Peapod the Pig

15 Oct '06

Posted by: ryan in: Miscellaneous

Last week’s open house at Poplar Spring was the most successful one yet in terms of attendees and money raised. Congrats to Terry, Dave, and crew for another excellent event.

Below is a video that my sister shot of a new arrival at the farm. His name is Peapod and he came all the way from New Hampshire. This poor little guy was used in one of those stupid greased pig contests where they let a baby pig loose and let a bunch of kids run after him. The winner gets to keep the pig. The “winner” (note the quotes) in this particular contest took the pig to the parking lot where his friends joined him in beating the big and throwing rocks at him. Fortunately, a security guard saw this and got the pig to the SPCA where he then found his way to Poplar Spring. He’s such a cute little guy, as you’ll see here, playing with his Piglet doll, a favorite toy of all new porcine arrivals at the farm.

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7 Responses

kitchenmage
16|Oct|2006 1

Losers like those “winners” give omnivores a bad name! I spent a few hours sitting an anti-LNG booth at the local county fair last month, right next to the livestok arena. Just in time for the greased pig thing. God, what an awful thing that is. Then I went home and ate homemade sausage from a pig that had a good life at a loving home before being (gently as such things go) slaughtered and made into food forresidents of our valley. Too bad that the ‘f*ck with the critters” crowd is out there making the rest of us look bad.
Ryan
17|Oct|2006 2

“Gently slaughtered”? C’mon, now, kitchenmage.
kitchenmage
17|Oct|2006 3

Well…I did qualify it. *grin*

I have to say that I can hear the folks down at that area of my valley when they yell and I did not hear the pig squeal. (no better?)

I talked to the guy who made the sausage and he said he was surprised at how quick and *seemingly* non-traumatic it was for the pig. Sure, the pig ended up dead, but we ALL end up dead, and there wasn’t much suffering along the way, which is more than you an say for a lot of people’s death.

(btw, thanks for your site… it’s one of the few vegan sites where I feel like I can be an omnivore without being seen as evil incarnate…and since even omnivores eat more flora than fauna there’s a lot of valuable info to share…)
Ryan
17|Oct|2006 4

“Sure, the pig ended up dead, but we ALL end up dead, and there wasn’t much suffering along the way, which is more than you an say for a lot of people’s death.”

That said, it’s death for taste’s sake. There’s no reason the pig had to die and looking at the pig as this “other” that’s there for our use is what’s still problematic for me with the idea of “humane slaughter.” Few people would ever consider slitting their dog’s throat and then eating it. I think you understand where I’m coming from, even if you don’t agree. The baseline for me (and most vegans, I’d say) is not “how we kill animals is wrong” it’s “killing animals is unnecessary.”
karma kitchen
17|Oct|2006 5

I’m with you Ryan, Thank you for your rebuttal, kitchenmage would do better off on a non vegan site posting thoughless comments like that. . .?
Gary
02|Feb|2007 6

If I may chime in three months too late…

I suppose it’s a reflection of how how low we as a society have set the moral bar when we can pat ourselves on the back and boast about our humaneness because we killed a pig who was genetically bred to be obese so humans could have more meat, and who probably had various body parts severed without any pain relief, and who was eliminated as soon as profitable, and who was brought into the world only to be killed for human profit and pleasure, but - here’s the “humane” part - we didn’t on top of all that inflict the many tortures on the pig that have become standard practice in animal agriculture.

So we needlessly destroyed a sentient being with a will to live but good for us for being humane. Yes, being killed only a fraction of the way through your life is bad but being killed as well as being tortured is worse. Agreed. But “humane” is a bit delusional. “Humane” is not making a deal with your conscience to only be cruel in certain ways and not others. “Humane” is not killing basically becuse you can. The minimum for “humane” should be refraining from avoidable cruelty. Rescuing a pig who would have been killed, saving a pig’s life - that, to me, would qualify as “humane.”

Which leads me to Poplar Spring and a much lighter note on which to end: Peapod and I made the paper! Deb of Invisible Voices took a picture of me and Peapod and I sent it and a brief story about the precocious porcine to the Falls Church News-Press “Critter Corner” feature, which is usually cats and dogs, and they printed it. A couple weeks later, Deb and I and some friends were at Poplar Spring, and apparently just as we were leaving, two people arrived for a tour. They learned about the sanctuary from the Critter Corner feaure!

And yes, what a cutie!
cannibal vegetarian
14|Oct|2007 7

“a pig who was genetically bred to be obese so humans could have more meat, and who probably had various body parts severed without any pain relief, and who was eliminated as soon as profitable”

Just curious, where you got that from? (assuming you’re talking about kitchenmage’s post - or are you referring
to some other pig?)