While most of America focuses on the turkey they will eat on Thanksgiving, animal rights activists cannot forget the poor conditions millions of turkeys are forced to live in every day. Animal activists do not begrudge the celebration of family and friends on Thanksgiving, partaking in the camaraderie of the day themselves, but they are actively working to improve the living conditions of turkeys and/or to encourage the public to consider more humane animal-free alternatives.

Groups like Compassion Over Killing (COK) and East Bay Animal Advocates (EBAA) conduct undercover investigations to expose the hidden truths about how intensive corporate farms produce the massive amounts of turkey they sell every year, such as the Butterball turkey brand. EBAA is not alone amongst activists in also sometimes directly liberating turkeys and other animals, releasing them to locations where they can live out their lives without fear or want. Groups such as the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) sponsor petitions to the government to address the fact that each year more than nine billion chickens, turkeys, and other birds are killed in the United States without the basic protections of the Humane Methods of Slaughter Act. Vegetarian and vegan groups like EBAA and Bay Area Vegetarians (BAV) organize feed-in advocacy events in public locations as well as gatherings for vegetarians to share meals apart from the general meat-culture conformity.

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Bay Area Vegetarians' Thanksgiving Events in Oakland (1|2), San Jose, and San Francisco

COK's Turkey Investigation | HSUS' Petition for Poultry | EBAA's Turkey-Production.com and Free-Range-Turkey.com | Compassionate Cooks article Thanksgiving for the Birds

Previous Indybay Thanksgiving and/or Turkey Features: Veg*n outreach planting the seeds of awareness throughout Bay Area | Days Before Thanksgiving, Suit Filed for Humane Treatment of Poultry | EBAA Serves Faux 'Turkey' and Distributes Info at KFC in Oakland | Open Rescue of Turkeys in Central Valley | Vegetarians Observe Thanksgiving Turkey-free