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Just idly listening to R4, heard the stat that 70% of ALL birds are poultry reared for human consumption. Initial reaction was that can't be right but research turned up this
Food Security Centre
Similarly, i read that the total weight of the pheasants in the uk, who are only there to be shot, is more than all the wild birds combined. Not a healthy ecosystem.
It's not that surprising when you think about it. There are about 8 billion humans and we eat a lot of chicken and eggs. Wikipedia says there are about 24 billion chickens. However, if you count how many chickens are hatched each year, it will be much higher than that because their life expectancy is pretty limited.
Estimates of the number of wild birds vary, but 50 billion seems a plausible figure:
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/50-billion-total-wild-birds-inhabit-planet-study-estimates-180977753/
That would make chickens about 1/3 the total number of birds at any one time, but if their life expectancy was only 6 months, that would take it to about 70% of all birds that hatch.
Doesn't surprise me, having lived on a broiler chicken farm and worked in a battery egg farm years ago.
That would make chickens about 1/3 the total number of birds at any one time, but if their life expectancy was only 6 months, that would take it to about 70% of all birds that hatch.
Broiler chickens are slaughtered after about 6 weeks I believe. Numbers are around 1 billion per year. That's just in the UK... US produces 10 billion per year...
The odd thing I find is that chicken does not seem so popular here in Sweden. I used to eat a lot of it in the UK (it was cheap and difficult to mess up), but here it is relatively expensive, so I eat far, far less.
I miss it.
two things that should not be allowed IMO!broiler chicken farm and worked in a battery egg farm years ago.
not necessarily a good thing (also IMO)it was cheap
we've only eaten higher welfare chicken for years now, although you could say that's an expensive luxury, I don't think we spend any more on it overall... just don't eat it for every other meal now!
We got some chickens for eggs/as pets during lockdown - would 100% recommend if you have the space as they are awesome! - and quickly realised how intelligent they are (way more so than cats, probably on par with dogs IMO). The conditions of intensively farmed birds are disgraceful, absolutely miserable (and short) lives.
I used to eat a lot of it in the UK (it was cheap and difficult to mess up), but here it is relatively expensive, so I eat far, far less.
Back in the olden days when I were a lad a chicken on Sunday was a treat. It was more expensive than other roasts. But with modern factory methods it's cheap (pun not intended).
Cheap chicken is a curse. I always get accused of talking from a position of privilege when I say that, but I still believe it to be true. We buy a (free range) chicken about twice a year, and get three meals out of each one (roast, curry, stock for risotto). A rare and delicious treat, not just cheap default weekly protein.
To think that up to 65 million years ago their ancestors ruled the planet and had done for nearly 200 million years
I wonder if our descendents will end up food stock for our lizard/amphibian/insectoid/crustacean overlords/
one of the many awesome things about chickens is that if you squint they totally look like the T-Rex from Jurassic Park. Which is why one of ours is called Grimlock 😂To think that up to 65 million years ago their ancestors ruled the planet
there are about 24 billion chickens
If we all went vegetarian tomorrow, what would they do with them all? Fly free chickens fly free!
@kelvin Agreed. Though in our case it's generally a couple of meals, a sandwich and stock for the chicken and veg broth.
I only have chicken meat as a treat, maybe 5-10 times a year, but then a lot of my better half's family that live locally are veggies.
Scotch eggs on the other hand are a weekly staple, 4-pack from Tesco for £1.65 make a few tasty nutritious "substantial meals." 😉
Was looking at chicken prices in Tesco the other day:
Low welfare/cheapest £6/kg
Some room to move: £12/kg
Free range: £16.50/kg
Pretty shocking how intensive farming can make a meat so cheaply (although I don’t know how much of the cheap price is a loss-leader).
Similarly, i read that the total weight of the pheasants in the uk, who are only there to be shot, is more than all the wild birds combined. Not a healthy ecosystem.
On the last estate where my dad was a gamekeeper he was responsible for the planting of thousands of trees in mixed woodlands. This despite the farm manager making it as difficult as possible, ploughing up areas that were marked out for planting etc. The estate was much more diverse as a result of the shooting activities. We have more pheasant in the freezer than chicken.
the really mad thing is Tesco will sell you a whole chicken that's been raised, slaughtered, processed & trucked across the country (and still presumably make a reasonable profit for all involved) for about 20-25% the cost of a pet one from the farm on which it was born!Was looking at chicken prices in Tesco the other day:
We got some chickens for eggs/as pets during lockdown – would 100% recommend if you have the space as they are awesome! – and quickly realised how intelligent they are (way more so than cats, probably on par with dogs IMO).
i always find it interesting when an animals intelligence comes up. Somehow its ok to eat animal X as its dim compared to my pet, animal Y. A pig is more intelligent than a dog, yet people wouldn't dream of eating a dog (in this country), but almost get a boner at the thought of a bacon butty.
