No more torture - Equal rights for animals!

Dear friends,

This is an international appeal, to people of all the nations to help out and stop the mass torture and killing that is undergoing in all chicken farms of the world.Not only that, this is an appeal to educate people through government funded programs to stop eating poultry products. How much harm are we going to do on creatures that can't defend themselves from the harsh selfish humans?

Please understand the straight facts ! A hen, similar to a human female undergoes an ovulation cycle at the end of which an egg is produced. In Hens, this takes about 22-28 hours at the end of which an egg is produced externally. In human females, similar process happens after 28 days, after which an unfertilised egg and other contents are released. I am sure its not normal that a person would eat the menstruation contents(excretions) of a human female because its just not done! and also if the egg were to be fertilised then it would be grown into a baby. Similarly, why are we so cruel and unmindful of other creatures in this world?

This is a public appeal to the governing boards of different countries to stop the publicising of eggs as a morally consumable product and also to impose strict laws against battery cages and torturing of animals in this manner. Please read the following autobiography of a hen to get more insight to the actual situation that's taking place even now, everywhere in the globe!

An Autobiography of a Hen

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I was born along with my brothers and sisters in a chicken-breeding farm. My parents were a pair of chickens kept solely for the purpose of procreation. The very day after my birth, I was separated from my brothers. And do you know why? Because male chicks are not needed for us female chickens to lay eggs. A few are kept for further reproduction, but the restwhenever I recall that brutal scene, a cold shiver runs down my spine. My brothers were literally thrown away. Weeded out from each tray, the male chicks are dropped into heavy duty plastic bags and left to suffocate to death! My poor young brothers- barely a day old! Ive come to know that half a million little baby chickens are disposed of in this way every day of the year in the USA.
And the ruthless lot dont stop there. After killing my brothers they steam them for half an hour, grind them into a powder and then give it to us to eat as poultry feed ! Is there no limit to these peoples callousness?
Do you know what else they feed us? Blood Meal blood collected from slaughter-houses ; Bone Meal and Meat Meal- crushed pieces of bone and meat; Fish Meal powdered fish; and even rotten maize is offered to us! All of which is imported from America.

I envy those free-range hens that get to roam in open fields under open skies, who enjoy their food with freedom, welcome the sun every morning, play with their friends and family.

Sometimes I wonder, maybe my brothers were the lucky ones. For those of us who are allowed to live- life is a nightmare. My home measures 18 by 20 inches and I share it with four other hens. According to the British Government, each hen must have a minimum space of 450 sq. cm ( less then a sheet of A4 paper).

Were crammed so tightly into these cages we cant even turn around, let alone spread our wings ( of wingspan 32 inches). We are unable to fulfill any of our natural instincts such as scratching the ground, dust-bathing, perching, nesting and caring for our eggsInstead were banished to a wire-caged hell. I stand all day and night on a sloping wire mesh serving life imprisonment. Due to lack of exercise, many of us form brittle bones. By the time we become spent hens; one in three of us caged hens will have suffered from broken legs, wings, even breast bones.

By nature we chickens are very sociable animals. In natural setting, we develop a social hierarchy known as the pecking order. This can only be maintained at best with a flock of up to 90 chickens. Beyond that, things get totally out of hand. In the factory I live in- were talking about thousands! Cooped up in these mechanized hells, its not surprising some of us are driven to madness. With the total lack of space- in their frustration and panic- hens frequently climb onto their cage mates- peck viciously at them and often try to eat each other alive! Not to be outsmarted of profits, the farmers answer is to cut off our beaks using a red-hot iron or guillotine when were only fluffy little chicks. Boy is it painful! Irregular beak growth in later life prevents some of us from eating or drinking. Ive seen poor birds die of starvation and thirst within inches of food and water. And thats not allAt the age of one, those same sizzling clippers cut off our wings so we occupy the least possible amount of space!
And its so dirty here! Because the cages are stacked one on top of the other, the hens above excrete all over us! The filth often gets mixed in our food. Ughh!

