Shadowing Practice: If You Eat Meat You Should Know This - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
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This is not an anti -meat video.
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We've all heard the arguments against meat.
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And yet in the EU and US, only between 1 and 6 % of people don't eat it.
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Meat is just too tasty, convenient and ingrained in our culture for most of us to consider giving it up.
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Also, food is personal and nobody likes to be morally lectured.
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At the same time, we love animals.
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Most of us have pets
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and believe in animal rights few things make the internet as
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angry as animal cruelty both are true we love meat
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and we love animals unfortunately most animals we eat live in truly horrible conditions we don't torture them for fun
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but because it makes meat just a little bit more incredibly cheap
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if we all paid just a tad more we could avoid
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most animal suffering often just for a few pennies per meal Farming is complicated.
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Many farmers are genuinely trying to give their animals the best life possible, but they're trapped in a complex system with extreme market pressure to keep prices low.
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No two countries have the same standards, no two farms are equal, and solid data is often scarce.
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We've done our best to combine data from different regions and the prices you pay in the end.
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To keep things simple, we're going to classify farming practices into three broad groups decent, prisons and torture camps.
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This is a bit sketchy and you've probably seen many more categories in the supermarket like organic or grass -fed.
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We'll come to that later.
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So fellow omnivores, what would it cost us to avoid animal torture and still have our fried chicken?
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Chickens.
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At any given time there are about 26 billion chickens alive on earth, as many as all other birds combined.
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Chickens seem dumb, but they're social, can communicate, solve problems, and feel empathy.
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And yet, we keep the vast majority in insane torture.
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Let's start with eggs.
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Worldwide, about 90 % of laying hens live in torture camps, crammed in extremely tight cages where they can barely move.
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They're unable to show any natural chicken behavior like nesting, roosting, foraging or pecking at the ground,
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so they become extremely frustrated and end up hurting each other badly.
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To stop this, many farms clip their beaks.
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In the US and Europe, legal bans and consumer initiatives have improved the situation a lot in the last few years.
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But still, more than 50 % of hens remain in cages.
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The insane thing is that this doesn't even save a lot of money.
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Let's say a dozen eggs cost you around 360 euros or dollars, 30 cents per egg.
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How much does it cost to free the hens?
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The main alternative to cages are barn systems.
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Hens are still kept indoors, but have twice as much space and roam freely.
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Barns are prisons.
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Still not amazing, but so much better.
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In the EU, barns increase the consumer price by about 2 cents per egg.
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The somewhat decent alternative is free -range, where hens are allowed outdoors, often with proper access to vegetation.
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In the EU, this increases the price by about 7 cents per egg.
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Housing aside, one of the cruelest practices is chick culling.
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Male chicks don't lay eggs, so they're killed right after birth, usually by gassing or grinding.
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This is a really widespread practice used for caged, barn and even organic eggs.
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7 billion baby chickens are killed this way each year.
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France and Germany have banned this, so many breeding eggs here are scanned early and only female birds hatch,
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which may have increased costs by only 2 to 5 cents per egg.
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So if you pay 85 cents more for a dozen eggs, you can make a difference between serious chicken torture and pretty decent chicken lives.
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And for another 60 cents, you can help end chick culling too.
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Chicken meat is a different story.
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Most meat chickens today are genetic freaks, bred to reach amazing weights incredibly fast.
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Their internal organs are under a huge amount of stress and they can't even walk properly because of their weight, which causes them a lot of pain for much of their lives.
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It's hard to give exact numbers here, but if farmers were to switch to breeds that grow slower and suffer far less, a serving of chicken breasts that you buy at one
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and a half dollars would become nine cents more expensive in the U .S.
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90 % of meat chickens in the EU live in prisons or torture camps.
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They're kept indoors in extremely crowded conditions with sometimes dozens of birds per square meter, often in the dark and with poor ventilation.
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So what if we moved them all to prisons?
