Taping of Farm Cruelty Is Becoming the Crime | Hacker News Reader

Taping of Farm Cruelty Is Becoming the Crime

nytimes.com

717 pointspraptak437 comments

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

To crystallize the point: how is this not, on its face, textbook First Amendment material?

It's First Amendment material, and I doubt the Supreme Court will uphold any of these laws. The problem is that there will be problems for people in the years between when the laws are passed and when a good case finally makes it to the Supreme Court.

(The bit about making violating your employment contract a criminal act sounds exactly like the law that makes you a criminal for violating a website's ToS. Which has pretty much been struck down. But hey, there's no penalty for passing bad laws, so why not try? It makes your handlers happy!)

...And of course if the supreme court refuses the case...

This is what I like about other countries which have Constitutional Courts that check for the a bill's constitutionality before it's passed into law.

How many years does it have to pass in US before the Patriot Act, NSL's and FISA are verified by the Supreme Court? We're already into the second decade of their existence now.

Americans have this persistent idea that their Constitution is somehow superior to the constitutions of other industrialized liberal democracies, when the reality is that the American system, notwithstanding amendments to fix certain practical failures, remains essentially stuck in 18th century ideas about liberty and governance.

I'd argue they are 19th century, since they were the first in a long line of democratic (r)evolutions. But they are still outdated.

That's not entirely right. The American Revolution and the Founding Fathers borrowed some ideas from the French Revolution, which would make that revolution the first in line. Yes, it was major, but it wasn't the first.

The French Revolution comes a full 13 years after the American Declaration of Independence, 2 years after the adoption of the US Constitution, and several months after the US Constitution was ratified and went into effect.

This should be obvious, given that the primary backer to the American Revolutionary War was the French monarchy. grumble grumble kids these days...

Then either my history teacher told me something absurdly wrong or I simply remebered it the wrong way round. I'm really sorry about that.

Either way, it's nothing to worry about. Don't let this hold you back from participating in the future, by the way. Being wrong sometimes is a powerful motivator for learning.

Actually, representative democracy started with the English Revolution, in 1688. It was carried out so competently that no one got shot, and hardly anyone has heard of it.

Usually known as the "Glorious Revolution":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glorious_Revolution

Then there was the earlier Civil War where parliament fought a war to remove (and eventually execute) a king long before the French has a similar idea:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Civil_War

For your comment to not come off as xenophobic you need to provide examples and counter-examples. Otherwise your comment is not constructive and is pure vitriol.

I dunno, it seemed like pretty highly-diluted vitriol to me.

Yes, it's a pity we never did things like make "hate speech" exceptions to freedom of speech, ban firearms, abolish double jeopardy, or revoke this silly notion that you're not required to talk to the police.

The only problem with the American constitution is that the federal government isn't very good at following it. Other than that, it's far more liberal than most liberal democracies even try to get away with.

This is exactly what I'm talking about. The US has no monopoly on the right to free expression, silence when talking to the police, protection against double jeopardy and so on. It is a peculiar kind of American exceptionalism that imagines other liberal democracies suffer under quasi-tyrannical legal systems by comparison.

The US Constitution's protection of the right to firearms, which actually is an outlier among liberal democracies, is also a case in point of its essentially 18th century conception of rights and governance. The Second Amendment is based on the quaint idea that individual liberties can only be secured through the constant threat of civilian rebellion and violence against the government.

Nearly every other liberal democracy regulates and restricts ownership and use of firearms far more than the US does, and those countries have no more fallen into tyranny than the US has - in fact, those countries tend to have governments that are more responsive and accountable to their citizens than the US, in addition to having rates of gun violence that are orders of magnitude lower.

I would respectfully submit that the common American assumption that the government cannot be trusted to do anything right is self-fulfilling.

> I would respectfully submit that the common American assumption that the government cannot be trusted to do anything right is self-fulfilling.

This, pretty much. It has bottomed out civic participation such that the majority of civic participation comes from businesses whose engagement is about gaming the system.

I admittedly do not have stats to back that sentence up, but I suspect I could find them.

  > I would respectfully submit that the common 
  > American assumption that the government cannot 
  > be trusted to do anything right is self-fulfilling

Yes. American here, and I feel the "self-fulfilling" aspect is key and is often overlooked.

With such a significant portion of the country deeply suspicious of government, we steer away from government in the name of "freedom" but actually just place more power in corporations' hands.

I feel as though our country is (perhaps stuck in) our awkward teenage years. You know how teenagers often resist anything teachers and parents tell them? We rail against government just because we can regardless of whether or not it's actually a good idea.

In our defense, the last two presidential elections have shown a willingness of the country (particularly among younger voters) to begin to move away from some of the mistrust in government.

In our defense, the last two presidential elections have shown a willingness of the country (particularly among younger voters) to begin to move away from some of the mistrust in government.

Sometimes people just have to learn things the hard way.

> I would respectfully submit that the common American assumption that the government cannot be trusted to do anything right is self-fulfilling.

Americans do not actually think this. The highway system, environmental protections, labor laws, the military, Medicare, and Social Security are all extremely popular.

What Americans actually believe is that government actions should not be trusted merely because they are government actions.

The fundamental concept of American governance is that the people are sovereign, not the government. This was a radical notion in the 18th century, and I would argue that is remains so today, given the number of folks who can't seem to wrap their heads around it.

For example, gun ownership is not based on the right to rebel--no such right exists (see: the Civil War). Americans have the right to own guns because Americans want to own guns, and Americans are in charge. We get to decide what we want to do and when we want to do it. The role of government is not to rule the people, but to adjudicate peacefully between the many different opinions that people freely hold.

The 2nd Amendment is still in force today not because it is old, but because the American people, today, want it to remain in force.

I would actually venture the opinion that the South did have the legal right to rebel and secede. The North just reconquered the South and readmitted it to the Union state by state.

In other words, you can try to rebel. You don't have the right to win though ;)

I see what you're saying, although I'd quibble with the word "legal."

It certainly seems very American to think that people have a right to rebel...that's how we got our country, after all. But I'd say that's more of a natural right than a legal right--one that supercedes the typical concept of legality in its very nature.

What I meant above was more that the U.S. Constitution does not provide a power, right, or mechanism for states or individuals to violently rebel. It's certainly not the reason we have the 2nd Amendment (quite the opposite, actually).

Sure. It's a logical absurdity to suppose a legal right to rebel, since the act of rebellion is the act of rejecting that legal authority in the first place.

I would actually say, though, that the Second Amendment is likely intended to put governments at explicit risk of rebellion, especially when it comes to day-to-day enforcement. It's not so much about rising up and marching on DC when they decide to oppress people. It's more about not being able to send in the cops to oppress people in the first place, because if they do, they'll end up being shot. Even within this century, the Black Panthers used the Second Amendment to protect blacks from police brutality: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/09/the-secr...

And used effectively in the Battle of Athens, too. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Athens_(1946)

They had the right to self-determination, just as the 13 rebel colonies did in seceding from Britain. But they gave up that right a-priori by enslaving an entire section of their population. The same could be argued about the American Revolution, but Britain had not raised any significant complaint about colonial slave-holding, so had no real standing from that perspective.

>The 2nd Amendment is still in force today not because it is old, but because the American people, today, want it to remain in force.

How does this apply to the rest of the bill of rights, though? Two major instances I can think of the oft-maligned "legislating from the bench" both apply to civil rights, first desegregation, and more recently marriage equality.

The courts are ruling the existing laws cover marriage equality despite the outcry - and this is a good thing. Some things are right and wrong regardless of how many people want it to be a certain way.

I don't think whether people "want" something especially when it comes to equal rights should have any impact on how the law is interpreted. One of the good arguments against direct democracy, IMHO.

If U.S. citizens do not like a Supreme Court ruling, they can pass a Constitutional amendment overturning it. After the Civil War, the 14th Amendment was ratified, overturning the Dred Scott Supreme Court decision and allowing former slaves and their children to become citizens.

That Amendment has since provided the legal power behind most civil rights decisions, including desegregation and (if they win) marriage equality. The "equal protection" clause justifies rulings against needless discrimination, and the "due process" clause makes those rulings apply to state and local laws in addition to federal law.

So here is an example where a huge swatch of what people take for granted today as Constitutional protections, in fact dates only to the 1860s.

If Americans as a whole wanted to get rid of the 2nd Amendment, they could pass a Constitutional amendment revoking it. They did it to Prohibition. The reason that is not happening is that most Americans like guns, or at least they respect the desire of other Americans to own them.

> What Americans actually believe is that government actions should not be trusted merely because they are government actions.

This is precisely the exceptionalism I'm talking about. Americans do not have a monopoly on the understanding that individuals are sovereign and that the government operates only with the consent of the people.

The citizens of other liberal democracies are not passive subjects - indeed, aside from selective dogmatism around gun ownership, Americans are far more passive and fatalistic toward their government's abuses and intransigences than the citizens of many other countries.

The US political system is as dysfunctional as it is precisely because so few Americans believe it can be made to work. In the absence of a culture in which large groups of people people actively engage in the formal and informal mechanisms of democratic governance, too many Americans instead express contempt and despair and stockpile guns.

I didn't say that Americans are the only ones who believe that. You are the one who is singling out the U.S. for some sort of special criticism--based on gross misunderstandings of the state of things here.

Pointing at lack of firearms regulations in the US correlating to higher firearm violence does not imply causation. We had an assault weapons ban for 10 years that did nothing, and given that 98% of murders are from handguns (in 2011) and DC banned handguns for 30 years, you would expect DC to have low handgun violence, but it does not.

Pointing out places within the US where (some) guns are banned is a bad choice of example, unless you can't get in without being searched.

So when we do have more freedoms than other countries, it's "quaint" and dangerous?

The examples I gave are things that aren't omnipresent among liberal democracies. It's not quasi-tyrannical to outlaw "hate speech", just less free. I prefer more freedom to less.

The US Supreme Court has ruled that the First Amendment is consistent with several arguably reasonable limits on free expression, including:

* Expression that incites criminal action;

* Expression that causes injury;

* Obscenity via the Miller Test;

* Child pornography;

* Regulation of commercial speech;

* Copyright and other 'intellectual property' restrictions;

and so on.

Of course, the various other liberal democracies also enshrine the right to free expression; and they also enforce arguably reasonable limits on that right, some of which are similar to the limits in the US and some of which are slightly different.

Is a country where you can be fined for saying "fuck" on television more or less free than a country where you can be fined for saying a minority should be exterminated, where it can be shown that hateful propaganda has the effect of silencing a whole group of people?

There is nothing special about the US Constitution. It is no better, and in many ways worse, than the constitutions of other liberal democracies. The US Constitution is a legal, historical document that admits of many possible interpretations, and it is nothing if not misleading to pretend to absolutism, however selective, in how it shapes the law.

As for the Second Amendment, the US is perhaps the only liberal democracy that perceives a need to guarantee a citizen's right to own and bear firearms, based on the 18th century idea that governments are inherently tyrannical and the only way to guarantee liberty is with the constant threat of violent rebellion.

As we have seen, this belief has been disproven. The citizens of other countries are able to keep their governments more or less honest through maintaining formal and informal democratic institutions and civic engagement - indeed, the governments of many other countries are more responsive and accountable to their citizens than the US government.

> Is a country where you can be fined for saying "fuck" on television more or less free than a country where you can be fined for saying a minority should be exterminated, where it can be shown that hateful propaganda has the effect of silencing a whole group of people?

You can legally say "fuck" on American television all you want, just not using the public airwaves. Since the rise of cable it's the market, not the FCC, that sets those rules.

And there is a very, very important qualitative difference between regulating pornography and advertising and regulating political and religious expression.

> As we have seen, this belief has been disproven. The citizens of other countries are able to keep their governments more or less honest through maintaining formal and informal democratic institutions and civic engagement - indeed, the governments of many other countries are more responsive and accountable to their citizens than the US government.

Well, so far. There are some liberal democracies that are more honest than the US (probably Germany) and some that are less (probably Italy), and they haven't been liberal democracies quite as long as the US.

Frankly, much of the problem is that the US is such a damn big country. Most liberal democracies have the population of a large state, and New York and California both have relatively responsive state governments compared to the US federal government. How responsive is the EU? Less responsive than they can be because Germany and Greece want radically different things. The same is true of California and Mississippi.

> The only problem with the American constitution is that the federal government isn't very good at following it

In other words, the Constitution has failed at its fundamental purpose - controlling the federal government. Not that there are any political remedies - this would just spread the cancer faster. Pride blinds. The more we insist our well-built ship cannot possibly be sinking, the less inclined we are to look for the lifeboats.

Exactly! Sure, the Supreme Court ruled that it was fine to prohibit a vast swathe of political speech, including pro-communist and anti-draft speech, but the moment - the very moment! - they realised that ruling could also be used to shut down groups like the KKK which actually murdered and terrorised black Americans they promptly reversed their ruling, making sure that hate speech was given the full Constitutional protection it so obviously deserved.

Ideas don't get old, like fruit left on the counter. They're still with us because they are still good.

Doesn't US have the equivalent of a Public Interest Litigation (PIL), like in India?

The US supreme court doesn't like facial constitutional challenges (IE challenging statutes as unconstitutional on their face with no actual injured person orset of facts) There is actually a mildly good reason for this, which is that facial challenges basically have no fact records, and involve a lot of speculation. One of the principles of judicial restraint is:

  Courts should neither "anticipate a question of   
  constitutional law in advance of the necessity of deciding 
  it" nor " formulate a rule of constitutional law broader 
  than is required by the precise facts to which it is to be 
  applied." 
  Ashwander v. Tennessee Valley Authority, 297 U.S. 288, 347 (1936) (Brandeis, J.)

(I borrowed this cite from wikipedia, so i didn't check it, but it looks rights at a glance).

A good explanation of the list is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashwander_rules

However, in practice, IMHO, this excuse is used to punt cases more than really viewed as a valid principle

Sure, but we have obvious "chilling effects" when a law is explicitly written to combat a specific recently witnessed fact pattern, and the law is unconstitutional not only in some theoretical future fact pattern, but also in its well-documented primary intent.

The argument here is that then it should be pretty easy to find a person it is impacting, and then it's no longer a facial challenge, but an as-applied one.

Back in my journalism school days, ABC v. Food Lion was referenced as the precedent for undercover reporting. In this case, Two ABC reporters got jobs working at a Food Lion in North Carolina and taped footage of the store selling spoiled meat.

Food Lion sued for unfair trade practices, fraud, breach of contract, etc. ABC was fined $5.5 million, but that was later reduced to about $300,000, according to a quick Google search.

This was used to illustrate why journalists must disclose that they are journalists and should avoid undercover methods, as written in the journalism code of ethics.

Sources:

http://lawclassolemiss.wordpress.com/2010/04/05/food-lion-in...

http://www.poynter.org/uncategorized/2125/abc-and-food-lion-...

http://www.nytimes.com/1997/03/09/arts/beyond-abc-v-food-lio...

http://www.spj.org/ethicscode.asp

Edit: Also interesting, but not quite as relevant, is the Chiquita/Cincinnati Enquirer scandal that happened around the same time.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2011/07/chiqu...

This is very interesting and I didn't know about it. Isn't $300,000 pocket change, though?

Oh definetly. In the Chiquita case, Gannett was willing to settle out of court for eight figures. IANAL, but my understanding is its more about the precedent set, as other similar cases will reference these judgements.

I don't understand why this is bad, though.

In that case food lion got publicly busted and undoubtedly had to tighten standards. What's the alternative in a system where you can't engage in undercover reporting?

