After much discussion, Fiona and I have come to a compromise regarding the narrative of our animation. We have decided to create an animated interview, but rather than use the interviews which we found on the internet, we are going to try and gather some first hand interviews. Neither Fiona nor I have any contacts in the meat industry, but fortunately once of our classmates, Grace, suggested that we could speak to her uncle who has worked as a butcher for many years. While we had originally planned to meet him in person, pressures of other projects and commitments made this difficult, so we decided to conduct the interview via email, with the potential to meet face to face at a later date if needed.
While we are grateful for the above responses to our questions, we just don't feel that the content matches our desired message and tone, regarding the mistreatment of animals in abattoirs. After further discussion, Fiona and I decided that we were fast running out of time to source another suitable interviewee, so our best option was to resort back to the found interviews, which have the added credibility of being published in a book (we merely found excerpts on the author's blog). From the more extensive information available in the book, Fiona put together two separate yet similar narratives, focusing on either pigs or cows:
IDEA 1
We have two different speakers, but they are both in the same abattoir. During the shots where the abattoir is empty we have the titles, over the empty shots then it’s taken in turns between the two different speakers and the focus varies between the two different puppets in the story board for each of the quotes.
"I've seen hogs beaten, whipped, kicked in the head to get them to the restrainer. One night, I saw a driver get so angry at a hog he broke it's back with a piece of board."
"Management was constantly complaining to us about blown loins. They claimed that when the stunner voltage was too high it tore up the meat. The supervisors always wanted it on low stun no matter what size hogs we were stunning. When you got big sows and boars in the restrainer, the stunner wouldn't work at all."
"When hogs end up in the catch pen alive, the shackler beats them over the head with a lead pipe a couple of times - until they're dazed so he can get a chain around the hog's leg - and then he hoists it up. By then they may have come back to life and be squealing their heads off."
"The managers would say, 'that's just muscle reaction, nerves. It's not alive.' I'd say, 'then why's the damn hog trying to bite me? Just how stupid do you think I am?'"
"After they left me, the hogs would go up a hundred-foot ramp to a tank where they're dunked in 140 degree water. That's to scald the hair off...there's no way these animals can bleed out in the few minutes it takes to get up the ramp. By the time they hit the scalding tank, they're still fully conscious and screaming."
“I’d Come home, wife would ask me how my night went, and instead of being happy to see her, I’d say, “What the hell do you care?’”
Fiona over end credit of lights turning off: We do care, don’t be ignorant, eat meat, source local.
This below is what's on pg 296 of the afterword.
“Workers open the hide on the legs, the stomach, the neck; they cut off the feet while the cow is breathing. It makes noise. It’s looking around,” said one worker. ‘Cows can get seven minutes down the line and still be alive. I’ve been up to the side-puller where they are alive. I’ve been up to the side-puller where they are alive. All the hide is stripped out down to the neck there,” said another.
“Their eyes look like they are popping out. I feel bad that I have to do my job on them,” explained a third.
“Sometimes they go pretty far. Sometimes they have all the skin out and they’re all peeled. Sometimes you can tell they’re alive because when you look at their eyes, you can see the tears of cow. And their eyes are moving and everything. But mainly they just make a lot of noise and are trying to kick,” described another.
“I’ve seen thousands and thousands of cows go through the slaughter process alive. If I see a live animal, I cannot stop the line. Because the supervisor has told us that you have to work on a cow that’s alive”
Idea 2
Same as before but instead of the hog quotes, quotes from the afterword of the same book regarding cows.
“Workers open the hide on the legs, the stomach, the neck; they cut off the feet while the cow is breathing. It makes noise. It’s looking around,”
‘Cows can get seven minutes down the line and still be alive. I’ve been up to the side-puller where they are alive. I’ve been up to the side-puller where they are alive. All the hide is stripped out down to the neck there,”
“Their eyes look like they are popping out. I feel bad that I have to do my job on them,”
“Sometimes they go pretty far. Sometimes they have all the skin out and they’re all peeled. Sometimes you can tell they’re alive because when you look at their eyes, you can see the tears of cow.”
“And their eyes are moving and everything. But mainly they just make a lot of noise and are trying to kick,”
“I’ve seen thousands and thousands of cows go through the slaughter process alive. If I see a live animal, I cannot stop the line. Because the supervisor has told us that you have to work on a cow that’s alive”
End speech: Stop the line. Eat meat, Source Local.
Okay so the reason I've chosen six quotes for each one is what I'm thinking is if we alternate the two voices, we can alternate the two being the focal point and this gives them equal time on screen and i think it will make it more impactful because the change of voice will force you to pay attention again. Sorry it's taken me so long, I was just making this task way more difficult than it needed to be it wasn't until I talked to annabeth this afternoon I realised simple is better.
After discussing the two ideas together, we have settled on the narrative focusing on the pigs. We felt that both had equal impact, yet the pig interview was ever so slightly more in depth, providing more material to work with.
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