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One EU study found that giving them 30 % more space, perches, fresh air and daylight would increase the price by another 13 cents per serving.
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Probably less than five percent of meat chickens live free -range in relatively decent conditions.
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This meat is actually noticeably more expensive double the price of regular chicken, but chicken is the cheapest meat, so depending on the cut,
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you'd pay 35 cents to one euro or dollar more for a serving of chicken that had a decent life.
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Pigs Pigs are basically dogs.
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They're as intelligent, social and playful as our wolf buddies and make lovable pets,
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so pigs really feel how they live and arguably have it the worst of all animals we eat.
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Probably more than 90 % of all pigs live in torture camps.
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They spend their entire lives indoors, in extremely crowded spaces, on concrete floors without straw or bedding.
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Since this is far from what they need, they get frustrated and often fight.
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Piglets have their tails docked to stop tailbiting.
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Most males are castrated after birth so that their meat will taste better, often without pain relief to save time.
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Mothers are kept in crates, extremely tight metal straitjackets where they can't move at all.
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This leads to extreme suffering for the mother and for the piglets, which are held in a barren area separated by metal bars and taken away at just three weeks old.
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Imagine treating dogs like that.
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First, let's get to the prison level.
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Getting rid of crates would raise the cost of a 2 euro serving of pork by about 20 cents.
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Anesthesia for castration costs almost nothing, around one cent per kilogram of meat.
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And a study in Denmark found that giving pigs more straw
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and bedding material and 30 % more space and other things
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that are more animal -friendly would increase the price per serving by another 20 cents.
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This is still an awful life for an animal this intelligent, but obviously much better, for 40 cents more per serving.
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Going one level further and giving pigs outdoor access for at least 40 % of their lives
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and 300 to 400 % more space indoors would increase the price per serving by another 80 cents.
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Just over 1 % of pigs in the EU live in these or similar conditions.
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We can't know if this is really okay for such a smart and social animal but it starts resembling something decent.
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And all for about 1 .2 dollars
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or euros more per serving of pig cows cows raised for meat have it the best
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because they usually spend about two -thirds of their lives outdoors making their lives pretty good
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if they were in the wild it would be basically the same thing
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but less safe their lives are far from perfect though especially
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the end the vast majority of cows spend the last months of their short lives in finishing feedlots either prisons
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or torture camps where they're fattened to reach their slaughter weight as fast as possible.
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Probably less than 5 % of beef cattle in the US have lifelong access to outdoor pasture.
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And yet, a recent German study found that it only increases the price of beef by around 15%.
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The life quality of cows varies widely even within countries and regions depending on the available land, climate and farming traditions.
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So it's really impossible to make more easy and cheap suggestions to make their lives better.
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Dairy cows do have it much worse.
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They're often kept indoors for most of the year and suffer pain, soul ulcers, and lesions from standing on concrete.
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But once again, none of these things seem to be needed to have affordable milk.
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In Germany, outdoor pasture increases the price of the milk by about 10 cents per liter.
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We could go on with many other animals and farming practices, but the summary is clear.
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For the animals we eat the most, upgrading their living conditions from outright torture to somewhat decent may cost you about 15 % more for beef and milk,
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50 % for eggs and pork, and 100 % for chicken meat.
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The meat of the issue.
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Opinion part.
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Meat has gotten so cheap that we have to torture animals to keep the prices insanely low.
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This really is all there is to it.
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Food in developed countries is the cheapest it's been in history.
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In the US, the largest meat consumer in the world, an average person spends $337 a month on food, $88 on meat, eggs and dairy.
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If these became an average 50 % more expensive, that would increase the monthly expenditure on food by about $43.
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This may sound like a lot, but relative to income, this only means paying as much for food as US consumers did in 1987.
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In Germany, the average person spends about 70 euros a month on meat, eggs and dairy.
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If we increased prices by 50 % on average to make the lives of these animals better in a really meaningful way,
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this would rise by about 35 euros to about 100 euros.