ABC: "Hey food lion. ABC here. Do you guys sell rotten meat?"

Food Lion: "no. no we do not."

ABC: "Mind if we check?"

Food Lion: "Sure, just give me a minute to clean up some things so you're not seeing how we operate day-to-day. I'll schedule your visit."

ABC: "Huh. Everything looks above board"

Food Lion: "Yes, they do look that way today. On your visit. Don't come back without notice."

At risk of being down-voted out of existence, this isn't First Amendment material in the same way that defamation (e.g. slander, libel) isn't First Amendment material - or how breaking into a pharmaceutical and publishing their formulas aren't First Amendment material.

Although Minnesota's version of the ag-gag bill was certainly too far reaching and rightfully shut down (https://www.revisor.mn.gov/bin/bldbill.php?bill=S1118.0.html...), I'm behind the core concept that guerrilla-style undercover videos belongs on the farm as much as it does in our offices. The biggest danger is confusing the "taping" discussed in this article with actual journalism - and in-depth analysis of the legislation definitively shows that these ag companies will grudgingly allow legitimate reporting of their facilities, but have a right to persecute unethical practices.

* Don't confuse the Humane Society of the United States with your local humane society. For example, their CEO is against the ownership of pets. More details are at http://www.humanewatch.org/, but take that with the same scepticism you would any documentary or online video:-)

  | breaking into a pharmaceutical and
  | publishing their formulas aren't First
  | Amendment material

Are you really trying to claim that filming the way that animals are treated behind closed doors is a 'trade secret' in the same way that pharmaceutical formulas[1] are?

[1] Not to mention that most of these are published in the form of patents anyways...

You're right, my formula analogy was poor because of the reasons you mentioned. Breaking in and filming the testing facilities would have been more apt. Certainly those facilities need watch guard groups advocating for the protection of the tested, but pharmaceutical has proper channels for that oversight and we're denying ag that same benefit.

Just a heads up: Humane Watch is run by the Center for Consumer Freedom which is a lobbying group for the agriculture and tobacco industries. I'd be wary of anything i read of their websites.

It's obvious. Animal rights activists are terrorists, and terrorists don't have rights because they are "attacking our way of life and they hate our freedom [to eat meat while ignoring how it gets to our tables]."

I'm a semanticist precisely for that reason. Due to ill definition of the term "terrorist", it went from "Violent supporter of an agenda that uses scare tactics to demoralize" to "People filming Animal Abuse" or other more benign individuals that do not deserve that description.

There is a paper that discusses this issue in more detail, "Principles for Resolving Conflicts Between Trade Secrets and the First Amendment" by P. Samuelson: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=925056

Upholding contracts and preventing trespassing (or other "wrongful conduct") are usually fair game for restrictions on 1A. But "Trade secret law is grounded in unfair competition principles, ... [so] First Amendment defenses to trade secret claims are most likely to succeed as to those who did not participate in misappropriating the information, who acquired the information lawfully, and who seek to make public disclosures as to matters of public concern. In exceptional cases, preliminary injunctions may impinge on First Amendment rights even when defendants are in privity or have wrongfully acquired the information."

This isn't just "what's your secret method for cheaply polishing ball bearings." It's clearly a "matter of public concern," and that does help enormously. But your first amendment claims would improve even more if the person distributing the information neither trespassed nor broke an employment contract.

Also note that the California Supreme Court has made it a jurisdiction least likely to apply first amendment to trump trade secret law, thanks to DVD Copy Control v. Bunner.

It would be advisable for any prospective documentarians to pass off any collected information to a local news station (rather than just youtube). Don't tell the network how you got it or develop any long term relationship with them. Make sure they have media liability insurance. Then maybe lay low while they fight the case, which they'll probably have to appeal all the way up. That'd set up the model case and the money to fund it.

Even short of that, though, as a "matter of public concern," this may be one of those "exceptional cases" alluded to above. It'd be interesting to see it argued.

Why does the breaking of an employment contract need to turn into criminal charges, and get labelled as 'terrorism?'

Note that it's labeled "terrorism" only in some interest group's "model bill."

Random interest groups are allowed to call whatever they like "terrorism," and they're allowed to write poorly thought out bills.

Also note that most of the bills are failing.

Even Missouri, where the article says one passed, you're just required to notify law enforcement if you witness animal abuse, and offer them copies of your video:

http://www.senate.mo.gov/12info/BTS_Web/Bill.aspx?SessionTyp...

It's a strange type of gag order that only compels speech.

I mean, these are definitely still bills worth challenging, but the article seems to be embellishing a bit.

>Note that it's labeled "terrorism" only in some interest group's "model bill."

This reminds me of an old web design trick. You get the customer specs, plan out exactly what you think will work, and then add something stupid-looking. Like a giant duck by the login button. The duck acts as a decoy for customer complaints; a lot of business people want to point at something and say "change it!", so you give them that. And when they bring it up you smile and say "say no more, I'll have it removed sir".

Likewise, if complaints about a given bill can be pulled or drawn towards language like "terrorism", then the meat of the bill avoids some scrutiny. Hell, an unscrupulous legislator whose constituency opposes the bill could demand the terrorism language be cut and then end up supporting the bill, pleasing both sides of the aisle as it were.

This is just me thinking out loud, though.

Because this is ALEC.

That is of course a totally separate issue from whether the law is constitutional or not. There is an infinitude of bad law that is constitutional, especially at the state level where the state police power was historically nearly unlimited.

If the Green Scare had happened a few years later, the words 'domestic terrorism' would have been thrown around quite a bit more.

The FBI has referred to animal rights activism as domestic terrorism for a while now, it's just that 'terrorism' wasn't a public meme until relatively recently.

Isn't this a privacy issue? Going in to someone's private property and filming/recording them without their knowledge doesn't seem like it would have anything to do with the first amendment.

By that logic, don't we already have an enormous apparatus of laws that exist to protect the property owner? What would these bills add?

I'm not advocating for new laws, but I do not believe this is a first amendment issue.

Sure it is. The proposed text of the "Animal Ecological Terrorism Act" provides for criminal penalties including jail time for violators. Why should the First Amendment not protect me from the state in this context?

Because you broke other pre-existing laws (trespassing, possibly breaking & entering, other violations of private property)?

> By that logic, don't we already have an enormous apparatus of laws that exist to protect the property owner? What would these bills add?

"And employees who do something beyond the scope of their jobs could be charged with criminal trespass."

So say an employee that's not an animal rights activist sees something deplorable and records it as evidence. Only then are they considered to have trespassed - flying in the face of whistle-blower protections that have been in-place in countless other industries for decades.

If what's happening is a crime - and I believe animal cruelty still qualifies (even if it occurs on a farm) - at what point does someone that chooses to look the other way become a co-conspirator?

Whistleblower laws would protect this individual.

The most recent law takes precedence, so this may remove Whistleblower protection.

You perhaps think the United States has some sort of generic whistleblower protection laws. This is not the case. What you may be thinking of this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower_Protection_Act

which only applies to Federal agency employees.

This is an important distinction.

To the best of my knowledge, individuals who are not Federal employees that engage in whistleblowing do so with the very real possibility that there will be permanent professional retribution.

"Professional" is bad enough. "Criminal" is far worse.

It's not quite that simple; many US states have a "public policy" exception to at-will employment that allows you to sue if you're terminated or constructively terminated in retaliation for whistleblowing.

in response to pc86:

professional retribution is fine. That is like getting fired.

Going to jail and being labelled a terrorist is not professional retribution.

Whistleblower laws protect no one.

For one, there is no such thing as unified "whistleblower laws." There are whistleblower laws in various states covering various domains, forming a legal morass that is near impossible for a human to navigate unaided.

But more importantly, abiding by every one of these laws still results in years of legal limbo under attack from the superhumanly powerful entity that you as a moral person managed to piss off, bankrupting you, ending your marriage, and making you a damaged, nervous wreck. No whistleblower says they'd do it again if they had the choice.

This is the protection your laws provide.

I sadly can't yet link to a source, and am not sure how much I can say about how I know this, but I will say there'll be a great article out in a month or so on this topic in a major print publication.

I think you're probably thinking about the NECC case which was profiled on '60 Minutes':

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=50142537n

Then the person should be prosecuted for trespass. Still doesn't make it OK to violate their free speech rights...

and certainly not for "terrorism"

If you invite me over to your house and I happen to see a dead body on the floor, the first amendment doesn't prevent me from reporting you to the police.

weeeeeell...mmmh, even if is a bird corpse? Are we comparing a dead chick with a dead chicken?

If I see direct evidence that you committed animal abuse to kill it, then yes, even then.

And if I see direct evidence that you commited plant abuse to kill it, can I call the police also? I want also to manipulate the other people with my elastic god-rules, created for the ocassion, like vegans do.

Hey a dead cactus, in a minuscule pot... call the FBI!

There are animal abuse laws on the book right now. If there are plant abuse laws, then feel free to report plant abuse that you observe while trespassing.

For that matter, feel free to report plant abuse even if there are not laws against it, just don't expect anyone to care.

> just don't expect anyone to care.

And this the sad fact that I want to stress.

Most people see only an invented and small part of the reality. Plants are much more important to the humans that animals.

To classify a living organism as good because it has neurons and can emit noises (like a clam?) or bad because it has chloroplasts instead and can not move quickly (like a Mimosa?) is a real nonsense. Inherited stupidity.

Same as to protect common animals with four legs but to crush rare animals with six legs. Same as to call the police because we can not stand that somebody kills a chicken and feeling soo virtuous eating soy that was cultivated killing thousands of animals and plants. Same as to ignore that we, humans, are omnivores, and our gut is neither a moral nor amoral structure.

Plants provide the 99% of the energy that moves the chain food and that permits the human life on this planet. Plants provide water, and we, the people, are made of more than 60% of pure water. We should be grateful to those magnificient creatures... Yes, we can argue that plants can not cry... and what's the big fuss? We don't expect a lattice singing opera. We are just scratching the surface about the complex plant communication (chemical, electrical)... So we chomp, ignore, cut down and poison the plants, and protect the animals that are plant eaters until the exhaustion of the resources... yep, human moral.

I don't think that the classification being done is "good" or "bad". Rather we classify things as "okay to eat" and "not okay to eat". Vegetarians are not classifying animals as "good" and plants as "bad". Fruititarians are not classifying plants and animals as "good" but things that fall off plants as "bad". Everyone is doing the same classification: "am I okay with eating this, or am I not"; the only trick is that different people come up with different answers to that question.

To be clear, my classification is tuned very far to one extreme. That is to say, I would eat anything given the opportunity (in some cases necessity comes into play).

Wait, was this necessarily without their knowledge? It seems like the proposed legislation targets people who get jobs under the guise of normal employment but are really there to film.

This takes away the "trespassing" thing that's getting bandied about ... there are certainly whistleblower protections for regular employees, are those out the window?

How is this any different from other investigative journalism? Why is "getting film of what happens behind closed doors" need to be called "terrorism?"

Perhaps I'm just cynical, but I would assume to make it less pleasurable to vote against. It's not tough to imagine a blurb come election cycle along the lines of "Senator X voted against anti-terrorism bills designed to keep us safe! Senator Y strongly cares about your safety, and the safety of the Nation. Vote Y. Vote America."

Right, and that's why this lawmaking behavior is so wrong.

No. If you're selling meat to the public, they have a right to know how that meat was produced. Farmers and slaughterhouses have no right to privacy, or their right to privacy is completely over-ridden by the right of their customers to know what they are buying.

"Farmers and slaughterhouses have no right to privacy"

This position is indefensible, I think. By the same token any institution that produces a product that somehow impacts customers should have no right to privacy. Having corporate privacy and being regulated are related but different things.

It's not indefensible, it's radical. IMHO almost all productive enterprise should be 100% transparent. Good luck convincing the world of that. But most rational analysis of capitalism will get you to that conclusion.

in part yes. at the same time, anyone using this argument for farms/ag is trying to conceal misdeeds, not trade secrets. Farms etc., house animals, which are protected by laws. The operation is not private such as your home is. Equally, a worker at a paper mill should be able to video and report illegal chemical dumping or worker safety issues.

The bottom line is that the prosecution processes aided by whistle-blower testimony is broken, requiring long investigations and, to play devil's advocate, wrongful accusations and financial harm to a business.

Many states do not allow ordinary citizens to record a phone call without the consent of both parties. This seems like it would have the same kind of justification.

That would be relevant if the state governments were banning display of these videos. But free speech rights have never encompassed regulation of what you can do on private property without the consent of the property owner. It's not any more unconstitutional (note, as usual, the disclaimer that just because its constitutional doesn't mean its a good idea) to make a law that bans video taping on private farms than it is to make a law that bans me video taping your wife in the shower in your house.

Why do you need a law to ban something that is already illegal, or something that is intentionally protected by law? Trespassing and violating private legal activity is already illegal, and whistleblowing on criminal activity is protected by current law.

The point isn't that video tapers should be prosecuted as anything other than as trespassers. The point is that the constitutionality of the law derives from the same place. It is not an exercise of free speech to go onto private property to do pretty much anything.

then we can expect a cascade of similar legislation banning taping in non-profits (Acorn), pseudo-private areas, etc.?

Seems to me institutions like Acorn that accept the public as part of their operation can't really prosecute a whistleblower as a trespasser. I'm not sure what a pseudo-private area is.

What raynier is saying (I think) is that if it is illegal to trespass, then it is illegal to trespass for purposes of whistleblowing because that is still trespassing - imagine if they had trespassed, filmed, and found nothing illegal. If one of the farm workers were to film the video, there would have been no trespassing - it would constitute whistleblowing.

It is farm workers filming the videos. It just happens that these farm workers got hired as farm workers with the sole intention of filming the videos and did not disclose this intention to their employer. I'm not sure how it can be construed as trespassing to enter your place of employment, regardless of what your intentions are.

> What raynier is saying (I think) is that if it is illegal to trespass, then it is illegal to trespass for purposes of whistleblowing because that is still trespassing

Not exactly. What I'm saying is:

1) The Constitution only prohibits governments from restricting free speech;

2) What you do on other peoples' private property is rarely if ever considered free speech or free expression.

On the other hand, the consequences of trespassing are typically pretty mild and don't usually include being placed on a "terrorist registry".

Following these heavy handed approaches to whistle-blowers and undercover reporting, then Acorn should be protected from terrorists using some 'intent to harm' argument. You see how insane this all becomes. I hope these legislations are challenged, tossed out, and in the meantime circumnavigated to reveal the barbaric treatment that occurs.

So is cruelty to animals...

Actually, I think some of the laws DO ban distributing the videos:

  Many of these bills are explicit about not just targeting the people
  who do the investigation but the people who distributed it, who
  republish it. For instance, there was an investigation a couple of
  years ago that at the same time the group, Mercy for Animals, was
  conducting the investigation ABC news was following along with it,
  aired the same footage, after they verified it, and it drew national
  attention to this and criminal charges. Under these bills, in North
  Carolina, for example, both the investigator and the journalist would
  be wrapped up together.

http://www.onthemedia.org/2013/mar/01/states-consider-so-cal...

I'm looking for more references now.

The N Carolina law mentioned appears not to have any reference to distribution: http://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2013/Bills/Senate/PDF/S648v1.p...

However this law in Indiana does, http://www.in.gov/legislative/bills/2013/SB/SB0373.2.html

IANAL but this appears to make distribution of such recordings illegal:

  Makes it unlawful recording of agricultural or industrial
  operations, a Class A infraction, for a person, with intent to harass,
  defame, annoy, or harm, to: (1) enter real property that is owned by
  another person and on which agricultural operations or industrial
  operations are being conducted; (2) take a photograph of or make a
  video recording or motion picture of the real property, structures
  located on the real property, or the agricultural operations or
  industrial operations being conducted on the real property; and (3)
  distribute the photograph or recording; without the written consent of
  the owner of the real property or an authorized representative of the
  owner.

