Pigs
Come the fuck on. Micro pig picnic? Really?
There is a new addition to what is quickly becoming a horrifying cavalcade of animal exploitation in London. There is the cat cafe, a (badly) planned owl cafe and now a picnic where people can hang out with micro pigs. This ‘trend’ needs to be halted.
Yelp London has teamed up with a micro pig breeding company called Petpiggies (that specialises in selling the animals as pets) to bring London the completely unnecessary experience known as Pignic.
According to the Yelp event page, Pignic is all about ‘food, drinks, piggy education and, of course, a picnic with the most adorable litter of teacup pigs London has ever seen.‘
Yelp claims the point of the event is to raise awareness of pig welfare. This is misguided at best.
An event such as the micro pig picnic is nothing more than a commercially-driven exercise in fetishising vulnerable creatures. A quick scan through the Yelp user comments shows attitudes such as how cute they are, how people want one of their own and how they can’t wait to play with the cute little piggies.
This event is working in conjunction with an animal breeder to create a demand for animals that don’t exist yet. They will be ‘manufactured’ to meet the demand for pet pigs created by the Pignic. If you were somehow confused as to my attitude surrounding animal breeding, here is a recap.
It is fucking horrendous.
We have billions of animals on the planet being slaughtered and mistreated and in need of homes already. Don’t fucking go about breeding more so some selfish fucks in London can feel marginally better about their meaningless fucking lives.
Oh, I forgot. This story gets worse.
Pignic (I am starting to feel sick typing that word) is also supported by a farm charity working to raise welfare standards for pigs. Kinda sounds sweet but they aren’t campaigning for you to stop eating pigs. Farms Not Factories wants you to help pigs get a nicer home before they are killed for food. A welfarist activist group coupled with a promotional opportunity for a pet pig breeder makes me want to vomit. (I am not against farming reform as a rule, but this partnership is perverse)
Don’t get me started on the fact that Pignic attendees will be served food at the event. It must take a fuckload of disconnection from reality to sit around scratching mini pigs on the chin talking while chowing down on food made from other animals.
Fuck off.
I couldn’t agree more, especially on the selective breeding issue.
Agree, hypocrisy at it’s worst!
I love your shameless passion here. Your anger seeps into your every word but it’s totally fine because every emotion I read in your words is mirrored in my brain.
Such an excellent post. And a crying shame that you had to write it.
I agree with you 100% on this and I HATE that it’s happening, but…I admit that part of me is hoping that any move towards pigs as a “pet” species could just possibly change the way that people see them? If this were to become a “thing” then perhaps these idiots would actually get the message that they are very similar to dogs, and this might have some impact on their desire to also eat them?
I say ‘hopeful’, but haven’t forgotten that the degree of cognitive dissonance shown by most meat-eaters is extraordinary. But is there nothing in my theory?
That’s actually a really good point. The disconnect between “these,” pigs and “those,” pigs is likely to affect a lot of people who eat meat as strongly as it does us – only fear is that this may create a whole new industry of exploitation for a whole new set of animals first:/
Oh, this is vile! I hadn’t heard of other animals being used in this way before – the only knowledge I had was off the spreading popularity of “cat cafes” the morality of which is already very much dubious without driving other animals that aren’t already bred as pets into the equation. And they ‘strongly recommend keeping at least two micro pigs’ if you please. Absolutely horrendous. 🙁