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If this still sounds too expensive, it may be because around 20 % of all meat people buy is simply thrown away.
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Meat got so cheap that we often don't eat it before it goes bad it's no longer valuable.
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Okay so if you go shopping what can you do?
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It can feel like you can't do anything as an individual consumer But this is not true.
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The market follows demand.
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So if you don't want to buy torture meat, look at the labels on holding conditions.
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If there is none, it is torture meat for sure.
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If there is, well, it's complicated.
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It's often unclear what different labels mean, if they're strictly enforced or legally binding.
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Some are great, others whitewashing.
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And we haven't talked about the most expensive meat so far, organic meat.
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You've probably noticed that many price estimates we've given here don't quite match your experience in the supermarket.
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This is in part because some retailers consider ethical products luxury goods
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and charge an even higher price and also because many labels like organic, natural, ecological,
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bio or the worst of all biodynamic often contain a lot of extras
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or pseudoscience that have nothing to do with animal welfare.
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Many but not all of these labels include some of the best practices mentioned before, but not necessarily all.
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Organic brands often include, for a lack of a better word, stupid measures, like forbidding GMO feed.
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As we covered in another video, banning GMOs doesn't do anything good for you or the animals.
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It just makes your food more expensive and seem more natural, while you are consuming unnatural animal breeds living a deeply unnatural life.
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Unfortunately, the label situation in many countries is extremely confusing, often on purpose.
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All too often we don't know what we're really buying.
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So, grudgingly, if you can afford it and want at least a high chance of torture -free meat, go for the label.
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If you can afford it, buy organic.
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If you can afford it and have time, research local farms and get your meat from a place you've seen yourself.
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There's one exception too good not to mention.
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Mussels.
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They suck up carbon and filter water, making coastlines cleaner.
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Calling mussels dumb is giving them too much credit.
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With no central nervous system and probably no thoughts or pain, they're basically moss.
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Really, everyone should eat more mussels.
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Okay, let's wrap up.
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You don't need to be vegan to think the current situation is unacceptable.
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The conditions of most animals we eat are hard to stomach
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and could all be avoided if we paid as much for meat as our parents did.
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Things are slowly getting better, at least in the West.
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Consumers can push the industry in the right direction if we bite the bullet and pay more.
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If you can't afford this, maybe eat a bit less meat.
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Don't throw meat away.
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Maybe avoid the worst torture meat like pork, at least sometimes and push for legislation that bans the most horrific practices.
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We can help make the lives of billions of animals dramatically better.
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It really is that simple.
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You can only advocate for better policies if you have enough reliable information.
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When the financial incentives are prioritized, facts can be manipulated or even omitted altogether. In 2024,
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many major fast -food chains backtracked on serving chicken that's free from antibiotics and do use it on sick chickens now.
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But is this the full story?
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To get nuanced perspectives, we draw on Ground News.
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We admire them, as a long -time sponsor, for their aim to provide a balanced account and leave the final conclusion up to you.
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This is what we're aiming for as well.
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Ground News lets you easily access nearly 100 additional articles published worldwide on these policy changes.
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Let's look closer.
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Scripps News cites flu outbreaks in farms across the US as causing limited supplies and higher prices.
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One source raises concerns that this move could increase the risk of spreading antibiotic resistance amongst humans.
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At the same time, the Associated Press reports that Tyson's senior director of animal welfare noted a plan to use antibiotics known as ionophores,
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which are claimed to have no effect on human health you
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can easily see the different angles of each publication side by side
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and assess the situation for yourself plus context like a credibility rating per publication
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and its source of funding go to ground .news .kin
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or scan the qr code to check it out our link
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saves you 40 off their unlimited subscription to worldwide coverage
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and a better way to stay informed this comes down to
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just five dollars a month the best investment you can make for a tool we think is more important now than ever.