IANAL, but the above citation says AND, implying that it may be legal to take the photo or recording, if you don't also distribute it, or to distribute it, if you don't also create it- so you would have to do both. I may be completely wrong with this interpretation though, and the wording is too vague.

Good catch! I guess you'd have to take it to a lawyer to be sure... I wish that On The Media bit did a better job with citations.

Just because it is not unconstitutional does not make it right. How can anyone argue that it should be illegal to videotape an illegal activity with the goal to expose and stop it, especially cruelty to animals.

That's not universally true: some states (e.g., California) take a wider view of freedom of speech beyond what first amendment allows and protected freedom of speech in certain kind of privately-owned spaces (e.g., malls open to the public). Supreme Court has upheld this, in a case that happened a few miles from my home:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pruneyard_Shopping_Center_v._Ro...

Sure, but a mall invites the general public in and acts as "third spaces" for the public (and profits from doing that). Even in the Socialist Republic of California courts aren't going to decide that activists' free speech rights extend to what they do on private farms.

As an outsider, it appears to me that almost the entire US legal and political system is driven by, and for the benefit of, corporate and big business interests. The only other major factor at work seems to be fear - witness the ever increasing power of the TSA

Probably appears worse than it is, but it does appear to be in a pretty sad state now.

The Founding Fathers are probably turning in their graves.

>As an outsider, it appears to me that the almost the entire US legal and political system is driven by, and for the benefit of, corporate and big business interests. The only other major factor at work seems to be fear - witness the ever increasing power of the TSA

Three factors driving law and politics in the US, IMNSHO:

money: big business, work the system for profit

fear: government works the system for more control

selfism: citizens (neoliberals, Bible Belt, etc) working the system to ensure nothing will be done for the public good

> As an outsider, it appears to me that the almost the entire US legal and political system is driven by, and for the benefit of, corporate and big business interests.

This is the case in every country. Those at the top will take an inordinate amount of time to make rules that benefit themselves and their friends.

The primary difference between the US and other countries is that the US constitution provides a means for the citizens to fight back against the most outrageous of offenses. Now, that doesn't mean it always works. In fact, it rarely does. But it does, in fact, work occasionally, which is better than nothing.

> The primary difference between the US and other countries is that the US constitution provides a means for the citizens to fight back against the most outrageous of offenses.

What way does the US constitution provide that other countries don't (besides the firearms shenanigans)?

1. A right to practice any religion without the establishment of any official religion.

2. The right to speak freely against the government. This is culturally extended to other targets of speech as well. Includes written, artistic, and some obscene works.

3. The right to not have soldiers commandeer your property, even in times of war.

4. The right to be safe in your possessions against arbitrary search. In the US, a police officer can't just pull you aside and search you. They need to have a clearly defined reason to do so or get a search warrant from a judge.

5. Every citizen above a certain age has the right to vote and be heard in government, regardless of political affiliation or sex.

I'm bored of listing things. Go read the constitutional yourself if you're curious. Two and half centuries later, and it's still a document that puts much of Europe and the rest of the world to shame. As I said, it's implementation isn't perfect, nothing in life is ... but it's certainly much better than the alternatives currently on display elsewhere.

Look, the constitution is 250 year old parchment and it appears a lot of legislators have probably forgotten what's on it.

1. Applies to most european countries as well. Some, like Scientology, are actually called what they are, scams. Not because of the dogma, but because they put greater emphasis on raising money.

2. And what EU member country doesn't have this?

3. The US has only been invaded by a) the British b) itself. Just like torture, when push comes to shove the government will find a way around this. Do remember the government confiscated property from the southern gentry by classifying them as traitors.

4. Minorities (black, hispanic, asian, arabic) throughout the US would like to have a word with you. Hell, NYC doesn't even try to gus it up. They call it "stop and frisk".

5. You have the right to vote. Not all states have to make it easy or convenient to do so. I'm lucky in that I live abroad so I'm entitled to an absentee ballot. If I lived in my last US address I could not vote by mail on my free time. I would have to go to the polls, on a tuesday, during working hours.

Europe isn't one country so I don't know why you describe it as such. I could equally say the US has a beheading problem since Mexico is right there and they are the same, right?

> 1. Applies to most european countries as well.

No.

http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/western-europe-vs-rel...

> 2. And what EU member country doesn't have this?

Germany, Austria, etc.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Irving#Persona_non_grata

Mind you, the man is absolute human garbage, but the entire point of protecting speech is protecting the most despicable kind. It's fairly easy to tolerate the pleasant variety.

> 3. The US has only been invaded by ...

My point still stands. Even if the US throws this one under the bus in the future, my point still stands. It's not about a perfect record, but a good one. The US has a good record on this.

> 4. ... Hell, NYC doesn't even try to gus it up. They call it "stop and frisk".

I live in the NYC area, so I know about this a bit. In each case, the person consents to the search. Yes, it's pretty scary when a cop walks over to you and tells you to empty your pockets. You need to have balls to say "No" and "I do not consent to any searches". But then again, any right given to you is pointless if you don't have the balls to exercise it.

> 5. You have the right to vote. Not all states have to make it easy or convenient to do so.

You don't have a right to a convenient process, merely a process. It's a wonderful thing to reach a point where people have the wherewithal to bitch about how convenient voting is, rather than if their vote is actually counted. Mind you, I'm of the same mind as you, I think we should be able to vote on the Internet. Lately, my home state of New Jersey has made an effort to permit this (albeit, in response to a natural disaster).

> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Irving#Persona_non_grata

Yeap. Moving the goalposts. You said "The right to speak freely against the government".

If you said "free speech" in general, yes, you'd be right.

But you said "speaking out against the government".

Right now, you've only shown that the US is somehow better because you're allowed to freely deny the Holocaust. Let's put your "god hates fags" guy in the same category. Such a free country!

See, my point is not that these anti-holocaust-denying laws are silly, they are and I wish they'd go away.

The point is, how does your "free speech" protect you when you've actually got something to say. So far you've demonstrated American citizens have the right to inane and offensive yelling, that doesn't actually speak out in any effective way against the government.

Let's see some real examples, where someone exercised their right to free speech of something that actually made the government actually really uncomfortable that actually really led to change, as well as a similar example where this was not possible in a EU country because its people didn't have the right.

And there's been enough examples, also in the US, of people gagged (with legal rulings) because of what they would have to say would make the government uncomfortable.

In practice, your right is the Freedom to Scream Dumb Shit. Don't delude yourself it's actually anything more than that. Maybe "Freedom to play court jester" sounds a bit more forgiving. I'm not saying the EU-"no holocaust denying"-countries are any better, but it's not "free speech" if it only protects raging lunatics.

What goal posts? I was summarizing the constitution. If my summary is too vague for you, here is the actual text:

> Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Then you spend the entire post ranting about what can really be summarized as:

> In practice, your right is the Freedom to Scream Dumb Shit.

Ok. Are you the arbiter of what is and is not "dumb shit"? Because as long as there is somebody deciding what is and is not dumb, then you don't have the capacity to speak your mind. You merely have the capacity to speak what everybody else is already thinking.

And the point wasn't that much of Europe is some sort of third-world cesspool. It isn't.

The point was that the US Constitution provides protections which are not clearly codified in the EU, beside the right to carry arms. Even though the EU is a modern invention, while the US Constitution is the oldest constitution still in use.

these hold true in all european countries, most south/central american ones and probably most asiab countries as well (although I don't know that side of the world firsthand, unfortunately. So much for a pedantic ufanist reply...

> these hold true in all european countries

Last time I checked, Belarus was in Europe.

> This is the case in every country. Those at the top will take an inordinate amount of time to make rules that benefit themselves and their friends.

It's actually a bit simpler than that. Any set of rules will allow certain segments to rise to the top. Once there, they have great interest in keeping the rules in their favour, but they don't have to take all that much time making the rules favour them in the first place.

Your categorical statement about rules is an interesting one. I think this is actually a mathematical claim which I'm fairly certain is false.

It'd be interesting to explore whether the space of rules that keep everyone on an even keel include any rule sets that we'd actually want to live under, though. Ever read "The Lottery in Babylon" by Borges?

Oh, absolutely. As a Canadian, I live in hope that the US will invade and replace our system of government.

Why? Or was that sarcasm?

Already happened. It was peaceful, and at least we're allowed to think we're different.

As a canadian I sincerely hope that you are joking.

No doubt you're joking, but one thing I've repeatedly noticed in my many visits to Canada is the extent to which Canadians define themselves as being "not American" (meaning not US citizens). Can't blame 'em, more power to them.

This is a fair point. I actually can't stand that too.

Oh please. You would only be so lucky. Then this sort of nonsense wouldn't even come to fruition:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/mar/01/quebec-language-...

No, I strongly disagree with that statement that it's the same in every country. US supports and openly agrees with lobbying. Actually, I have read opinions saying it's a good thing - companies can have a direct effect on laws by pouring money into the government,so it kind of is democratic, right?

Well, not every country is like that. In many others lobbying is illegal and people who do it are severely punished. Any connection with a business is strongly frowned upon, and if the laws a politician is voting for turn out to support his/her company or his family's business, the negative press will pretty much destroy their career as it has happened many times in the past. Meanwhile, in the US, politicians are very well known for making money thanks to policies they themselves wrote, and it has been a plague of both senators and presidents of the United States.

The problem is, that the US is calling our approach socialist. The first question we always ask is - how is this going to affect people? Most of the time the people's interest is put before companies interest. Media companies lobbying for making breaking ToS criminal offence? They can piss right off, this does not benefit people in any way. Monsanto wants to grow GMO crops in our country? Sure, but only after they show the documentation that its safe for people and does not affect local businesses. I can't imagine Microsoft ever being given a fine in the US for monopolistic practices - in the US it's probably just how you do business and no one sees anything wrong with it. In the "land of the free" you are also free to exploit your employees, because they being "free" can just change jobs,right? Well, in most of the EU you need to guarantee decent working conditions, health insurance and you can't work more than X number of hours per day. Is that bad/socialist? Maybe, but I know for certain where I would prefer to live and work!

And sure, its very,very far from perfect, but I am pretty sure its nowhere as corrupt as the US government. Mostly because in US it's not corruption, it's legitimate business.

    > companies can have a direct effect on laws by pouring money into the government,so it kind of is democratic, right?

"corporations are people my friend!" ;)

I realized the other day that it's a grammatically correct way of saying "corporations are made of people." Consider the famous quote: "Soylent green is people!" It doesn't mean that Soylent Green is a person, it means Soylent Green is made of people.

> Well, not every country is like that. In many others lobbying is illegal and people who do it are severely punished.

That's not the only way to buy influence.

> Monsanto wants to grow GMO crops in our country? Sure, but only after they show the documentation that its safe for people and does not affect local businesses.

So this only applies to Monsanto, or do local companies have to do the same things?

> In the "land of the free" you are also free to exploit your employees

Utterly untrue. You have no idea what you're talking about.

> And sure, its very,very far from perfect, but I am pretty sure its nowhere as corrupt as the US government.

How can you possibly know?

> Utterly untrue. You have no idea what you're talking about.

It took ten (1998-2008) years before the US minimum wage went up.

That's 10 years without a pay rise for the unskilled worker of America.

It that's not an example of worker exploitation I don't know what is?

Statutory minimum wages not rising are not an example of worker exploitation. Even if there were no minimum wage laws worker exploitation does not necessarily follow.

Additionally, in your example while the federal minimum wage might not have increased many states have their own minimum wage laws that have changed over the period you describe.

The closest statement you could make is that an absence of minimum wage laws may make it legal to employ people at an exploitatively low wage. This is not really the name thing.

> Even if there were no minimum wage laws worker exploitation does not necessarily follow.

To answer this question you have to go no further than to study history.

When there where no minimum wage laws workers where exploited.

You have to go back no further than the first industrial revolution to see evidence of this.

Now that exploitation brought about the rise of the union movement.

I don't think it is a coincide that as we now witness the decline of the union movement, there is a corresponding rise in the exploitation of workers.

Those who don't study their history are destined to repeat it.

Germany doesn't have a minimum wage either.

It's becoming more complicated in Germany. See e.g. http://www.economist.com/node/21536648

>So this only applies to Monsanto, or do local companies have to do the same things?

This would naturally apply to any company, local or foreign.

> Utterly untrue. You have no idea what you're talking about.

Just six words: "right to work", "at will employment".

And only four to counter: "Be a hard worker".

"I can't imagine Microsoft ever being given a fine in the US for monopolistic practices" See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft

"Well, in most of the EU you need to guarantee decent working conditions" You also do in the US. See OSHA safety standards. Also US has much stricter anti-harassment and anti-discrimination laws and rules than much of the EU. Comments that would be acceptable jokes in the workplace in Denmark could get you fired for creating a hostile work environment in the US.

Maybe instead of just slandering the US, you should learn a bit more about it.

Harassment and discrimination are nothing compared to actually abusing the worker through lack of vacations, imposed overtime, laughable minimum wages (specially for the "mandatory tip" jobs) and no safety nets.

> laughable minimum wages (specially for the "mandatory tip" jobs)

I couldn't believe this when I first heard of it: Some (or most?) states have a "different minimum" (? yeah ..) wage for certain types of service jobs (waiters, etc) that exclude some arbitrary amount they are supposed to get as "tips".

If that's not something that's purely beneficial to the business and puts a burden on the individual person, I don't know what. It makes the whole concept of "minimum wage" laughable by setting an impossibly low one for a certain class of jobs ("tip money" isn't guaranteed so you can't count it as part of the minimum wage, the guarantee is the whole point). And then it turns into a situation where the customers (nicely sidestepping the business) are made to be felt responsible for the servants to make "minimum wage", but they aren't responsible at all, it's charity.

Any country you could be talking about is either shittier than the U.S. in other ways (Continental Europe), exactly like the U.S. (U.K., Australia), or too small and homogenous to be a credible counter example (Scandinavia, etc).

Scandinavia is small, but depending on who you ask it's not homogenous. E.g:

http://www.sweden.se/eng/Home/Work/Life_in_Sweden/A_multicul...

Examples or evidence for any of those 3 claims? Appears to be wind and noise.

Over 15% of the Swedish population was born outside of the country. The largest groups are from Irak, Poland, Afghanistan, Somalia, China and Iran. There are also large groups of second generation immigrants with parents from Chile, Greece and Italy. Not everybody is blonde and blue eyed...

That's mostly white people then?

You'll get diversity when there isn't a single majority group. Put all of Europe together (including western and eastern), that would be reasonably diverse.

Yes, just like in the USA, the large majority is white (72% for USA, Sweden doesn't measure ethnicity). And Sweden has more foreign born inhabitants than the US (12.4% for US and 15% for Sweden).

So, just dismissing comparisons with the Scandinavian countries based on homogeneity of population might be hasty.

> exactly like the U.S. (U.K., Australia)

They are different. E.g. the UK has `socialistic' health-care.

Not to mention that thing about guns.

the US constitution provides a means for the citizens to fight back against the most outrageous of offenses

Did you, by chance, mean "voting"?

How quaint.

Did you, by chance, mean "voting"?

Suing obviously. Legal action is the American way.

I think the observation was that this has turned out to be the problem, not the solution.

I.e. that not everything is better as a confrontation.

