<$BlogRSDUrl$> The Cyberactivist

Behind the scenes of the fight for the protection of animals and workers and the preservation of the environment - my experiences as a Tyson slaughterhouse hanger/killer turned activist. Exposing the evils of factory farming, by Virgil Butler. If you have arrived here looking for the Tyson stories, view the early archives. Some of them are now featured on the sidebar for easy searching.

Monday, November 17, 2003

Corroboration 

Guess what I found this morning? A
fellow blogger, living in the Ouachitas,
that also worked at Tyson. Now, what
are the odds of that?

But, the thing that made me the gladdest
was that he backed up several things that
I have said and brought up an issue I don't
think I have talked much about. Check out
what he had to say:

I have little sympathy for chickens, but
he tells it like it is about Tyson's operations.
I worked in a Tyson plant back in the 1980s.
I've seen the aptly-described "fecal soup"
of the chiller tanks where the chickens roil
around after they've been killed, scalded,
beheaded and so on. I've seen the plant
running full production when the water
used in processing was running yellow-
brown. The USDA knew it too, but the
head inspector refused to let the subordinate
inspectors shut the plant down.

I can talk about ammonia leaks too. Once
an ammonia line in the big frozen-storage
room ruptured and soaked thousands of
cases of product with ammonia. They had
us repack it all in new boxes. Just the smell
of the ammonia off the boxes was sickening,
and we were doing that all day for several
days in a row until it was all done.

And it was not at all unheard of for some
supervisor to remove the USDA "hold" tags
from a few pallets of questionable product
after the inspector left in order to meet the
production quotas.

He also agreed with my thoughts on the
power of the huge corporations, like Tyson
and Wal-Mart. He especially seems to hate
Wal-Mart. I was quite amused by some of
his writing. He has a good sense of humor,
and I was glad to find him.

There aren't too many bloggers from these
rural parts (at least none that I am aware
of) and I was glad to find him, especially
since it is so hard for me to find anyone
around here to talk about what goes on
down at Tyson. They have way too much
influence and control around here for many
people to want to speak out against them,
at least publicly. You could almost feel the
buzz coming off of houses in the area from
private bitch sessions of the workers. But,
they know better than to come out in
public and say bad things about them. For
way too many, Tyson is not only their bread
and butter, but their family's too.

Maybe more will come out with time. We
will see how many have the courage to do
so. Meanwhile, I will be keeping my eyes
and ears open for whatever else I find.

You can bet on that. You hear that, Tyson?
Posted by: # Virgil / 8:26 AM
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