In the wake of the recent release of our undercover investigation exposing cruelty and suffering inside animal labs at the University of Utah, students, local PETA supporters, and members of Salt Lake Animal Advocacy Movement gathered outside the university's Park Building yesterday and urged the swarm of spectators to help put an end to the cruelty committed against the dogs, cats, and other animals confined to the University's labs.

The demonstrators weren't just humans—some adorable companion animals campaigned for the cause too. Together, they collected signatures for a petition to scrap the law that requires government-run shelters to make homeless animals—even those who are friendly, trained, and adoptable—available to universities and private labs for experimentation and testing. How could you not put your name to something these guys are supporting:

Join the effort and urge the University of Utah to stop abusing shelter animals in its labs immediately.

Posted by Logan Scherer

When I was 16 years old, I was invited to a picnic. When I arrived, I was shocked to realize that I'd actually been invited to a pig roast—big difference. The sight of a whole charred pig turning on a spit with an apple stuck in his mouth was all I needed to convince myself that I'd never eat pork, i.e. pig, again.

The pig was already dead, and I knew nothing about his journey from his mother's womb to the fire pit. I didn't need to—after all, I called myself an "animal lover," so it was a simple, logical decision. If I wouldn't eat my dog, I wasn't going to eat a pig.

Despite the overwhelming evidence that pigs and other animals on factory farms routinely endure horrific abuses, millions of people continue to happily chow down on hot dogs and ham. Today, Fox News offers food for thought—the Web site is featuring exclusive undercover video footage taken by Mercy for Animals at Country View Family Farms, one of Pennsylvania's largest pork producers and a Hatfield Quality Meat supplier.

The video shows a slew of horrors, including workers as they hurl baby pigs and slam them into transport carts, pick piglets up by their ears and tails, cut off the animals' tails with pliers, and rip off their testicles with their bare hands without any painkillers. (The sound of screaming piglets in the video made my skin crawl.) Their squealing mothers are shown scrambling to escape workers who slam spiked mallets into the animals' sides. Many pigs bear sores from their constant confinement—one mother pig suffered an excruciating prolapsed rectum for at least 13 days before she was killed.

Folks, this video is tough to view (I had to pause it three times), but as caring people, we owe it to ourselves and the animals it shows to watch it and then pass it on to others—along with a link to GoVeg.com. You can share the video and the link via e-mail, via a link on your Facebook page, and via "tweets." Anyone you know who still needs convincing that animals suffer on factory farms won't question it after they've watched this footage.

Posted by Karin Bennett

cbs3springfield / CC

"California cows can keep their tails."

That sentence in the Central Valley Business Times says it all. California state proved it was full of animal-friendly folk when Prop. 2 passed last year, and now lawmakers in the state have just signed a law that will make the docking of cows' tails illegal starting this January!

During our recent undercover investigation on a Pennsylvania factory farm, our investigator witnessed tail-docking on a number of occasions. The tails of cows were removed by "banding"—which means that circulation to the tail was cut off using an elastic band, which caused the cows' tails to slowly lose blood flow and die. Once the tail is necrotic and lifeless, it is snapped off by a farm worker. Tails act as natural flyswatters for cows, who have no other way to chase off insects or stop them from biting. Once the cows on this farm had their tails removed, they still tried in vain to rid their bodies of flies, who were rampant in the manure-slicked barn.

Tail-docking is just one of the many horrendous abuses inflicted on animals on factory farms and is a practice that even the notoriously hypocritical AVMA opposes.

Cheers to the California legislature for taking this important step.

Posted by Jeff Mackey

Today, PETA unveiled footage from our five-month undercover investigation of a filthy factory dairy farm in Pennsylvania that supplies milk to St. Paul–based Land O'Lakes, the largest seller of branded butter in the U.S.

Other Viewing Options

Our investigator documented abuse and neglect of cows and calves at the facility, including that cows who were in terrible pain and resisted standing were electro-shocked and jabbed with the blade of a pocket knife in an effort to force them to move and that sick and injured cows were left to languish—often so weak that they couldn't even get out of their own waste—for days and even weeks without veterinary care. In one case, workers were told to wrap an elastic band around a cow's gangrenous, infected teat in order to "amputate" it. The cow's condition deteriorated for 11 days before she finally died.

It is a violation of Pennsylvania law to neglect animals, deprive sick and injured animals of veterinary care, and deny animals clean and sanitary shelter. Charges against the farm's owners have been approved and filed by a local magisterial district judge. The factory farmers are innocent until proven guilty, of course, but they would face up to 90 days in jail and $750 in fines if convicted.

We have also called on Land O'Lakes to buy milk only from farms that meet our 12-point animal welfare plan, which would prevent much of the suffering we documented at this farm.