Kind of. Democracies are often driven by entrenched interests. This is especially true in the US, with their non-compulsory voting. If your livelihood depends on producing meat, you have an incentive to learn who supports it, and bother to actually vote. If you just think the meat industry is kind of icky, you won't bother informing yourself, and may not even bother voting. It doesn't help that politicians will go out of their way to communicated to these entrenched interests, but not try to tell regular voters what they are actually up to.

Not only the US. The EU has been following the same shady path.

There's even a good documentary made to throw some light at this subject.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2279313/

Probably appears worse than it is

I don't mean to diminish the significance of any particular issue, but this is definitely true for much of what you hear about the US. Our media, both mainstream and alternative, tends to revolve around scandal and outrage, and there's an apocalyptic undertone that we love to hear in everything. Imagining events as fragments of gigantic intractable problems that may soon crush us all infuses our opposition to them with a sense of heroism so American that we feel naked without it.

>Imagining events as fragments of gigantic intractable problems that may soon crush us all infuses our opposition to them with a sense of heroism so American that we feel naked without it.

This rings so true. I think you just hit upon one of the reasons why American politics is so polarizing. Maybe middle ground and slow progress don't get talked about because there's no bad guy to rally against.

Media in general tends to revolve around scandal and outrage, including the scandal and outrage over how the media revolves around scandal and outrage.

Imagining events as fragments of gigantic intractable problems that may soon crush us all infuses our opposition to them with a sense of heroism so American that we feel naked without it.

Yes but, what if, this itself really is ... a gigantic intractable problems that may soon crush us all...?

"The Founding Fathers are probably turning in their graves."

Keep in mind that the Founding Fathers were the big business interests of their time.

it appears to me that almost the entire US legal and political system is driven by, and for the benefit of, corporate and big business interests

"Corporate and big business interests", i.e., publicly traded companies, are responsible for the majority of wealth creation (source: well it's obvious, but see for example William Bernstein, "The Birth of Plenty".) So what you said can be rephrased as, "The US system works to enable wealth creation", or in other words, "The US system is optimized for providing the best standard of living for its citizens." Which is exactly the case.

You spelled 'wealth extraction' wrong

What with Thatchers passing, a Home Secretary wanting to abolish our signing up to the european human rights act, I just love the sound of those words tonight.

+1 to Madison and Jefferson

The way that it's determined if these laws are congruent with the U.S. Constitution is for the infringed groups to take the case before SCOTUS.

It's just the sad way it is, the Legislature is under no particular obligation to determine the Constitutionality of the laws it passes.

Sucks, but that's the way it is.

This is not meant to defend cruel people, I just want to raise a few points about farms.

While I have only been to small farms, I have definitely seen what some people would consider animal cruelty. But I think it's important to understand the mentality of people that work with these animals.

Animals on farms are seen as property, not a pet in any way. Most owners and workers of animals distance themselves from the animals to keep themselves mentally healthy as they will be putting these animals to slaughter to sell or eat. When distance yourself from an animal, you won't be treating it as nicely as you would your family dog.

When talking about farm help, they may hold a grudge against the animals they are working with. A friend would work his uncle's farm every saturday to help clean up after the pigs. His job was basically shoveling pig poop for 8 hours (or other equally not-fun jobs). It would take a day before he smelled normal again. Doing this kind of work can make some people resentful of the animals they work with.

Farmers and farm help see animals as money, so they won't do anything that could jeopardize being paid (won't damage the product).

When people are disconnected with the animals they are working with, it is easier for some people not to be so nice to those animals. This isn't to say that all people working with animals will be abusive towards them, but it creates an opening for those people that aren't as nice to take their anger out on the animals.

Sounds more like you are defending hypocrites/unprincipled people. By your argument, it's more ok for me to hurt you (from whom I am distanced by the fact that we have never met) than my girlfriend.

It's a question of rights, not convenience or qualifications.

As of a couple of years ago, the average job tenure of an employee working in a slaughterhouse was 6 months. Many people lasted half a day to three days. The emotional stress and trauma of witnessing living animals being put through the kind of things factory farming does to them is emotionally overwhelming to even the most hardened people.

The people who have to witness that day in and day out frequently end up with extreme emotional turmoil/psychological trauma similar to PTSD and it is these traumatized employees who end enacting much of the crueler practices talked about in these videos.

It's very challenging for a person to witness what goes on in a slaughterhouse and to maintain their sanity. Trying to keep the idea that these are living creatures with rights but also that it is perfectly fine for them to suffer the horrible treatment they are subjected to requires a tenuous mental gymnastics that apparently seems to break down after only a couple of months of exposure.

  | factory farming

Slaughterhouses aren't just for 'factory farming.' It's mandated by law that only licensed/register abattoir can kill animals used for meat, so even the animals coming from 'humane' farms go through the same process.

Also, I remember reading some statistics about how domestic violence is higher among slaughterhouse workers. Too lazy to look it up, but IIRC it was after they started working there (not necessarily that violent people were attracted to the trade).

This depends on the animal. My recollection was that one must process cattle through a USDA approved facility, but there were no such restrictions on pork or poultry.

(The lack of a poultry restriction is obvious to anyone who's bought an organic bird from a local farm.)

Further, as the local eating movement grows, there's an increase in the number of "boutique" (if you will) slaughterhouses. http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2012/06/04/153511889/small-...

Seems backwards. Why are we justifying the cruelty that results from a mindset necessary to witness cruelty? Perhaps the workers won't strike; let's ask the animals.

I'm not justifying the cruelty. At least that wasn't my intent. My intent was to outline how horrifying that cruelty is that human beings cannot even witness it for a 6 month time frame without suffering strong emotional trauma.

That's precisely why we need to change this sort of thing. When good people do bad things, there might be a bigger problem. Perhaps meat is not meant to be cheap.

He is not describing good people. Good people can reason that hurting others is not how to improve mood.

That's exactly the opposite of my point.

You seem to be missing a crucial point. As far as our whole history and our current system are concerned, (food) animals are not people. That's the crux of the issue.

When you say "others" you're implicitly ascribing personhood to those animals.

I'm not arguing whether this is right or wrong, but it's where we are now as a society. In general, most people do what's socially acceptable and avoid doing what's not. It is socially acceptable to kill animals, which involves some level of cruelty. It is not, except in war, socially acceptable to do that to humans (although we concoct all kinds of excuses for special circumstances).

> It is socially acceptable to kill animals, which involves some level of cruelty.

Yes, but its not socially acceptable or lawful to be excessively cruel and torture them. Animals aren't people, and most people don't think they are. However they are alive, they do feel pain, and they do deserve to be treated with some level of kindness and respect.

> its not socially acceptable or lawful to be excessively cruel and torture them.

For better or worse, that seems to depend entirely on the animal in question. Nobody laments the treatment of sea-sponges, the fact that they are animals instead of plants is basically just a curiosity of biology as far the majority is concerned when considering the ethics of them. Moving up from there: few (though probably more than in the case of sponges) worry about how we treat insects. We kill them with industrial grade chemicals (this concerns people, though not for reasons that are relevant), electricity, lasers, etc. There is little thought put into determining how to kill them ethically. Continuing on, rodents, snakes, and other medium sized pests: I would say that probably most people don't care how these are killed. Glue traps are very popular for instance, even though they are very cruel. These are the animals that we really start to see people caring in numbers worth paying attention to; humane killing devices and even live-capture traps are becoming increasingly popular for these sorts of animals.

Once you get larger than rats and snakes it seems most of the general public becomes fairly concerned about how the animals are killed. We have laws about what sort of traps trappers of small animals are supposed to use, and even most trappers are very serious about the ethics of what they are doing (for instance, they are typically very strict about how often they check their lines, so that animals are never trapped for excessively long periods of time.) As you get bigger and cuter more and more people start to care.

Of course all of this is basically just my observations of American cultures. The knobs on these different value settings are turned one way or the other for other cultures (in particular I think you can probably point to examples of both extreme settings of these values in various Asian cultures).

It's not about cuteness, it's about (perceived) level of consciousness.

Then how do you explain the discrepancy between dogs and pigs?

I think thats a culture thing, in china a dog is no more valued than a pig i think. But generally i don't think there's things would be considered cruel to do to a pig but not to a dog.

Are there things that would be considered cruel to do to a dog, but not a pig? I suspect most people in western cultures would say "slaughter". That might not be the most well thought out position (though it is not a position I hold, so it may be unfair for me to say that), but I suspect it is a common position nevertheless.

Anyway, as I said in another comment, my take on it is that we are all performing the same mental calculus (Americans, Vietnamese, French; Vegan Americans, Omnivore French, ... Everyone.) but we are going into the calculation with different values. Some Asian cultures have the "willingness to eat it" cranked way up so that they are more willing to eat animals that could be considered cute (sparrows, dogs, etc), while at the same time other Asian cultures have "willingness to eat it" cranked way down. The calculation is the same, only the values and weights assigned to things differ.

If you started to dial down the "willingness to eat it" I suspect that "creepy things" (snakes, bugs) might be the first to be spared, followed closely by whatever things that culture finds cute. Maybe the other way around.

I suspect the Vietnamese treatment of dogs is an outlier, which doesn't invalidate the general rule. People think dogs are their friends, that they have stronger and more pronounced feelings and emotions than pigs (which may or may not be true - most people, including me, have never had pigs as pets). The same can be observed with cows in India - I suspect hurting a dog would be less of a crime than hurting a cow there.

Anyways, I wasn't talking about eating animals - I was talking about being cruel to animals. That's where the perceived consciousness plays a role - you don't want to hurt something that you see as more or less similar to you and capable of the same thoughts and emotions like you.

P.S. The fact that I'm talking like these are all facts and statistically proven theories is just for style. In reality I'm talking out of my a$$.

I very strongly recommend the book "Eating Animals" by Jonathan Safran Foer in relation to this topic.

He covers the desensitization of abattoir workers, as well as documenting some of the cruelties (and just day-to-day work) that is involved throughout the life of the animals we eat (with a particular emphasis on factory farming).

From the article: > "The videos may seem troubling to someone unfamiliar with farming, said Kelli Ludlum, the group’s director of Congressional relations, but they can be like seeing open-heart surgery for the first time."

I completely disagree with using this as a reason not to show what is really going on. Personally, I think people should know exactly what goes on to produce the food they eat - and at that point decide whether you think it's ok or not.

Very similar things can be said of prison guards or soldiers; Zimbardo thoroughly documented what can happen when good people become part of a bad system.

The key preventative is supervision and scrutiny. Abu Ghraib happened primarily because a group of people in a position of power were left unsupervised. It's a matter of keeping good men honest.

> This is not meant to defend cruel people, I just want to raise a few points about farms.

You seem to have some sympathy with farm workers, but the points you raise have had the opposite effect on me - I am now more inclined to want laws which specifically allow videotaping animal cruelty, even at the expense of privacy/trespass rights.

> Farmers and farm help see animals as money, so they won't do anything that could jeopardize being paid (won't damage the product).

That's true, but aren't there also situations where greater suffering of the animal would lead to greater profit for the farmer? For example, keeping a pig enclosed in a very small cage, or weening piglets at a very early age?

We may have different images in our minds when we talking about animal cruelty. There are different things people can do to be cruel to their animals and they may do it for different reasons.

Honestly, I can't talk on this subject all that well. I've never had to work a farm, but I've had a number of friends over the years that grew up on farms and I got to hear lots of fun stories about it. Seeing and hearing these interactions with animals may change your opinion on the subject (either to help you understand why farm hands act the way they do, or to make you a vegetarian).

My main point is: being a farmer is hard, the pay isn't all that great. Try to understand what a farmer has to do on a daily basis. See how they look at their animals. Put yourself in their shoes. But to really do this, you need exposure to see what they deal with. This could be in-person exposure or a detailed run-through in a book or documentary.

The media likes to report the scandalous issues about farming, but there are many farmers that treat their animals properly. Don't base your opinions on farming from the few that are cruel.

>My main point is: being a farmer is hard, the pay isn't all that great. Try to understand what a farmer has to do on a daily basis.

That's no excuse to mistreat animals.

> but there are many farmers that treat their animals properly.

And there are others who don't. They are the reason why laws need to be in place to ensure animals are treated fairly and why videotaping them being cruel should not be outlawed.

> When talking about farm help, they may hold a grudge against the animals they are working with. A friend would work his uncle's farm every saturday to help clean up after the pigs. His job was basically shoveling pig poop for 8 hours (or other equally not-fun jobs). It would take a day before he smelled normal again. Doing this kind of work can make some people resentful of the animals they work with.

Working in a call center, I resented every customer I dealt with. At no point did I electrocute, scald, maim or torture them. Not just because of the distance, but because I'm not a fucking psychopath. People who abuse living creatures do not need any defense; on the contrary, they're immoral, depraved and indefensible.

Animals do not have the rights we accord to people who phone call centers. But should they? That's where discussion of this issue most frequently breaks down.

It's not really about farming or filming. The issue comes down to whether people think it is moral to eat meat. (or meat raised on a factory farm, or meat they did not kill themselves, or some other gradation on the vegan-carnivore scale)

It is not about whether it's moral to eat meat. We have laws that protect these animals from unnecessary cruelty. Their murder is permitted for food production. Kicking them, taunting them, housing them in unbearable conditions - these are all illegal under the law. There is no reason why filming such abuse in undercover investigations should be made illegal, let alone an act of terror. This simply makes it easier for these people to commit crimes.

This is one of the main reasons that I moved from loose vegetarianism to strict veganism. For the longest time, I convinced myself that dairy cows and egg laying hens didn't have it so bad. But as long as animals are seen as replaceable parts in a machine, they're going to be abused.

When you hear people throwing around terms like "humanely slaughtered beef", you know that we've hit a point of exceptional self deception as a society.

>When you hear people throwing around terms like "humanely slaughtered beef", you know that we've hit a point of exceptional self deception as a society.

I disagree; I think there are in fact humane meat processors, like the one shown in this video: https://vimeo.com/22077752

There's no such thing as humane killing. If you kill something, it's not humane.

I suppose you've never had to end something's life to cease its suffering?

While that is a valid objection to nilved's overly general statement, it is irrelevant to the question at hand. This isn't a case of choosing the lesser of two evils. It's a case of killing an animal so you can sell his or her body.

In relative terms, there are more and less humane ways to slaughter. Obviously, causing less suffering is better than causing more suffering. So if they called it "more humanely slaughtered beef", I'd have less of an objection.

But to call the unnecessary destruction of lives for the sake of profit "humane" is an insult to humanity. Then again, perhaps it is a well-deserved one.

I disagree. Not to get too pedantic here, but since we're discussing the meaning of words, the dictionary definition of humane is relevant: "characterized by tenderness, compassion, and sympathy for people and animals, especially for the suffering or distressed." There is no reason that the "unnecessary destruction of lives for the sake of profit" could not be done in a way that is accurately described by that definition. In fact, I believe the video I linked is a perfect example of someone behaving in that way.

HN circa 1813: s/animals/slaves/g

This is not meant to defend cruel people, I just want to raise a few points about slave owners.

While I have only been to small plantations, I have definitely seen what some people would consider slave cruelty. But I think it's important to understand the mentality of people that work with these slaves.

Slaves on plantations are seen as property, not an employee in any way. Most owners and workers of slaves distance themselves from the slaves to keep themselves mentally healthy. When distance yourself from a a slave, you won't be treating it as nicely as you would your hired hand.

Plantation owners see slaves as money, so they won't do anything that could jeopardize being paid (won't damage the product).

