Animals should be slaughtered to provide people with food.

Intro: When discussing the killing of sentient animals, or the killing of anyone for that matter, it is extremely important to exercise caution. Historically, humans have tended to fail to exercise such consideration, and their history books are a testament to their mistakes. Though, perhaps "mistake" is not an appropriate word to describe African Colonization, the Trail of Tears, Apartheid, slavery, the cruel treatment of persons with mental and physical disorders and non-straight sexual identities, the eradication of species, the oppression of women, and the Holocaust. What "Counts?" In each of the above shameful catastrophes, humans have justified their measures because they believed the victims didn't "count." The bondage of black persons didn't "count" because they were considered part-animals, ape-like, who had inferior moral and mental capabilities. American Indians didn't count because they were "uncivilized," "un-Christian," "animal-like" "savages." During the Holocaust, Jews, homosexuals, persons of color, and persons with mental disabilities didn't count because they were "less evolved" than the master-race that is the blonde-haired, blue-eyed anglo-saxon. At the time, the powers-that-were saw this hierarchy as matter-of-fact, or maybe slightly incorrect. Historians in the future looked back on these events and winced. The methods that the historical groups used to differentiate between those who "count" and those who "don't" were found to be flimsy and ridiculous. And yet, whole cultures used such differences to justify horrendous crimes at the time. The historical precedent is clear. If humans are to learn from such tragedies in order to avoid them, they must be careful of committing crimes against those whose perspective they think doesn't "count." I believe that right now many humans are committing the same sins that history warns us against. We must learn from history, and rethink our assumptions about who "count" in order to recognize our cruelty so that we may stop the violence against those who don't "count." The Debate (see comments for further rules): My opponent accepts the Burden of Proof that nonhuman animals ought to be slaughtered for food. This is what BoP means in this context: If Pro can't prove that killing animals is better, Pro loses--even if I don't prove that killing animals is bad. On the other hand, I plan though to argue that this contemporary practice of systematically slaughtering animals is not only bad but among the most horrible, morally destitute policies that humans have ever committed. That being said, I would not even need to come close to proving that to win that it is bad. And again, I don't have to prove that it is bad (though I will) to win, but only that Pro has not sufficiently demonstrated that it is acceptable. Be aware: I may copy and paste arguments I have made from other debates of mine that have similar topics. Ninety-nine percent of meat comes from factory farms, so if we are talking about meat-eating in general, it seems only natural that we focus on factory farming. In addition to that, 99% of all slaughtered animals are raised and slaughtered in the United States, so it would seem that factory farms in the United States are most relevant to our discussion [1]. Contention 1: Non-human animals are not so different from humans. Nonhuman animals are capable of (I don't have room to cite these, so if you wish to contend Pro I'll give cites next round): 1. Experiencing pain 2. Belonging to complex societies 3. Loving their children 4. Feeling empathy 5. Using tools and 6. Possessing great intelligence. Many animals can do mental tasks that humans cannot, such as remembering the locations of hundreds of nuts for months without revisiting them. Pigs: Nevertheless, these traits of nonhuman animals do not matter to the slaughterhouses. Pigs, for example, are highly intelligent animals and highly social animals. In a factory farm, for a pig's entire life she lives in a cage so small she can't turn around. She is forced to wallow in her own defecation. She will never see the sky. She is so fat and her legs so weak that her heels snap. She has one of the sharpest noses in the animal kingdom, but she constantly smells godawful. She is so bored that she becomes neurotic and gnaws on her cage bars until her teeth break. Before she dies, she is forced to receive a rod in her private areas while a worker fondles her sensitive nerves to ease its passage [2, 3]. That way, she can give birth to another child that will experience the same Hell, and the same assured death. All of these pigs are convicted to life imprisonment, torture, and death row for absolutely no crime whatsoever. The human supervisors do not care about the pigs' lives, but only their bodies. They and their children are the living dead--living in a perpetual nightmarish existence, all so they can be used for their bodies. Poultry: In America, chickens are not given even the legal status of "animal" [4]. This means that literally any cruel action may be taken against the chicken, and it would be legal. They have been bred to be too fat to walk, and live their entire existence in extreme pain [5]. Turkeys are also bred to be too fat to walk or even breed. That's right: humans have made turkey's so unnaturally fat (x300%) that they cannot even have sex [6]. The solution? Humans spread the turkey's legs and gives them artificial insemination. This problem of turkey breeding is across factory -style farms and non-factory-style farms. Both chickens and turkey's are eventually crushed to death under their own weight [7]. Poultry also do not get to see the sky, but are bred and killed in utter captivity. Here's a really sick fact: Because there is no federal protection for chickens, "almost all chickens are conscious when their throats are cut, and many are literally scalded to death in feather-removal tanks after missing the throat-cutter" [7]. Veal [8,9]: I don't think I need to mention the extraordinary cruelties of veal. Cows are slaughtered when they are very young. When a male cow is born, rather than be given to a live of imprisonment as a dairy cow, he is slaughtered to produce veal, which is prized for its tenderness. The diary cows have strong attachments to their children, and yet their children are stolen away hours after they are born. We drink their stolen milk, and eat their unnaturally tender male young. Immorality: This system of torture would be horrible for any creature, regardless of its label or epidemiological status. And yet, we continue to ignore these problems. Approximately 9 billion animals are slaughtered in factory farms in America alone every year. One's enjoyment of animal flesh comes at the cost of agony, and yet many say that it is morally acceptable because humans are omnivores, not recognizing the cultural parallel in which "boys will be boys" is a culturally-acceptable justification for rape, and one's evolutionary dominance was a justification for the Nazi's genocides. The nonhuman animals are enslaved, forced to breed, imprisoned, tortured, and killed without a second thought, for no crime. This is in no way justice, in no way morality, and in no way good. Animals are alive, and have their own value independent of the economic value we assign them. Humans may think that an calf is worth a hundred or so dollars, but his mother and the calf undoubtedly think differently. Unfortunately, no humans bothered to find that out before they slaughtered the calf. They have inherent value beyond the human price tag. Health: My opponent may try to say that humans need nutrients that only meat can give then. My opponent would be wrong: In fact, vegans and vegetarians tend to be far more healthy, including having lower cancer risk and lower risk of heart disease [10, 11]. There are no vitamins or minerals that vegetarians cannot access through other sources besides meat, such as eggs, milk, cheese, and yogurt. Vegans in refusing to eat any kind of animal products may have a slightly harder time finding vitamin b12 (the only difficult nutrient), but there are vegan b12 vitamin supplements that are easy to access and cheap, and many cereals, soy milk, and tofu are fortified with b12 [12]. On the other hand, factory farms are the #1 of food-related illnesses. They are the chief and almost exclusive source of salmania and E. Coli (due to the animals wast products gathering on their dead flesh and fecal runoffs infecting other food products such as spinach) [13]. Environment: Factory farms play a major role in soil runoff and global warming [14]. Sources: [I have 14 sources. Yes, one of them is PETA. PETA is correct in this case, as are all my other sources. Don't be scared off by the name.] [1] http://www.farmforward.com... [2] http://www.aspca.org... [3] http://www.farmsanctuary.org... [4] http://www.animallaw.info... [5] http://gulfnews.com... [6] http://www.wired.com... [7] http://www.peta.org... [8] http://www.exploreveg.org... [9] http://en.wikipedia.org... [10] http://www.dailymail.co.uk... [11]http://brown.edu... [12] http://www.vegansociety.com... [13] http://www.huffingtonpost.com... [14] http://ecowatch.com...