Earthlings

On a free evening, I decided to do something different and went to watch this real life documentary on Earthlings. I had absolutely no idea what it was about, except what the name suggested. Something related to the environment. And that it had taken 5 years in the making, most of it done with hidden cameras. Why would you need hidden cameras to make a movie on the environment? Maybe it talks about shady government policies or something like that. To be honest I could have done some research, but hell, I just wanted to enjoy a free evening and so I went. I could have never anticipated what I was about to witness for the next 2 hours.

The movie started with how we, all living beings who inhabit the Earth, are all equal. And how one species, the humans, are exploiting all the other species, in the name of food, clothing, entertainment and research. And I understood why the entire movie was shot with hidden cameras and why it took 5 years to make.

Here are some of the things I saw..It is even harder for me to recollect and be descriptive than it was to watch, yet I share these with you, not to spoil your dinner, but to make you aware of what you are being a part of ...what we are being a part of. What is written further is only a part of that movie, only that which I remember. It is easy to stop and not read any further, as it would have been for me to walk out...but I chose not to live in denial and ignorance, and false hope that the animal I am eating, or the fur/leather I am wearing did not cause pain to make. Do you have the courage to face the truth? It is up to you to choose.

Beef: cows are inhumanly stacked on top of one another while transporting from one place, half of them suffocate to death on their way to slaughter houses. Those who survive, go through branding with burning torches and de-horning without anesthetics, the animals left to writhe in pain until the blood spurting out stops on its own. the cows are tied with their feet and dangled upside down and fed into the slaughtering machines.Those machines rotate them, their heads dangling outside, when their throats are slit. The animals, still alive, and writhing in agony, are dragged outside the machines, their guts hanging out, and are then dangled directly with iron hooks stuck into their bodies! Still alive, their blood is collected for various sauces n tonics.

Milk: Milking cows are fed and milked incessantly. With no exercise, they are tied to their stands all day long. While usually a cow loves as long as 20 years, milking cows live for only 4 years, thanks to the endless over exertion. And once they can no longer produce milk, they are tied with their feet and dragged alive to the slaughter houses where they go through the torture aforementioned.

Pork: Amongst all forms of meet, pork has the maximum consumption in the world, followed by beef and poultry. For every hamburger that we eat, here's just a sample of what the pig has to go through....sows are kept constantly pregnant through artificial insemination. Cluttered in thousands under one facility, the only life they know is to eat and give birth. In order to stack more live pigs in one facility, and "better utilize" space & "prevent cannibalism", baby pigs, soon after birth, have their ears chopped and tails cut without anesthetics before or bandages after wards. Just like the cows, the baby pigs are left to shriek, cry and writhe in agonizing pain till the bleeding stops on its own. For the male babies, this isn't the end, they are castrated to "prevent" natural breeding, along with having their tails and ears chopped. All pigs go through branding, either by burning torches or electric casts. The slaughtering of pigs takes many forms..from electrocuting, drowning live pigs into boiling water & throat slitting with blunt knives, to actually thrashing the live animals on the floor and stomping repeatedly on their heads and necks.

Poultry: Facing a similar fate to baby pigs, the chickens are de-beaked soon after their birth with hot cutters. The cutter temperatures and speeds are not always controlled, resulting in severe injuries to the hens.Dangled upside down with hooks, they move on a belt and get their throats slit. As mechanically as it sounds in this line. the hens, which are still alive with their guts hanging out are picked up one by one and dumped into [some sort of] containers where they slowly bleed to death. Stomping on the hens is another "technique".

Fur: wild animals of all kinds are caged into tiny cages, where they, completely unused to being caged and unable to even move more than 1-2 steps, usually go mad. The killing of these animals is usually carried out by the cheapest means, read throat slitting by blunt knives and actually digging hooks into their heads from above. Some of these animals, once their skins have been taken off for fur, are actually fed to the others for food.

Leather: Most of the leather in the world comes from Indian cows. Since cow slaughtering is banned in India, the people in the trade torture them to death. The cows first are horse shoe-d in the crudest, most brutal manner and then forced in and out of trucks without ramps. Most cows end up with broken pelvic bones, ribs, knees and legs because of this. The cows are then dragged, forced to walk, without food and water for days at end, until they collapse and either die or are so close to the brink of death that their slaughtering can be justified. The slaughtering then is equally brutal and ruthless, as the techniques mentioned above.

Seafood: All human waste and sewerage goes into the oceans. The sea life are forced to consume that waste for we humans have polluted their environment. And then we eat that same sea life. Our endless dumping of oil and nuclear waste into the oceans has given rise to many mutants of bacteria and viruses which infect the fishes we eat. Dolphins, a Japanese delicacy, are killed through elaborate plots. Their sonar systems are meddled with by sounding pipes under the water. Once confused they are trapped and dug with long arrows and saws. Since dolphins don't leave injured family members behind, the injured member is used as a bait to lure the entire family, which then meets a similar fate. then these bleeding, writhing dolphins are thrashed on the floor and left to bleed and die. the blood flows unhindered and untreated into the sea and suffocates the natural sea life in the area.

Environment: I used to think that if we raise extra cattle and then kill it, we are not really disturbing the net ecological balance. But extra livestock means extra space, and extra food. The agricultural land goes into raising livestock. the thus reduced land is treated with loads of pesticides and such to increase its productivity. The extra livestock is then fed with further treated high vitamin rich grain to increase their body fat. Grain goes in and waste comes out. all this extra waste is then dumped into the seas, to this day largely untreated, where the natural sea life is forced to consume it.

Us: All the animal only diseases, like the mad cow disease, have been unleashed on humans thanks to all the meat consumption.

By the time the movie was over, most men were looking away and most women were crying. Many were throwing up. I, having forced myself to sit through and watch, rushed out in the fresh air to breathe. And then I realized the fish in our waters, along with millions of other life forms, no longer have this luxury of breathing easily. thanks to the waste we have dumped on them.

Thanks to my parents, I was a vegetarian for most of my life. In the recent years, in the rebellious exploratory moods, had I started venturing otherwise. This movie however, the stark reality of the inhuman brutalities that are conducted on every single animal we eat have made it impossible for me to so much as touch meet again.

Animals can also eat, breathe, love and feel. They have families, societies and clans. Digging with hooks in the heads, slitting throats and leaving to bleed to death, chopping beaks, ears, tails and genitals off without anesthesia, branding with burning torches, live electrocution, beating, stomping....the list is endless

What we are doing every single day to the world around us is far more brutal than what the Nazis did in their concentration camps.But while that ended decades ago, this torture is still far from over. And for those who say this is all food chain... the other animals in the food chain have to kill. We humans, on the other hand, choose to kill. And in the most brutal possible manner!!

[ the movie details can be found here ]