When people are disconnected with the slaves they are working with, it is easier for some people not to be so nice to those slaves. This isn't to say that all people working with slaves will be abusive towards them, but it creates an opening for those people that aren't as nice to take their anger out on the slaves.

So you are equating human beings with pigs and cows, here?

Yes. Or, more properly, equating pigs and cows with human beings. I've yet to see a logical reason not to.

How about insects?

Pigs and cows are mammals with central nervous systems much more similar to ours than any insect.

I don't eat them either.

It's really only an accident of history that there's such a sharp division between humans and other animals in terms of intelligence and advanced culture. If we'd developed technology while there were still intermediate species like Australopithecus and Homo Habilis around, it would have lent greater clarity to the fact that we are just a branch of a varied tree.

Choose any random cow or other livestock animal. You and Bessie have at least one common ancestor.

"One of the group’s model bills, “The Animal and Ecological Terrorism Act,” prohibits filming or taking pictures on livestock farms to “defame the facility or its owner.” Violators would be placed on a “terrorist registry.”"

This sounds like a line out of some futuristic dystopian film

To me, it sounds as if it's taken from George Orwell's novel "Nineteen Eighty-Four."

Animal Farm also comes to mind, but that's awfully literal.

Terrorist??

Sounds like fun.

"Sorry mum. I can't come home for thanks giving cause I filmed a guy burn pigs alive and now I'm on the no fly list"

"What are you in for?"

"Terrorism"

"How many people did you kill?"

"I filmed some chickens."

Not sure what this is showing up on HN now. The law has been on the books since 2011. We should be more interested in the new law That just granted legal immunity to Monsanto.

what law are you talking about? I'd be intrested to learn more. can you provide a source / links?

Google "Monsanto Protection Act" or "farmer assurance provision"

for the 2011 law Google

"Enterprise Terrorism Act (AETA)" or "Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act"

That law says nothing about photography.

Just wait until you find out how all this works with our Grand Jury system to send people to jail without trial or 5th amendment rights.

This is nothing but plutocracy fighting its final battle.

No one is actually suggesting that animal cruelty is OK. But when documenting such (immoral, mind you) acts raises awareness that eventually harms business, in the meat and dairy industry in this case, then big money raises its head in the form of legislation that favors the $$$.

We see the same pattern when hackers are cast as the new terrorists.

"final battle" ? Not hardly. This continues to be a successful tactic of suppression

I wonder how the tech community would respond if undercover reporters were breaking into offices and documenting the "incomprehensible" C that managers are forcing down on employees when they could be purportedly writing software in English, and people stopped using software to help free the abused employees who are stuffed in a small cubicle to write nonsensical gibberish day-in, day-out?

That is what this situation seems like. Animal cruelty is definitely not okay, but I have noticed a growing trend of reporting best practices, that attempt to minimize animal suffering as much as possible, as animal cruelty. And the solutions people are coming up with to improve on those best practices are as non-sensical as a non-industry expert suggesting that we write software in English. In a perfect world, sure, but the real world has real constraints.

I would like to see real awareness, not people who feel they are experts on all rural affair matters after watching a two hour documentary and a YouTube clip or two. A video ban is definitely not the way to do that, but I can see the other side. Google isn't going to be too happy if you go around filming their datacenter, lamenting that you could do the same with a server in your closet at home, either.

Not that this is really relevant to the topic at hand, but are you actually drawing an equivalency between people who get paid to write code for a living and an animal being slaughtered? I don't think the analogy works at all.

No. I'm saying people who do not understand technology could be lead to believe such things if people started reporting it. Nobody is going to take the time to realize that people actually enjoy writing software using programming languages.

And I'm not suggesting animals enjoy being slaughtered, but if it is going to happen, do you not support doing it the most humane way possible?

I apologize for making my point in the form of a rhetorical question. What I should have said is that, based on the construction of your comment, your comment draws an equivalency between programmers and these animals being slaughtered.

Not at all. I only drew an illustration of something people in this demographic understand to show how people react to biased reporting.

If you want people, who have never stepped foot in an office and have never turned on a computer, to believe that programmers are treated horribly because they have to type "gobilty-gook" all day long, it would be a pretty easy sell. Likewise, you can easily make the optimum care we can give an animal given our current understanding look like the worst treatment possible to an outsider without domain-specific understanding.

And I wasn't really referring to slaughter specifically, or even at all. There are a lot of care issues too, which are more interesting to me having a farming background and not an abattoir background.

  | biased reporting

Animal rights activists may be biased towards their cause, but it's not like farmers aren't biased towards their livelihood. If they were to admit that what they were doing was wrong, they would have to own up to everything they had done up to that point, in addition to changing professions.

My livelihood comes from being a software developer, but have spent enough time in barns to understand how they function, so hopefully I can come as unbiased as possible. I'm curious to know more about what you think that is being done is wrong?

I guess a better example of what I'm saying is that a plantation owner in the Confederate South wouldn't have been unbiased about slavery. You can't claim that bias only works in one direction (i.e. AR activists are biased, but farmers are not).

Which is why I'm trying to argue down the middle, free of as much bias as possible. The video ban is ridiculous, just as the videos that we will lose due to the ban were ridiculous. We should be looking for real education, not petty fights between interest groups.

> If you want people, who have never stepped foot in an office and have never turned on a computer, to believe that programmers are treated horribly because they have to type "gobilty-gook" all day long, it would be a pretty easy sell. Likewise, you can easily make the optimum care we can give an animal given our current understanding look like the worst treatment possible to an outsider without domain-specific understanding.

Not that it really matters, but I think this is a bad analogy. Code looks technical and mysterious to most people, not inane. You might be able to quote, say, code style guides that impose rigorous rules about formatting and make people think that the owners of those guides have rigid practices, but that would be nowhere near enough to convince people that programmers themselves are treated horribly, especially since you would have a hard time getting any of the programmers in question to agree.

(Now, if you look at working conditions, unpaid overtime, and the like, in environments like the game industry, you might be able to convince people quite correctly that some programmers are treated horribly...)

Fuck, no.

Why would you assume mass-slaughter of living beings is going to continue happening?

Because demand for meat has only risen over time? Most people only seek quality care while the animal is alive, not a complete end to eating meat.

I realize technology is on the horizon that could change things in the future, but we are talking about today.

  | Most people only seek quality care while
  | the animal is alive

This is impossible at current levels of demand, and the push to keep meat, which historically was only hyper-available to the rich, cheap so that people can all afford to have turducken[1] wrapped in bacon for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turducken

Care to elaborate? I assume you mean because owners are increasingly reliant on external labour to fulfill the demand, and, like with any business, labour does not always care about the level of quality in operation that the stakeholders, that have traditionally supplied the products, do?

If you also want to talk about the quality of life of the animal, it gets more complicated. Even "free range"/"cage free"/etc animals live in stressful and crowded environments, just less stressful and crowded then other farms animals that are not <insert label here>.

I once took an animal rights activist friend to another friend's farm, which is on the larger size – one of the largest in my area – and he was quite surprised by and happy to see the level of care the animals received. The animals were calm, friendly, and not at all what I would imagine a stressed animal would look like. What we observed there was pretty typical of the other barns I have been in as well.

That doesn't make you wrong, of course, but it leaves me wondering that if the barns/pastures you have spent time in are equally representative, perhaps you just come with a different metric for what is quality care? If so, who gets to decide what is acceptable? What is good for one animal rights activist isn't necessarily good for another, so who gets to be right when striving for the same goal?

What does "large" in this case mean? Are we talking about factory farm style CAFO? What I've read, which may admittedly be outdated, is that these kinds of farms are where the majority of meat, dairy and eggs comes from (in the US).

We're talking hundreds, possibly thousands, heads of cattle, but it wouldn't fit my definition of a factory farm. Those aren't really a thing around here. There is only one a wide radius I would even begin to consider a factory farm.

But we weren't talking about factory farms anyway, we were talking about typical farms, free range, cage free, etc. and whether they are still providing a comfortable environment for animals, or not.

A few comments up thread pyre suggested that it is not possible to meet the demands of cheap, plentiful meat while providing animals reasonable quality of life. This seems to be born out by the fact the factory farms are the norm, and smaller farms like the one you mentioned are the exception (note that I'm specifically talking about in the US, where meat consumptions is ultra high, and from what I've read factory farms are the norm).

Factory farms are most certainly not the norm by any stretch, but their scale does naturally allow them to provide more product than everyone else, as your previous post indicates. A "factory farm" with 10,000 cows is obviously going to supply more milk than 999 other farms with 100 cows, if we can assume, for argument's sake, a constant output from each animal. The farms with 100 cows in that example are much more prevalent by a wide margin though. If I recall correctly, the average herd size for a dairy farm is somewhere around 40 cows.

pyre, in the post I responded to, suggested that even free range farms that put focus on animal care were not providing sufficient care for animals, leaving them still tightly packed and stressed. And maybe that is true, but I am still left wondering how we measure which farms are providing sufficient care? If we want to strive towards a better life for animals, we need to start setting definitions and targets to work towards. Otherwise, every change towards the better will be met with equal criticism by somebody.

Sorry, you're right, by "the norm" I meant that the majority of meat etc consumed comes from factory farms.

I agree with you that setting unreasonable or unrealistic goals is problematic. Although I personally stick to a 99% vegan diet, I've never been an abolitionist and I think setting reasonable goals and working towards them within the system is probably more productive, such as Temple Grandin's work.

Pushing for legislation like this doesn't make me very sympathetic towards the industry though.

Most people will do whatever they are told, and eat whatever they are sold. I will believe human beings are truly interested in eating meat once they carry out the necessary steps themselves, instead of importing workers from other countries to commit these atrocities in their name (Fast Food Nation is a recommended movie to watch in this regard.)

If we are talking about today we should recognize that mass enslavement and slaughter of animals, mechanized and automated, is immoral and wrong, and act to bring an end to it.

Why? Why is being an ethical omnivore wrong? If a pig is raised in a nice surrounding, not separated from it's kids, and slaughtered in a way that is significantly more painless than dying of disease or natural causes, why is that actually bad?

Let's worry about that case after we've handled the 99% of cases where omnivorance is not supported by ethical practices.

This is not true in the United States. Per capita meat consumption in the United States dropped by 6% between 2006 and 2010 (http://www.voanews.com/content/as_world_meat_consumption_gro...). The USDA predicts that this decline will continue. (http://www.theatlanticwire.com/national/2012/01/americans-ar...)

I support free information. If "best practices" in animal slaughter gross people out, then maybe we need better "best practices" or maybe we need to rethink our agriculture system. Just because something has been decided upon by a group of experts does not make it socially just or appropriate. The treatment of slaves was, I'm sure, generally done according to what, at that time, would have been considered "best practices", and people wanted cotton. But that doesn't mean that slavery should have been ignored and "left to the professionals".

I am sure agriculture would love to work with the people concerned about current best practices to find new and better best practices. Agribusiness is always at the forefront of technology and is quick to adopt better ways.

The problem is that the people who come with concern tend to not take time to understand the situation. I recall a recent incident with a celebrity suggesting dairy farmers should breed their calves to not have horns. Great idea in theory. The genes do exist in some living cattle, but it is quite rare. Anyone with even a basic understanding of biology can see how that isn't going to work out so well, but we cannot even seem to find that level of understanding out there.

They demonstrate this by lobbying to suppress freedom of speech? Weird. You haven't justified restricting free speech. I am willing (happy) to admit that some animal-rights people are uninformed blowhards. But that doesn't justify punching holes in the first amendment.

According to the article, the law intends to prevent animal rights activists, who show some intent to harm the operation, from conducting their business on private property without permission. That is a lot closer, if anything, to being a trespassing matter, not one of free speech.

I'm not sure that still justifies it, and I am not in favour of it myself, but I don't think we want to go down the road of misguided analogies like comparing copyright to theft. Surely people should have some say over what happens on their private property, and if they are being prevented from doing so for whatever reason, perhaps a law of some kind (not necessarily this one) is needed?

Granted, I haven't read the actual wording of the law yet, or have any understanding who is behind it and what their motivation is, so perhaps the article is off base.

Unless you switch everyone to a meat substitute, killing will be required for eating meat.

I've eaten: cow, chicken, pig, turkey, duck, frog, octopus, salmon, tuna, and I'm sure other meats too. All of them required to be killed, for processing.

Don't get me wrong. I eat meat. I've also done slaughtering as well and know what goes on when you do kill. I also strongly prefer eating humanely treated animals, before and during slaughter.

"humane slaughter"

Look at the way we treat prisoners who have been found guilty of a capital crime: lethal injection.

That was because drowned, hung, shot, or electrocuted was considered inhumane. Even the first of 3 of the cocktail puts the prisoner to go unconscious.

Now, treat the animals that we eat similar. Nitrogen gas suffocation is known to be the least traumatic death yet. Some executing prisons are going to that as well.

Fine, that's perfectly fine with me. But nothing you said suggests that recording slaughter practices should be some sort of special "first amendment black hole". If it grosses people out, then maybe we'll just end up with more vegetarians, oh well.

I'm not sure it is quite that simple. The article seems to indicate that it isn't about hiding information per-say, but to keep the people, who come with the specific intent of destroying the farm, away. You will notice it is not just about videos.

I think most farmers respect, and even often agree with, with normal animal rights activists, but they also have a real fear towards the "crazy PETA types", and with good reason. I think you'd find any industry trying to push for similar laws in the presence of similar activists, and we do have laws for similar cases that have come up.

Its unfortunate that those who have a real concern for the well-being of animals, and actually want to work with farmers to see improvements, get wrapped up in the spectacle that others bring.

And the harsh fact: for you to live, something else must die.

We only focus on factory farm operations and the possible illegality of filming illegal actions. Yes, there are horrible practices in many parts of industry (I would say more horrible than not).

I just got done watching a documentary about plant communication on Nature (PBS). They also seem to be able to identify self, relative, and non-self. They communicate across species about predator information. They initiate active chemical defenses against organisms that attack them. They also respond to negative stimuli (pain). All things considered, they seem to be able to think and feel similarly to the animals.

Now.. I say this why? Most people would have no compunction about killing a plant for food, yet many I know would strongly object in killing a cow or chicken to eat meat.

My point is this: plants and animals seem to feel pain and seek to minimize it. Plants and animals are both living. I would not say that any specific plant is any more or less important than an animal (including us). However, for us to live, something must, inevitably die.

I make a thanks to the beings, plant and animal, I consume before each meal.

Governments and large corporations, simply because of the size of their budgets, seem to be the biggest victims of bad practices in software development. If the public understood these boondoggles better, compared with, say, cost overruns on construction projects, taxpayers and shareholders might be better off.

I really don't see the downside to greater transparency in most endeavors. Either there isn't an analogy here, or livestock farming is somehow special, which I'm also not seeing how that is.

The analogy is that software companies would react the same way, if faced with the same problem. I'd love to walk into a large software company and document all of their inefficiencies to share with everyone, but I suspect I'd quickly end up in legal hot water, even as the law is written today.

I don't think text files should have the same rights as animals. Yet.

> I'd love to walk into a large software company and document all of their inefficiencies to share with everyone

Many large software companies develop some of their software in the open, recognizing the benefits of such transparency. You only have to peruse Github and other repo sites. The idea of developing software in the open is widely adopted, and practically a requirement for some kinds of software, like cryptography and other security software.

It seems more natural to draw the exact opposite analogy: If proper handling of livestock and meat is critical to one's safety, meat production should be as easy to monitor as "git log" for a repo of crypto software.

To be fair, I haven't met many farmers that wouldn't love to have you come tour their operation. In fact, its pretty common, at least where I reside, for farmers to host open houses so people can do exactly that. Certain species are prone to illness by human exposure, so there are some limitations on certain farms, but generally farmers are proud about what they are producing and love to show it off.

