Animal Rights Group Protests At Gordon Food Service

More than 30 people, including one man in a chicken suit, were protesting acts of animal cruelty during lunchtime Monday outside the Gordon Food Service location at 2424 Oakton St. in Evanston.

Local and regional members of Mercy For Animals, a non-profit organization dedicated to preventing cruelty to farmed animals, were among the group of individuals that stood quietly on the Oakton Street sidewalk - right outside the main GFS sign - for one hour, protesting the abuse of chickens by Gordon Food Service chicken suppliers as evidenced by an undercover video.

Watch the video here

According to Jeni Haines, national campaign coordinator for Mercy for Animals, said the abuse depicted in their hidden camera investigation amounts to “sickening abuse no company with morals should support.”

“Gordon Food Service has the power and ethical responsibility to demand their food suppliers stop shackling, shocking and slicing open conscious animals,” said Haines, who noted several attempts to speak with GFS officials on the matter have been unsuccessful.

The video, Haines says, shows chickens whose “short lives are filled with misery and deprivation.”

“The undercover video shows workers violently slamming birds into metal shackles, breaking their wings and legs, birds being electrocuted and some having their throats sliced wide open while fully conscious,” she said.

A number of the signs Monday afternoon read “Gordon Food Service Tortures Animals.” Haines said the decision to protest in Evanston was made due to the high volume of traffic in the area. Other similar demonstrations are planned at other GFS locations nationwide.

During the first 15 minutes of the protest, cars passing by honked, some feverishly, in support.

Despite the fact that chickens make up more than 95 percent of the animals killed for food each year in the U.S., they are excluded from the federal Humane Methods of Slaughter Act.

“Unfortunately these practices are considered standard and legal in the poultry industry,” added Haines. “But we are urging GFS to catch up with some of their competitors like Wal-Mart, Nestle and Starbucks, who have all developed policies against this.”

GFS distributes chickens to a variety of restaurants, Haines said, including PF Chang’s, Culver’s and Red Lobster.

MFA and nearly 130,000 consumers - including actress Pamela Anderson - have signed a petition calling on Gordon Food Service to immediately “adopt meaningful animal welfare guidelines for its chicken suppliers, including on-farm improvements to reduce the number of birds who arrive sick and injured at the slaughterhouse and switching to less cruel killing systems that eliminate the horrific suffering caused by shackling, shocking, and slitting the throats of conscious animals,” according to a Monday morning news release.