Dairy: Dead On Arrival

Animal Outlook investigator reveals her identity and exposes the truth behind the closed doors of the dairy industry.

After a two-year career working undercover inside several factory farms, Animal Outlook investigator Erin Wing now reveals her identity, stepping out of the shadows to shine a light on the stomach-churning horrors she witnessed at her most recent — and last — investigation at Dick Van Dam Dairy, a factory farm in Southern California.

While there, Erin documented some of the most egregious cruelties she has seen in her career, along with barbaric (yet standard) dairy industry practices. She was also able to rescue a calf who now lives at a sanctuary (more on the calf rescue below).

What Erin witnessed was one of many dairy farms in its death throes with innocent cows caught in the middle of a battle between a world progressing and an industry fighting tooth and nail to keep us entrenched in the past.

This shocking footage underscores the urgency to end this inherently cruel industry once and for all. It’s time for consumers to ditch dairy, and for companies like Dean Foods to pivot to vegan products.

Animal Outlook’s undercover footage revealed:

• Cows so sick or injured they are unable to walk subjected to extremely cruel treatment by workers who sprayed them in the face with high powered water hoses; kicked, jabbed and shocked them; and closed metal gates on them.

• Workers routinely lifting these so-called “downer” cows with a tractor and dragging them with a metal device called a “hip clamp.” They lifted one suffering cow this way and dangled her almost 20 feet in the air to move her over a wall, and then dragged her backward over a cement slab.

• Sick cows left to suffer without medication, veterinary care or euthanasia. They languished for days until they died on their own, with no access to food or water while they were unable to stand.

Workers and a manager hitting cows with wooden canes and metal pipes in daily acts of extreme aggression and violence, sometimes as a form of retaliation against the animals.

• Workers and managers punching and kicking cows, and twisting their tails.

• Squalid and filthy conditions – cows forced to walk through thick feces and newborn calves unable to escape thousands of flies covering their fragile bodies.

• Shocking mortality rates of cows and calves, as well as high rates of injuries and illnesses – likely resulting from the putrid conditions and lack of care and treatment. One calf was born dead,  and was pulled roughly from his or her mother. The mother cow didn’t have the benefit of pain management during this incredibly painful and rough incident.

• Cows repeatedly shocked with an electric prod as they were taken away to slaughter.

• Workers cruelly using automated gates to try to force cows to move in tightly packed spaces.

Turning hidden cameras into instruments of truth, undercover investigators are on the front lines of justice for animals — and consumers. Erin’s courage resulted in hidden camera footage that is changing the way the world sees what — and who — they’re eating. And the against-all-odds rescue of two young calves.

In more ways than one, dairy is dead on arrival. Cows must be pregnant in order to produce milk, so calves are mere byproducts to the industry. At Dick Van Dam, a slow and painful death was commonplace for calves. In one instance, a stillborn calf was pulled violently from his suffering mother. Many living calves were simply left in the hot California sun, covered in flies and slowly dying.

Meanwhile, consumers are slowly but surely realizing that the milk they drink does not come from happy cows, but relies on the broken bond between mother and child, and the violent exploitation of these individuals’ bodies. The dairy industry is dying, but not fast enough.

We also followed a truck carrying so-called “spent” cows from the factory farm to a stockyard. Later, we documented trucks going from that stockyard to American Beef Packers (ABP), the site of the former Westland/Hallmark Beef Packing plant that closed down after issuing a massive beef recall following the Humane Society of the United States’ 2008 undercover investigation, raising the question of whether this facility’s cows are ending up killed at this infamous site. ABP currently sells beef to the federal government for its National School Lunch Program.

Animal Outlook submitted investigative materials to county law enforcement agencies. Despite our overwhelming video evidence depicting dozens of apparent violations of California’s laws against animal cruelty and neglect, local law enforcement declined to recommend criminal charges. However, we are still actively pursuing justice for these animals through other means. And after reviewing the investigation, the Animal Legal Defense Fund filed a lawsuit against Dick Van Dam Dairy and the individuals caught on camera for violating state and local animal cruelty laws.

Regards Mark

“We love our animals”
… Farmers always tell us this when another animal scandal is uncovered.

Then listen to this tiny baby goat cry out in pain as the farmer pushes a red-hot metal stick into her head.

It has nothing to do with love. In technical jargon, this is called “dehorning”.

It is done to prevent the horns from growing. Of course without anesthetics, of course without painkillers, in order to have no costs for an animal.

That is peasant love!
Their brothers and sisters crouch in the corner and witness the traumatizing process before their turn.
This procedure is standard around the world.

Rock the Natur, Germany

And I mean…The reason that the farm animal lives at all is for any kind of satisfaction of human animals: if an animal is needed to eat, it is allowed to live. But if it is no longer needed, then it must not live. The slaughter comes then.

And no! humans have no right to decide that animals must be tortured and killed for their consumption.
That has always been the cornerstone of any fascist system.

So … do the carnivores claim that they don’t have to give a reason why animals are forcibly impregnated, imprisoned, deprived of their children, exploited, tortured, and killed when they are not productive? Seriously?

