| You don’t wanna know |
If it’s been too long since your last undercover-video-of-ghastly-animal-abuse fix, then check out the footage cited in this lawsuit concerning the Cal-Maine egg farm in Travis County.
The Animal Legal Defense Fund is suing the Texas Health and Human Services Commission, the Texas Department of State Health Services, and the Texas Department of Agriculture, accusing the officials of allowing Cal-Maine to essentially run a birdshit-covered cesspool of disease and animal cruelty. (The linked KXAN story contains a link to the lawsuit.)
Filed on behalf of some folks who live near the facility, the suit
comes on the heels of a Humane Society video, purportedly of the
Cal-Maine facility in question, of hens crammed together in tight cages
often containing rotting corpses of their fallen comrades. As alleged in
the lawsuit (and video), some hens were “suffering from severe and
bloody uterine prolapses [and] hens covered in feces from birds in cages
above them.” (The plaintiffs allege that the conditions inside the
plant might harm their health, which seems pretty weak…but still, that
goddamn video!).
Hair Balls generally can’t muster much feeling one way or another
regarding chickens/hens/turkeys, which seem less like animals to us than
dinner-waiting-to-happen. However, being human beings with at least a
modicum of conscience, we hate to see any sentient beings kept in the
conditions depicted in the video.
A director of the Animal Legal Defense Fund told KXAN the
organization had previously sent “demand” letters to the Texas agencies
named in the suit, but only heard back from the Texas Animal Health
Commission, which stated it did not have jurisdiction.
Neither Cal-Maine’s spokeswoman nor the Waelder facility’s general
manager were available for comment Tuesday, but the company previously posted a response to
the Humane Society’s video, stating in part that its facilities “are
operated in full compliance with existing environmental, health and
safety lawsm and regulations and permits….All of Cal-Maine Foods’ eggs
are produced in accordance with United Egg Producers (UEP) animal care
guidelines….The guidelines place top priority on the comfort, health
and safety of the chickens.”
Which, given the content of the video, seems to be a pre-existing
non-statement that some long-forgotten Cal-Maine flack spewed out before
the advent of tiny surveillance cameras that could be smuggled into a
facility by some bleeding-heart chicken-lover. Like Richard Pryor said:
“Who you gonna believe — me or your lying eyes?”
C’mon, Cal-Maine. You can do better.
This article appears in Dec 9-15, 2010.
