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In investigations from California to the Carolinas, DxE has probed the space between industry promise and industry practice, with often grotesque results. By sneaking onto factory farms with cameras, DxE investigators had revealed mass cannibalism in cage-free chicken houses that supplied Costco. They found turkeys packed together with open sores, in six inches of feces, in a California farm that Whole Foods had marked as the best of the best. And when Smithfield, the Chinese-owned, Virginia-based corporation that is one of the world’s largest pig farmers, announced that they had phased out farrowing crates for sows, a DxE investigation alleged that crates continue to be used.
Read more from The Intercept here. On Saturday, around 120 volunteers and members of the animal rights group Direct Action Everywhere (DxE) moved in to occupy facilities at Petaluma Poultry, a Northern California farm which supplies chicken and turkey products to Amazon and other food retailers. The activists began live-streaming their actions at the farm early in the afternoon, and staged a medical intervention for birds carried out of the farm's housing.
According to the group, which secretly documented some graphic scenarios at the farm in pictures and video, Petaluma Poultry fowl still endure malnutrition, disease, and dangerous over-crowding, despite marketing materials that promote products as low-cruelty and "free range." Read more from forbes here. Gizmodo reported today that a leaked 45-minute training video for Amazon managers takes an "aggressive" stance on quelling interest in organized labor at its facilities. According to Gizmodo, the video was sent last week to Team Leaders at the Whole Foods grocery chain, which Amazon purchased last year, and where employees have reportedly been considering union membership for themselves.
Read more from Forbes here. Former law professor Wayne Hsiung and the animal rights network Direct Action Everywhere (DxE) that he co-founded, along with dozens of unnamed individuals and affiliates, were sued in Alameda County Superior Court yesterday by Whole Foods Market California Inc. in a complaint seeking to restrain protests against the company.
Hsiung says internal memos from Whole Foods that were secretly passed to DxE by insiders at the company, as well as personal correspondence with Whole Foods CEO John Mackey, demonstrate the company’s intolerance to criticism. The company’s acquisition by Amazon, DxE activists say, has led to a new strategy: stopping activists through litigation. Hsiung says the internal memos show the company’s efforts to characterize peaceful protests as violent. He is currently facing prosecution in three separate matters relating to investigations of Amazon or Whole Foods suppliers. Read more from Indy bay here. Here is a moveon.org petition asking the CEO to stop their attempt to silence activists. Amazon is also wreaking havoc on the environment, and its delivery vehicles are generating untold amounts of greenhouse gases, ozone and particulate matter. California environmental advocates are taking on this challenge to protect the air quality in communities living with these warehouses in their backyards. Read more from truth out.org here.
"Whole Foods bills itself as “America’s healthiest grocery store,” but what it’s doing to the environment is anything but healthy. According to a new report, the chain is helping to drive one of the nation’s worst human-made environmental disasters: the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico."
FYI: Walmart received a better score. 39 Arrested Protesting Industrial Farm Supplying So-Called “Cage-Free” Eggs to Amazon & Whole Foods:
Glenn Greenwald, during an interview with Democracy Now- "Because there have been, thanks to the heroic work of animal rights activists, increasing recognition of how horrifically animals are treated as part of animal agriculture. And so a lot of consumers are receptive to appeals by corporations like Whole Foods and Amazon that there is ethical eating choices, that you can buy organic foods where the animals are treated better. And the reality is much, much different." See more from Democracy Now here. "In February of this year, Norbest was purchased by Pitman Farms of California, a supplier of Whole Foods. As The Intercept reported last September, Pitman itself has its own struggles with accusations of abuse of animals at its farms.
But now that Norbest is part of Pitman, this appears to be a case where a corporate supplier of Whole Foods — which touts itself as selling the healthiest and most organic products — is pressing charges against people who exposed animal abuse and threats to the public health." Read more from The Intercept here. As animal cruelty issues have come to light, the food industry has responded by creating marketable terms that make their products sound more humane. "Free range eggs" is just one example of these terms, and while it sounds good for advertising, it may not be all it's cracked up to be. Read more from the investigation, and see the undercover video here. The residue of a FDA-prohibited antibiotic has appeared in tests done by the United States Department of Agriculture [USDA] on Diestel Turkey Ranch birds. The company's meat products are sold in Whole Foods stores, as well as other 'natural' food shops across the US. Read more from Plant Based News here.  |
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