Holtry

Robert Holtry
Professor Celestino
English 1010; 8:30
3/25/16
Argument Essay
The Destructive Nature of Factory Farming
Farming has been a part of the human culture for as long as we have existed. It has
evolved from plowing land and growing crops in order to feed the population, to having large
factories that farm animals and make our food. With the advancement of technology and the
building of factory farms, our health, society and future are at risk. There are many arguments
against factory farming. One of the arguments is that animals raised on the farms are fed
antibiotics and steroids that when humans eat the animals, it can cause serious health problems.
Other studies have shown that factory farms cause a large amount of environmental issues,
including the creation of super bugs, the contamination of our water supply and the high levels of
pollution in the air that will continue to get worse. Many feel the treatment of the animals inside
the factories is unacceptable. A breakdown of the negative effects points to the solution that, as a
society, we need to change the way that we produce our food. Factory farms cause more negative
health and environmental effects than they are worth and changes need to be made.
The main purpose of a factory farm is to produce extremely high amounts of food in a
short amount of time. One of the biggest issues that the farming industry has is finding a way to
help make the animals grow at an accelerated rate to produce more food in a shorter amount of
time. Over time they have tried many different resources to make animals grow at a faster rate.
They finally found that using antibiotics not only helps the animals grow in size but also helps

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with therapy for illness, and it prevents disease inside the animals. This worked very well for a
considerable amount of time until the Center for Disease Control and the American Medical
Association began to study certain infections that transferred from some of the animals to
humans. They found that because of the amount of antibiotics that they were feeding to the
animals; some of the bacteria that were causing infections in humans were becoming immune to
the antibiotics that doctors would use to cure the infections. This cycle overtime has created what
scientists call super bugs. These super bugs deliver a much more potent strain of bacteria that
makes it much harder to get rid of and it lasts much longer. With the more potent strain of any
infection, it takes almost twice as long to fight the infection because we are unable to use the
basic antibiotics that would help cure the infections. At the rate that we continue to feed
antibiotics to animals and how frequently people are getting sick, we will not be able to use
antibiotics at all to help cure even the smallest of infections or diseases. This will leave us with
the need to find alternative means of curing infections. (Ariele Lessing, 464-471)
In 2009 one of the strains of the bacteria caused by feeding the animals antibiotics was
discovered. It was the epidemic that involved the H1N1flu virus, or more commonly known as
the Swine Flu. It was a strain of the flu that had not been encountered before that caused, in
many cases, death. Scientists were not able to find a cure for it very quickly due to its nature of
being immune to antibiotics. This strain of the flu is common among swine that are placed in
extremely close quarters, like those in factory farms. This infection causes mild flu like
symptoms in animals. Normally this would not be a problem but in certain cases this strain can
be easily transferred from the swine to the workers at the factories causing much worse
symptoms in humans. This is what happened as this new strain of flu swept the world and caused
so many problems. This is an example of one of many of the diseases that can so quickly sweep

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across the country as we continue to create new strands of infections that are resistant to the very
things that we, as a population, would use to treat them. (Charles Schmidt, A394-396)
Factory farms are known to house thousands of animals at a time. The animals create a
lot of waste. The amount of waste that is produced and then discharged from the facilities is
incredibly harmful to not only the environment but also our water supply. In an article posted in
the Boston College Environmental Affairs Law Review, Terence Centner states The EPA has
struggled to meaningfully address the pollutants entering surface waters from the land
application of the manure. He then goes on to say, when many large farms are located in a
single region, manure volume may become excessive. Watersheds are being polluted by nitrogen
and phosphorus from the large amounts of animal manure that are applied to fields (6-7).
Through the years EPA or the Environmental Protection Agency, has been trying to set up laws
that will limit the amount of waste that these factories are able to put into the environment.
Though EPA has been fighting for these laws to be put in place, they havent seen much success
in recent years. One of the topics of discussion with these laws is the rise in pollution as the
amount of animals increases to fit the rising population and demand for food. This water
contamination and environmental damage caused by the factories can and will become an even
bigger problem as they continue to grow to fit with the rising population.
Not only do the factory farms contribute a lot of waste into the surface of the planet but
they also contribute to the pollution that is in the air. The USA Today Magazine posted an article
that had some frightening statistics. They stated, The industry accounts for an estimated 18% of
the worlds greenhouse gas emissions, including nine percent of the carbon dioxide, nearly 40%
of the methane (a greenhouse gas 25 times more potent than CO2), and 65% of the nitrous oxide
(300 times more potent than carbon dioxide (1). The numbers of the different pollutants that the

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factories are putting into the air are extremely high. The amount of this pollution can have
serious health effects to humans. Many respiratory conditions like asthma are caused by high
amounts of pollution in the air. As we continue to put more pollutants into the air, more
respiratory health problems will emerge. The high amount of pollution that the factories put into
the air creates an increased danger to the average person, especially those who enjoy outdoor
activities and those that already have respiratory problems.
Aside from the effects that these farms have on our bodies and the environment, the
treatment of the animals inside the farms is inhumane. According to the Merriam Websters
dictionary, the definition of the word inhumane is without compassion for misery or suffering;
cruel. The conditions that these animals live in is the definition of inhumane. The overcrowding
of these factories leaves almost no room for any of the animals to move. Many of the animals are
born and put into cages that do not allow for much growth. They quickly out grow these cages
but are still kept inside them. Mixing the lack of space that the animals have with the antibiotic
filled food they are fed, animals are born, grow and live an extremely dismal life for the small
time they have until they are killed. Often times their death is extremely brutal. In documentaries
showing the cruel practices that go on in these farms, these animals are maimed, de-limbed, and
beaten while still alive. In an article written by Natalie Purcell, she talks about the issue of
industrial live stock treatment. In her article she states, Animal well-being is a concern only
when it intersects with market value, and too often animal welfare and profit are at odds. There is
ample evidence that animals raised for food production in the early 21st century endure more
difficult lives and deaths than domesticated animals have faced in the past.(64). When it comes
down to it, cost overrules the ethical treatment of these animals. The American Society for the
Prevention of Cruelty of Animals stated The majority of U.S. states expressly exempt farm

