Today’s BBC farming and food topic is....

[Cowabunga]

I kid you not....
Confessions of a slaughterhouse worker

About 100 million animals are killed for meat in the UK every month - but very little is heard about the people doing the killing. Here, one former abattoir worker describes her job, and the effect it had on her mental health.

Warning: Some readers may find this story disturbing

Confessions of a slaughterhouse worker

A former abattoir worker describes her job and the effect it had on her mental health.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[Campbell]

100 million a month!! I'm guessing most of that is chickens.

 

[Sid]

Sounds like she is now writing graphic fiction. The use of language can easily set emotions running. Perhaps the BBC should do a piece on the confessions of a care home worker, or a quorn production line worker or an amazon picker?
I've been to many slaughterhouses and not had an issues with the process at all. All very humane.
BUT the probable only place you will see pregnant animals being slaughtered is on TB days.

The government's handling of F and M has an effect on my mental health. What choice did I have over dealing with that?
Once again a BBC agenda led piece.

 

[SilliamWhale]

Im wondering how the guy who came and fumigated my Grain weevils is feeling?

 

[Andrew1983]

It really does look like peta wrote that for them or the journalist just copied and pasted it from their website

 

[JCMaloney]

Had a read of that this morning and whilst a good amount of it is factual it is written in a very emotional way,calves, eyes etc but emotion is something you need to leave at the door in an abattoir or the process will eat away at you. You have to look at the job as being the last bit of care the animal receives and do that in an efficient, kind and respectful way.
I done a week, firstly as an apprentice, and then full time for 18 months a long while ago and wouldn`t rush back but it was a job at the time.

 

[Tim G]

You have to look at the job as being the last bit of care the animal receives and do that in an efficient, kind and respectful way.

What a great way to put it.
We now retail most of what we produce on the farm and encourage customers to see how we do it. The one question they all seem to ask is "How can you eat the animals you rear?"
We always say that we give the animals the best care we can and make sure they have everything they need, and that includes when the time comes for them. Its good to hear again that our philosophy is continued along the chain.

 

[Gong Farmer]

As the saying goes, 'They have a wonderful life, and one bad day...'

 

[Ted M]

What about the mental health of farmers constantly battling the tide of lies and half baked environmental truths and being demonised as abusers, rapists and murderers on top of everyday stress?
I have a bid in on a 45 acre block of grassland right next door to me. Part of me is seriously considering retracting it and spending what I would have borrowed on another house to let out because I don't want to spend the next 20 years looking over my shoulder.
The other part of me says this goes against what I believe and is letting the barstewards win...

 

[roscoe erf]

what a work of fiction didn't like the job from day one felt sick but stayed on for 6 years

 

[An Gof]

Keep calm, we have to endure another 25 days of this drip feed by BBC. I bet they have planned vegan items EVERY day for the month.

 

[Tim G]

Keep calm, we have to endure another 25 days of this drip feed by BBC. I bet they have planned vegan items EVERY day for the month.

Not heard them mention dry January yet (another ridiculous idea)

 

[Scribus]

If the BBC is plainly issuing propaganda then it raises two important questions-

1. On whose behalf and what is the objective?

2. If it is clear that the BBC is working to an agenda now when has it done so in the past and for what causes with what effect?

 

[tepapa]

what a work of fiction didn't like the job from day one felt sick but stayed on for 6 years

I worked in an abbatoir for a bit after leaving school. Luckily I was in the lairage.
You would have five new people turn up from the job center on Monday morning. By lunch time you'd be lucky if two where left and even luckier if one returned the next day. If one made it till the end of the week it was a miracle.
You sure as hell don't stay 6 years if you can't get on there.

 

[ollie989898]

I've visited an abattoir twice during my studies and the only thing that concerned me was the blokes working there.

 

[roscoe erf]

I've visited an abattoir twice during my studies and the only thing that concerned me was the blokes working there.

there is one nr us and it was mostly polish It was said the local shop sold gallons of vodka and there. was a few instances of stabbings and fighting apart from that they made Beirut look calming

 

[kiwi pom]

I've visited an abattoir twice during my studies and the only thing that concerned me was the blokes working there.

Hardly surprising though, not exactly a dream job.
They're always advertising for workers here and seem surprised that people aren't falling over themselves to work there.

 

[Cowabunga]

Im wondering how the guy who came and fumigated my Grain weevils is feeling?

How stomach churning is beheading and gutting weevils? I imagine it is on the same level as doing fish, which many housewives may well be familiar with.

It is, to a certain extent, only a matter of scale. But the scale does have a disproportionate impact on human perception. Scale and the type of animal. Very few people object to poisoning rats, causing deaths from internal and external bleeding, for the carcasses to rot behind skirting boards and under floorboards and in walls.

 

[Cowabunga]

there is one nr us and it was mostly polish It was said the local shop sold gallons of vodka and there. was a few instances of stabbings and fighting apart from that they made Beirut look calming

My nephew worked as an engineer in a large abattoir a few years ago. One asked to borrow a screwdriver and wouldn't give it back. Said he didn't have it. Nephew called security and four hefty blokes came quickly, floored the worker, got the screwdriver off him and cable tied his hands behind his back. Threw him in a van later on and took him to be instantly deported. No messing.

 

[ollie989898]

Hardly surprising though, not exactly a dream job.
They're always advertising for workers here and seem surprised that people aren't falling over themselves to work there.

It wasn't that, it was that most of them looked harder than coffin nails, were heavily muscled and seemed colder than ice.