Peter Singer and Jim Mason, "Meat and Milk Factories "

Questions for Making Connections within the Reading:

1. In “Meat and Milk Factories,” Singer and Mason assume that their readers will know what is meant by an “intensive” industry. The beef, chicken, and pork industries are all described as “intensive.” What does this term mean? Are each of these industries intensive in the same way?

2. Singer and Mason write that, “The real ethical issue about factory farming’s treatment of animals isn’t whether the producers are good or bad guys, but that the system seems to recognize animal suffering only when it interferes with profitability.” What would an ethical system look like? How would it differ from the one in place now? Is the Australian farming system that Singer and Mason describe ethical? Is it not concerned with profitability ultimately?

3.  Throughout their piece, Singer and Mason describe farm animals as experiencing maladies that overlap with human experience: the animals experience “clinical depression,” “psychological stress,” and “the stress of boredom.” What evidence do they provide to justify these descriptions? Is there a scientific basis for such descriptions or are Singer and Mason being metaphorical? Is the effect of their descriptions the result of the evidence they provide or of the stories they tell?

Questions for Writing:  

1.  Towards the middle of their piece, Singer and Mason pose the following parenthetical question: “Is it part of the gulf we draw between ourselves and other animals that leads farmers to talk of animals as ‘farrowing’ rather than ‘giving birth,’ ‘feeding’ rather than ‘eating,’ and ‘gestating’ rather than ‘being pregnant’?” What is the answer to this question? If the farmers Singer and Mason describe used a different set of words, would farming practices change? Would the eating habits of American consumers change if the “gulf we draw between ourselves and other animals” were closed?

2.  After their visit to “Wayne Bradley’s” farm, Singer and Mason share their write up of the experience with him and, seeing his words in print, he asks to have his name and location changed. Singer and Mason comply and close their discussion of pork farming by juxtaposing their assessment of the Bradley farm with the Bradleys’ self-assessment. What are we to make of the fact that the assessments are diametrically opposed? What would Singer and Mason have the Bradleys do? Can individuals change the system Singer and Mason have described?

Questions for Making Connections Between Readings:  

1.  In “Another Look Back, and a Look Ahead,” Edward Tenner describes what he terms “the revenge effects” of technology and the unitended consequences that follow from these acts of “revenge.” Do you think that Tenner would be likely to share Singer and Mason’s concerns about the factory farm? What “revenge effects” might Tenner expect to see follow from intensive farming? On balance, do the benefits of the factory farm outweigh the dangers and the ethical dilemmas posed by the way animals are treated on these farms? Is there an objective way to assess the ethical benefits and costs of this system?

2.  Singer and Mason conclude their discussion of the factory farm with gruesome descriptions of the slaughtering process. The last thought they leave their readers with is this: “it is probably that anyone who eats meat will, unknowingly, from time to time be eating meat that comes for an animal who died an agonizing death.” For Singer and Mason, it is clear that this matters to them, but can they make it matter to all the others whose eating habits fuel the factory farming industries? In “An Army of One: Me,” Jean Twenge asserts that “Narcissism is one of the few personality traits that psychologists agree is almost completely negative.” Does narcissism play a role in eating habits? Is it fair to say that eating meat evidences a “lack of empathy” or is there an ethical way to be a carnivore?