This is what you get from raising consumers and system servants instead of compassionate people.

At birth, every person has only positive qualities, such as love, honesty, justice, etc.
But the system does not benefit from it and breeds its members to be indifferent racists, speciesists, in a word: the system breeds us to be fascists against the “other” animals.

My best regards to all, Venus

WAV Comment: This is the kind of thing they consider important; live transport and intensive farming system legislation can go to hell. Typical useless EU.

Here below are some animal abuse issues we have covered in just the last week or so.  Yes all EU  issues that need addressing real fast. 

But the MEP’s don’t take action about any of this do they ? – they sit on their self opinionated fat backsides deciding paltry issues like if a veggie burger can be called a veggie burger.  How sad is this; but oh so very EU.  Why do people still want to be in this pathetic ‘club’ ? – get out and be nations again.

https://worldanimalsvoice.com/2020/10/05/italy-essere-animali-reveal-terrible-violence-on-a-pig-farm-supplying-beretta-cured-meats/

https://worldanimalsvoice.com/2020/10/05/portugal-unpublished-and-shocking-images-inside-the-ships-transporting-live-animals-from-portugal-to-israel/

https://worldanimalsvoice.com/2020/10/02/1-4-million-signatures-call-the-eu-to-act-on-farmed-animal-welfare/

https://worldanimalsvoice.com/2020/10/02/call-to-stena-line-stop-illegal-calf-transports/

https://worldanimalsvoice.com/2020/10/07/germany-mass-murder-on-the-march/

https://worldanimalsvoice.com/2020/10/06/eu-animal-farming-in-eu-worse-for-climate-than-all-cars/

https://worldanimalsvoice.com/2020/10/06/bulgaria-inbred-lion-cubs-victims-of-neglect-rife-in-bulgarias-decaying-zoos/

No more veggie burgers?

European Parliament to vote on terminology for plant-based meat and dairy substitutes

8 October 2020

Today, Eurogroup for Animals and 12 other NGOs sent a letter to the Members of the European Parliament urging them to vote against a ban on the use of ‘meatish’ and ‘dairyish’ names for plant-based products on 20 October. This ban would contradict the ambitions of the Green Deal, which promotes the uptake of more sustainable food and would further also interfere with consumers’ demand for plant-based products.

In the second plenary session in October, the European Parliament will vote on the regulation establishing a Common Organisation of the Markets (CMOs) in agricultural products (2018/0218 COD). This regulation is one of the three regulations composing the Common Agricultural Policy.

As it presently stands, this text proposed by the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development (AGRI) includes two alarming amendments: 

• Amendment 165would effectively ban widely accepted and commonly used terms, such as ‘veggie burger,’ or ‘plant-based steak’. 
• Amendment 171 would further restrict the naming of dairy alternatives by prohibiting terms, such as ‘yoghurt-style’, ‘alternative to cheese,’ or ‘butter substitute’ to describe plant-based dairy alternatives. 

In an open letter to the Members of the European Parliament, Eurogroup for Animals expressed its concern over these amendments, and urged Members to oppose these two amendments. In the letter, Eurogroup for Animals explains why the measures contained in these two amendments contradicting the EU’s objective, as laid out in the European Green Deal measures to create a more sustainable and healthy food system. Encouraging the broader uptake of plant-based diets is instrumental in achieving the European Commission’s climate neutrality objectives, and prevent a decline in global biodiversity.

Countless studies have evidenced that industrial animal agriculture is a major contributor to climate change, environmental degradation, public health risks, biodiversity loss, and poor animal welfare. In the Farm to Fork Strategy, the Commission explicitly acknowledges the need to shift dietary habits. The Commission further points to the necessity to increase the intake of plant-based foods and reduce red and processed meat consumption levels  to reduce the risk of life-threatening diseases and decrease the environmental footprint of the food system. In 2018, the Commission’s Plant Protein Report already noted that the market for meat and dairy alternatives was particularly promising in the EU, with annual growth rates of 14% and 11%, respectively.

This possible ban is also inconsistent with consumers’ purchasing habits and perceptions. For many years already, European consumers have been accustomed to seeing and buying plant-based products displaying terms such as ‘veggie burger’ or ‘plant-based steak’. Prohibiting the use of such well-recognised terms not only is unnecessary, but it would also lead to preventing them from making informed purchasing choices.

Indeed, a recent survey by the European Consumer Organisation (BEUC) demonstrates that EU consumers are overwhelmingly favour of the use of meat-related terms for plant-based foods. The report shows that more than 68% of consumers support ‘meaty’ names for plant-based food products, as long as the products are clearly labelled as plant-based or vegetarian. Furthermore, petitions against the proposed restrictions have already garnered thousands of signatures.

It is now in the hands of the Members of the European Parliament to vote against such a  ban and to  improve information to consumers. For example, by requiring the use of qualifiers for non-meat products, such as “plant-based” or “vegetarian”, while reserving the terms with no qualifiers for meat products. This would mean that “sausages” would be made from meat, and  “plant-based sausages” would be made of plant-based ingredients. If high quality consumers information is the goal, the use of qualifiers along with meat and dairy denominations is the way to go.