I have further bad news: all of the animals that go into your beef, turkey, bacon, eggs, milk, butter, and animal products of any kind also have terrible, excruciating lives, as the full documentary conveys.

If you don't want to watch this, all I have to say is: Why? Don't you owe it to yourself to know where your food comes from? What are you afraid of? That us vegans might have a point? If you're confident that you'll be a steadfast non-vegan no matter what information you become privy to, then you have nothing to lose by watching something like this. If animal agriculture didn't have anything to hide, then why do ag-gag laws exist? I thought we liked whistleblowers who expose shocking things to the public?

If you think that this clip is a shocking, out-of-context, worst-case example for what goes on in animal agriculture and that most farm animals are treated fairly and with dignity, do you actually believe that? Vegan or not, we're all already anti-capitalists on this site, and we know that any business reveres and pursues profit above all else by any means necessary, or else they would not exist for long and be chased out of the market by a more ruthlessly "efficient" competitor. And "by any means necessary" means that capitalists won't bat an eye at all at unsafe working conditions, grueling work hours, shit benefits for employees (if any), or hell, using cheaper labor if not outright slavery in Global South countries to take advantage of lax/non-existent labor laws in US client states.

Do you think that animal agriculture companies don't operate with the same mindset? Do you think they pamper their livestock and then "humanely" slaughter them when the time is right, instead of being a brutally efficient killing machine designed to extract as much profit as possible? Of course they don't, there's not as much money to be made by investing in treating livestock with dignity. These animals are treated like unfeeling machines designed to maximize profit.

Please stop eating animals and contributing to this sadistic industry when more ethical alternatives exist. Using "there's no ethical consumption under capitalism" to condone your current lifestyle does not mean that you cannot make more ethical choices within this shithole economic system. There has never been a better time to go vegan, there are many great vegan meat/dairy alternatives that already exist if you need transition products to wean you off of meat and dairy. And if that is out of your price point, there are millions of vegan recipes online and so many cookbooks that exist, I'm sure you could find some of your favorite dishes and veganize them.

If you've ever had even the slightest urge to go vegan but are too afraid to take the plunge, I think it's fair to say that many current vegans felt the same way at one point, myself included, so you aren't alone in that. But once I had the moral framework for why people choose veganism and once I did research for how to successfully transition to veganism and avoid pitfalls, it ended up being much easier than I thought it would be. You won't know until you try.