14 Facts That’ll Turn You Into an Animal Rights Activist

These 14 facts will make you want to be a voice for farmed animals.

1. The meat industry emits more greenhouse gases than all transportation in the world combined.


2. Animals on factory farms can’t even turn around, lie down comfortably, or stretch their limbs because they live in spaces so small.


3. The dairy industry rips calves away from their mothers when the babies are only a day old.


4. Since male chicks do not lay eggs or grow quickly enough to be raised profitably for meat, they are often killed within hours of hatching. Some are ground up alive, while others are gassed or suffocated.


5. The USDA’s Wildlife Services division is responsible for killing any animal that famers deem a threat to their livestock. In 2013, Wildlife Services killed more than 2 million animals, including bears, coyotes, wolves, foxes, and prairie dogs.


6. Animal agriculture uses a whopping 56 percent of water in the United States.


7. A study by the World Health Organization places processed meats like bacon and sausage in the same carcinogenic category as asbestos and cigarettes.


8. Piglets who are too sick or too small are killed by being slammed headfirst onto concrete floors.


9. Animal agriculture is culpable for nearly 91 percent of Amazon destruction, according to the World Bank.


10. The National Journal estimates that 20 percent of fish caught by commercial fisheries is “bycatch,” or unwanted animals. This means animals like sea turtles, seals, small whales, porpoises, dolphins, and sharks are swept up in massive trawling nets and often die.


11. Chickens raised and killed for meat have been bred to grow so quickly they frequently become immobilized under their own weight and endure debilitating pain.


12. Dehorning, tail docking, debeaking, and castration are all mutilations performed daily on factory farms. These cruel acts are carried out without anesthesia. Because of the filthy factory farm conditions, they often result in infection.


13. A Royal Society Open Science study found that farmed fish suffer from severe depression and sometimes “drop out, or float around lifelessly.


14. Not a single federal law protects animals during their lives on factory farms, and the law that protects cows and pigs at the slaughterhouse—the Humane Methods of Slaughter Act—does not extend to birds or rabbits.



Help save about 30 animals each year by switching to a compassionate vegan diet. Click here to order your FREE Vegetarian Starter Guide.

Click here for some actions you can take to fight for farmed animals.