The Other Side Of The Fence

This short video opens with shots of a human baby. Voiceover narration reminds us that we all learned the basic human needs when we were children in school: food, shelter, companionship. Expanding on the subject of food, we are told that we eat some 1,000 lbs. per year. And the scene shifts to a baby Holstein playing in a farm meadow. Veal calves, we are reminded, are killed at the age of four months. Yet, on a dairy farm, those baby calves receive the basic needs: food, shelter, companionship. Then we are shown a factory farm, where baby calves are chained into cramped individual stalls, shot full of chemicals, and left to stumble in their own waste products--until the day they're killed. Produced by the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, this video essay is not a call to give up veal; it's about the inhumane treatment of baby animals. Babies who, by and large, have the same initial needs as you and I. A powerful program that makes its point with reason and sensitivity (there are no graphic slaughtering scenes), this is highly recommended for both public schools and libraries. (See Coma: The Journey Back for availability.)