Its a shame all chickens aren't treated to a 'free range' life. Yes the price goes up, but hey, if you cant afford to pay for the murder, enjoy some yummy veg instead. It will make you and the world a better place.
Low welfare/cheapest £6/kg
Some room to move: £12/kg
Free range: £16.50/kg
The big difference between the first two is feed and rearing time.
Both will probably be reared in similar conditions.
The cheapest meat is raised very quickly through feeding that maximises growth/weight gain. There have been numerous documentaries, as it can be pushed that far the chickens grow faster than their skeletons develop.
I don't think we push it as far as the good old USA with their hormone fed animals, where quantity is the only goal, and quality something you just think about.
Free range is often debateable as well.
Given the bird flu issues over the past few years, there will be a lot of 'free range' chickens that have never seen daylight.
Not just chicken, but there’s so much meat in everything at the supermarket, that it’s put me right off.
I think the meat lobby in the uk exerts too much sway over the supermarkets.
Under its aegis, you’ve got everything from grass-fed highland cattle to cut price bangers, and everything in-between.
Just as with the drinks lobby, or car parks, you’ll have a cadre of ex-cops pursuing their own narrow interests, deep within the organisation.
So when Scotland moved to increase the cost of floor-polish/ booze, the mass market producers hid behind the value-added distilleries and shouted ‘unfair’.
We could do without the mass of ham that finds its way onto our pizzas.
It has all the taste and consistency of inner tube.
I just cook with veggie chorizo instead of the real thing nowadays.
It’s just that smell of cooking meat, yuk.
And it’s the sheer quantity of chicken in supermarket curries.
I’d prefer quality over quantity.
Chicken satay is kind of a step in the right direction. But, as with all meats, it stinks when being cooked.
More veg in the mix?
A big chunk of the poultry producers could be farming hemp.
It’s about the most nutritious thing on the planet.
I guess that were still (sci3ntifically) malnourished here in the uk.
the really mad thing is Tesco will sell you a whole chicken that’s been raised, slaughtered, processed & trucked across the country (and still presumably make a reasonable profit for all involved) for about 20-25% the cost of a pet one from the farm on which it was born!
A laying hen, is different from a broiler chicken.
You won't get much meat of a laying hen, as the only thing they're good for is the stock pot, as they have very little meat on them. If you ever pluck one, you're pretty much just left with a skeleton with some skin on.
The cheapest slaughter chicken will likely be reared in under 8 weeks.
A point of lay pullet (what you buy for laying hens) is around 16 weeks old.
Food suppliers will buy chickens as day old chicks, and they'll never leave the property until they're slaughtered, so there is very little handling of the birds involved. They'll also likely use a deep litter approach with the houses only being cleaned between batches.
Laying hens will usually be reared by the breeder for 16weeks, then moved to a laying house, and require much more interaction for their typical 18-24month expected laying life.
Was looking at chicken prices in Tesco the other day:
Low welfare/cheapest £6/kg
Some room to move: £12/kg
Free range: £16.50/kg
Sure that's right?
Aldi Freerange RSPCA assured is only £4.79/kg
I'd happily eat dog as long as it was treated humanly. 😂 Don't think you'd get a lot of meat off one so probably not worth it! I think all intelligent animals should be farmed humanely as they can, and do, experience suffering otherwise.i always find it interesting when an animals intelligence comes up. Somehow its ok to eat animal X as its dim compared to my pet, animal Y. A pig is more intelligent than a dog, yet people wouldn’t dream of eating a dog (in this country)
I'm sure it's way better than factory farming but if you think that means they have the run of the farmyard - they don't. It means they must have "continuous daytime access to open-air runs, for half their lifetime" and have no more than 13 birds per square metre. Which is still not a lot of space. My pet chickens have about 3½ sq m [I]each[/I] in their aviary & I still feel guilty that they're cramped as we can't let them out at the moment due to bird flu!Aldi Freerange RSPCA assured is only £4.79/kg
Octopus widely acknowledged to be quite clever little chaps...yet lots of people tuck into calamari
I’m sure it’s way better than factory farming but if you think that means they have the run of the farmyard – they don’t.
