October 13th, 2016

Dear Next President,

I am writing to you today because we, as a country, have a lot of problems. We all need to start coming together and doing our part to make our world better for everyone and everything that lives here. We need to start treating every living thing equal. We need to give animals rights. Why should we have rights and animals shouldn't? Well, some may argue that animals are dumb or survival of the fittest, but shouldn't all that mean that we should be looking out for them more than ever? What are we doing for the animals that get abused every day?

Abuse isn't the only inhuman thing going on with animals, it's also the mass killing of animals on factory farms. PETA is a well known group that stands up for animal's rights. On PETA’s website it says, “Our factory farms have gotten so out of hand that two out of three farm animals are on factory farms. They’re often given so little space that they can’t even turn around or lie down comfortably. Egg-laying hens are kept in small cages, chickens and pigs are kept in jam-packed sheds, and cows are kept on crowded, filthy feedlots. Antibiotics are used to make animals grow faster and to keep them alive in the unsanitary conditions. Research shows that factory farms’ widespread use of antibiotics can lead to antibiotic-resistant bacteria that threaten human health. Most factory-farmed animals have been genetically manipulated to grow larger or to produce more milk or eggs than they naturally would. Some chickens grow so unnaturally large that their legs cannot support their outsized bodies, and they suffer from starvation or dehydration when they can’t walk to reach food and water.” The way animals are treated in this country is disgusting and cruel.

One big question I have for people that eat meat and have pets that they love is why do you feel like it's okay to kill one and not the other? You walk down the streets of New York City and can find hot dog stands everywhere where they sell dead pigs, but you wouldn't walk down the streets in New York and find cat meat being sold, why is that? Because people find that morally wrong? Well, why? That pig had just as much of a right to live as that cat did. In a story published in the New York Times in August of 2015 it says, “In a country that lavishes love and legal protections on house pets, factory-farmed animals are left out in the cold, exempt from almost all animal-cruelty laws. As a result, they suffer torture and other mistreatment to a degree that is hard to imagine. The only way to make it stop is to ensure that Americans can see for themselves what goes on behind the factory doors.” We as a country need to open our eyes and see the abuse that is going on and put an end to it.

Factory farms are not only bad for animals but they are bad for the environment. Factory farms are the cause of a large amount of air, land, water pollution and deforestation. Factory farms contribute to Deforestation by cutting down large amounts of trees to create the space they need to house the thousands of animals that are subjected to slaughter. The air, land, and water are polluted by the waits from the animals. The animal's fecal matter is put into cesspools that are as big as a football field. This causes the waste from the animal to end up in the air, water, and land. It's not only fecal matter but the blood from the animal also gets mixed in with the water supply. For example on the website dosomething.org it says, “Hog, chicken and cattle waste has polluted 35,000 miles of rivers in 22 states and contaminated groundwater in 17 states. The pollution from animal waste causes respiratory problems, skin infections, nausea, depression, and even death for people who live near factory farms.” It isn't logical that everyone will stop eating meat right away. We as a country have come so far with technology and we should take advantage of that. We no longer have to survive on other living things. We have plenty of other foods to eat that didn't have to be killed and abused first.

We can start to fix the problem in factory farms by educating the people that work there. They should have to take a agricultural and science class before they are allowed to work with these animals. Many of the animal's get hurt after being crammed into the shipping trucks with other animals that they don't know. On their travel to slaughter the are not given food or water. By the time they get to the slaughterhouse they are weak and most are injured. No one at the slaughterhouse knows what to do with a dying or sick animal. It could take days of that animal suffering before is is even slaughtered. Some of the undercover investigations inside slaughterhouses that I have seen are unbearable to watch. If a cow broke its leg or just couldn't walk the workers didn't care. They would use the cow taser on it until it moved along or it died. Heartless people work at these factory farms. These animals are giving their life to you so you can have a meal and this is how they are treated? Like trash? Another idea would be to stop the selling of meat at restaurants, schools, and supermarkets two days out of the week. This would decrease the meat consumption and decrease meat production. Not by much but it would be a start. We could also raise meat prices. It's insane that meat costs less than fruits and vegetables.

Something needs to change with the way animals in this country are treated. People see a dog getting abused and they are so sad for that dog, but then they can turn right around and eat meat. These animals that have nobody to love them and pet them. Animals that are put through an auction ring, sold for five dollars to a kill buyer, crammed on a truck for days without food and water, by then they are most likely sick or hurt, sit in a pen for days, only to be slaughtered. This cruelty needs to stop in factory farms and the only way to stop it is if we take a stand.

Sincerely, Colleen