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>Modern/advanced societies have laws to protect conscious beings from exploitation and cruelty.

I can think of no such society where this is generally true. One need only consider that pigs are far smarter than dogs and then the median pig’s life in said societies.

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Laws exist that ban practices that are - according to those who set and enforce the laws - excessively cruel to pigs. That’s all this discussion is about.

That pigs are still treated with cruelty is a terrible thing, and I’d happily see more done to protect all animals against cruelty. But it’s a separate argument to what’s relevant here.

No, unfortunately, this is goalpost shifting. We’ve gone from “cruelty” to “excessive cruelty,” nor are there any laws that prevent the common sense understanding of either thing from happening to the median pig. One can here also point out that we in fact engage in such extreme cruelty that they have to make it illegal to document it:

https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2019/1/11/18176551/ag-gag...

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