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273- Film Review: The Chicken Whisperer (2025)
44 Plays5 hours ago
Can a film of only nineteen minutes successfully advocate on behalf of an animal that is killed in its billions each year? Kate, Dominic & Paul get stuck into this short film- based at an animal sanctuary (https://animalplace.org/) and discuss just that.
For more about the movie & to watch, visit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKEwKi6ccIc
As ever, we love hearing your views on the topics under discussion (or anything else!) so do drop us your thoughts via enoughofthefalafel@gmail.com
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Enough of the Falafel is a community of people who love keeping on top of the latest news in the world of veganism & animal rights. With the Vegan Talk podcast, we aim to develop listeners' (& our own) thoughts around key issues affecting veganism & the animal rights movement; giving our opinions, whilst staying balanced; remaining true to our vegan ethics, whilst constantly seeking to grow & develop.
Each week we home in on one topic in particular and pick it apart in more detail. If you have a suggestion for a future show, do get in touch via enoughofthefalafel@gmail.com.
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Thanks everyone for listening; give us a rating and drop us a message to say "hi"; it'll make our day!
Kate, Dominic & Paul
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Transcript
Introduction and Lighthearted Banter
00:00:00
Speaker
Hello everybody! Who are you calling a bird brain? You might actually need a PhD to really get to know chickens. My name is Dominic and for this episode of Vegan Talk I am also joined by Kate and Paul. Welcome to Vegan Talk!
00:00:16
Speaker
So I think vegans go looking for trouble even when they're not looking for trouble. That's not what butt is used for! Brrr! Brody! Take your flat-grown meat elsewhere. We're not doing that in the state of Florida.
00:00:29
Speaker
Should I call the medium and say, hi, sorry? True education. younger generation are getting know how brutal these practices are. That leaves a lot of pizza delivery companies in problems of things.
00:00:40
Speaker
What is this? What kind of movie is this? It's comedy gold, maybe. Any form of social injustice has... a connection with another. As long as you don't get the wee brunions with the horns you'll be all right.
00:00:53
Speaker
Does veganism give him superpowers?
00:00:59
Speaker
I cannot fly around the city.
Show Format and 'The Chicken Whisperer' Film
00:01:01
Speaker
I don't have laser vision. hi listeners it's Kate here with you today. Welcome everyone and thank you for listening to this episode of Vegan Talk. It's great that you're here. Hello everyone, it's Paul here whose phone's falling slowly on the side so it looks like I'm on a ship.
00:01:20
Speaker
Welcome to to everyone. um This is Vegan Talk. It's the um show where we delve into a subject in a bit more detail and ah there are loads of these that are sitting on our repository that we've got and they're pretty timeless so you know we're we're there philosophizing talking whatever about various subjects and somehow we still manage to find new subjects still I don't know how we're doing it but we are um and uh yeah so they're they're they're really good for just dipping in whenever and they've they've got that long longevity of time yeah thank you Paul so all of us contribute to both the vegan talk and the vegan week
00:01:58
Speaker
episodes and the vegan week where we talk about the news sometimes there'll be something on there and we'll be chatting away and i think this could really be a vegan talk episode and this is one of them on a vegan news episode i talked about the movie the chicken whisperer from we animals it's something that's free to watch on youtube And we chatted a little bit about it when it first came out.
00:02:27
Speaker
And I gave my opinions on the first few. I'm very happy to see that the numbers of viewers has has really gone up and up and up. That's a very positive thing to see happening, Paul and Kate and I. have watched it ready to chat about it in a little bit more detail on this episode so kate for someone who hasn't yet had the chance to see it and we will certainly share a link to the youtube episode in in our in in the podcast but but would you care to say uh you know what what's it all about what is the chicken whisper about kate
00:03:02
Speaker
Well, it's not actually about chi whispering to chickens, really.
Insights into 'The Chicken Whisperer' and Chicken Personalities
00:03:06
Speaker
It's only about 20 minutes long, so it's not going to take a huge chunk of your life up. But gosh, don't you learn a lot about chickens on it, I think. So it's kind of, it's a story of the chickens on the Animal Place Sanctuary in the States. And it's a story about the chickens that live there, about 150 of them, but also one of the carers who is somebody called Maria Goller and she's
00:03:38
Speaker
actually an avian researcher with a phd in biology she it tells about her passion as a young kid how she loved birds she loved spending time with her dad bird watching you know there's even a little picture of her all dressed up as a bird i mean she's clearly loves loves loves birds And then when she'd done her PhD, I don't think she was quite sure what she wanted to do. And she ended up applying for, oh, she she did go and do lots of conservation work, I think. And then she applied for ah work in an animal sanctuary.