If you feel there is a lack of transparency, I would suggest it is primarily due to distance. When the nearest metropolitan area is hours away, you get a disconnect on several levels. If you don't already have connections to farmers, its difficult to find the connections to build the opportunities to learn more, granted. Especially when you consider that only 2-3% of the population are farming to begin with.

As someone who actually owns a few cows, many chickens, and a horse, my main complaint about the legal situation is how I am kept from selling a gallon of milk to a "close" customer: one that actually walks on to my land, hands me $16, sees the cow that I milked and comes again next week. Now that is transparency.

Although in many cases I can get away with selling the milk, if I were to butcher a cow an sell the meat (outside of a USDA approved slaughter house, etc) that would be pure unadulterated evil.

I would love to see a change in perspective that emphasized "local and small" = more self regulated, "farther and bigger" = more state oversight... oddly enough, in practice, it is the other way around.

Just let the small guys have more freedoms, and people will vote with their dollars.

This results in the rather brutal net result of "uncaring people will pay the least and demand the most abusive practices". But, honestly, I don't think we can get around this with legislation.

I have noticed a growing trend of reporting best practices, that attempt to minimize animal suffering as much as possible, as animal cruelty.

I am reminded of Mike Rowe's discussion about castration and docking of lambs:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-udsIV4Hmc

I have noticed a growing trend of reporting best practices, that attempt to minimize animal suffering as much as possible, as animal cruelty.

What are these best practices, and how do they get reported? I noticed the article said the same thing, but didn't give any examples.

I picked up Steven Pinker's The Better Angels of Our Nature the other day† and I have to say that it allows me to view this whole episode quite clearly.

Pinker documents the increasing ratcheting down of violence in humanity, perhaps not in absolute terms but certainly in percentage of population terms. Take modern Western Europe, it has statistically the lowest homicide rate compared to anywhere and any time.

The decrease in violence has occurred with what Pinker calls Rights Revolutions at two points in history, around about the time of the American and French revolution and mid-twentieth century onwards. So we have people asserting the rights of man in general leading to the abolition of chattel slavery, the rights of woman in particular, gay rights, the rights of children, and recently the rights of animals. In England the last blood sport (fox hunting) was recently outlawed in the teeth of much protest from the good old boys that think cruelty to animals is A OK.

These rights revolutions stem from ideas born out the Age of Reason and the Age of Enlightenment which led most famously the amendments to the US constitution but which have there parallel in most of the Western world. Forces that work against these ideas are thus called counter-enlightenment forces. Getting back to the issue at hand (I've got a point I tells ya!) these laws represent a back-sliding and we should take these counter-enlightenment forces very seriously - we are talking about a centuries long struggle to eliminate violence (of whatever type) from our societies. I guarantee you that future generations will look back at our times and recoil in horror at the way we treat animals in much the same way that systemic torture, bear-baiting, corporal punishment, domestic abuse and so on leave most of us (apart from the odd sadist and sociopathic outlier) sickened nowadays.

† I cannot recommend this book highly enough. Here it is on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1455883115

How is it a final battle? The plutocracy is not going anywhere. It is the new organizational principle for the Earth and it will last 2000 years just as the previous organizational principle did.

If you eat factory farmed meat, eggs, or dairy, you are almost guaranteed to be supporting animal cruelty. There are many fantastic books and documentaries detailing the horrors and dangers of factory farming and I've linked to a few below. This is an open secret.

I would be willing to bet that almost anybody here, once they've looked deeply into factory farming, would come out the other side and look at factory farmed animal products in a completely new light.

Do you truly want to stop farm animal cruelty? Investigate this industry and consider no longer buying factory farmed animal products.

http://www.amazon.com/Food-Inc-Participant-Industrial-Poorer...

http://www.amazon.com/Eating-Animals-Jonathan-Safran-Foer/dp...

For many, the concept "boycott meat" is even more ridiculous than the concept "animal rights". We have a very long way to go.

Certainly, but I said nothing about boycotting meat. I said boycott factory farmed meat. Meat can be done "humanely." Seek it out and support it if you wish but it is not to be found in factory farms. Vote with your wallet.

I am doing this. It is difficult. And it makes restaurants suck.

And let's be real, SF, Portland, etc might one day reach 50% humane meat... maybe. What's the plan for telling the "average" American that a dozen eggs cost $12? And some of them are weird colors?

My farm-fresh dozens cost $6 in the greater NYC area. I'm only in my first year of farming as a startup but I'm finding that it is profitable and enjoyable to serve fresh, local food to people without gouging them for it.

It's going to be a difficult challenge. But I think this bill proves how terrified the Meat Industry is of people finding out what it's really like inside of a factory farm. So many people truly think that their meat and eggs comes from local farmer Bob who loves his chickens and the farm has been in his family for 100 years. The reason for that is that that is how it really was for centuries. People think that now the big companies just buy it from the local farmer and serve as middle man.

Only in the last 30 - 40 years has it changed over to being 99% big aggro (at least in US).

Big Farm definitely thinks the word getting out will hurt their profits so I think fighting this bill and getting the word out is the first step.

I'm all ears for other ideas.

There is no such thing as humane meat, eggs, or dairy, even in the absence of factory farming. Dairy requires that cows be forcibly inseminated, male chicks are ground alive in hatcheries, and it is impossible to produce meat without killing an animal. "Humane" meat is just a way for the wealthy to absolve themselves of complicity in killing for taste and convenience by paying a premium for something that is anything but humane.

You're wrong about this.

-dairy animals can be chosen based on their long-term milk production (my goats haven't been bred in 2+ years and are still giving more milk than I know what to do with, and when they are finally bred we have other uses for males around the farm).

-I hatch my own chicks and the males are not ground alive (or tossed in trash, or euthanized, or whatever). My chickens get as much love as my dogs do.

-Of course it's impossible to produce meat without killing an animal, but it is very much possible to produce meat while caring about the animal immensely and ensuring its quality of life is never compromised (save for the last instant). It is the hardest thing in the world- and it should be. Raising my own animals for meat has changed the way I consume other meat (or rather, the way i DON'T consume other meat) unless I'm sure it has been handled, beginning to end, with the same care and concern that I give my animals.

Humane meat is possible without being elitist, expensive, and inhumane, and I take personally your accusation that there's any convenience in it. Attitudes like yours are just one more factor that a small farmer has to deal with in this uphill battle against backwards attitudes towards meat raising and I'd appreciate it if you'd cool it on the propaganda!

How did your goats initially start lactating? They must have been pregnant at some point and I'm assuming that they were artificially inseminated. I'm also assuming that your male chicks are eventually killed and do not die of old age. Unless you kill and eat your dogs I don't think you can consider the chicks you raise to be pets. Taking an animal's life because you like the taste of their flesh could never be considered caring or kind. I don't think that my opinion is part of a backwards attitude or propaganda. You and I just have different values.

The goats weren't artificially inseminated. They were each studded, birthed a single kid each. I have 2 of them still, and the others were given away to other farmers (before my time). I am however considering starting a beef cattle operation and we'll have to deal with those issues soon. I think the solution is quality dual-purpose breeds (which is the solution for chickens) so that males can be eaten rather than destroyed.

I don't know about you personally, but many people I have encountered who abhor the idea of eating meat have based their values on the state of the existing factory farming system- which is fine, opt out if you have to. But when given a choice to do it properly, it needs to be understood that it IS possible.

Thank you for this. Moral absolutism with respect to killing animals for meat doesn't advance the conversation; it just gives vegans a way to feel superior. You seem to understand that what matters (to many people) is the quality of life for the living animal.

A note to all hard-line vegans: If you want to do something to improve the welfare of the animals we raise for meat, engage people in discussions of humane farming practices w.r.t. livestock. Most meat-eaters you talk to aren't ready to give it up. So ask yourself: Would you rather live in a world of factory farms, or a world where animals are raised and slaughtered in the most humane way we can manage? Give up on the idea that you'll convert everyone you meet to a vegan, and you can still do a lot of good in this world. When you take hard-line stances like the poster above, you alienate your meat-eating audience and end the conversation.

Ending chattel slavery probably didn't seem that feasible to abolitionists in 1820s United States. That doesn't mean they would have gained anything by compromising though. Advocating for welfare reforms rather than abolition sends mixed messages and suggests that there is a tolerable level of (to put it bluntly) exploitation.

I guess we'll be forced to stick with the status quo, then. Politics requires compromise. Not everyone's moral yardstick is the same as yours. I don't think you would find a great many people who would think that the slave analogy is appropriate, so the only option I have left is to exclude you from the conversation. You're in a very small minority when you equate the rights of animals to the rights of a human.

> quality of life is never compromised (save for the last instant). It is the hardest thing in the world- and it should be.

You seem to understand, and admit, that you're doing something wrong. So: why do it? What is your justification for doing it?

I'm not admitting to doing anything wrong.

I'm taking my role in my own food production and consumption with the weight it deserves. I'm further accepting my role in the food cycle, and realizing that things die at every stage of food production- even "vegan" food production, whether it's insects that must be removed from crops, animals displaced by tillage, fertilizers made from fish emulsion, and the squirrels that the semi trucks run over on their way to deliver pallets of Veggie Burgers to Whole Foods... and deciding that all things considered, meat is possible, ethically and at a lower environmental impact than the alternatives.

But when you say it's the "hardest thing in the world," what does that mean? Why is it hard?

If someone can kill an animal that they've raised from birth and cared for each day- without wincing, without feeling it in their heart for days- I don't want to buy meat from that person.

I apologize for belaboring the point here, but... you're avoiding answering the question about why it's hard, why you have these feelings.

To be more direct: I can't help but think that the reason you have these feelings is that you feel guilt for doing something wrong in regards to the animal(s) in question. I think I've had similar feelings, after learning what goes on in typical farms, and my ultimate reaction to that emotion has been to be vegan as much as I can. So I'm just trying to wrap my head around what your reaction is.

(FWIW, I feel compelled to say that I understand the opportunity to be vegan is a privilege. One that I am able to afford in the city where I live. I don't begrudge anyone who can't be vegan due to lack of access to reasonable vegan options.)

To me 'humane' simply means that the animal hasn't suffered. Can't male chicks be gassed rather than ground alive? Can't a cow be inseminated naturally, or artificially under a general anaesthetic?

>Dairy requires that cows be forcibly inseminated

Moreover, that produces calves, and it turns out that half of those calves are male. Those males typically get turned into veal.

And another side effect caused by that is that those calves are forcibly taken from their mothers, which is intensely traumatic for both. It is common for the cows to injure themselves struggling to go after their calves as they are taken away.

As an animal researcher, I'm of two minds on this.

Obviously, it's better if animal cruelty is exposed. The practices mentioned in the introduction definitely constitute cruelty. They should not be allowed to happen, and whistleblowers should be permitted to record them so that evidence may be presented in court.

On the other hand, people with ties to animal rights organizations have a habit of finding animal cruelty where there is none. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver_Spring_monkeys for a classic example. The pictures produced by PETA portrayed a researcher's work as an open-and-shut case of animal cruelty when, in fact, the research was scientifically justified and it was ambiguous whether there was any negligence in the way the animals were cared for.

There was no doubt whether the animals subjected to unreasonable suffering. As for the question of scientific justification, there were non-animal models for neuroplasticity research available at the time. The widespread use of monkeys in neuroscience is more of a matter of convenience and entrenched interests. Just because a study produces scientific results does not mean that it is ethically valid, take the Tuskegee syphilis experiments or San Antonio Contraceptive Study for example.

This debate has been covered to death in other sources. The majority of scientists disagree with you. It might be because there is a vast conspiracy; it might because most peoples' values differ from yours; or it might be because we know neuroscience better than you do

EDIT: Just to make clear, I don't want this to be taken as a wholehearted endorsement of the treatment of the animals in the Silver Springs case. There were some questionable practices. However, I feel that there was a scientific reason to be performing the general class of experiments.

Scientists who don't feel strongly about animal rights defend the position that is most convenient and efficient for them. If using a monkey instead of spending months cultivating petri dishes is easier (e.g. more deterministically successful for publication) then of course they will advocate for using the monkey. This argument leaves the animal rights activist unimpressed. In the end most animal experiments are certainly useful but few are strictly necessary. Researchers complain about all the paperwork required but I wish it was 100 times more difficult to get these experiments approved. Then people would really make sure the experiment is well thought-out and important. And I would happily delay some scientific discoveries by 50 years if that can spare a few million animals (thanks to better computer models or new noninvasive techniques)

And if the delay costs human lives? perhaps lots of them?

You make it sound like there is no consequence of the delay except time. Alas, time is among the most precious things each of us has, and I personally don't have another 50 to spare.

How is that the animals' problem? But note that I was referring to some discoveries. I just don't believe we're close to making an efficient "use" of the millions of animals subject to experiments every year.

Reading the Silver Spring monkeys case, it sounds like the researchers would have been in a better position legally if there was 24/7 recorded surveillance of the animals' conditions. Of course, this assumes that he was correct and that the PETA member intentionally stopped cleaning the cages when the PI was on vacation to set him up.

You linking that Wikipedia article made me donate some money to PETA straight away. I can't believe you're defending obvious animal cruelty with the heartless argument that it was "justified".

If you read the Wikipedia article, then you would realize that not everyone thinks the situation is as obvious as you do. I tend to agree with David Hubel's opinion referenced in that article.

OTOH, this seems like obvious animal cruelty to me, although you apparently support it: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nathan-j-winograd/peta-kills-p...

Why not require video cameras be installed in factory farms, and have footage independently reviewed? I feel like a lot of this abuse is due to poorly educated workers in a stressful environment and no observation.

For the same reason this law exists. Profits.

Everything else be damned.

I just pasted this quote elsewhere in this thread but I'm going to paste it here again because it's so bold-faced.

  The videos may seem troubling to someone unfamiliar with farming, said
  Kelli Ludlum, the group’s director of Congressional relations, but
  they can be like seeing open-heart surgery for the first time.
  
  “They could be performing a perfect procedure, but you would consider
  it abhorrent that they were cutting a person open,” she said.

Some of the behavior filmed is standard operating procedures, and they don't want that viewed by the otherwise ignorant public.

And yet, in contrast, we have surgeons posting their videos for all to see on YouTube because they are proud of the work that they do and they want people to see what goes on in the OR.

It helps that "victims" of successful surgeries end up playing catch with their kids, and not in a clearance bin in a supermarket.

That's why I think independent reviews are better than public shaming. The untrained eye might not notice a surgeon improperly clean an instrument before surgery, but that may be the most dangerous mistake that they make - one which the trained eye would catch but the untrained would not.

I do, however, think that there is real animal cruelty that is going on. How big a problem it is I don't know, but we are civilized enough that we as a society should be taking steps toward stopping it.

That struck me as well. While, I've never been to a slaughter house, I did spend quite a bit of my youth on my Uncle's dairy farm. So, I would argue that I'm not one of the "ignorant public" when it comes to how large amounts of animals are dealt with in captivity.

I think this attempt to simply redefine abuse is pretty deplorable. Equating it to open heart surgery is simply madness. If we were talking about the actual slaughtering process, then yes, that analogy would have weight. Seeing a cow get killed and then chopped up would be similar on a "shock" level to seeing someone have open heart surgury. But that's now what we're talking about. That's not what these videos show.

A better analogy would be someone breaking your knees in the waiting room, and then forcing you to crawl to the operating room where you'll finally receive your open heart surgery.