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This video was only possible thanks to a special group of people, our patrons.
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They're a vital part of the Kurzgesagt team, lifting us up, supporting us, and giving us the freedom to continue sparking curiosity all around the world.
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We couldn't do it without them.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This B2 speaking lesson is built on the video “If You Eat Meat You Should Know This”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: meat, animal, chicken, torture, cent. This video has 182 sentences and 2483 words to shadow. The speech runs for 15:13. The speaker talks at a natural 163 words per minute, close to everyday conversation. 82% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English; the rest is worth studying before you start.
Key vocabulary in this video
The 15 most advanced words in the video, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| torture noun | /ˈtoɹt͡ʃɚ/ | The infliction of severe pain or anguish, especially as an interrogation technique or punishment; (usually in the plural) a technique, method, or device which… |
| pig noun | /ˈpɪɡ/ | Any of several mammalian species of the family Suidae, having cloven hooves, bristles and a snout adapted for digging; especially the domesticated animal Sus… |
| cow noun | /kaʊ/ | An adult female of the species Bos taurus, especially one that has calved. |
| hen noun | /hɛn/ | A female fish (especially a salmon or trout) or crustacean. |
| indoors adverb | /ɪnˈdɔɹz/ | Inside, into, or within a building. |
| euro noun | /ˈjʊɹoʊ/ | The currency unit of the European Monetary Union. Symbol: € |
| barn noun | [ˈbɑɹn] | A building, often found on a farm, used for storage or keeping animals such as cattle. |
| breed verb | /ˈbɹiːd/ | To give birth to; to be the native place of. |
| mussel noun | /ˈmʌsəl/ | A saltwater mussel, usually edible, of the order Mytilida in subclass Pteriomorphia. |
| antibiotic noun | /ˌæn.taɪ.baɪˈɑ.tɪk/ | Any substance that can destroy or inhibit the growth of bacteria and similar microorganisms, generally transported by the lymphatic system. |
| chick noun | /t͡ʃɪk/ | A young bird. |
| dairy noun | /ˈdɛə.ɹi/ | (also dairy products or dairy produce) Products produced from milk. |
| cage noun | /keɪd͡ʒ/ | An enclosure made of spaced bars, normally to hold animals while providing some ventilation. |
| cull verb | /kʌl/ | To pick or take someone or something (from a larger group). |
| frustrate verb | /ˈfɹʌsˌtɹeɪt/ | To disappoint or defeat; to vex by depriving of something expected or desired. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| come down to verb | To reach by moving down or reducing. |
| end up verb | To bring to a conclusion. |
| throw away verb | To discard (trash, garbage, or the like), to toss out, to put in the trash. |
| wrap up verb | To cover or enclose (something) by folding and securing a covering entirely around it. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- We've all heard the arguments against meat.
- We'll come to that later.
- First, let's get to the prison level.
- This is what we're aiming for as well.
- We couldn't do it without them.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | is complicated · are still kept · are allowed |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | We've done · you've probably seen · have improved |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 42 contractions and reduced forms, such as they're, don't, can't. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: anesthesia /ˌæn.əsˈθi.ʒə/, empathy /ˈɛmpəθi/, ethical /ˈɛθɪkəl/, altogether /ɔl.tuˈɡɛð.ɚ/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: anesthesia /ˌæn.əsˈθi.ʒə/, ventilation /ˌvɛntɪˈleɪʃ(ə)n/, vegetation /ˌvɛd͡ʒəˈteɪʃən/, subscription /səbˈskɹɪpʃən/
- Long words — get the stress right: antibiotic /ˌæn.taɪ.baɪˈɑ.tɪk/, supermarket /ˌsupɚˈmɑɹkət/, anesthesia /ˌæn.əsˈθi.ʒə/, ventilation /ˌvɛntɪˈleɪʃ(ə)n/, manipulate /məˈnɪp.jʊ.leɪt/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like torture, pig, cow.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.