The United States may now negotiate with terrorists, but one hero mom who had her nightmare son arrested after he started slaughtering hostage-chickens earlier this week certainly does not.

This year (because of a law, obviously, not out of any sense of kindness), chickens will get bigger houses. That means the price of eggs is going up. Okay, good.

An unidentified suspect broke into a poultry plant near Fresno, Calif. on Sept. 19 and allegedly bashed nearly 1,000 chickens to death with a golf club, according to police.

When you ask Americans what they look for in a tasty piece of USDA-certified chicken, they say, "Less government inspection of this chicken before I eat it." Today, the government has heard your voice, America.

A Nebraska man is now in jail for 108 days after being sentenced Tuesday for a DUI and livestock neglect after being pulled over for driving drunk with 100 chickens in his SUV.

Chickens: pretty good. Do we need to improve them? Maybe.

An antibiotic-resistant salmonella outbreak linked to a California poultry farm broke out in October. Six months later, it's still getting people sick.

"While the college is not commenting on why Ferguson was dismissed, he said it was 'absolutely' related to the student's unorthodox use of a chicken in art."

On Monday, the New York Times struggled again to strike the balance between Hurricane Sandy stories that are utterly depressing and Hurricane Sandy stories that are the fluffiest little fluffmonsters that have fallen asleep atop a cotton ball wearing bunny slippers (everyone ate candy during the hurricane; they're so bad).

Up to a point, Joshua Shelton had a normal Friday night this weekend. The 21 year-old got drunk and passed out in a shack wearing only a t-shirt and his boxers, soaked in his own urine. Who hasn't done that before? Well, the point that separates Shelton's night from yours or mine was that when he woke up, a Wicomico County Sheriff's deputy was there to inform him he'd murdered 70,000 chickens overnight.

Do you ever feel like, no matter what you do, some chicken, somewhere, is tryna copy?

Instead of creating cuddly animals that people might actually want (mini-giraffes for the home, hamsters large enough to put on a leash and take for walks), some Harvard University scientists are mixing up chicken DNA to make "embryos with alligator-like snouts instead of beaks." Great!

Why did the chicken cross the road? For eons, philosophers have debated the question, because that is philosophers' idea of a "funny" riff on their own weighty profession, which is why most philosophers are not "chick magnets." Well, we're happy to report that the question has finally been answered.

The whole "people living in urban areas but raising chickens for some fucking reason" trend has been going on for years. Gawker was making fun of that back in 2007. But here is where it gets interesting, Trend Science majors: the Son of The Urban Chicken Trend! Urban chicken coop tours. For when you're really into looking at chickens for some reason, but still sane enough not to erect a chicken coop on your own property. The WSJ reports:

Chef Martin Yan is the host of the completely awesome favorite show of my childhood, Yan Can Cook. And boy can he! Here, watch as Yan teaches us how to "relax" (read: molest) a chicken before attempting to bone it.

The Way We Live Now: Playing chicken. Do the lesser nations of the world truly believe they can intimidate us with a mere poultry tax? We will crush you and your cheap knockoff Rolex imports! We're from The Hamptons, bitch!

Harold Ford needs a better agent. He's got a plum gig speaking in Bermuda to a bunch of tax-dodgers next month, but in April he goes to Vegas to talk about chickens. As long as the check clears, right?

What follows the jump is video of a man at Flinders Street Station in Melbourne, in a chicken suit, playing "What is Love?" on a Pianica. Again, I'll say it: All the freaky people make the beauty of the world.

Behold the power of this funky chicken getting down to techno music. Apparently this is a thing in Germany, seriously.

PETA's gift to children: "Unhappy Meals" containing "a 'menacing, knife-wielding' Ronald McDonald cutout, a ketchup packet disguised as chicken blood, a plastic chicken covered in 'blood' and a 'McCruelty' t-shirt." Less violent than a GI Joe Kids Meal! [via Deceiver]