There is a current silly story here about a bunch of piglets that got rescued from a fire. "The farmer, Rachel Rivers, promised she would present the firefighters with organic sausages when the animals were slaughtered for their meat. Six months later she did just that and the firefighters cooked the bangers on a barbecue."
People are saying that the animals should have been reprieved after their traumatic experience, but the farmer points out that they were always destined for the sausage factory and in any case; what would anyone do with half a dozen fully grown boars.
I am curious to see the consensus here - do you agree with me that it is total nonsense, or do you think they should have been sent off to a retirement home for pigs?
I expect there’ll be some cognitive dissonance involved, by people who otherwise happily chomp away on bacon sandwiches. When presented with individual animals, many people’s conscience kicks in and they become compassionate.
I don’t think the pigs should have been killed for food, but then I don’t think any pigs should be killed for food.
There is no reason to turn them into a burden. You just know if the pigs are saved now, later in life they’ll need dialysis or a transplant and the who wants to pull the plug.
If the Final Destination movies have shown us anything* it’s that you can’t escape your fate. If god didn’t want the piglets eaten he wouldn’t have made them out of meat.
If the firefighters had prevented a fire in a cake factory, and the owner had showed their gratitude by giving the firefighters a selection of cakes that would otherwise have been burned, nobody would be complaining that the cakes didn’t get to fly free and realise their dreams.
Now of course some people argue that pigs are different from cakes and should never be eaten. I’m not saying those people are wrong. I am saying that those people are not the only ones complaining here.
A friend’s son raised a 4H pig from birth to maturity. He woke up early each day so he could care for the pig before school, hung out with the pig after school, bonded with the pig. He won ribbons at the county fair. While the fair was in progress, he slept, cuddled up with the pig.
Looking through the pictures it looks like a “boy and his pet” photo album. At the end of the fair there are pictures of the kid fighting back tears as he says goodbye to the pig.
A farm family raised a cow for meat. They named him Clyde.
Eventually Clyde was big enough to be slaughtered. That evening, the wife was serving hamburgers for supper. One of the children had a friend over for dinner.
One after another, the children asked if the meat was from Clyde, and hearing that it was, declined the hamburgers. Finally they got to the friend. She said
“I’ll have a hamburger. I didn’t know him that well.”
If it was wrong to eat these pigs, then it’s wrong to eat any pigs. And I know that some people do hold that view, and I won’t criticize them for that: They’re consistent about it. But I suspect that’s not the view of most of the people complaining about this one.
If you’re going to be getting that attached to meat animals, then you shouldn’t be raising them. Didn’t his parents see what was happening?
My dad grew up on a farm and they raised some pigs for personal consumption. Dad said even though they named them (one needed to differentiate them) they knew from the start that the pigs were going to end up as breakfast. They knew what their bacon, ham and sausages had been made from and didn’t really bother them. Just the way it was.
So yeah, those little piggies were going to market, fire or not. And no foul on the pig farmer of firemen.
It’s part of “growing up” on a farm. Ideally you want your kid to feel empathy, you want your kid to get a little attached, then you want your kid to learn how to deal with the animal being slaughtered. (all per the kid’s mom, and I can see her point)
I have a friend who used to raise pigs. She said she cried all the way to the slaughterhouse every time she took them in, and cried all the way back. But she accepted that that’s how farm life was, and consoled herself with the fact that she’d given them a good life while they were alive.
A “save the saved pigs” tale – to the best of my knowledge, true – from “my side of the pond”, occurring about a century and a quarter ago.
This happened in the early days of the narrow-gauge railway which used to run the 32 miles between Tralee and Dingle, in south-west Ireland. This line took a twisting course through mountainous country, with steep climbs / descents; and was built on the cheap – had rather a lot of accidents, surprisingly few of them fatal. The line’s worst mishap took place in May 1893: a livestock train carrying some hundreds of pigs – destined for market in Tralee, the “big town”, and of course slaughter shortly thereafter – plus various workers in attendance on the pigs; got out of control on a steep falling gradient, and became derailed, with stuff going all over the place. Three human lives were lost, plus a number injured; and all the pigs were killed, except for a lucky four or five of them. Picking up the pieces after the disaster, the railway company impounded the few surviving pigs, with a view to – as part of resuming normal operations as soon as possible – sending them off for late appointments with the butcher.
It appears that the local folk were not happy about this callous approach: they felt strongly that the porcine survivors deserved a reprieve after their miraculous escape. Such sentiments on the part of poor Catholic countryfolk, most of them earning their living by farming, strike me as surprising; but as per the account, “thus it was”: feelings ran quite high for a time – though it seems that what ultimately became of the pigs, is unknown.
I always found it unfair that in Greek mythology, animals that helped you – even saved your life – were often then sacrificed to the gods.
That’s what happened top the ram that saved Phyrixus and Helle from Ino and being themselves sacrificed, bearing him away to Colchis. There Phyrixus promptly sacrificed it (it’s fleece became the famous Golden Fleece)*
These pigs weren’t any more deserving than the Golden Ram. But that wouldn’t have saved them.
*Helle fell of while crossing the Hellespont, which was named for her.
This takes me back to my re-entry student days at UC Davis. There was a half-Brahma steer that got loose from a testing facility and wandered down near the administrative building, one day. Animal Control* wasn’t up to such a large animal and it was nearly noon, when everyone would come streaming out of the building. So the police shot it.
This was mid to late eighties - no internet. Early reports in the student paper were critical. The local paper was more supportive. Public safety and all. Then someone from the Sacramento Bee looked into things and it turned out that the test the escapee had been going to was a carcass summary. And the police had still gotten permission from the owner before shooting it. Oops.
*On-campus Animal Control at the time was one guy, with a truck big enough to handle good-sized dogs. At lunch, later, he said that he should use the uproar to justify ordering a dart gun with nicotine darts, cause that was the only thing besides bullets that could have taken something that big down fast. It would also have taken it down permanently, but passers-by would have seen it being darted instead of shot.
I don’t think he ever actually tried to order a dart gun. He certainly didn’t get one.
