The factory farming industry spent millions of dollars to advance Issue 2 in Ohio, which creates an industry dominated board to oversell farm animal care standards in the state. The ballot measure was made to sound like it would help animals, and voters predictably supported it by roughly a two-to-one margin.
Ironically, the intention of Issue 2 is to prevent meaningful reform by allowing industry officials to define what is "humane." Agribusiness brought Issue 2 to the ballot in the hopes of heading off legislation proposed by humane advocates to ban some of the cruelest forms of factory farming confinement: veal crates, gestation crates and battery cages. Despite the industry’s effort, change is coming. It has been said that the only constant is change, and this applies in Ohio just as it applies everywhere else.
You’d be hard pressed to find anyone, other than those who profit from abuse, who thinks it’s okay to confine animals so tightly that they cannot walk, turn around or even stretch their limbs. Ohioans, like citizens across the U.S., oppose the inhumane treatment of animals on factory farms. Thankfully, they will have another chance to address this topic in the near future.
With the million plus that voted against issue 2, there hopefully is a way to follow-up that support for farmed animals among those in Ohio. After all, over 3 million voted on the issue, so it garnered a significant response. Of course, it's uncertain what the vote would have been if everybody had been properly informed
Posted by: Kalen Cap | 11/09/2009 at 04:35 PM