25% of the pigs that vegetate on fully slatted floors – and that is still the majority in Austria, according to the will of the politicians by 2040 – die before they are ready for slaughter. This means that they first must look next to mum, who is lying in the crate, to see how they get food. Some are already dying here because they are too weak and cannot reach their breasts. The first to end up in the trash. Then the male babies are spayed, still without anesthesia. Some die from it too. Then, after they have been weaned, they move into a pen and must stay there for the next few months until they finally see daylight on the day they are loaded onto the transporter and taken to the slaughterhouse. They are only six months old then. Every fourth of them must endure pain, lack of space, stuffy air for weeks for the garbage can. The situation is no better for chickens and cattle. But what does that have to do with capitalism?

Capitalism is a very simple ideology, so simple that even the most ignorant idiot can understand it. One of the principles is that it must be produced so that people can earn money in order to be able to consume the goods produced. This must be done as efficiently as possible. Efficiency means the highest possible production success with the lowest possible use of resources. It doesn’t matter whether it’s shoes or pork, there’s always a nibble. For the shoes, to use as little material as possible and to produce it as quickly as possible. The faster production takes place, the lower the wage costs for each pair of shoes. If an overpriced price can then be demanded, the margin between input and yield increases, so that the added value that the entrepreneur gains increases. Exactly the same is the requirement for pigs. The closer the animals are kept, the less space they need and the less food, because the less a creature moves, the better the food works, which can also be observed with humans. The goal is that this animal, which from the entrepreneur’s point of view is nothing more than a pair of shoes, in which I first must invest resources, pays off the need for food and the other maintenance costs, such as medicines, water and electricity for ventilation and other automation. The quicker this pig reaches the 110 kg slaughter weight, the shorter the period in which it must be fed, watered, given medication and fresh air. What remains is the waste caused by poor housing conditions. To a certain extent, this waste pays off, because even if feed etc. has already been invested in it, it is lucrative as long as the loss is of a magnitude that is smaller than additional investments in better husbandry conditions. Apparently, it’s around 25%. If it is higher, too many will die before they can be sold, and investing in better conditions will pay off. If the loss is less, they are obviously doing too well, i.e. a few more can be stuffed in so that the output is optimal. Now, if the farmer is asked to act as if they have any feeling for their animals, that is just as misguided as if I were to ask that a businessman treat the shoes he produces well, at least in the spirit of the Capitalism, which pig like shoe, in the sense of an opportunity to gain income. And just as fashion keeps changing to keep demand at the highest possible level, society is still being successfully persuaded that eating pigs is natural, normal and necessary. Necessary, however, only from the point of view of the producer. Natural for the investors, of course. And normal for the lobby. Sound cynical? It isn’t if you stay trapped in this logic. However, if you recognize that a pig is more than a shoe, even grants it a right to life, however you define that, you have essentially exited capitalism and moved on to what can be humanity.