I was checking the pricing quoted, not the process for production.
I think you're right, even M&S free-range chicken is only £8/kilo so unlikely Tesco would be more! (couldn't actually see a current price though with a quick google). My point though was that Aldi free-range is very much the minimum standard possible to get that accreditation. Don't know if Tesco standard is higher, don't shop there!! I believe M&S standard is higher, so you'd expect to pay more.I was checking the pricing quoted, not the process for production.
Pretty shocking how intensive farming can make a meat so cheaply (although I don’t know how much of the cheap price is a loss-leader).
I dont know why free range is so much more expensive. We have battery farms round our way and 'free range' The only difference I can see is that the chickens can choose to leave the same size shed and wander it to a same sized bit of land and potentially get eaten by a fox. Not that many choose to be outside.
Other than that I really cant see the difference.
I had some tofu in a vietnamese restaurant in Santa Clara last week. It was incredible; if all tofu tasted like that, I'm not sure I would ever eat meat again.
Sadly not available here as far as I can tell.
All hens (even the ones in your garden) are supposed to be undercover at the moment, due to bird flu. Third winter running. They still let them sell eggs as free range for up to 16 weeks after they've been confined to the barn. Not sure about broilers.
Organic Soil Association approved chicken (the minimum we should legally allow IMO) - £18.
Chicken from my garden - probably more than that tbh. But it's had a better life, better food, been truly free to do what it want (including poop on the car) and gets slaughtered more humanely than anything produced in any factory ever.
I'm lucky enough to be able to look to start to raise all my own chicken / guinea fowl / geese. In a couple of years I'll never go to the supermarket for it - and it can't come too soon.
Octopus widely acknowledged to be quite clever little chaps…yet lots of people tuck into calamari
That makes about as much sense as "Pigs widely acknowledged to be quite clever little chaps…yet lots of people tuck into beef"
Anything you buy from a big supermarket has gone through a national supply chain, free range or not (ie mass produced, in large barns etc etc).
That statistic is probably right, there are literally millions of chickens reared for meat around Mid-Wales every few months. Seems stupid to me that we use vast areas of land to grow crops which are then fed to animals for humans to eat. Why not just eat the plants in the first place?
Aside from that, chicken shit is very high in Nitrogen, so can't be left to leach into watercourses.
As a result of all the chicken farming, the whole of Wales is now a 'Nitrate vulnerable zone' and it's caused a massive problem with pollution, although the govt have brought new rules in to manage this.
All hens (even the ones in your garden) are supposed to be undercover at the moment
Octopus are clever but squid are stupid and fit for nothing more than being turned into rubber bands.
Tofu doesn't taste of anything except what it's cooked with.
(ok it does have a very mild taste, except for the fermented/blue stuff)
The XKCD image from the link above. Randall Monroe is generally pretty good with his science stuff. Here's an explanation.
https://explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1338:_Land_Mammals
Not sure I could be part of this - as a worker, the profiter, or the consumer. It feels way way beyond reasonable, to me at least. Just not sure how a nation so besotted with its pets could have this as one of it's mainstays of sustaining itself.
The above is why I hatch, rear and eat my own chicken.
All schoolkids from the age of 7 should have to go from farm > abbatoir > butcher to see exactly where all their meat comes from.
It's not "traumatising" btw - at that age in years gone by they'd have been doing it themselves. At least this way when they grow up and become adults they'd maybe vote for better animal husbandry and more humane practice.
Right now - everybody is either lying to themselves or doesn't care.
There was a chicken farm near where I used to work, 24,000 chickens in four sheds. From day old chicks to ready for the table in twenty eight days. The smell when they cleared the sheds out for the next batch was unbelievable…
The 28 days is why when you get a rotisserie chicken from a supermarket it literally falls apart - it's not had time to grow proper ligaments.
About 4% die of heart attacks because their hearts aren't strong enough / fall apart.
Shockingly bad in this day and age.
The 28 days is why when you get a rotisserie chicken from a supermarket it literally falls apart – it’s not had time to grow proper ligaments
Hmm… dubious.
Slow cook an old laying bird and it will fall apart. We had chickens when I was a kid… nothing wasted.
