You are exactly right in your assessment of agribusiness-factory farming,idustrial farming. Add to that the small farmer that needs to incorporate some of the practises used by the above. Otherwise the family farmer is done and may as well quit.
Even without having livestock as part of the equation the crop farmer has a huge lifetime investment just in equipment. Many pieces of machinery cost more than the middle class home. No one wants to pay an increase in the cost of the food they now purchase. Your assessment that they care little for their animals is not accurate. If they do not care and do not take appropriate measures to see to their health,
each one represents a loss of that bottom line,you can't have it both waysBut like most things in this life the consumer/culprit in dictating what they want have little regard for the chain reaction set in motion. They only know it is the fault of that greedy, calloused farmer.
Couple that with org. like Peta and you have the farmer between the rock and the hard place.
We have this interesting thing going on in the midwest, I am sure all over but have not bothered to check.
All the yammering about fossil fuel and following all over themselves to embrace ethanol. Along with it's lower price than gas, it also has increased the cost of any item/product that uses corn. Not only that but efficient milage is reduced. The farmer that needs to have corn for his livestock needs to pay more for his corn. He pays more for the seed corn to begin with. Then take a tour thru your grocery store. Milk in our region keeps climbing and has risen over a dollar per gallon recently.
In grocery shopping not to long ago, I was so privileged to be behind two women that were incensed at that greedy farmer that just wants more and more.
Of course the human race has become calloused. If you had never seen death and sin had not entered we wouldn't be having this conversation.
You as well as everyone else benefits from the very practises that bother you so.
The lanolin that more than likely can be found in something in your home comes from someone like me shipping their sheep to market. You may not eat meat, but you can and do benefit from the actions that bother you so.
Any leather that you have in your home or wardrobe came from the calloused agri-business man/woman.
Obviously any making their living in agri-business have to have an eye on the bottom line/profit.Whether it be a large corp. or the small farmer, if he doesn't pay close attention to the bottom line he soon won't have a business to worry about.
As for this statment of yours.....
(But can you imagine that? To mourn the drooping flower and falling leaf more deeply than we now mourn over our dead. I might get upset if my dogs dig up a plant or break a branch, but I don't don't recall ever even crying over it.
I am not sure that I know how you are applying this. Mourning our dead in relation to a discussion on livestock sounds a lot like PETA, which has more than once stated a "cow is a rat is a dog is a child".
Sorry for me I will mourn the death of a loved one far quicker than I will an animal.
No I do not cry over a dead plant when there are very real issues and concerns to cry over.
Most here probably don't eat meat, but are is guilty in enjoying the by- product of the moral evil of a fleah diet.
Think of the cruelty of all those that use the by-products. Sheep die before anyone can benefit from their lanolin. Principally cows die before they become a leather belt, leather shoes,leather car seats and many, many other items.
It may be worthwhile to consider not condemning the agri-business man if you take part in what he offers in such a calloused way