Response to "Hunting vs. Factory Farming."

Response #11

In Jenna's blog, she talks about her take on hunting and how it should only be done for the survival of a human being and not for sport. She then talks about the conditions of factory farms and how it may be more humane to kill an animal in the wild than have it suffer its whole life, without seeing the outdoors, up to the point where it is slaughtered for human consumption. She states, "If the hunter that is hunting for sport kills the animal and actually eats it and uses it then he has not wasted." In Native American cultures, all parts of an animal was used in order to make use of the life they took. She asks, "Do you think it is “morally” better to hunt an animal yourself then it would be to buy it from a store, where the animal has been produced from such a place as a factory farm?"

I think taking a life (animal or human) in any way is simply wrong, especially for human consumption. However, I can not change the minds of all meat-eaters to choose not to consume animals so buying meat from local farms or hunting animals instead of supporting big industries is better, in my opinion. My uncle owns a meat business, I guess you would call it, where he raises his own cattle and then kills it to sell locally for food. This way is more environmentally friendly, healthy, and the cows at least get to see daylight and have some what of a life. Now, I am not condoning the killing of animals for food but if I was to choose where to get my meat, I would buy from local farms. That way, I'm supporting local businesses (and my Uncle) and I have a better idea of what I am eating. Hunting, on the other hand, is something I could never do because I am actually taking a life out of the animal's natural habitat and preparing it myself. I do think this would be better than having factory farms because, that way, the conflict of how people should not eat animals if they could not kill it themselves would be solved.

My morals go against killing and eating animals all together, but I see how hunting and buying animal meat from local farms could be more humane, healthy, and morally correct compared to supporting the factory farming industry and what they do to the animals they slaughter and employees who work there. If the lives of animals have to be sacrificed for human's satisfaction, hunting is the better way to go. There is nothing good about factory farming... End of story.

My question to you is: Are factory farms and individually owned local/small farms really any different in their ways of killing animals for consumption, in your opinion? Also, in what ways can factory farming be defended as moral and necessary in our society?