Humanewashing: How Deceptive Labeling Enables Our Ignorance
The most direct form of contact most of us have with non-human animals (other than our pets) is at mealtime. It is at the dinner table and in our supermarkets that we are brought into direct touch with the most extensive exploitation of other species that has ever existed. But when we pick up a package of ground beef for tacos or a carton of eggs for breakfast, we wouldn’t know it, especially when these products are often misleadingly advertised to us as being “all natural” or “raised humanely.” As Peter Singer writes in Animal Liberation,
“Buying food in a store or restaurant is the culmination of a long process, of which all but the end product is delicately screened from our eyes.”
It is true that the only step in the process of the production of our food which we see is the final step. The animal meat that is sold in stores, for example, is often packaged in plastic. It comes in relatively clean packages from which little to no blood drips. Based on brand names - Plainville Farms, Perdue Farms, Abby Fresh Beef Company - we may think (if we think about it at all) that these animals were raised on peaceful, idyllic farms. When we see the word “farm” in itself we might conjure up images of a barn, a flock of hens, and a herd of cows grazing in an open field. When we then see the brand’s packaging, often accompanied with illustrations of happy animals and attempts at humane labeling, we become further and further removed from the realities behind our food.
Natural. Humanely Raised. USDA Organic. Hormone-Free. Cage-Free. Free-Range. Grass-Fed. Vegetarian Diet Fed. No Added Growth Hormones. Raised in Stress-Free Environment. Blah. Blah. Blah. These intentionally deceptive claims have come to be referred to as humanewashing.
Humanewashing is an effort to market animal products to conscientious consumers through deceptive packaging and labeling, promoting the illusion of animal well-being while concealing the extent of animals' illness and suffering (Farm Forward).
Almost all of the animal products people consume as food come from mass-production factory farms, where animals are tightly packed together in unsanitary warehouses, and yet the packages these products are sold in try and sell consumers an entirely different story. This dangerous new trend, similar to greenwashing (the practice of advertising consumer products using vague or deceptive sustainability claims), is an industry-driven, carefully devised marketing tactic used by the meat and dairy industry itself to increase sales and, therefore, profit margin. In order to eliminate the concerns of more conscientious consumers, companies need to disarm people with false claims of “better meat,” which actually just comes from the same sickly, genetically modified animals as does meat which is not labeled “humane.” The only difference is the increased price and the “feel good” sensation consumers may receive from believing that they are making a more ethical, more mindful choice.
Corporations prey on well-meaning consumers to increase prices without actually taking meaningful steps towards the more humane treatment of animals, which is itself a very questionable concept since the use of animals against their will and for our own benefit, followed, of course, by their slaughter, can never truly be humane.
Since most of us like to believe that causing LESS harm is better than (or at least more achievable than) causing NO harm, the dirty business of humanwashing successfully accomplishes what it sets out to do: confuse consumers and make even more money.
Humanewashing falls into 3 categories: claims, certifications, and imagery. Claims, such as “humanely raised” and “all natural” have very little legal definition, if any, when it comes to how animals are raised. In fact, the label “all natural” has absolutely nothing to do with how “naturally” animals are raised. This claim refers exclusively to what additives are put into animals after slaughter. Similarly, terms like “humanely raised” have incredibly weak definitions and extremely little regulatory oversight from the USDA.
To come off as more meaningful or credible, claims benefit from being paired with certifications, which fall into two categories: industry certifications and independent certifications. Industry certifications are developed by meat and dairy companies themselves.
It seems reasonably very, very questionable to consider what truth there may actually be behind industrialized factory farming facilities making positive claims about themselves.
For example, the UEP Certification was launched in 2002 by a nationwide group of egg farmers that together produce roughly 90% of all eggs in the U.S. The UEP’s standards for certification lack even the most basic provisions for hen well-being and realistically just describe the conditions of the current industrial egg production business. Industry certifications like this one are very questionable and deliberately misleading. They are lies, not certifications. They don’t certify anything.
Then there are independent certifications, which are created and operated by independent non-profits (unless they are controlled by industry interest and secretly partnered with meat and dairy facilities). These are generally more meaningful and more honest certifications but have recently also come under scrutiny for becoming entangled in humanewashing. It has been revealed that the nation's largest independent welfare certification, Global Animal Partnership (GAP), may have been putting their stamp of approval on factory-farmed products, which, as we all know, are absolutely NOT humane.
Factory farming and the humane treatment of animals are two very separate, very incompatible things.
Ideally, independent certifications are those to be trusted because they are established with more distance from the animal agriculture industry and are instead composed of animal welfare advocates with backgrounds at organizations like World Animal Protection and the Humane Society of the United States. This, however, may not be the case and even when it is, the ideas customers have of what “humane” tends to mean are very different even from what these independent certifiers deem to be “humane” improvements.
For example, Consumer Reports found that “the majority of consumers think a humanely raised claim on eggs, dairy and meat currently means the farm was inspected to verify this claim (79%), the animals had adequate living space (77%), the animals were slaughtered humanely (75%), and the animals went outdoors (65%).” Even higher percentages of consumers were found to believe that a humanely raised claim on eggs, dairy and meat should mean these things if they already don’t.