Mrs DB keeps chickens - her brood are Dorothy Egglayer, Eggetha Christie and Ruth Hendall, they are hilarious to watch and are into everything - they ocassionally catch a mouse or vole and all hell breaks loose as they rip it to shreds. We only keep them for the eggs. Not sure they are cleverer than dogs or cats when one is on the outside of the polydome, whilst the others are inside and can’t understand why it can’t walk through the polythene and just bounces and flaps against it! Their recall is better, grab a handful of corn or mealworms and they come running!
Are there any stats as to what percentage of the chicken reared in the UK end up being dunked in KFC gravy?
That video from Convert is shocking but this is from the RSPCA website...
[i]Are male chicks ground up alive?
It’s upsetting to think of young chicks being killed at all, and if not carried out humanely, both ethical and welfare issues might be raised. Whilst maceration is a legally permitted method of killing in the UK at present, the majority, if not all, male laying hen chicks in Britain are killed using gas.[/i]
https://www.rspcaassured.org.uk/farm-animal-welfare/egg-laying-hens/what-is-chick-maceration/
All schoolkids from the age of 7 should have to go from farm > abbatoir > butcher to see exactly where all their meat comes from.
Absolutely not, what a ridiculous suggestion.You have to be 18 to enter an abattoir(might be 16 for apprentices.) But you think young children should be traumatized. End goal there appears to turn them vegetarian or vegan.
Why leave at that, why not take them to a mortuary to see the smashed up human remains of a serious car accident so they know what happens when they get a car, or perhaps we could do pics in class of aborted fetuses, so they dont engage in promiscuous sex.
Sure that’s right?
Aldi Freerange RSPCA assured is only £4.79/kg
Prices as observed for chicken breast pieces, not whole chickens.
Will be shopping in Aldi for my chickens next time…
I'm not convinced by that 70% claim. According to National Geographic there are between 50 and 430 billion birds on earth. According to DEFR there are 17 billion chickens worldwide.
https://www.nationalgeographic.co.uk/animals/2021/05/how-many-birds-are-there-in-the-world
According to National Geographic there are between 50 and 430 billion birds on earth.
That is quite the confidence interval. If the actual number is around the 50 billion mark and the average chicken lifespan is four months, then the number of chickens that are hatched each year would be in the ballpark of 70% of all birds hatched.
The national geographic confidence interval is possibly as accurate as the suspiciously round 7 out of 10 quote.
Why leave at that, why not take them to a mortuary to see the smashed up human remains of a serious car accident so they know what happens when they get a car
We have a local hospital program that works along those lines. Not quite a visit to a mortuary, but get to meet someone that got very close and it gives them a good shock.
Michael Pollan's excellent book Omnivore's Dilemma (from around 2008 IIRC) talked specifically about the issues of poultry farming, particularly in relation to water pollution from the concentration of chicken poo.
one of the many awesome things about chickens is that if you squint they totally look like the T-Rex from Jurassic Park. Which is why one of ours is called Grimlock 😂
We had a bantam cock that took on fox hounds for fun. Having witnessed a savage snarling **** of a dog scarper with a lacerated face from maybe a kg of flying cutlery I'd say evolution went like this
Raptor>Chicken
He ended his days in RAF Leuchars as the mascot for No. 43 Squadron.
Not sure they are cleverer than dogs or cats
No not sure about it, chickens do not show higher intelligence than a cat or dog. Having had chickens, cats and dogs for over 20 years I have never had a chicken (had around 30) I would count as intelligent.
They are great to have around the garden though, especially cockerels. So great I made the choice not to eat them over 40 years ago...
They are great to have around the garden though, especially cockerels. So great I made the choice not to eat them over 40 years ago…
That's a very long life for cockerels!
@kelvin:
Hmm… dubious.
Slow cook an old laying bird and it will fall apart. We had chickens when I was a kid… nothing wasted.
Yep. I'll do that with my layers when they've stopped laying, and replace them with a few girls that I've grown.
However, we're not talking slow-cooked old birds - we're talking battery-farmed rotisserie chickens in sainsbury's falling apart - and a rate of death amongst those birds because 28 days, no exercise and food designed to make them put on mass means they have real health problems - including the ligament issues I spoke about (which also contribute to the 4% heart attack rate).
My light sussex take 20 weeks to grow to full size naturally. That's obviously an economic no-no for large producers. But like I said, within two years we'll never have to buy our own chicken ever again.
That's a luxury that a lot of people can't afford, but it's part of why I moved to the country. I cannot in good conscience sit by and continue to consume meat in the UK in it's current offering. I find it morally abhorrent. But I'm strongly of the opinion that veganism isn't the solution to the problems we face and I tried vegetarianism for years but cannot stick with it - so that leaves me in a place where I control how the animals I eat are raised.
