For Immediate Release
Vermont: In a communique received today by the North American Animal Liberation Press Office, activists with the Animal Rights Militia claim to have liberated animals from a Vermont farm for the second year in a row. Every year, nearly 300 million turkeys are killed in the U.S., spending their entire lives crammed in large sheds with little room to move. Artificially inseminated and selectively bred to gain enormous amounts of weight, they suffer heart attacks, broken limbs, lameness, and death from their genetically-induced accelerated growth rate. Conditions are so severe that about 9% of turkeys raised for food (or over 26 million) don’t even survive long enough to make it to the slaughterhouse.
The current communique reads, in full:
During the early morning hours of November 16, VTARM members liberated 16 turkeys and 2 geese from a road side holding pen. The same location had been visited the previous year. Power to the lights surrounding the outside holding pen was cut by the security team and two cameras installed after last year’s visit were removed. The extraction team utilizing NVGs cut the fence and liberated 16 turkeys. In addition the security team disabled 2 ATVs and liberated 2 geese located during the visit. In all the operation took less than 10 minutes. We enjoyed our visit “farmer Bob” now consider yourself out of business, you don’t want us coming back for a third time. We will use whatever means necessary to liberate animals, prevent cruelty and punish those who commit acts of cruelty. This liberation is dedicated to Walter Bond and all of the other political prisoners: you are in our thoughts and actions every day, thank you and happy thanksgiving!
A similar communique was issued in November 2010 and reads:
During the early morning hours of November 14th, members of VT ARM liberated 20 turkeys that had been cruelly forced into a small pen without shelter. The pen had been set up along side a road as a marketing ploy. The decision to liberate the turkeys was made after it was learned that they were to be murdered that morning. It took the extraction team less than 5 minutes to breach the fence and liberate the turkeys. As a parting gift members of ARM slashed the tires of the mobile slaughter house, which had been parked less then 20 meters away, while the driver sat in the front seat smoking. Uncle Sam spent thousands training us to be the best and now those who think they can profit off the suffering of animals will learn that we are. We will use whatever means necessary to liberate animals, prevent cruelty and punish those who commit acts of cruelty. To the Bushway criminals, Happy Thanksgiving.
Factory farm conditions are so harsh that turkeys must be pumped full of antibiotics just to stay alive. Shortly after birth, they have their snoods and parts of their toes and beaks cut off with hot blades, without the use of anesthetic, to reduce damage from from stress-induced aggression. They are then delivered by conveyer belt to a carousel where they get a power injection, usually of an antibiotic, whacked into the back of their necks. The rest of their lives they are forced to endure crowding, living in their own waste, and ravaging diseases. As many as 25,000 birds may be housed in a single shed. Their eyes and lungs are burned by toxic fumes emanating from their excrement. After 16 weeks of misery, they are hung on a conveyer belt, their throats are cut, and they are dumped — sometimes still fully conscious — into scalding water to strip their feathers.