Originally Posted by Equinox

[QUOTE=Nancy LC]I disagree.

QUOTE]

+1

First, geese, ducks and other water fowl gorge in the fall, in order to store fat to last them through the winter. They do this to themselves, and the liver stores the fat without taking permanent damage. If the birds are not killed (i.e. wild geese) they lose the fat and the liver goes back to normal size. Farmers have gotten birds to fatten their own liver to foie gras proportions just by giving them feed that they really really (really!) like, and they gorge like nobody's business.

Second, they don't have a gag reflex. It's all too easy for us humans to anthropomorphise (="humanify") animals, and assume they feel *exactly* the same as us in a given situation. The tube going down, the volume of high-calorie food, none of it makes the bird gag, or feel like throwing up. it's also over quickly. Apparently the birds may run *toward* the gaveur, eager for their "fill". Force-feeding a human is literally torture.

There are horrible examples of gavage, where the birds are kept in cages too small to move at all, because that makes the liver grow even faster, but it can in fact be done humanely.

I think it's important to see both sides of almost any issue.