It was an AOL first. Nestled between Gosselin estrangement and Michael Jackson burial news on its homepage was the headline Are Your Eggs Unethical?
"Hatchery Horrors," an undercover video <www.mercyforanimals.org/hatchery> showing male chicks ground up alive at an Iowa hatchery, went viral last week, scoring 1.5 million YouTube viewers, two AP stories and mentions on Fox news, MSNBC, National Public Radio and in Time magazine.
This was not like run-of-the-mill abuse videos where management blames a few Bad Apples and vows to investigate while insinuating the acts were staged or instigated, law enforcement sits on its hands, distributors plead ignorance, the public boycotts the brand for 4 hours and an assistant night shift supervisor gets a 3 month suspended sentence.
No, here the bad apple is the system of egg production itself which is predicated on the death at birth of half the chickens involved--the males.
Ever since two breeds of chickens began to be cultivated in the 1950's--one for eggs and one for meat--the meatless "egg" male is an unwanted byproduct to the industry.
Mitch Head, spokesman for the US trade group United Egg Producers, confirms the daily "grind" of newly hatched males which the video depicts to the Associated Press, saying, "If someone has a need for 200 million male chicks, we're happy to provide them to anyone who wants them. But we can find no market, no need."
Of course consumers are used to health warnings about artificial sweeteners, peanuts, allergens and bits of fruit pit or nut choking hazards in their foods. Used to ignoring them.
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