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animals or certain farming practices, from their anti-cruelty provisions, making it nearly
impossible to provide even meager protections. Brutal treatment and killing of the animals can
easily be avoided in the factories. More humane practices of killing and preparing the meat of the
animals can be found and used.
The Huffington Post put out an article in early 2014 pointing out what some in the food
industry are doing to keep us, as consumers, from realizing all that is really going on at the
factory farms. They state that the food industry does all they can to give consumers false
impressions of the food we are buying at the store. While browsing through the meat section of
your local grocery store you will see many food packages that have pictures of what looks like a
farm out in rural country with a happy looking cow grazing on the grass around it. These
packages give off the impression that the meat that you are buying came from a rural farm with
free roaming animals, when in all reality it came from a factory that most animals have never
even seen the outside of. This tactic is used to give us a false sense of security of where we are
getting our food. It deters us from thinking of what is really going on behind the scenes of
getting our food to the grocery store. If they had pictures of the factories and slaughter houses
that these animals live in, we would be much more likely to question where the food we are
buying is coming from and what exactly is happening in order for us to have our food. (1)
During my research I discovered there are many who advocate for the use of factory
farms. Many consumers say that without them we will not be able to provide the food supply that
we need to sustain our country. The way of farming, before factory farming, took a long time for
animals to grow and mature to the point where they would be able to be used as food. With the
way that factory farms are running they have created a way for a lot of animals to grow and
mature at a much more accelerated rate. This has created a greater food supply for consumers in

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a much shorter amount of time. With the American growth in population and our desire to have
the amounts of food we do, as a country we would not be able to keep up our food supply
without factory farms. Using the old way of farming our country would eventually deplete our
food supply and run out of food all together.
Along with being able to produce more food, there are those that would argue that using
factory farms has a lot less of a demand for land. Traditional farming requires a lot of land to
keep the animals fed and roaming. When land is not used for farming, there is more room for
development of communities and businesses. Factory farms are also able to employ many more
people at a time. It is estimated that throughout the United States factory farms have created
500,000 jobs. To many, the appeal of the amount of jobs that are created is reason enough to keep
these factories going. With the steady need of food, thefactories are able to have a steady
employment rate regardless of the economic status.
As a society Americans have gone from traditional farming with open pastures and lots of
room for the animals to roam, to factories with overcrowding to the point where animals do not
have enough room to live. Most people would never treat an animal the way they are treated in
factory farms, but being silent on the subject is silently condoning it.
The pollution, environmental damage, health effects and animal cruelty inside factory
farms, based on past and current trends, will continue to rise if nothing is done about it. Finding
an alternative to factory farms or finding a more humane and efficient way to run them, will help
not only our own lives but will promote a society that will become more aware of how they are
getting their food. Putting in more effort and efficiency to the old style of naturally raising

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animals is what we need if we are to save ourselves from the issues that we have created from
factory farms.

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Works Cited
Center, Terence J. "Challenging Nodes Permits Granted Without Public
Participation." Boston College Environmental Affairs Law Review 38.1 (2011): 140. Academic Search Premier. Web. 8 Mar. 2016(6-7).
"Factory Farms." ASPCA. Web. 21 Apr. 2016. <http://www.aspca.org/animal-cruelty/factoryfarms>.
Leader, Jessica. "9 Facts About Factory Farming That Will Break Your Heart (GRAPHIC
PHOTOS)." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 17 Mar. 2014. Web. 19 Apr.
2016. (1)
Schmidt, Charles W. "Swine Cafos & Novel H1N1 Flu." Environmental Health
Perspectives 117.9 (2009): A394-A401. Academic Search Premier. Web. 4 Mar.
2016(A394-396).
Pleasant, Barbara. "Bird Flu Explodes In Factory Farms, Again." Mother Earth News 272
(2015): 11. Academic Search Premier. Web. 4 Mar. 2016.
"Public Health Risks from "Animal Farm... USA Today Magazine 140.2805 (2012):
6. Academic Search Premier. Web. 4 Mar. 2016.
Purcell, Natalie. "Cruel Intimacies and Risky Relationships: Accounting For Suffering In
Industrial Livestock Production." Society & Animals 19.1 (2011): 59-81. Academic
Search Premier. Web. 4 Mar. 2016 (64).
Wagstrom, Elizabeth A. "The Take Care Program and Responsible Use of Antibiotics." Animal
Biotechnology 17.2 (2006): 233-238.Academic Search Premier. Web. 7 Mar. 2016 (464471).
"Factory Farms." ASPCA. Web. 21 Apr. 2016. <http://www.aspca.org/animal-cruelty/factoryfarms>.