It’s that time again. The VGT is anonymously provided with recordings from a slaughterhouse, which shows the brutality and contempt with which people treat feeling, suffering creatures. This case is about chickens, but in the end, it probably doesn’t matter which species it’s about or which slaughterhouse the pictures come from, in all of them our fellow creatures are treated cruelly. Now and then people take heart and want such recordings to reach the public. The consequences are as banal as they are predictable.

The media picks up on the revelation and spreads it among their readership, which of course is a very important thing, because what seems to exist is what the media spreads. The people are appalled. „If you had known that“, yes, then what? Or „This has to stop immediately!“ or „Where are the controls?“ is shouted. Those responsible are to be held accountable and consumers are being deceived. Thereupon the AMA, whose seal (there can hardly be any question of goodness) this company bears, promises wringingly that these are probably only exceptions and that everything else is actually in compliance with the law and they vow to carry out more checks. The operators of the slaughterhouse reacted just as promptly and unsurprisingly, on the one hand by threatening to sue the VGT because of the economic damage that would be caused if the truth became public, and on the other hand by announcing that the relevant employees would be called to be held accountable. But what will ultimately happen?

Consumers will continue to eat the chicken because you’re so good at suppressing it. The AMA and consorts will forget their announcements because nobody is checking whether the controls are being carried out anyway. And the operators of the slaughterhouse will continue as if nothing had happened, just like before. Maybe they’ll step up security so nothing can get out to the public. And the media? They immediately turn to other topics that are currently relevant.

But no matter what is announced, it doesn’t matter at all. Because these scenes play out constantly in all slaughterhouses, sometimes more sometimes less, but in any case, always brutal. Neither controls nor goodwill help, because this is due to the system. As soon as a living being is seen as something that makes money, it is treated as such. This starts with breeding so that the means of production grow as quickly as possible with the least possible use of feed or produce as much of the products as is needed. This satisfies the classic production efficiency criterion of achieving the highest possible yield with the lowest possible input. The same goes for shoes. But the shoes don’t care. Not the living creature. This means that both farmers and slaughterhouse operators are under enormous economic pressure. The owners are not bothered by the fact that the pig is limping in the stable or has a navel, but when they have to invest more feed. All who endure the ordeal come to the slaughter. The others on the garbage. In the slaughterhouse, killing is done piecemeal. In the above slaughterhouse, 70,000 animals are executed every day. This is killing by the second. Nobody cares about the welfare of the animals. That’s completely irrelevant. They are delivered crammed together in transport boxes and emptied like garbage. The people have the requirement to fulfill their planned target. Nothing else matters.

The only real remedy would be an exit from the system, a system in which all compassion, all humanity has been sacrificed for profit and pleasure. No outcry, even if it is not half-hearted for once, no control can change anything about the basic requirements to produce as much as possible with the lowest possible costs as quickly as possible. Anyone who is actually serious about the fact that the animals should be fine can only go one way and that is to stop consuming these products. Once you realize that they are sentient beings, you can no longer see them as products, nor treat them as such. Only a society in which living beings are allowed to do what they are entitled to, namely to live freely and undamaged, can guarantee that this suffering will no longer exist. As long as we remain in the system of animal exploitation, everything will remain as we were drastically shown in this exposure, anytime, anywhere.