Backing up my ethics with my hard-earned is all I've got left - but I ain't spending that hard-earned without understanding what the problems are in the first place 🙂
End goal there appears to turn them vegetarian or vegan.
Are you suggesting that would be a negative outcome? if so... why?
The mistreatment and slaughter of millions of animals is out of sight, out of mind for so many people. Maybe if more were aware, they would change their eating habits, maybe to a more plantbased diet, which would be better for the world as a whole.
@muffinman - yep. Maceration is legal so still done. But don't be conned by the "gas" thing - suffocation is painful - and that's what CO2 does (I know they use inert gases in other situations). Suffocation is not really a nice painless drift off to sleep.
Frankly, I think maceration is probably kinder - at least it's almost instant. But tipping bucketloads of terrified chicks onto the conveyor belt of death can't be fun either.
Mass slaughter of chicks is just one thing. Look into how they mass-slaughter the adult birds. And then imagine how the nice way it's written doesn't really fit with the reality.
Ethics are a right pain in the arse. Had to look into the dairy process for work recently. I've concluded that being a consumer of anything involving mass produced animal products is grim.
synthetic dairy - basically indistinguishable from the real thing but made in a lab - is going to be the Next Big Thing, particularly for processed foods. Probably not great news for dairy farmers though!Had to look into the dairy process for work recently. I’ve concluded that being a consumer of anything involving mass produced animal products is grim.
On your "traumatized" kids waffle. Lol. Mates kids helped me process my last batch. They also go visit their grandparents on a working farm that does similar. They know what it involves - and for the past 150,000 years of homo-sapiens kids of that age were actively involved in DOING it. It's only since we've mechanised things that we've become separate from what we actually DO as a species - and that's wrong, and results in cruelty.
I've no doubt that it would indeed result in a lot more vegetarianism. Which would be a good thing for the planet. But it'd also lead to much higher welfare for animals - which is the morally right thing to do.
I think what we do now is snowflake-ism of the worst kind, morally reprehensible and intellectual cowardice.
Kids can take it. It'd be upsetting, yes. But they're only as fragile as we bring them up to be.
Got to agree with chevy (but not the odd "snowflake-ism" line)... if the process is extremely traumatising, don't hide it away, otherwise they'll never be the pressure to change it. Public cameras in slaughterhouses would soon lead to greater public pressure for a more humane end, even if at a higher cost and lower volumes. As an aside, my younger brother used to slaughter our birds, as a young teen.
The reason I used snowflake @kelvin - is that it's happening across all walks of life. We're not exposed to stuff so on the rare occasions that we do come across it (be it language used, unpopular opinions, unusual things in general) - we meltdown. (Sometimes violently because the level of anger is related to the level of shock - and if you're never exposed, you're more shocked).
Snowflakification of society 🙂
And since we ditched the enlightenment principle that we founded our society on - i.e. "I detest what you say but I will fight to the death for your right to say it" - and changed it to "I'm offended by what you say, so I will campaign for it to be banned like a thought-crime and for you to be locked up - but I do believe in 'free speech'" then this phenomenon is just going to get worse and worse.
You can say what you want. Deal with the consequences.
Nah. That's anti free-speech. As long as the consequences aren't criminal legal action then that's fair game. (Lose your job? Fine. But prison? That's the very definition of thought-crime).
Act in a way we don't like? Yep. Prison.
Say what we don't like? Different kettle of fish.
"I detest what you say, but will fight to the death for your right to say it".
Anything else is horribly dangerous.
What do you want to say that you think will result in you going to prison?!?
Are you quite sure you didn’t nod off while reading 1984, and wake up a bit confused?
End goal there appears to turn them vegetarian or vegan.
Are you suggesting that would be a negative outcome? if so… why?
@kelvin:
What do you want to say that you think will result in you going to prison?!?
Are you quite sure you didn’t nod off while reading 1984, and wake up a bit confused?
Nothing. I don't want to say anything that would land me in prison. But I understand that if we adhere to the enlightenment principles that our societies were founded on then there's stuff - stuff I really very vehemently disagree with - that people (arseholes, imo) can say that WILL land them in prison.
That's really really dangerous. Because it means we defer our ability to think to an authority - like a government - and we're infantilised by that. And it also massively increases the risk that unpopular speech - like "give gay people equal rights" - becomes criminalised and therefore injustice can easily become harder to reverse.