The bulk of the farm videos I've seen all involve the terrible treatment of animals in their days to day lives. It's tough to buy "That's just the way it is" when "the way it is" doesn't need to be abusive.

As someone who grew up around farms, this is joke. No, that is not a good comparison by any measure. These videos are depicting cruelty, plain and simple. If that cruelty has become standard operating procedure it does not suddenly become OK, and certainly doesn't equate to a beneficial procedure such as open-heart surgery.

For the same reason we can't require videocameras to be installed in your home to make sure you don't beat your kids. Presumption of innocence, due process, those sorts of things. That's not saying there aren't some severe shortcomings, just answering your question.

Licensing requirements frequently require access to the facility by inspectors. Video access would be a new stretch but if food inspectors aren't a violation of the meat packing plants rights, I'm not sure that video camera's would be deemed to be so.

Of course the legislative trend in this area is quite obviously in the opposite direction, and away from, not towards, tighter regulation of such facilities.

I love these short pieces on stupid legislation in the land of the free.

Makes me so happy I don't live there.

Who in their right mind would even propose such legislation. What kind of immoral, capitalistic people are in charge in the US.

These things have happened elsewhere. In Finland in 2011, a district attorney prosecuted animal farm videographers that had taken video in 2007 and 2009. Most of the claims did not hold in court.

Yes, but if legislation lije this passes in the U.S., these claims will hold in court here.

Yes, I'm sure the Supreme Court will uphold prior restraint laws. The problem is the fear, uncertainty, and doubt as we wait for the case to make it there.

If we jailed the supporters of the bill for knowingly trying to pass unconstitutional law it might even happen less.

But unless we do that they'll just have passed another corrupt law by the time this one gets overturned.

Though they were not prosecuted for just taking video. The claim that did hold was for a felony that roughly translates to breaking and entering. For some other claims (like defamation in case of claiming that farm A does what was filmed at farm X), it was not possible to prove who did what, so it fell apart.

Some indecent farming was exposed, which is good. On the other hand, I understand that people are not entirely comfortable about groups of masked men appearing on their premises at night, premises near which their families live.

"What kind of immoral, capitalistic people are in charge in the US."?

Darwinist capitalistic people. It's the invisible hand of evolution in action.

That's satire, right? You're mocking Friedman, right? Because at this point I honestly can't tell any more in discussions on this topic.

I think you, like many people, are conflating Darwin with Malthus.

Not really, I'm mixing a sci-fi meme with my observations of much of the "fk you elite".

I've had the opportunity to live alongside and work with. Many of them truly believe that their gaming of the system, luck and hard work is either divine or a product of "dog eat dog" evolution-style aka "hussle". I've got shocking stories of outrageous actions, but the long term economic trends/facts are sobering.

I love how people try to blame Capitalism for the problems caused by Statism and Cronyism.

OK, I'll bite. How exactly is the state in fault here? Private businesses and farms in the agriculture and livestock industry cheap out on labor and labor practices on purposes to make extra profit. I am aware of federal and state subsidies for such businesses, but even without such subsidies you will see this kind of skimping on labor costs and facilities that encourage this kind of cruelty.

Businesses pay for legislation, the state, represented by politicians, sell it. Repeat. Two sides, two villains.

With no state to offer anti-terrorism protection to the industry, they'd have to sort their stuff out on the same terms as everyone else.

Its a byproduct of the completed merger of corporation and state. If overall policy is to mix them together inseparably like coffee and creamer, you can't blame people for getting confused about the source of the bitter taste. (edited to add, and if they're perfectly merged, does it matter, after all, attacking one is by definition attacking the other?)

Somewhere long ago before my time society "decided" that the merchant class was above all others. And we have suffered ever since.

> What kind of immoral, capitalistic people are in charge in the US.

People who know where the funding for the next electoral campaign vote comes from. It's a free market: as a voter, you're the product, the corporations are the customers.

You say this as if treating elections and voting as a market should be acceptable.

I don't. I'm just calling a spade a spade. Not to say this is the case with all lawmakers, but corporations have much more influence over politics than they ought to, especially in the US (or so it seems as a European)

Newsflash: it's extraordinarily unlikely that you live in a country with stronger protection of freedom of speech than the US. In fact, if you live in Europe you almost certainly don't.

Any references?

References to what? The fact that Europe has lots of laws restricting free speech?

Europe has almost no laws. We are not like the US.

The EU does enforce a bunch of laws. So does the EEA.

So I would like a good example of a law from a european country that is not the UK or eastern europe.

Try publishing information about a criminal trial, or about an auction of WWII memorabilia, in "almost no laws" places like France or Germany, and let me know how it goes.

Criminal trials, in much of Europe, are protected by privacy of justice laws, until the proceedings are complete. Then, the information is free.

I view that as a good thing, as it prevents mob justice on the media. Let the courts decide, on their own timing, we can analyse the result later; instead of condemning someone in the public view, only to find out later she is an innocent with a forever tarnished reputation.

You didn't address the WWII memorabilia. Also, are you free to say that the holocaust didn't happen?

I am in Europe and, yes, I'm free to deny the holocaust publicly and I'm free to sell WWII memorabilia. Portugal does not suffer from public order problems with neo nazi groups.

It will take probably one more generation for Germany to be able to lift those restrictions. WWII was a big event, and it is emotionally charged still today. I think their approach to limiting free speech is an extraordinary measure to deal with extraordinary circumstances. It is not an easy decision, was heavily discussed among Germans, and is widely accepted by the population. While not ideal, it's acceptable and well managed. And limited in time.

So which country are you talking about then?

30 seconds into Wikipedia:

> So I would like a good example of a law from a european country

Germany "Insulting of Faiths, Religious Societies and Organizations Dedicated to a Philosophy of Life if they could disturb public peace (Section 166)."

On topic, Switzerland tried to censor essentially the same thing (livestock farming practices) and was sued for it. They lost.

As despicable as it may be, you will be jailed in Germany for espousing anti-Semitic views or denying the Holocaust etc, and in Britain you can be jailed for "hate speech" e.g. making racist statements. Personally I think it is insane that you can literally be jailed over speech, regardless of how unsavory it is. Canada has the hate-speech law as well.

If you live in a free county, say fuck on TV. If not don't lecture others about free speech.

You can do this in most parts of the Western world. Make your own TV station and say "fuck". Nobody will stop you.

Freedom isn't the right to inject arbitrary programming into someone else's commercial enterprise.

In most countries you can say what you like if no one can listen to it (imagine a desert or the largeness of the taiga). If the commercial enterprise is the only way that people can hear you, and those oligopolies censor you with a peep or take down your website for commercial reasons, it doesn't matter your government is strong on freedom of speech.

We have plenty of channels using the word "fuck" on tv at any given moment. In fact, it's highly likely that you regularly watch a few of those shows.

Actually no. I prefer shows from the UK.

After the watershed in the UK, strong language[1] may be used on telly.

[1, contains actual strong language]http://www.bbc.co.uk/editorialguidelines/page/guidance-langu...

You don't watch a single US-produced television program. I believe this.

My point was not that I do not watch US produced TV shows (though I only watch TV on Sunday) but that it is not highly likely that I watch some of the shows with "fuck" in them, because I mostly watch UK shows which makes it highly unlikely that I watch one of those.

Your sarcasm indicates that you think this is somehow a preposterous concept. Despite being American, I have not watched a single American TV show in more than a month, and that instance was a single episode at a party gathered to share food and watch it (I was there for the people, not the show).

Granted, I watch very little TV, but what I do watch is from the UK.

If you live in a free country, go up to someone and call them a hateful racial epithet and suffer as your only punishment the dirty looks of others.

That's nice and all. But it didn't help in this case, didn't it?

"What kind of immoral, capitalistic people are in charge in the US?"

The Lesters of course. http://www.ted.com/talks/lawrence_lessig_we_the_people_and_t...

Yes. I saw that one just yesterday :D He makes great points, but his presentation makes me feel like I've walked into an appliance store and the salesman is trying to convince me to buy the most expensive fridge in the shop.

Funny. That TED Talk is sponsored by Goldman Sachs.

> Who in their right mind would even propose such legislation.

The Swiss. They lost.

Who's this - the ghost of Hugo Chavez gracing us with his presence?

What kind of immoral, capitalistic people are in charge in the US

The kind of people that don't throw you in jail if you just deny something in public, like in Germany, France, Canada.

Canada jailing people for 'just denying something'? Do tell.

He's probably referring to the Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel. If I recall he spent quite a bit of time in jail in Canada for publishing his stuff, although I'm not sure his convictions stuck on appeal.

After Zundel was finally deported to Germany (he was never a Canadian citizen), the Germans locked him up pretty promptly.

There are 300m people in the US and any one of them can propose a law.

In this case: "But a dozen or so state legislatures have had a different reaction: They proposed or enacted bills that would make it illegal to covertly videotape livestock farms..."

Ridiculous. Are you implying I have the same legislative power as the agriculture lobbies?

I'm saying you don't need a lobby when you have millions of farmers who identify politically and culturally with big agriculture and part time state legislators who are often farmers themselves.

My wife grew up in Iowa farm country. You don't need a lobby to convince these people that animal rights activists are terrorists.

Oh I see. When someone threatens your wallet it's now socially acceptable to cry "terrorist".

You're a perfect example of what the OP was talking about. Justifying every abomination.

I'm not justifying anything. I'm explaining. People in farm country: 1) constantly feel threatened due to the fickle nature of farming and thus are culturally very tight (even to the point of embracing agribusiness as "one of them"; 2) are insular and fairly culturally homogenous (my wife went to a high school with a graduating class of 60 people); 3) have a very different relationship with animals than people on the coasts.

Animal rights activism is so outside the mainstream of their experience, that it doesn't take a huge lobby to convince them that these video tapers are one step away from blowing up farms. More broadly, they perceive the movement, like movements to control farm pollution, in terms of their own experience. Not as a cool cost-benefit calculation, but an existential threat to their way of life.

That is not to say that they support animal cruelty per se. They react badly to what they perceive to be external threats. They rally around their own. They are really no different than any other group of people in this regard (see, e.g., how Hacker Newsers rally around their own any time people propose regulating tech companies; note the complete lack of moral outrage at Intel, AMD, Hewlett-Packard, etc, in the recent article about how these companies poisoned Palo Alto).

Why is almost everything you say misleading?

As a US citizen, this scares the crap out of me. If the government is actively and publicly preventing people from exposing rampant crime, it speaks volumes. At least if they were trying to be covert or slick about it, it implies they know what they are doing is wrong.

They just rammed a bill through congress to make Monsato above the law. They have drones scouring the globe for vans filled with people they can drop bombs on if they think they may associate with "bad" people. If you talk about it you're a conspiracy theorist. Which means you go onto a list. Gotta watch what you're doing now. They try to disarm the public in the name of safety while arming themselves to the teeth and solving every problem they have with the threat of violence.

Think this is crazy talk? Well that's my point. It's become crazy to even mention some things. Frankly, the stuff is getting outright creepy and they better be careful because they are playing with fire.

I find this bit to be on the 'oh-please' side of crazy:

>They try to disarm the public in the name of safety while arming themselves to the teeth and solving every problem they have with the threat of violence.

because I have a friend who used this basic argument to say gun control increases the likelihood of a nuclear strike on DC by North Korea.

People with big guns always say they are trying to make peace. Doesn't mean that trying to make peace is a bad thing.

And by "disarm" I presume in the terms of rights/finances/influence....rather than literally in terms of guns.

Well is it not the truth? The US has the world's most heavily armed police forces. Their military makes others look quaint. They have military actions going on today right now all over the world. They always need more $ to continue the violence. Yet they claim that violence is wrong. It's really no wonder we're like a bunch of crazy people.

The simple fact is uncle sam solves every problem with violence so I'm not surprised when it's citizens act the same way.

In the overall argument, I find a distinction between citizen and government. I disagree with the Supreme Court's interpretation of the second amendment, so that gives a basis of where I come from when equating ownership of firearms for personal protection to a standing military.

However, I can't stop my eye's from rolling at someone telling me that if everyone had guns, there would be no nuclear threat from any person/group/country. I honestly don't understand how one can connect to the other.

One minor correction to an otherwise pretty good post:

Its more like if you talk about how a list exists, that makes you a conspiracy theorist, which means you go onto a list.

I am totally for people being able to expose farm cruelty if the goal is an open debate to enact political change. I wonder, however, if sometimes people use their free speech rights to terrorize potential supporters and advocates, folks who are unfamiliar with reality and context, in order to raise money through FUD. That doesn't mean I don't support their right to free speech. Just means that the speaking part and the recording part need to be considered separately.

I added that caveat because what we're going to see is all sorts of people with all kinds of interests taping things, especially with drone technology and ubiquitous surveillance. This isn't somebody writing a play, novel, or an editorial. It's somebody taking something that you thought was private and displaying it for the world to see, inside their own editorial frame. It's something we should think about carefully. While I am completely in support of MLK's right to make the speech "I have a dream", I'm not so sure I'd be in favor of somebody secretly taping him with a drone while he was creating it. And then creating their own political content around that tape.

Case in point: here's an article I was going to research and rewrite last week but didn't have time. In Australia, animal activists are planning on using drones to tape farmers looking for cruelty.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/04/02/animal_liberation_au...

Would you want anybody with a political cause access to your property whenever they wanted to make recordings to support their political point?

There's a creepy trend going on in the world and it's always been around, but it's gaining steam - the restriction of information. Make it illegal to talk about or simply ignore it becomes the standard. "These aren't the droids you're looking for" as they speak to the world.

I disagree. I think we are trending in the opposite direction, and these kinds of bills are the "bad guys" fighting back against that progress. The Internet and computing generally have really opened the flood gates on freedom of information. We have to fight to keep making progress, but I honestly believe we're trending forward on this.

It's easy to draw an analogy to another fight dear to me, gay rights in the United States. 40 years ago, there were no anti-gay constitutional amendments. Today we're seeing many states pass anti-gay constitutional amendments. Is that because we're going backwards on gay rights, or because the "bad guys" are fighting progress? I think it's clearly the latter.

Don't get discouraged by losing a battle when you're winning the war :) Keep up the fight.

Can't the people filming the cruelty just re-brand themselves as undercover journalists and get all the protection journalists receive?

You can't just "brand" yourself a journalist. You need a licence and accreditation.

I wasn't aware that was the case, can't anyone be a self proclaimed investigative journalist?

You can write articles, but you don't get all the laws protecting journalists without getting a licence first. And even then, you usually need to be working for a press agency to get all privileges, you don't get all of them by being a freelancer.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Press_pass

The top-level comment is proposing using journalism as a defense against prosecution, not trying to secure press passes to go into the farms and film. A press pass is not a license.

Of the court cases I remember, most used a number of factors to determine whether or not the defendant qualified as a journalist.

It's more a question of whatever journalist-protecting laws should apply to you in a certain situation, not whatever you are a journalist or not. Conducting successful surgery does not make you a doctor, a proper licence does.

I agree with both sentences, but don't see the connection between the two. Are you arguing for how the law currently works, or how you would like it to work?

Currently, there is no such thing as a journalism license in the US.

It is not, he's wrong. Whether someone is, or is not, a journalist has been decided by courts in the past as part of the application of the various journalist shield laws.

Working for a well-known publication and having a journalism degree certainly helps your case, but it is not required.

You can only get to certain places with a press pass, like war zones and such, and it grants you diplomatic immunity and journalist protection from many things that could happen to you :P

You can't just run in yelling "I am a journalist!" and expecting everyone to accept it. Either you are accredited or you are not.

Maybe in Zimbabwe or Saudi Arabia.

