Slaughter From the Horses Mouth

I have taken care to include whole quotes as I find them. Accordingly, if you pay attention you may find a sentence that if removed would have made the statement far more demeaning to certain people and to the slaughter industry in general. Because I believe in keeping things in relative context though, I have avoided this entirely. Therefore, these statements are as issued.
(9 Quotations)

• Slaughterhouse Employee (taken from Gail Eisnitz's book Slaughterhouse) - "There's no way these [pigs] can bleed out in the few minutes it takes to get up the ramp. By the time they hit the scalding tank, they're still fully conscious and squealing. Happens all the time."

• Slaughterhouse Employee (taken from Gail Eisnitz's book Slaughterhouse) - "Animal abuse is so common that workers who've been in the industry for years get into a state of apathy about it. After a while, it doesn't seem unusual anymore. In the wintertime, there are always hogs stuck to the sides and floors of the trucks. They go in there with wires or knives and just cut or pry the hogs loose. The skin pulls right off. These hogs were alive when we did this. Animal abuse … is so commonplace nobody even thinks about it."

• Slaughterhouse Employee (taken from Gail Eisnitz's book Slaughterhouse) - "A veteran USDA meat inspector from Texas describes what he has seen: "Cattle dragged and choked...Knocking ‘em four, five, ten times. Every now and then when they’re stunned they come back to life, and they’re up there agonizing. They’re supposed to be restunned but sometimes they aren’t and they’ll go through the skinning process alive. I’ve worked in four large [slaughterhouses] and a bunch of small ones. They’re all the same. If people were to see this, they’d probably feel really bad about it. But in a packing house everybody gets so used to it that it doesn’t mean anything."

• Slaughterhouse Employee - "A couple from Cedar City who worked briefly for Circle Four Farms say they quit in disgust after seeing what they called 'inhumane' conditions at the hog production complex in southwestern Utah [. . .] they witnessed workers slamming small pigs against the wall or floor, beating uncooperative sows with metal rods and improperly castrating newborn pigs" [17].

• Slaughterhouse Employee - "When [Circle Four officials] say there is no harm done to the pigs out there, that's nothing but a bald-face lie [. . .] They are very money oriented. . . . They don't have any concern for the care of the animals" [17].

• Slaughterhouse Employee - "Wayne Jenson, who grew up on a sheep farm in Iron County, said the castration tools and training that workers received at Circle Four were inadequate. As a result, young pigs suffered unnecessary pain and, in a few cases, death when intestines were pulled out of the animals along with testicles. Jenson said he saw a lot of ruptures during the procedure. Clippers used to cut into the pig's scrotum often were dull, adding to the pain, he added" [17].

• Slaughterhouse Employee - "If a piglet did not weigh at least 5 pounds after a week, it got "knocked," a euphemism for "beaten to death." They estimated about six piglets were killed each day. The most common "knocking" method was to grab the animal by its hind legs and slam it into a wall or concrete floor. Sometimes, they said, it took two or three such blows to kill the animal. Krysta Jenson said the sound of pig-knocking made her physically ill and she refused to do it. The practice of slamming pigs against a hard surface, or knocking them in the head with a club, is known as "blunt trauma," an acceptable method for euthanizing unwanted animals that has passed muster with the American Association of Swine Veterinarians, said Sundberg" [17].

• Slaughterhouse Employee - "The Jensons say they observed workers beat uncooperative sows twice. On one of those occasions, a sow that refused to be transferred from one shed to another was pummeled with an 18-inch-long piece of re-bar" [17].

• Slaughterhouse Employee - "After sows are impregnated artificially they are placed in cramped pens to birth and nurse their young, Krysta Jenson said. After the piglets were taken away, the sows were visibly upset, she said" [17].