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Originally Posted by tc33  I agree that industry-wide abuses are tolerated. I was speaking strictly from an individual/commercial farmer's perspective. For example, let's say you have two farmers, A and B, who sell beef to McDonalds. A 'tortures' their cows, while B doesn't. If a PETA zealot successfully exposes farmer A, McDonalds will sever ties with farmer A and claim ignorance in order to save face. Farmer A goes bankrupt while farmer B prospers. In this situation, I believe it would be a significant business risk for farmer A to continue to torture their animals if farmer B does not. If exposed, farmer A's credibility is destroyed instantly. |
This is essentially what PETA does, but there's far more abuse than manpower available to confront it. Plus there's a lot of follow-up required even after the initial research is done. Often it's an internal whistleblower that brings the abuse to PETA's attention.
PETA's budget isn't even 1% of their opposition's, so they have to pick their battles. Typically they target large corporations rather than smaller businesses like individual farms. Not long ago they scored a victory by getting KFC to stop some of its most abusive practices. Pet food company Iams was another target. They even went after the U.S. military for intentionally shooting animals to conduct wound research.
One thing I like about PETA is that they make an effort to bring animal researchers up to speed with nonviolent research methods that are just as effective. A lot of torturous animal research procedures are obsolete, but they're still done out of habit. PETA understands the importance of the bottom line for corporations and tries hard to work with them to find viable alternatives that don't require animal cruelty.