clivehamilton.net.au/cms/ (Accessed 3 August, 2012)

[12] Manne, R, “How can climate change denialism be explained?”, The Drum Opinion, ABC, 9 December, 2011, http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/3722126.html (Accessed 3 August, 2012)

[13] The Museum of Public Relations, “Edward L. Bernays, 1960: Dangers of Smoking”, http://www.prmuseum.com/bernays/bernays_1960.html

Images:

Cigarette Packet © Akiyoko74 | Dreamstime.com

“Statue of Liberty” © Americanspirit | Dreamstime.com

Tags climate, climate change, environment, sustainability

Categories Climate Change, Environment

Maybe McHappy Day is not so happy after all

November 7, 2013 //

McDONALD’S says:

“This year McHappy Day will be celebrated on Saturday 9th November and we are calling on all Australians to get involved to help us reach our fundraising goal of $3.4 million. Now in its 23rd year, McHappy Day has raised over $20 million for RMHC . . . These funds have enabled Ronald McDonald House Charities (RMHC) to continue to provide much needed programs and services to seriously ill children and their families.”

So are McDonald’s simply responding to various outcomes of people consuming their products? Here’s some food for thought:

HARVARD UNIVERSITY:

“Eating red meat is associated with a sharply increased risk of death from cancer and heart disease, according to a new study, and the more of it you eat, the greater the risk.”

WORLD CANCER RESEARCH FUND:

“There is strong evidence that red and processed meats are causes of bowel cancer, and that there is no amount of processed meat that can be confidently shown not to increase risk. . . . Try to avoid processed meats such as bacon, ham, salami, corned beef and some sausages.”

CSIRO SCIENTISTS INFORM THE CSIRO BOARD IN APRIL 2006:

Recent findings from [CSIRO] scientists have established that diets high in red meat, processed meats and the dairy protein casein can significantly increase the risk of bowel cancer.

NATIONAL CANCER INSTITUTE AND LOMA LINDA UNIVERSITY:

“Studies comparing levels of [cancer-promoting growth hormone] IGF-1 in meat-eaters vs. vegetarians vs. vegans suggest that we should lean toward eliminating animal products from our diets altogether. This is supported by the new study in which the thousands of American vegans studied not only had lower rates of obesity, diabetes, and hypertension, but significantly lower cancer risk as well.”

SOUNDS PRETTY CONVINCING TO ME. I THINK I’LL STEER CLEAR OF McDONALD’S ON SATURDAY 9TH NOVEMBER AND EVERY DAY BEFORE AND AFTER.

Blog Author: Paul Mahony (Also on Twitter, Scribd and Slideshare)

References:

Bakalar, N., “Risks: More Red Meat, More Mortality”, The New York Times, 12 March, 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/13/health/research/red-meat-linked-to-cancer-and-heart-disease.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=red%20meat%20harvard&st=cse#

World Cancer Research Fund, http://www.wcrf.org/cancer_research/expert_report/recommendations.php

Russell, G., “CSIRO Perfidy”, Vivid Publishing, 2009, http://www.perfidy.com.au/

Freston, K., “A Vegan Diet (Hugely) Helpful Against Cancer”, Huffpost Healthy Living, 9 December 2012, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kathy-freston/vegan-diet-cancer_b_2250052.html?ref=topbar&utm_hp_ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false#sb=3513286,b=facebook

Notes:

None of the information in this article is intended to represent health, medical, dietary, nutritional or similar advice.

The CSIRO is Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation.

Information on the World Cancer Research Fund can be found here.

This article contains material that first appeared in my article “If you think it’s healthy to eat animals, perhaps you should think again” of 12 February, 2013

Tags Cancer, Diabetes, Health, Heart disease, Junk Food, McDonalds, Obesity

Categories Health

More Horrors from Australian Piggeries

November 6, 2013 //

Would you like to see and hear material about the Australian pig meat industry from two different perspectives? Here are images from Animal Liberation ACT (ALACT), said to be from Golden Grove Piggery and Dead Horse Gully Piggery in NSW, which the activist organisation’s website, Aussiepigs, indicates are owned by Blantyre Farms Pty Ltd, whose shareholders are Edwina and Michael Beveridge .

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Farrowing Crates and Sow Stalls

The Golden Grove images are of farrowing crates. Despite all the talk and PR in Australia about “sow stall free” pork, there seems to be no suggestion that producers will cease using farrowing crates.

