Video gets to heart of animal cruelty

Chicken dinner took on a whole new meaning for some Penn students earlier this week.

Penn Students for Animal Rights invited Josh Balk, outreach coordinator of the nonprofit organization Compassion Over Killing, to lead a discussion and show a video on animal cruelty on Tuesday at the Rotunda, an arts venue on Walnut Street.

"The sound of chickens clucking as they are bleeding to death is hopefully a haunting sound that will reverberate over and over again," Balk said.

Balk began the discussion by examining the rationale for eating meat. Encouraging audience participation, Balk asked a group of mostly Penn students to bring up the reasons that humans slaughter animals. He framed the decision as an ethical one, questioning the religious viewpoints that condone or advocate meat eating.

"It seems to me a loving God would never advocate animal cruelty," Balk said to the approximately 20 people seated in the audience.

Balk dismissed the belief that kosher meat is prepared in a more humane manner.

"I was told a lie in Hebrew school," said Balk, who went on to describe his personal realization that cows raised under the kosher guidelines are kept in conditions similar to other cows.

He also rejected the practice of raising animals "free range," claiming it is "just a marketing ploy to sell more product."

After addressing all of the reasons brought up by the audience members, Balk went on to show a video that he described as one of the most "graphic videos you've ever seen in your life --ever."

The video, entitled Meet Your Meat, showed scenes of slaughterhouses, diseased animals, animals being hit with metal rods and the slaughter of chickens, cows and pigs. Actor Alec Baldwin narrated the video and described the striking details, ending with the message, "Every time we eat, we make a choice."

Balk continued moderating the discussion, emphasizing ways in which the audience could act.

He advocated veganism and education, such as passing out animal rights leaflets to Penn students.

College sophomore and PSTAR member Carmen Rodriguez said he enjoyed the event.

"It was pretty upbeat," she said. "I guess it's depressing stuff, but his presentation was really good and I'm grateful for what we can do to help."

College senior and co-founder of PSTAR Randi Sokol "was very pleased with the event," though she said "there can always be more people at an animal rights event because I feel like people who come are generally already vegetarian or vegan."

"I applaud anyone who is willing to listen," Sokol added.

Ian Ross, the other co-founder of PSTAR and a graduate student in the School of Arts and Sciences, also wished there had been more attendance, recognizing the weather and scheduling conflict with the State of the Union address may have prevented some students from attending.

However, he was pleased with the discussion, stating that the talk helped to shed light on animal issues and that "all animal advocacy by its very nature has to be educational."

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