Interestingly, however, the USDA, which publishes its Animal Raising Claim Labeling Guidelines, focuses on documentation to verify humane labeling and NOT inspection. For most animal raising claims, the documentation needed to support these claims includes the following:
A detailed written description explaining the controls used for ensuring that the raising claim is valid from birth to harvest or the period of raising being referenced by the claim;
A signed and dated document describing how the animal are raised (e.g., vegetarian fed, raised without antibiotics, grass fed), to support that the specific claim made is truthful and not misleading;
A written description of the product tracing and segregation mechanism from time of slaughter or further processing through packaging and wholesale or retail distribution.
The required documentation for other claims, such as organic claims and non-genetically engineered claims, are the same in that they focus again on documentation and not inspection. This poses a problem, of course, because multimillion dollar companies are not very interested in always telling the truth, especially if doing so will hurt their business and even more so if no one is going to verify their claims anyway.
If all it takes to be able to label a product “humanely raised” or “organic” or “natural” is documentation, then any factory farm with any understanding about how to lie on paper is able to utilize such claims on their products without actually making any “humane” improvements to the production of their products.
It’s not too surprising that not everyone prioritizes integrity and honesty, especially those in the business of slaughtering animals. And as we’ve seen throughout history, people struggle with appropriately handling power, so we can not reasonably trust that the wealthy, industrialized meat and dairy factory farms are accurately depicting the realities of their facilities. When the documentation submitted is not followed by rigorous inspection, humane labeling and certifications begin to mean very little, if anything at all. It’s also significant to note that companies often submit humane labeling/certification requests for all of their factory plants while only implementing “humane” improvements to ONE of those plants. And the USDA says this is permitted under certain circumstances. Fascinating!
The Consumer Reports data strongly suggests that Americans are becoming more and more committed to anti-cruelty principles and that they expect welfare certifications to meet, at least, what might be considered “common sense” animal welfare requirements (like access to the outdoors). Unfortunately, both industry and independent certifications typically do not even approximately meet these consumer expectations. People rely on certifications to CERTIFY claims about the products they are purchasing, but when even those certifications are questionable and manipulative, how can we ever know the truth behind the products we consume?
It’s also significant to note that most large animal meat “farms” now hire professionals to handle negotiations with animal protection groups, which is often yet another form of manipulation by the industrialized billion dollar meat and dairy industry.
Rather than making real change, agribusiness companies pretend to be sincere and honest in their willingness to change their practices towards a more humane treatment of animals but realistically just hide behind a smokescreen and avoid revealing the truth at all costs.
As a result, negotiators from animal protection groups are regularly deceived and lied to about changes that are never actually made (or are at least not made to degree of our expectations). In their report titled “The Dirt on Humanewashing,” Farm Forward explains,“The deception of the public thus occurs at two levels: techniques like certifications function to deceive the masses, and more sophisticated techniques, like assigning professionals to “manage” nonprofit groups demanding change, function to neutralize or weaken resistance from animal welfare professionals.”
With all of this, I think it’s significant to ask the following question: Why are these intentionally deceptive and purposefully vague labels and certifications allowed to be used by companies that have no real intention of reducing harm? The answer? Because very little legitimate regulation exists around these claims and certifications. The terms “humane” or “ethically raised,” for example, aren’t legally defined by the USDA or by the FDA. The USDA does require documentation to support these claims, but according to experts, those claims aren’t closely scrutinized or monitored. Why? Because of the enormous power of the meat and dairy industry to bribe even the independent well-meaning certifiers. The next very important question we must ask is:
Why is there so much to hide when it comes to the meat and dairy industry?
Even if we are not at all discussing whether or not we should be consuming animal products from an ethical and moral standpoint, we should definitely still question why there seem to be so many lies circling this industry. And why is the meat and dairy industry so interested in keeping consumers disconnected from the realities of where their food comes from?
The simple answer: MONEY. The increasingly educated consumer base that cares about welfare tends to want more information about the animal products they’re purchasing - and they’re willing to pay more for it. Consumer Reports found that 86% of consumers wanted meat from animals raised without antibiotics to be available and 60% were willing to pay more for such products. Meat production companies, of course, have taken this trend, which could have significantly hurt their business, and found a way to exploit conscientious consumers in their favor instead. These multimillion dollar (if not billion dollar) companies do not lose and they certainly don’t care about honesty and integrity the way they care about money and profit.
In order to keep consumers in a cycle of purchasing the same products, especially from the same brands, companies need to offer an element of comfort about their products. Intentionally deceptive claims and certifications that don’t actually mean anything at all are emotionally and mentally comforting to consumers who believe, at least before further investigation, the labeling of products they’re purchasing. Claims like “humanely raised” or “no hormones added” sooth customer anxiety and make for a more appealing purchasing experience. These terms also distance consumers from the horrific truth behind how animal products are produced.
It should also be mentioned that the use of misleading claims and certifications from industrialized factory farms weaken such claims from truly high welfare farms (questionable concept, again) and push such farmers out of important markets. Humanewashing also intentionally prevents the kinds of reforms necessary to phase out industrialized farming, because that, of course, wouldn’t be good for business!
Accountability isn’t something we can expect large, money-hungry corporations to have. However, with policy change and more intensive regulatory verification practices, humane labeling and certification can become a useful tool for consumers interested in purchasing “better” meat and dairy. Lots of reform and intervention from third-party certifiers is required to make this possible. Integrity and honesty are also required to make this possible. So surely, this will be an uphill battle.
The humane labeling and certification practices that exist today are intentionally misleading and deceptive. They can not be trusted. It is our own responsibility as consumers to shuffle through the misleading information we are relentlessly presented with and learn about the origin of our food on our own.
Ask questions. Seek the truth. Be kind to animals.