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'Don't buy duck meat!'
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Like pigs, chickens, or any other farm animal for which animal welfare
organizations claim to protect, ducks also endure the cruelty of
exploitation. The best way for a serious advocate of animal rights to fight
these abuses is to go vegan and educate his or her peers on a vegan way
of living. These animals endure this treatment because we as consumers
ask for them to be processed for our enjoyment.
The Sentinel recently published an article featuring a picture of ducks in a setting so similar to circulated pictures of the horrors of cage free chickens, it almost looks photoshopped.
I don't blame anyone for composing disgust over the physical treatment of an animal, but doing so is not animal rights activism any more than wishing a master would beat his slave less is human rights activism.
'Don't buy duck meat!'
In this case, we have yet another single-campaign protest over the "sad result of today's intensive farming systems." from a writer who "expected high welfare standards from their meat suppliers."
I wonder why, if someone expects high standards of animal welfare, they would purchase the meat or any other product of an animal at all? Outside of a factory farm, ducks will still be raised and kept as property for the sole reason of being killed for their meat and feathers. I fail to see how any kind of life preceding this outcome could turn this into a humane situation (much more an "animal rights" victory as some would proudly claim).
I recently wrote on why we should not promote single campaign issues like the protest over foie gras, the use of gestation crates, or...factory farming ducks for meat. I think the last section of this brief article provides a clue as to why these single campaigns are a dangerous mixed message:
Anyone who has seen the pictures of how these pathetic animals are mistreated knows just how hollow are the supermarkets claims of caring about animal welfare. Don't be fooled and don't buy duck meat.
Let's be clear, this individual is not genuinely concerned about the animal but their sense of conscientiousness when eating his or her body. When we protest purely against factory farming an animal, we simultaneously endorse their being produced without a factory farm--even if we don't say this explicitly.
I'm sure at the heart of this, an article telling people not to buy duck meat (without saying the purhcase of any other animal product is no better) gives someone the comfort of feeling as if they are doing something positive for animals. Don't be fooled, don't buy duck meat, don't buy any meat, don't be fooled into using animals for any reason. If you're genuinely concerned about the welfare of animals, concern yourself with their right not to be an object whose value is determined by its utility to you. Go vegan.
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