For those of you who can't stomach the thought of eating butter after watching that video, take a minute to tell Land O'Lakes to implement our 12-point animal welfare plan. Then check out one of the many vegan butter alternatives that are widely available. My personal favorite is Earth Balance margarine. It's 100 percent vegan and free of trans fat (and pus), and it tastes even better than butter. Best of all, it's also 100 percent free of cruelty to cows and calves.

Posted by Alisa Mullins

247wallst / CC

PETA is always determined and serious in our efforts to raise awareness about—and to stop—animal suffering. Sometimes, our methods are loud, boisterous, and even a little silly, but they are never naïve. That said, we admit that we're floored by the discrepancy in media coverage surrounding two recent events.

After President Obama killed a fly with one swat, media all over the world swarmed PETA for a response. But when landmark cruelty convictions against pig abusers were issued as a result of our undercover investigation, there was barely a buzz.

We know that countless people turn away from upsetting details about how pigs are beaten and sexually abused by pig farmers, raccoons and foxes gnaw their paws off to escape steel-jaw traps set by furriers, and immobilized rabbits writhe when wrinkle creams are smeared into their eyes. And so do many media outlets, lest they anger advertisers and lose money.

So, headlines everywhere mock PETA for suggesting that people consider employing kind methods of dealing with tiny unwanted visitors. Meanwhile, the pigs get zilch. Please help us change that by writing letters to editors to draw attention to this historic victory against animal abusers and spreading the word to your friends and family.

Posted by Karin Bennett

A worker slammed these piglets' heads against the floor and left them to die in a bin.

Just days after PETA released video footage of an undercover investigation at an Iowa pig farm whose piglets are destined for Hormel, the wheels of change are in motion. Here's what's new.

1. Acknowledgment
PETA met with Greene County, Iowa, Sheriff, Tom Heater's staff, and he is taking the documented cruelty seriously. After this meeting, Sheriff Heater told the Associated Press, "Our next step is to secure interviews with potential suspects, and definitely make sure that there's no further abuse occurring down there—that's our main concern at this point. Asked if crimes had been committed, Heater responded, 'It appears that there were, yes.'"

2. Action
Dr. Jennifer Greiner says Minnesota-based MowMar, LLP, which owns the farm where the investigation took place, has already fired two employees involved in the abuse and will continue to terminate those involved based on the findings of the investigation.

3. Deception
Following the release of the investigation video, Hormel issued false statements to consumers and PETA's members saying that the abuse shown on the video occurred weeks before their supplier purchased the farm. This statement is blatantly untrue, as the video depicts acts committed both before and after MowMar's purchase of the site. Furthermore, Hormel suppliers either owned or managed the Iowa farm during the entire investigation.

Although PETA's investigation garnered some serious media attention and is prompting needed change in regard to animal abuse, it still may take some time before meaningful changes are made to standards in the pig industry. Mother pigs are still confined to tiny gestation crates and their babies are castrated and mutilated without any anesthesia or painkillers. Even worse, unwanted "runts" are sometimes killed by "thumping" (slamming the animals' heads against the floor). Although cruel, these standards still appear to be legal in many U.S. states.

The good news is that you can make a huge difference. You can join PETA and take a stand against the cruel factory-farming industry by going veg today.

Posted by Carrie Ann Harris

Anyone you know still eat SPAM and Dinty Moore? Well, show them a new PETA investigation of a pig factory farm in Iowa—where investigators took truly disturbing undercover footage of workers who were abusing sows and their piglets. This farm breeds and supplies piglets to be grown and eventually slaughtered for Hormel. In addition to keeping pregnant pigs in hideous gestation crates that are so small that the mothers-to-be cannot even turn around, workers and supervisors are seen on our tape kicking pigs maliciously, beating them with metal rods, jabbing clothespins and fingers into their eyes, and slamming piglets against the floor to kill them (a standard practice in the pig-meat industry). A worker was seen spraying paint directly up a sow's nostrils and all over her face as well. Some of the piglets convulsed for more than 12 minutes before dying.

PETA's undercover investigators also documented the following:

A supervisor repeatedly urinated near crated pigs, his urine running into the only area where food was dropped and animals could lay their heads.

Dead piglets' entrails were removed, ground into a stew, and set under heat lamps to grow bacteria. This stew—called "feedback"—was then mixed with feed and fed to the sows.

Workers cut off piglets' tails and pulled out piglets' testicles—without any painkillers—as the small animals screamed next to their mothers. Their tails and testicles went onto a pile on the shed floor.

Tails and testicles from baby pigs

If you eat hot dogs, ham, sausage, or bacon, you are supporting gross abuse and cruelty in this "house of horrors." Please don't. Tell Hormel to stop cruelty to animals at its suppliers' facilities now!

Posted by Amy Elizabeth