two new cows

So we received two cows - steers to be more exact - on Friday. I'm proud to say I successfully managed to guide the deliverer to the barn and picked out a stall to put them in without Farmer J and M. That is besides the point though. When cows arrive to a new place they're a bit unsettled and it takes a while for them to start eating and drinking on a regular basis. So I've been trying to encourage these two steers to eat. I put down a bale of hay for them to eat when we first put them in, but it wasn't in a proper feed trough because I had them in a smaller makeshift pen with a good view of our own regular cows. Now they don't really eat out of the trough at all, they continue to eat on that side. They'll eat the grain out of the trough though. They also don't know how to use the water spout. There's a little brass button that they have to press with their nose and water will rush out. Yesterday they didn't get a lot of water and I stood there for ages pressing that button for them. One of the cows I think was beginning to get it and began to press the button, but then the other cow pushed it out of the way. I began to realize at this point that I was putting a lot of effort into these steers and I wasn't really getting all that attached to them. I was merely doing it so they would keep their weight up since they're going to the abattoir. I'm trying to decide if this is cruel or not... Ultimately the heavier they are, the more meat we'll get, the more money we'll earn and with that money we can fix the tractors and equipment, afford groceries, buy more food for the chicks, pay the bills, have satisfied customers. So really it's a good thing and a fact of life that animals die everyday for the sake of food - both by humans and other animals.