00:04:17
Speaker
And she got a job at this animal sanctuary, particularly looking after the chickens. And one of the people there said, oh, you you' you'll never get to know. I think they had like 200 chickens there at the time. And they went, oh, yeah, don't worry, you' you'll never learn.
00:04:34
Speaker
who all the different chickens are, you'll never learn all their names. And she immediately set to work doing little kind of identifying sheets of all the different chickens, taking photos, drawing the outline of their comb on the top of their head. They're all different.
00:04:56
Speaker
describing their personalities, their likes, their dislikes, who they like to hang out with in the flock. She sure did learn all of the chickens, all their different names and all their personalities. and I just found it an absolutely lovely, heartwarming film. and it it shows all the care that has to go into looking after these chickens who are all rescued from the animal abuse industry, basically. So, yeah that's basically the film. Yeah, it's a really good summary. I was going to say, they also kind of showcase the animal sanctuary itself and show what else they do there. so But, yeah. don't know, Paul, ah if you would agree with with my reaction. I felt that in a world where the phrase animal lovers is so often used for just liking pet animals, cats and dogs and, you know, chickens are not seen as cute animals. They're not seen as as lovable. And and yet I did ah live with
00:06:09
Speaker
chickens when I was a boy, not farmed chickens, like they were rescued chickens that we just had out in our in our garden when we'd we've moved over to Wales. And I was very attached to them as ah as a boy. And it was it was me who'd said to my mum,
00:06:25
Speaker
can we stop eating meat and we weren't that well off despite how much the image i've painted may may suggest so mum was like if we stop eating meat you've got a stick at it dominic you can't afford to buy a whole load of vegetarian food and let's go back to it and my mum didn't believe in my ability to stick at not eating meat and i remember thinking i'll never eat chickens though if i if i if i really can't do it and i have to go back to to bacon or, you know, never chickens. Anyway, never did go back, never, never did. But, um yeah, i don't think I've ever seen a film which does such a good job of showing the personalities of of of chickens, of the the joy of chickens, the individuality of chickens, and really the the lives, you know, who they are, you know, what they can be. And I would argue, to get to my question, Paul,
00:07:25
Speaker
I'm not succinct, am I? Kate says to us, I'm not succinct. Kate, you are the most succinct person in the world good compared to me. My question is, Paul, do you reckon, I reckon this is good for showing to to chicken eaters. I think that this would be a good thing to show. I think, I don't think I've ever seen anything. that is as good, in my opinion, as this, as really showing chickens in the same light that we might see cats or dogs.
00:07:53
Speaker
What do you reckon, Paul?
Impact of the Film and Comparisons to Dinosaurs
00:07:55
Speaker
Do you reckon, is it good? Succinct. Yes and no. Well, I was going to say, so as in like, yeah, I think it is good. um verys It's a nicely recorded piece, actually. It feels very nicely done. It's quite gentle. And yeah, I think it's a good it's a good insight. And like say, you get that natural, you feel the natural love of those chickens and the kind of, was going to say profiling doesn't sound like a very nice way of doing it. you the kind of individual traits that the chickens have i think there's there's obviously other media that has done a lot for chickens chicken run being one of those things i think you mentioned earlier on from a cartoon and connecting with kids point of view so maybe there's there's that but yeah that's kind of obviously more of a a cartoony well cartoons the wrong phrase isn't it as animation um piece uh but it's perhaps done quite a lot for for chickens as well but yeah
00:08:51
Speaker
thought it was a good piece and it did, it did, it was very accessible I think and like you say i think that you would be quite comfortable showing it to most people that you might not show other animal rights um material to because it might be either a bit too, some you know some stuff can be a bit gory, some stuff can be, we might think, we've reviewed many films, maybe isn't always the best anyway but yeah it feels it feels like a quite gentle a gentle way of introducing thought about chicken individuality and then respect for for chickens given that like you say they're normally seen as food so this paints them in more of that individual light and being sentient beings and having personalities etc Yeah, for sure. Kate, why do you think people have such a hard time caring about chickens? I i spend a lot of my time working with children and we talk about dinosaurs. Kids love dinosaurs and chickens are like modern day dinosaurs. They're so cool. Their big claws, their big beaks and strutting around. They're amazing. i
00:10:05
Speaker
fail to see why they don't generate that kind of love. But but but in so many, they don't. Why why do you think that is? Yeah. I don't know. It's really sad, isn't it? I guess, especially when you see photographs of great masses of chickens, it's so hard to identify with just one of those chickens and just imagine that they're all...