Well, in these countries too, what's your point?

Not in the US. There is no such thing as a journalist's license. That's my point. I can issue a press pass to my cubicle and have security escort out people who don't have one. That does not make it a journalist's license.

Stop spreading bizarre misinformation.

Trespassing is a crime no matter how noble your intentions.

I doubt all the people signing on to this even know it's happening.

American Legislative Exchange Council: http://www.alec.org/about-alec/

It might help to contact your representative and let them know about this article and that you associate them to it, and to protecting animal cruelty.

I wonder what would have happened if this kind of legislation was in place for the guy who filmed the Mitt Romney "47%" video.

That recording was illegal: http://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/florida-recording-law

Why did the original posting get deleted? On to the topic, this is just ridiculous, how can anyone vote for such a law?

Yeah, I found the deletion really weird too! Good that it's back though.

You mean this one? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5510201

Because mods = gods I suppose.

Here's a crazy idea, stop eating meat. It's energy inefficient and cruel.

Here's a better idea. Engineer meat from animal stem cells. More energy efficient and less cruel (although maybe less tasty). Plants take less energy but provide less energy to humans (meat is more power efficient). Think of plant and animal like 1.5V batteries vs. 3V batteries.

Well, all the power stored in your beef-battery was charged with plants ... There is some upper limit for the energy efficiency of meat, and it is below that of vegetables.

I think most meat has more calorie per kilogram than plants. If you could grow it without having to feed the plants to the animal it's a win-win, no?

Nope. It would require less farming to feed people than to feed animals and people to eat those animals. Energy loss is an order of magnitude. If you ate the plants instead of eating the animals eating the plants it would be more energy efficient.

Would it take less energy to grow meat (in lab) or grow plant?

I don't know anything about growing meat in the lab, but it doesn't sound very appealing and I've lost any desire to eat meat long ago so I don't really care either way. The theoretical potential to grow meat isn't in any way a convincing argument to make eating meat right this minute either non-cruel or energy efficient however.

There are a lot of ways to raise meat for human consumption with care, mindfulness, and free of cruelty. We often say that the animals we eat have a great day, every day, and then it ends with one very bad instant. True, the modern agricultural system is stacked against the average consumer, but we can't condemn meat eating as a whole. On a well-planned small farm or homestead it's actually quite easy to do.

From original article: but they can be like seeing open-heart surgery for the first time.

“They could be performing a perfect procedure, but you would consider it abhorrent that they were cutting a person open,” she said.

So should we now ban the taping of heart surgery?

Putting the issue of legality of such legislation aside, it kinda surprised me that the farm-owners/workers were not more concerned about the kind of cruelty going on in their property. Do these people not find the videos incredibly unsettling? How can they allow these things under their watch?

I don't think you understand.

Before the filming, the cruelty happened and profits were just fine.

After the filming was shown, profits went down/business was lost.

Clearly the problem they need to fix is to stop filming to help keep profits up and avoid losing business.

Clearer now ?

I have a relative who runs a big company selling meat. He only goes to his office once per week, no need to be there any more often. Almost everything that happens in the company is dealt with by his managers, so only super-critical stuff gets through to him. I can see how a person like that can be unaware that workers in one of his slaughterhouses kick pigs in the face, he's got better things to do than look through security footage all day. And when these things happen they are dealt with by local managers there,not by him personally.

Like there was a case few months back, when one of his drivers was in an accident and killed a few people, and he - as a company owner - wouldn't even know about it if the insurance company hadn't called him directly telling him that they will be paying few million out of his policy, which made him look into it. If that didn't happen, he would not even be aware of that situation.

At least one of the practices mentioned, de-beaking [0], is nowhere near out of the ordinary at factory hatcheries. One of the quoted lobbyists even makes the point that some of the behavior recorded is the norm, not the exception:

  The videos may seem troubling to someone unfamiliar with farming, said
  Kelli Ludlum, the group’s director of Congressional relations, but
  they can be like seeing open-heart surgery for the first time.
  
  “They could be performing a perfect procedure, but you would consider
  it abhorrent that they were cutting a person open,” she said.

While some of the abuses may be unusual, I suspect the truth is that they would prefer no one tape the regular day-to-day goings on at factory farms either.

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debeaking

Regarding debeaking, it IS not removal of the whole beak. It is the technique of rounding off the beak.

We've raised chickens before, starting from chicks/eggs. The chicks will peck at anything, including other chicks. We lost 2 chicks that way, because one had a bloodspot, and we don't know about the other one. Having rounded beaks (and the tools to do that) would have saved us 2 animals.

I also saw on Facebook someone moaning about Cannulized cows and the "evil trauma" it must be. Let alone, it is a great way to monitor the herd (cows) along with providing rapid response to bad plants causing problems, like jimpson weed.

If most people had to go through the process of raise animal; slaughter animal; clean carcass; package meat: Most people would be vegetarians. I've done it, and would do it again if I had to.

You're right, I should have used the word "trimming" since "debeaking" is a bit loaded. I didn't know that it was still necessary or recommended for raising chickens in smaller operations, thanks for enlightening me.

I still think that most consumers of eggs (and meat, and milk) who have never seen a battery cage operation (or factory farm, CAFO, slaughterhouse, etc) would be surprised, if not horrified, and I suspect that this is the real motivation behind these laws and lobbying efforts.

I very much do agree: much of the current factory farm techniques are just plain disgusting.

Many of the big egg-ufacturers calculate space per chick in cm^3. They cannot turn or pretty much move in any direction. General treatment is abhorrent. Feed is not a natural ground-peck but some nutrient paste pellets filled with antibiotics. Sanitation is whatever falls through the cage. What doesn't ends up burning the chickens' feet.

But about my story: We bought 15 chickens. 8 of them were chicks, and 7 were eggs about to hatch. Baby chicks, especially in an incubator, are harsh little evil things. They will all peck at whatever is different. Out of 15, we lost 2, which does seem average for farmers. It's also why you use red lights on chicks too: so they can't see blood.

Mike Rowe learns that the humane method of castrating lambs isn't what he expects. Farming is the [second] oldest profession and they do things that might seem weird or cruel, but are based on generations of experience.

http://www.ted.com/talks/mike_rowe_celebrates_dirty_jobs.htm...

Just because it's based on generations of experience, that does not mean it is not cruel.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_tradition

Absolutely correct, except for confusing expert knowledge with tradition.

Science has been and can be cruel. But a layman watching a youtube clip about farm practices is hardly the person I trust to make a judgement on preferred practices, anymore than a I trust a layman to comment on engineering or medicine.

An expert in farming has a conflict of interest in determining whether using animals for humans is ethical.

Sure, I'd trust a farmer on the most "effective" way to artificially inseminate a cow, but I don't need to study farming to say the instrument known as the "rape rack" is immoral.

I argue they're standing too close to see the big picture.

Desensitization would be my hypothesis.

Can we, as a hacker community, do something about this kind of abuse - irregardless whether taping animal cruelty becomes illegal or not?

My idea would be to set up some kind of wiki leaks for those videos, where animal rights militants would be able to anonymously post their videos.

They should pass a law requiring 24 hr cameras in all animal facilities broadcasting to the web. People who care could monitor the feeds.

If no cruelty takes place and those who care about animals not being mistreated cover the costs, it is win win.

"But a dozen or so state legislatures have had a different reaction"

May we know them by names? "state legislatures" is a body, not a actual person. I want to know the names so next time they knock at my door asking for a vote, I know what to say.

These companies can already include non-disclosure, non-disparagement and non-circumvention provisions in their employment agreements. If an employee/undercover investigator violates those contractual terms not only could they be individually liable for damages but the organizations (news or animal rights organizations) sponsoring the undercover investigation could also be liable.

Further, they can contractually prohibit employees from video recording at their place of employment - there is no need for these companies to be lobbying for criminal sanctions for this behavior.

Even in the most extreme of cases, I don't see how claiming that A.L.F. even is a 'terrorist' organisation. Sure they 'liberate' the animals from their owners, but you don't call a burglar a terrorist. Seems these days like "breaking the law in the furtherance of a political cause" is the new definition of terrorism (rather than using violence to sow the seeds to terror), and we're creating more laws to make more terrorists. Gotta fuel the War on Terror somehow I guess...

Its worse because it trivialises actual terrorists and the people that gave their lives to protect us from them.

ALF is an umbrella term. There was an ALF press office, which would release information and propaganda. But anyone was free to perform an action and claim it for the ALF. Calling an organisation like that terrorist is problematic. But, still ...

There was a campaign against department stores selling fur in the 80s / 90s. The claimed intent was to cause massive water damage from sprinkler systems. People would place incendiary devices into the pockets of clothes (one reason pockets are now stitched closed) and these devices would go off at night. Unfortunately sprinkler systems didn't go off, and stores burnt down. 'Out of hours' does not mean 'empty'; the lives of cleaners, for example, were risked by this campaign.

There have been other arson campaigns against abattoirs, meat packing / distribution plants, dairies, etc.

Animal rights activists have dug up corpses.

There has been an extensive campaign of harassment against anyone linked to Huntingdon Life Sciences; this includes anyone providing any form of service to HLS. People think in terms of 'legitimate targets'. A company is a legitimate target. Anyone working for that company is a legitimate target. The children of, for example, a secretary working for that company are not legitimate targets.

Early members of ALF got advice from IRA.

Breaking the law to further a political cause is, perhaps, fine. But some of the extremes done in the name of animal rights are clearly terrorist offences.

Maybe so, but the government likes to label all animal rights activists as terrorists. Even groups like ADL whose expressed mandate is to promote animal rights via legal means.

My point wasn't that all animal rights activists are angels, but moreso that there is a bias against them from government/law enforcement. Some anti-abortion activists have bombed abortion clinics, but you don't see the anti-abortion movement labelled as a bunch of terrorists.

That's hardly all the ALF does. Here's a partial list:

http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/intelligence-report/br...

And, despite what you say down-thread, the FBI also considers abortion clinic violence to be acts of domestic terrorism. For example, scan this list from the FBI:

http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/terrorism-200...

From the same document:

  Terrorism is defined in the Code of Federal Regulations as 
  “the unlawful use of force and violence against persons or 
  property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian 
  population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political 
  or social objectives” (28 C.F.R. Section 0.85).

So, by that standard, firebombing feed trucks would be terrorism. Secret filming would not.

  | the FBI also considers abortion clinic
  | violence to be acts of domestic terrorism

I was referring to the feeling I get from (generic) law enforcement in the US that "1 animal rights 'terrorism incident' == all animal rights people are terrorists," but "1 abortion clinic bombed == just an isolated incident." I think it stems from the idea that AR activists are "a bunch of dirty hippies" or anarchists, whereas anti-abortion protesters are just fine, upstanding Christians.

Of course, none of this will be in official documents, much in the same way that DWB[1] is not an actual offence, or official department policy.

[1] Driving While Black

Ah, ALEC is behind it. Color me not shocked. Here's some background:

* http://swampland.time.com/2012/04/09/alec-what-it-does-and-w...

* http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-04-13/why-are-mcdo...

If you'd like to take action against Ag-Gag, I suggest signing the petition at http://www.ag-gag.org/. You might also want to consider subscribing to the FarmForward mailing list and/or making a donation - http://www.farmforward.com

Isn't this in direct conflict with whistleblower laws? I mean, it should never be illegal to report on illegal activity.

However, if PETA feels that a perfectly legal and well-maintained slaughterhouse should be taped and the 'horrors' shown, that's a different story. Just because they feel 'meat is murder' doesn't mean that it is.

I think that's probably at least the intention of the legislation. When PETA films some normal farm procedure, they'll add ominous music, show only the most horrid parts of whatever is happening, desaturate the pictures and tar the entire industry with being gruesome.

Under 1st Amendment rights, they're allowed to do this. They're not showing anything that didn't happen so it isn't libelous.

Personally I think the first amendment is out of date. The appeal to it's authority is a prime example of the Historians Fallacy[1]. In many other countries there are restrictions on speech -- and that is seen as a generally good thing. Eg. hate speech, and holocaust denial. Defamation cases are also able to hide behind the first amendment in the USA, where they cannot elsewhere.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historian%27s_fallacy

At this point in the US, censorship laws like this usually get defeated. Fourth Amendment/privacy/etc. are the areas where I'm more worried about civil liberties.

That said, the reason they get defeated is, in large part, because of the outcry when they're attempted. I don't want to minimize the need to keep fighting for freedom.

For anyone fammilar with the US legal system, would you need to be tried for breaking this law before you can challenge it in court (where you would be on the hook for criminal penalties), or can you proactivly challenge such laws without breaking them?

Depends!

In some cases, you can make the claim that a certain law is so broad and clearly unconstitutional that it affects everyone and should be struck down. The courts may accept such a case or they may say, "no, doesn't look like that to us, wait until you have someone prosecuted under this law and then come back and argue about the specific case".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facial_challenge

Burying your head in the sand was always an excellent survival strategy.

Sure, it's a silly law, sure, it probably won't survive constitutional review, and most definitely, true cruelty to animals is a crime.

But this is also a rather predictable backlash against groups who aren't looking to correct occasional violations of regulations in the meatpacking industry, but shut down the industry as a whole - devastating local communities by getting rid of a ton of low-skilled jobs. Since we're not exactly making more low-skilled jobs these days, many of the people affected will be impoverished for life, taking their towns with them.

Given that, it's not at all surprising that employees, employers, and local politicians are responding very aggressively. Any industry under the same threat would respond the same way.

> devastating local communities by getting rid of a ton of low-skilled jobs

Why would those communities be devastated? People still have to eat, hence low-skilled jobs would still be required to produce other kinds of food in the same local communities.

Meatpacking remains labor intensive in a way that other forms of large-scale farming are not.

Even if there was labor parity, they're not usually done in the same places. Meatpacking is usually done near transportation hubs, and ranching is usually on land that's not suitable for agricultural purposes.

>but shut down the industry as a whole - devastating local communities by getting rid of a ton of low-skilled jobs.

The same arguments were thrown around when we were talking about abolishing slavery. The economy will adapt.

Oh, perhaps it will. But I'm not arguing about the ability of the economy as a whole to adapt.

I'm arguing that the extreme-sounding response of the meatpacking industry, which everyone in the thread is flipping out about, should be completely expected given the motives of those doing the filming, and their attitudes towards the meatpacking industry - they don't want to reform it, they want to shut it down. While economies can adapt, people and industries get left behind. Whatever you feel about meat, this is just a simple attempt on the part of an industry and its participants to defend their livelihoods, and should be understood accordingly - it's a perfectly rational act.

This is so gobsmacking obvious I'm amused by the downvotes. Half the country fought a civil war in defense of slavery. Are people seriously surprised meatpackers want to criminalize a little filming in defense of their own industry?

Unwittingly in this attempt to legislate, they might have found the best way possible to raise moral justification to do farm tapes in the first place.

Is there a farm cruelty map? One where locations can be tagged with media, info about the farm and the farm product buyers? There should be...

and now, for something different

With the avian flu problem rising again, Maybe to keep these young activists out of the farms and safe of touching avian decays is not as bad idea as it could seem

There are some risks associated to each working place, and is not very sage that any not autorized people can mess with the human food chain

This is disgusting. Apparently taping animal cruelty in order to influence economic behavior is now terrorism.

This reminds me of how much of the press sat on the wiretapping scandals of 2004 because "it might be political" (meaning it might affect the election, since Bush was directly responsible). As long as the information is truthful, that's the press's fucking job!

Ignorance is Strength, Freedom is Slavery, and Truth is Terrorism.

I don't think anyone here has been to a farm.

Wrong

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