Sometimes, we don’t ask a question because we don’t want to hear the answer.

Sometimes, we look the other way, lest we see something we’re uncomfortable with.

Sometimes, we say we want the truth but deep down we don’t because when we know the truth, It becomes difficult for us to pretend. Change is not easy. It makes us work harder or let go of some comfort and enjoyment.

When I learned how crustaceans (lobsters and crabs) are cooked – dumped alive in boiling water – I stopped immediately eating them. And when I saw a documentary on how foie gras is produced, I stopped eating foie gras.  Even when I was a student with limited means, I switched to organic free range eggs after I watched a documentary on the horrors of factory farming.

Pork meat has never been part of my diet, other than the occasional slices of bacon. But, when I learnt, just last year, about the cruel practice of suffocating pigs in CO2 (basically in gas chambers) before slaughtering them, I could no longer take even the occasional slice of bacon.

Relying on reports from Compassion in World Farming, pigs suffer “horrible death” with this method, because the “stunning” with gas does not take place instantly, as it should. Actually it could take up to thirty seconds or longer when the pigs were seen to show signs of extreme distress (We will spare you the graphic details…).

I feel grateful to organizations such as Compassion in World Farming and World Animal Protection for promoting humane ways of raising farm animals. If we still want to eat other animals, we should at least give them decent, cruelty free living and humane slaughter.

In 2020, GentleWays encourages you to:

  1. Become more aware of the plentiful alternatives to meat.
  2. Ask your grocer about the sources of their food; choose food produced according to high animal welfare standards.
  3. Say NO to cruelty and unnecessary suffering.