00:10:31
Speaker
individual little beings with their own thoughts if only they they were allowed to express them and people i mean they said it in the film you know people think of them as robots basically they they don't imagine for a minute that they've got different personalities i don't know it's just i guess that they're one step further removed they're not mammals for a start you know in fact, they are they are almost looking like dinosaurs, aren't they? Very much so, yeah. Yeah. So, um you know, I guess, yeah, that they're, again, a bit like fish, perhaps. Only fish have an even harder time, don't they? Yes. I mean, chickens have beaks, they can't smile. My little stuffy girl that I had, she had the biggest beaming smile, you know. It's just much harder to identify with them somehow and read their expressions, maybe. They probably have, I don't know, Dom, you you would know. They're a bit like cats. They kind of express themselves through their tail, through their eyes, through their teeth. Yeah, and also cats and dogs are...
00:11:44
Speaker
often interested in us, whereas chickens are quite independent. And i was a young lad who did not have many friends at school. So I was quite happy to sit outside with the chickens and it's not like how a bounding puppy runs up to you and wants to know you straight away. It was quite a slow forming thing. But as a really young child, I saw the difference between the six chickens we had, not immediately. And I named all of them. And the the reason was I was like, I'll never eat chickens again, wasn't just some personification of the that that creatures outside it was that i spent so much time with them and i saw it with my own eyes i i could tell them apart and this isn't what we often are exposed to the image of it we're just so used to to just seeing them as as
00:12:55
Speaker
you know, pecking around interchangeable, you know, even even the, even the, you know, very false image of the so-called free-range chicken ah isn't full of personality in how it's depicted. So, yeah, there's a lot of undoing of And I guess we get presented with them in the supermarket as just this sort of naked thing, you know, or one looking very much like another cut covered in plastic and still called chicken.
00:13:31
Speaker
And, you know, clearly devoid of any behaviour, personality or anything. And, um you know, so therefore, maybe it's easy to think that they were like that before they were. We've not had to rename it, have we? Like, you know, pig's bacon, you know, cow's beef. Yeah. But, you chickens, no need to think of a euphemism. People are quite happy to be like, yeah, this is chicken. i am eating chicken. Whereas like if you're like, oh, do you want a bite of this piglet? Like that would make some bacon eaters uncomfortable. But yeah, what a what an interesting ah thing. For all the things we talk about, I've i've often heard people say, you know, chickens are pretty much, as far as I'm aware, the most consumed animal in the world and certainly in the Western world, I believe. And they probably get the hardest time on that basis because there's so many of them and so so many ah are killed for human consumption. They get a bad deal, plus obviously if they're egg producing as well. So they they yeah they do fall at the sharpest end of humans' cruelty, I think. So it's ah perhaps know good that we are trying to help portray their individuality and their
00:14:49
Speaker
ah characteristics um when like you say we are there's already that association with dogs with cats um for example and it's trying to move away from the agricultural animals that are just like product food don't even people don't even want i think people are resistant to even associating those animals with that because it makes life difficult for them to think that there is personalities. It's a lot easier just to kind of, as Kate said, see them as a packaged product, it headless, just not really resembling what they were in life. You know, it's it's kind of, ah you know, it's it's ah made into shapes, et cetera. It's very easy then for people just to go I like the taste of that thing.