Besides, no-one seems to be suggesting that sow stalls will be eliminated from their supply chain altogether, so “sow stall free” does not appear to mean “sow stall free”. (Silly me, why should I have thought it would?) Even Coles is allowing sow stalls to be used for up to 24 hours per pregnancy. For as long as stalls remain, how can we be sure that each sow will not be confined for longer than the permitted period?

One of the images above appears to show a piglet who has been crushed by his or her mother. The Aussiepigs site states:

“A number of piglets were killed or severely injured by ‘overlay’, where the sows lie on top of their piglets, crushing them. The industry claims farrowing crates prevent overlay. Yet the footage from Blantyre Farms completely undermines such a claim. The footage shows that where sows have difficulty standing or lying and cannot move away from their young, and where piglets have little room of their own, overlay is inevitable.”

In his book “The Pig who sang to the Moon”, author Jeffrey Masson described a sow’s nesting process:

“In the wild, . . . sows getting ready to give birth will often construct protective nests as high as three feet. They line these farrowing nests with mouthfuls of grass and sometimes even manage to construct a roof made of sticks – a safe and comfortable home-like structure. On modern pig farms, where the mother is forced to give birth on concrete floors, her babies are often crushed when she rolls over. This never happens in the wild because the baby simply slips through the nest and finds her way back to her own teat.”

The Industry’s Position Regarding the Role of Animal Activists

You can hear Ms Beveridge’s comments regarding the activists investigations, along with comments from Andrew Spencer of peak industry body Australian Pork Ltd, in this report of 5th November 2013 from the ABC’s Lateline program.

Edwina Beveridge appears to be a respected pig meat producer. So is Ean Pollard of Lansdowne Piggery, who also appears in the Lateline segment. His piggery was investigated by ALACT earlier this year. They are two of eleven piggeries that ALACT have secretly investigated to date.

In my opinion, the message is one of consistent horror, yet all the industry seems to do is attack the activists.

What About Free Range?

Another producer, Otway Pork recently lost its “Paw of Approval” accreditation from the RSPCA, after Animal Liberation Victoria exposed its so-called “free range” operations. According to The Age newspaper, the RSPCA earns a royalty in exchange for its “Paw of Approval” accreditation equal to 2% of product sales. The RSPCA does not appear to have stated publicly its reason for removing Otway Pork’s accreditation. According to ALV, the RSPCA saw the undercover footage of Otway Pork in December 2012, but “the endorsement was underhandedly withdrawn in July this year”, a delay of eight months.

Some More Thoughts on Animal Cruelty

If you eat pig meat, who can you trust in terms of animal cruelty and product quality? In any event, much of the cruelty is perfectly legal, due to exemptions from anti-cruelty legislation in favour of producers.

One of those forms of cruelty is tail docking without anaesthetic. Here’s some more from Aussiepigs in relation to the Golden Grove and Dead Horse Gully Piggeries:

“Workers at Blantyre Farms’ Golden Grove Piggery cut off the tails and teeth of piglets, and cut sections out of their ears, all without pain relief. Tails are discarded in the aisles and sometimes even end up in the food trolley. Tail cutting is performed by the majority of piggeries in Australia as an attempt to prevent cannibalism (tail biting) once the pigs are moved into overcrowded ‘grower’ sheds which completely lack stimulation. Despite the tail cutting, Blantyre’s grower facility, DHG, has a severe cannibalism problem.”

“At DHG, pigs are crammed into overcrowded sheds where they do not see sunlight until they are being trucked off to the Cowra abattoir. Out of boredom, they eat at the stubs of each others’ tails, leaving large bleeding wounds. From the nature of the wounds, it appears that little or no effort is made to treat these injuries.”

The best way to avoid cruelty to animals is to stop consuming products and services derived from them in the form of food, clothing, entertainment and the like.

Blog Author: Paul Mahony (also on Slideshare, Scribd, and Twitter)

Edits 17th January, 2014: (a) Images added to gallery, including some that are said to be from Dead Horse Gully Piggery; (b) Reference to Animal Liberation NSW deleted, as the Aussiepigs website now only refers to Animal Liberation ACT.

Related articles and other material:

Pig Cruelty with Curtis and Coles

Some thoughts on “The truth about pig farms”

More on our open letter to Tammi Jonas of Jonai Farms

Open letter on free range pig farming

Wilbur’s Woes

The plight of pigs: Oliver’s Piggery, Tasmania

The Australian pig meat industry via Melbourne Pig Save

Images:

Courtesy of aussiepigs.com