pjmedia.com
Why are foreign-owned conglomerates trying to interfere with Americans’ food supply? You might be surprised to learn that some of these corporations are attempting to invalidate a key food safety measure passed overwhelmingly by voters. In 2018, Californians took a stand against food they deemed unsafe and cruel in their marketplace by enacting Proposition 12. This law says that pork from an animal “confined in a cruel manner” cannot be sold in the state (similar to the standards already in place for hens in the egg industry).
Leading food safety experts supported these restrictions because bacteria and viruses are more likely to grow, spread, and mutate in facilities that cram animals into tiny cages. But rather than adhering to the law, some in the pork industry, including massive conglomerates like trade groups representing Chinese-owned Smithfield or Brazilian-owned JBS, are fighting to have Proposition 12 struck down by the United States Supreme Court. I wrote about this elsewhere last week because as an old 4-H’er and ranch-dwelling kid, this stuff matters to me, and I happen to be lucky enough to have a megaphone.
Here’s what’s bugging me: At some industrial pork operations, pregnant pigs are confined in tiny cages that are virtually no bigger than the pigs’ own bodies. These metal cages — in which the pigs are forced to eat, sleep, and defecate, all in the same space — are lined up next to each other and resemble a parking lot jammed full of parked cars. Lawyers from companies like Smithfield have defended this practice. Meanwhile, American multigenerational family farmers have asserted that Proposition 12 “provid[es] important new production and marketing opportunities to family farmers.”
Lining pigs up in tiny cages and prohibiting them from engaging in most of the behaviors that are natural to them is inhumane. Conservative Christians are speaking out against this cruel treatment and defending the rights of Californians to prohibit pork from confined animals in their market. Notre Dame Law Professor O. Carter Snead, author Mary Eberstadt, and former George W. Bush speechwriter Matthew Scully (author of one the greatest, most thoughtful books I have ever read on the subject of animal welfare) filed an amicus brief in the Supreme Court, in which they outlined our ethical duty to animals.