00:15:31
Speaker
The fact it's been killed for me. and I don't really want to think about that. I just want to eat it and and enjoy the taste of it. And when ah when they're killed, they are still babies. So, you know, I do sometimes go to pig vigils and I haven't been to a chicken pig vigil, but apparently they are they come in and they're still cheaping. They're not, you know, because they're still so young. They are just babies. And i mean, that's just pitiful,
Personal Experiences and Vegan Decisions
00:15:58
Speaker
isn't it? And you're right, Paul, I looked up the numbers and it's 70 to 75 billion chickens per year.
00:16:08
Speaker
worldwide which is 200 million killed every day which is you just can't get your head around the numbers can you comprehend it in a way that the the size of the numbers make it even more it's weird it kind of goes off the spectrum so yes you can't even imagine if someone said 80,000 or 40,000 you might think of a full stadium or something like that you can envisage it you've got you can put it to something but you how many How many times do you look at something and go, oh, yeah, there's 80 billion or whatever? they get yeah I can't even picture it. you know it's Yeah, exactly right, Paul. And and you yeah that does add to the ability to not take it as a tangible thing that we care about because it's just too big, too big a thing to cope with when there's news stories about all this stuff.
00:17:00
Speaker
cow was broken free and running on the road you know one cow you sometimes get people really caring all so what happened to that one cow because we can understand that our brains can make sense of it but that many millions yeah it's really really really hard. Maybe I'm speaking with a child's innocence when I say i don't think it was particularly difficult for us to look after the hens that we had. We did have an outside shelter which I believe we might have inherited. i think that
00:17:34
Speaker
um we got them with the hope of, because we were meat eaters at the time, ah so we got them with the hope of having the eggs, that was the plan, and we're all ignorant of things until we are faced with new knowledge, and these hens um were not churning out eggs, you know, who knew, who knew, you know, we we found out, so we, we,
00:17:59
Speaker
I'm very glad to say stayed with these animal companions and and and loved them, even though there had been a intent for their their purpose that was not met. I've never considered this before, but it might have actually been ah me as ah as a kid being quite a key ingredient, how much I did i bonded with the the hens. So I don't think it was loads of work for my family.
00:18:26
Speaker
for for for for my mum and dad. I think they were let out in the daytime and put in the run at night. I guess they hadn't been in the factory farm system. They were very lucky chickens, weren't they? They were, very lucky. The thing in this film, you see this woman Maria caring for some of these chickens you know have you know have had a horrible life in the um animal abuse industry and that the number of chickens that are like on medications she's having to give them pop pills for them she's looking after their feet bandaging up their feet she even has some of them end of life care she lives in it she lives in like a a mobile home thing that looks really it looks really lovely but you know, um but um yeah, she has these chickens living with her and, you know, end of life. And then they've they've they've lived a lot longer. So she's obviously taken an incredibly good care of them. But my word, they take such a lot of, you know, these sick chickens, those chickens who have been through the industry, they need so much care.
00:19:42
Speaker
And it does make me, I have thought, oh, you know, wouldn't it be great to rescue some chickens? But crikey me, if you know, If she she's very perceptive, they've said that she's incredibly perceptive. She can spot when things are going wrong with them before anyone else can see it. So, um you know, I'm not sure I would be that perceptive. But gosh, they do. She takes so much care over them, you know, clearly.
00:20:11
Speaker
And when we think about Julie and her sheep, she, you know, really looking after these animals, you know, really well, you know, animals that have been bred for consumption or what have you. They're not bred to live long, healthy, happy lives, are they? It's spread into them to get sick early because they're not going to live very long. So, yeah, they take a lot of looking after I've i've had the the great joy of being able to go to other countries through my work and I was in Australia and found myself at a cow sanctuary and we're all ignorant of things until we learn otherwise and the very charismatic man who was the face of the cow sanctuary was speaking of the vilification of bulls and how we're told that bulls are violent and
00:21:06
Speaker
ah some of the bulls that he had similar to the chickens we had. They they hadn't known cruelty. They'd been taken at you know young ages. So similar how male chicks are of no use and are often killed straight after birth. Same things go for bulls. But you know there were there were bulls who had been ah found their way i and we were allowed to get quite up close and personal you know sort of saying hello to the bulls but i i was quite scared in in in doing so it was really respectful how it was done it wasn't i don't want to paint any kind of image of like you know donkeys on blackpool pleasure beach it wasn't like have a ride on the bovine it weren't that it weren't that it was it was very much a sanctuary but the the purpose was not to treat the bull as a commodity but uh
00:21:56
Speaker
but to to educate and just see like you know what you are safe you've been told the bulls will chase you the bulls will be fierce and violent and
Misconceptions about Animals and Ethical Considerations
00:22:05
Speaker
this bull has got no reason to be mean no reason for anger and it really really opened my eyes. rio my But as you say Kate that's very different from taking an animal that has been part of the industry. Something that this film does so very well is is showing that because you know we live in the world of
00:22:29
Speaker
you know, supermarket packaging with happy hens being written on there and all these terms which have got no legal basis just being, but even free range, you know, isn't what the image in the mind suggests it would be. So it's really good that this film does show the horrible reality. The horrible reality that whilst, as Paul says, still overall being quite gentle. I just know that in the same way that like millions is too big a number to cope with, there's a level of cruelty that for some people you show them a level of cruelty and they will turn off, which goes back to my earlier point. I think this is a good film to show folks who are maybe...