Weve never felt the sun on our backs. When it rises and when it sets- God only knows! Right from birth we are put in the artificial white light of an electric bulb. This speeds up our growth and egg laying. We never ever get any proper sleep. Forever standing on these wire floors, my feet ache so much!

To get us lay eggs even faster, we are fed special hormones such as oestrogens; to avoid diseases spreading in the filth, poisonous drugs as DDT are sprayed; and to make the egg yolks of our eggs appear yellower and brighter, chemicals such as citranacasanathin are fed to us! What more can I say!....Drug companies cash in on big profits. They dont care two hoots about our health. And our owners can only see the eggs we lay- not us!

Our average lifespan is around 12 years, but Ive not seen any hen last here for two or three years. A quarter of my sisters die early of cancer of suffocation. The British Ministry of Agriculture estimates that over two million battery hens die in their cages from disease or injury every year. Im not even two years old yet, but I can already see my end in sight. I pass my days in fear.

In fact ,these battery farms are not unlike those cruel concentration camps operated during the World War! O dear humans- have your morals completed deserted you??!

Just yesterday, two of my neighbors were taken and replaced with two new hens. Do you know where they went? Theyd been laying fewer eggs recently. I overheard couple of humans talking. Both my friends were sold by our owner to a restaurant owner for $7.50 each. The restaurant owner plucked every feather out of the hens- alive! Then, still dripping with blood, he twisted their necks! By now, my friends have probably found their way into someones intestines.maybe yours!

The other day, I heard the factory workers discussing two new poultry plans operating near Pune, India . They prepare chicken meat very scientifically. Useless hens like me (that dont lay enough eggs) are hung upside down from hangers in a row. As the hangers keep moving, each hen receives a deadly bolt of electricity to its head.and then further up the line, its head is cut off automatically by a machine! Before the head and feet are cut off, they are dunked into boiling hot water. Excruciating! Even after the hens are decapitated, they are still left hanging- wings flapping as long as there is dear life in the poor bird. After the last drop of blood is drained from the hen, it is placed at -2 degrees. Some 12,000 hens are slaughtered in these two plants every single day! The owner boasts, We are preparing the countrys most hygienic chicken meat. We use 450000 litres of water in the cutting and cleaning of 12,000 chickens every day. The check of it! Here were are without even enough water to drink, and you are wasting so much water on murdering us? Not just Pune. Selfish humans kill 16,000 of my friends in Mumbai and 12,000 in Delhi every day of the year!
The other day, I heard the factory workers discussing two new poultry plans operating near Pune, India . They prepare chicken meat very scientifically. Useless hens like me (that dont lay enough eggs) are hung upside down from hangers in a row. As the hangers keep moving, each hen receives a deadly bolt of electricity to its head.and then further up the line, its head is cut off automatically by a machine! Before the head and feet are cut off, they are dunked into boiling hot water. Excruciating! Even after the hens are decapitated, they are still left hanging- wings flapping as long as there is dear life in the poor bird. After the last drop of blood is drained from the hen, it is placed at -2 degrees. Some 12,000 hens are slaughtered in these two plants every single day! The owner boasts, We are preparing the countrys most hygienic chicken meat. We use 450000 litres of water in the cutting and cleaning of 12,000 chickens every day. The check of it! Here were are without even enough water to drink, and you are wasting so much water on murdering us? Not just Pune. Selfish humans kill 16,000 of my friends in Mumbai and 12,000 in Delhi every day of the year!

Next time you go to work on an egg, consider the facts. In Britain alone, there are over 38 million of my egg-laying friends and 96\% of them are kept in battery cages. The battery cage has been condemned by the British House of Commons Agriculture Committee, the European Parliament and many other veterinarian associations. But whos bothered?

If we hadnt been made to lay eggs, maybe wed be saved from these atrocities. Will the pockets and stomachs of you cold-blooded humans ever be satisfied? Will we never be able to taste freedom? O humans fighting frantically for human rights and equality all over the world we are living in your country too, you know! Free us first. Charity begins at home! Start by freeing us from the cruelty and beastly ridding slavery and human exploitation.

........"( The Crack in the Egg,V.Patel)