The fact that gay people have equal rights in this country is down to the fact that people were free to speak their mind without criminal consequences. They had all sorts of consequences (lost jobs, getting beaten up etc. etc.) - but they couldn't go to jail for it.
You can go to jail (or a lot lot worse) for speaking up for equal rights for gays in many countries. We used to chemically castrate our heros (see Alan Turing) for being gay in this country.
Free speech - including the protection of unpopular disgusting speech - is the only barrier to that.
IF you don't think that, that some speech should be prohibited - then you don't believe in free speech. You might tell yourself you do, but you don't really.
I think very few people in the UK actually believe in free speech. I bet vanishingly few actually deeply understand the concept and it's ramifications. And that can be seen by the fact that laws are regularly passed that weaken those protections because of the outrage of people who detest unpopular language.
It's a trap we've fallen into and it's one that leads to very horrible places.
Okay, nothing you want to say... but what "words" (not actions) by someone else can result in a prison sentence in the UK? How many people are in prison in the UK, right now, because they simply voiced their opinions? Based on what law?
If you're not already immediately aware of what sort of things we're talking about (and which I won't repeat here) then I can't help ya.
But I suspect you do know. And you're happy that they end up with prison sentences.
Just admit - you believe in freedom of speech "with limits". Which, in reality, is not freedom of speech.
Point me to one person in prison in the UK right now just for voicing their opinions?
I can't help you fight something that isn't happening.
That Begum woman has been effectively banished for her beliefs, not deeds.
For her actions, not her beliefs. A decision I don't agree with. She's not in prison though.
Who is in prison, in the UK, just for voicing their opinions? If this is genuinely happening, an example must be available. Sentencing is public in the UK.
If we're to call for their release in the name of "free speech", we need to have an example. And just as importantly, if there are laws that have been used to imprison someone just for speaking their opinion, let's detail them... so we can fight for their repeal or reform.
Point me to one person in prison in the UK right now just for voicing their opinions?
The reason you phrased your question that way is clear and apparent. You've decided that "voicing their opinion" is different from things that they say. A quick google search will find you lists of people and cases where people are in prison for things they've said.
Speech doesn't have to be considered - thoughts and opinions don't have to be intelligable, or reasoned or considered to be valid. If we are to be free, truly free, we have to be free to be arseholes.
We will never be that in our actions, but we must be that in our thoughts and words - however abominable.
You know that and know what I'm getting at. So I won't go any further with you - and refer you to the answer I gave above.
A quick google search will find you lists of people and cases where people are in prison for things they’ve said.
An example then? Google is big. Be precise and we can discuss it.
You know that and know what I’m getting at.
I haven’t got a Scooby. Really. Sorry.
End goal there appears to turn them vegetarian or vegan.
Are you suggesting that would be a negative outcome? if so… why?
They'll never experience the joy of bacon.
Sorry @kelvin, I'm not dumb enough to fall into the obvious trap. Been there before - and it'd just be you challenging me to justify "supporting" speech that should "rightfully" be banned.
If you genuinely don't have a scooby (pffft, yeah right) then google is a small space and a useful tool.
You know when two people manage to trash a reasonable thread with a sidebar irrelevant bicker......that.
Sorry Convert. People being so angry about things that might not even be happening worries me a lot. Lots of misplaced anger out there.
The stats, ethics and future of poultry farming really interests me as well, so I’ve been part of ruining a thread I was really enjoying. Sorry again to you and others.
“for the past 150,000 years of homo-sapiens kids of that age were actively involved in DOING it”
According to your ‘ancient apocalypse’ theorists (Graham Hancock, et al), were still stumble-bumbling within a post-apocalyptic caveman type epoch.
“This is the era of calamity” (Gwar).
The preceding epochs may have been more technologically advanced and less egregious to the planet. Think ‘Terraforming’, billenia ago:
Our ancestors may have had means to feed themselves, without bashing each others skulls in.
My argument @Greatbeardedone - is that traditionally kids have been involved in killing and processing food. Be it in an agrarian system or otherwise. It's only very recently that there's been a paradigm shift that means we're divorced from that - and whilst beneficial and freeing us up to do other things, it's also detrimental - in that the distance means we treat our food abominably, in ways that previously we never would have.
The way to fix that is to make sure - to force - everyone to have explicit experience of what our society is. So we can't lie to ourselves, and we can't pull the wool over our own eyes.
It's the morally correct thing to do.