00:23:19
Speaker
open to seeing stuff about animals but but would be easily easily lost if it got got too much. I've not yet shown this to to to my fella, the guy that that i'm I'm seeing. ah he He has become vegan in the time that he's known me. he wasn't vegan when I met him. He is vegan now. So that's a good thing. Kate, have you have you shared this film with anyone in your life?
00:23:42
Speaker
Yeah, I sat down with my other half, we watched it together and immediately it had finished. He said, come on, let's go and visit Hillside Animal Sanctuary, which is about an hour and a bit from us, which we did. And that was just so lovely. It's just like an antidote to all things awful going on in the world. Unlike the sanctuary in the film, they also do um education. you know They have all these signs up everywhere. They they talk about the different animals and what they what their background is, why they've ended up there, you know what happens they to to normal to you know within the system, what is the normal thing that happens to the animals. that there was There was some little, ah very small chickens that looked like, inverted commas, you know, broiler chickens, you know, chickens bred for meat. And it had a little sign up saying, these chickens have been rescued from slaughter by a very kind lady.
00:24:46
Speaker
and And in the next one, there were these little ducklings that had been rescued again by somebody from a ah school hatching project who would also have just got killed, these little ducklings. So, you know, it is quite upfront. And it had this lovely a big section with loads of leaflets and things from Viva and posters. And, you know, they have schools going around there.
00:25:15
Speaker
um drawing pictures of the animals. um They had a vegan cafe, you know, go vegan, go vegan, go vegan. So you know, the messaging was up front, and you know, center. So that was all really great.
00:25:31
Speaker
So yeah so maybe, maybe if you get some of your people to to watch and not vegan, maybe you can then drag them along to a or not necessarily drag they might be really up for going on to an animal sanctuary and meeting the animals in person and um yeah just spending some time with them and getting a feel it's not the same as having your own little chickens like you had but just just to to to just spend some time and yeah and enjoy being in chickeny company or pig company or whoever um yeah anyway so that's my recommendation for a grand day out been to hillside myself a couple of times it's a great place um really enjoyed it good setup uh yeah like like like it a lot big place it was really good i uh also was wondering whether it might get people thinking about
00:26:29
Speaker
other ways of interacting with chickens that might be quite positive as well. So i volunteered, i think it was three times for battery work a Battery Hen Welfare Trust. And we, I think over those three weekends, i can't remember, I think we rehomed,
00:26:48
Speaker
I think it's like 1,200 chickens. um ah um I didn't go to collect them from the farm, but basically ah the guy who ran it sort would go along in his truck and had the cage, and literally they're about to be killed anyway, and they were kind of fairly roughly handled but given over to him and then brought back to his he sort of farm, um like a non-animal farm. And um then ah we had people turning up to adopt, you know, ah usually more than a couple because they like them to go in groups.
00:27:24
Speaker
And um yeah, I met loads of people. I helped with that. got Got quite good at catching chickens or and and running a car park. And like, ah yeah, I think 99% of the people adopting them, I felt were people that were really good people and they were really interested in you know taking on these chickens and like they had kids with them and stuff like that and i was thinking this is good for education and this could be a door opening to really good treatment of animals maybe even you know veggie vegan sort of direction i'll be honest there was probably a couple of people that turned out and i thought i'm not quite sure what's happening to these guys if i'm completely honest but i think when you're doing and it sounds maybe a bit
00:28:05
Speaker
brutal, but if you're rehoming like 1,200 chickens and there's a few that go into directions that isn't the right way, I'll take that. I think it ties into what you said before, that the numbers are so large, Paul, the problem is so great that it's just...
