Reporting Factory Farms Abuses to Be Considered Act of Terrorism If New Laws Pass

[FourScore]

Reporting Factory Farms Abuses to Be Considered "Act of Terrorism" If New Laws Pass
By Katherine Paul and Ronnie Cummins, AlterNet
26 January 13


Three states are the latest states to introduce Ag-Gag laws and lawmakers in 10 other states introduced similar bills in 2011-2012.

How do you keep consumers in the dark about the horrors of factory farms? By making it an "act of terrorism" for anyone to investigate animal cruelty, food safety or environmental violations on the corporate-controlled farms that produce the bulk of our meat, eggs and dairy products.

And who better to write the Animal and Ecological Terrorism Act, designed to protect Big Ag and Big Energy, than the lawyers on the Energy, Environment and Agriculture Task Force at the corporate-funded and infamous American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).

New Hampshire, Wyoming and Nebraska are the latest states to introduce Ag-Gag laws aimed at preventing employees, journalists or activists from exposing illegal or unethical practices on factory farms. Lawmakers in 10 other states introduced similar bills in 2011-2012. The laws passed in three of those states: Missouri, Iowa and Utah. But consumer and animal-welfare activists prevented the laws from passing in Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, Nebraska, New York and Tennessee.

In all, six states now have Ag-Gag laws, including North Dakota, Montana and Kansas, all of which passed the laws in 1990-1991, before the term "Ag-Gag" was coined.

Ag-Gag laws passed 20 years ago were focused more on deterring people from destroying property, or from either stealing animals or setting them free. Today's ALEC-inspired bills take direct aim at anyone who tries to expose horrific acts of animal cruelty, dangerous animal-handling practices that might lead to food safety issues, or blatant disregard for environmental laws designed to protect waterways from animal waste runoff. In the past, most of those exposes have resulted from undercover investigations of exactly the type Big Ag wants to make illegal...

MUCH MORE: http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/312-16/15727-reporting-factory-farms-abuses-to-be-considered-qact-of-terrorismq-if-new-laws-pass

[silverweb]

1. Absolute insanity!

[font color="navy" face="Verdana"]As Gandhi said, "The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be measured by the way its animals are treated." These states should be utterly ashamed if they allow these laws to pass.

And for you meat eaters, these laws would mean that you'll never be allowed to know whether your meat came from diseased, filthy conditions or even reasonably sanitary ones -- and these factory farms ship to retail stores all over the country.

[limpyhobbler]

2. “To learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize.” - Voltaire

[dixiegrrrrl]

3. THAT ought to be a sig line in every post.

Clear and simple.

[woo me with science]

9. [phone]

[Zoeisright]

4. ALEC, repukes,

and factory farmers should all be burning in hell.

[Kalidurga]

5. I am so glad I gave up meat...

still working on my pesky addiction to eggs and dairy even if they are just minuscule amounts in my diet.

[Egalitarian Thug]

6. Just change where you buy them. Eggs and dairy in themselves are not cruel.

The methods used within the industries are the problem,

[Kalidurga]

8. All the eggs and dairy in my diet are from commercially made products..

So, yeah they are really bad for me as well as from some place bad. I didn't stop eating meat until just over a year ago. Jan 1, 2012. Wasn't my idea. Three weeks later my daughter says I am quitting the vegan/vegetarian thing. I said that's nice I am not, because of stuff that I had read since starting like about pink slime, yuck, meat paste, wtf, and my concern about hormones and anti bodies, anyway it all just added up to me being disgusted with the way meat is produced and I decided to keep off of eating meat. I gave up cheese mostly I would still sprinkle parmesan on my pasta, but not like before when I would use oh bout a quarter of the container. Anyway, I am cheese free now for about 3 weeks. I will give up mayo when I am out, which is pretty much now I have maybe enough mayo for a sandwich left. I have a bottle of ranch dressing and I will probably cry when that is gone. So, I have to learn to make my own dressings and sauces from scratch because that is where the dairy and eggs in my diet comes from.

[Egalitarian Thug]

10. Do you have Trader Joe's where you live? n/t

[Warren DeMontague]

7. Who says lobbyist dollars don't go as far as they used to?

$$$$W00T!!!$$$$