The Humane Society of the United States, the ASPCA, and Compassion in World Farming Promote the Factory-Farming Industry
Update (September 12, 2024): The Humane Society of the United States continues to defend the Global Animal Partnership. See PETA’s point-by-point breakdown of this issue, and read on to find out why The Humane Society’s “broader context” doesn’t mean anything for animals suffering on farms.
Original post:
The U.K. showed it first: It ripped the lid off the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals’ accreditation scheme, which lulls kind consumers into thinking they can eat factory-farmed meat, eggs, and dairy with a clear conscience because these foods are “certified” as “humane”—when in actuality, they’re outright, inarguably, hideously cruel.
As noted in The Guardian: “It might seem odd that an organisation devoted to animals is promoting their exploitation and killing. It seems odder still when you discover that this … includes massive factory farms … in which animals live short, distressing lives before being trucked away to be stunned and slaughtered. … Stand back and marvel at the perversity. It’s as if a children’s welfare charity had published a directory showing where you can hire child labour.”
The same thing is going on in the U.S., and we want you to help stop the rot right now:
The Type of Farms The Humane Society of the United States, the ASPCA, and Compassion in World Farming Endorse
PETA investigators who got jobs at Plainville Farms and Sweet Stem Farm—two Pennsylvania companies that claimed to produce “humane” turkey and “humanely raised pork,” respectively—found systemic cruelty, deprivation, and suffering. What we’ll describe here is just some of the cruelty PETA’s investigators witnessed, and it’s being endorsed by “animal protection” groups here in the U.S.:
- Plainville workers beat up and attacked turkeys for fun, to instill fear, to vent their frustration, or to relieve their boredom.
- A Plainville worker held a turkey by her injured neck, mimicked masturbation, dropped her on the floor, kicked her, and left her to die.
- Sweet Stem staff left pigs with painful rectal prolapses—as large as an orange and dripping with blood—without care for up to 24 days.
- More than 20 pigs were tightly packed into a metal trailer without water on a hot day more than 24 hours before they were hauled to slaughter for Whole Foods.
- A pig ran a fever intermittently for up to a month before finally being shot in the head and killed.
These farms were certified by the Global Animal Partnership, the group behind those misleading signs you see posted in Whole Foods Market stores’ meat departments touting “enriched environment” and “treated humanely,” claims that aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on.
And the betrayal of animals and consumers goes deeper. The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA), and Compassion in World Farming (CIWF) are part of the Global Animal Partnership, and their representatives sit on its board of directors. Then these ”animal protection groups” betray the animals by lying to consumers that these certifications mean that farms can be expected to meet humane welfare standards.
Even after former Plainville Farms workers received criminal convictions on cruelty-to-animals charges following PETA’s investigation, the HSUS, the ASPCA, and CIWF remain affiliated with this sham. Will they stop giving the cruel factory-farming industry cover? That’s where you come in.
Groups Founded to Protect Animals Are Letting Factory Farmers Get Away With Murder
Any animal welfare organization worth its salt would be up in arms that suffering animals’ flesh, eggs, and milk were being falsely marketed to caring consumers as “humane,” yet these groups not only aren’t upset but also approve and endorse the lie.
It’s totally shocking, and it has to stop.
Even after PETA investigations revealed abuse at 12 certified farms—leading to 141 counts of criminal cruelty to animals against a dozen now-former Plainville Farms workers and numerous convictions—representatives of these organizations still sit on the rubber-stamping certification organization’s board of directors and allow their organizations’ names to be used to endorse the factory-farming operations that cause such misery.
The Global Animal Partnership uses that fact—and these groups’ status as its “partners”—to deceive people who care about animals.
It shouldn’t take more video footage of animal abuse and suffering for these organizations to stop promoting these fraudulent assurances of humane treatment. They are betraying millions of animals as well as well-meaning consumers who actually believe that this certification is real and true and good—that it means what it says, when it does nothing of the kind. Your help is needed to put an end to this.
Please Help End the ‘Humane’ Lies
Kind consumers and members of these organizations can take steps to end this cruelty and the “humane” lies—first, by not paying for anything that involves factory farming or slaughter; and second, by making sure these organizations know that you won’t support them until they end their endorsement of any factory farms. Please, shun all animal-derived foods, and remember that “organic” and “free-range” labels mean nothing to animals. They certainly don’t mean a humane life or death. Living vegan is easy and convenient, and we can help you get started.
Please sign our petition telling the HSUS, the ASPCA, and CIWF—in no uncertain terms—to immediately resign from the Global Animal Partnership’s board of directors and end their affiliation with the partnership and all factory farming of animals.
And please get at least five relatives and friends to sign it, too!