00:28:22
Speaker
you know, shockingly large thing. and And it's great that there is at least some positivity. We're right to be angry. We're right to be sad. We're right to be affected by vigils. And and because we've got to I believe, retain some sense of reaction to the injustice, to want there to be something better, to want there to be an improvement, you know. So, um yeah.
00:28:52
Speaker
i I think this film does a really, really good job of that. ah I remember I was one of those people who said before I went vegan that I was only going to have free-range eggs. It's something that a lot of people say, don't they? Oh, I only have free-range. And when I said it, I really meant it and realised just how many things have egg.
00:29:15
Speaker
as a ingredient, as a binding product. So i did i did stop eating cake ah because I was like, oh my gosh, yeah, I didn't i't even really thought that egg was in so many cakes. hadn't really crossed my mind. So, um It's something that i always point out. People are like, I only have free-range cake. Free-range cake. Yeah, exactly. Free-range cake, you know, doesn't exist, does it? Only have free-range eggs. And it's like, what about that cake you had? What about, you know, that's a lie. You're lying to yourself. And then we get on to what does free-range even mean? So i'm I'm so glad that we watched this ah film again. Really, really... ah
00:29:54
Speaker
ah good thing I think that it is a really useful thing to help us ah advocate better for chickens. ah Yeah, happy days. I just love how this woman, and Maria, has she has justified.
Maria Goller's Passionate Life and Listener Engagement
00:30:11
Speaker
followed her passion and that where she's ended up um you know what some people might argue she's ended up penniless or dollarless or you know not very wealthy but my goodness does she have a rich life yeah oh that's a wonderful life you talk what does rich even mean exactly a exactly you know so
00:30:36
Speaker
passion and compassion they are not incompatible they're very much compatible i just yeah anyway so i just think it's a lovely heartwarming film very much so thank you well everyone thank you so much for listening ah We love it if you get in touch with us. We have an email address, enoughthefalaffle at gmail.com. We love hearing your views if you have anything to say about this particular film or any of the things which we discuss, including suggesting stuff for a future Vegan Talk episode. We actually have entire episodes where we do just answer people's questions and comments and are always happy to do that. So please do get in touch. So the next Enough of the Falafel episode coming out will be available from Monday the 18th of May and it will be a Vegan Week episode with the wonderful Dominic.
00:31:42
Speaker
David and Paul. And it will be our usual roundup of the vegan animal rights news. Indeed it is, Kate. Indeed it is. And if you want to support us in doing that, please do check out our www.co-fee.com
00:32:19
Speaker
even better So the people who have already supported us financially, massive thank you for doing so. If you want to join those folks, check out ko-fi.com forward slash enough of the falafel.
00:32:38
Speaker
Anyway, that is enough of the falafel for this episode. Thanks to Kate and Dominic for all your contributions. Thanks again, everyone, for listening.
Closing Credits and Listener Support
00:32:47
Speaker
I've been Paul and you've been listening to Vegan Talk from the Enough of the Falafel Collective.
00:32:58
Speaker
This has been an Enough of the Falafel production. We're just a normal bunch of everyday vegans putting our voices out there. The show is hosted by Zencaster. We use music and special effects by zapsplap.com.
00:33:13
Speaker
And sometimes if you're lucky at the end of an episode, you'll hear a poem by Mr. Dominic Berry. Thanks all for listening and see you next time.
00:33:39
Speaker
This episode may have come to an end, but did you know we've got a whole archive containing all our shows dating back to September 2023? twenty twenty three That is right, Dominic. There's over 100 episodes on there featuring our brilliant range of different guests, people's stories of going vegan, philosophical debates, moral quandaries, and of course, around a dozen news items from around the world each week.
00:34:04
Speaker
So check back on your podcast player, to hear previous episodes. And remember to get an alert for each new episode, simply click like or follow and also subscribe to the show.
00:34:15
Speaker
Thanks for your ongoing support wherever you listen to us from.