Posted on 01/05/2011 8:06:31 AM PST by 1rudeboy
Animal-Welfare Groups Are Joining Ranchers in a Push to Revive an Industry That Died in 2007
Less than four years after the last equine slaughterhouses in the U.S. closed down, an unlikely coalition of ranchers, horse owners and animal-welfare groups is trying to bring them back.
The group, gathering in Las Vegas this week for a conference called Summit of the Horse, aims to map out a strategy for reviving an industry that slaughtered as many as 100,000 horses a year in the U.S. before it was effectively shut down by congressional action in 2007.
Advocates say the slaughterhouses could bring an economic boost to rural areas and give owners who no longer have the means or inclination to care for the horses an economical and humane way to dispose of them.
"We believe that humane processing is absolutely a moral and an ethical choice," said Sue Wallis, a Wyoming state lawmaker who organized the event.
Ms. Wallis is working on bringing a slaughterhouse to her state, but said her coalition first must overcome what she called "the 'ick' factor."
Indeed, animal-welfare activists opposed to the resumption of slaughter say the public will rally to stop it, since many Americans grew up with such books as "Black Beauty" and TV shows like "Mister Ed" and consider horses companions, not meals.
"Public opinion is with us," said Patti Klein Manke, executive director of the Hooved Animal Humane Society.
Pressure from animal-rights groups and from undercover videos that circulated on the Internet and showed apparent cruelties in the horse-butchering process prompted Congress to shut off all funds for inspecting equine slaughterhouses in 2007. That dealt the industry a fatal blow, as federal inspections were required by law before the meat could be exported for human consumption.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
I love how they stopped the slaughterhouses. They didn’t ban the slaughter. They simply stopped paying for inspections. No government inspections meant no way of getting your process inspected, and the law required inspections so they shut you down.
Imagine that. Obama could shut down any industry he wanted this way, simply be cutting off funds to the inspectors. Did the chicken farmers support republicans in the last election? Well, cut off the funds for chicken inspections, and the chicken farmers are history.
In that case, you misread my comment #7. But, if you can't handle a little rudeness after being rude to me first, perhaps you should stick to fashion and interior-design threads.
Whatever, Skippy.
Was “conversely” too big of a word for you? You do understand it means, “if this is true, then this is true,” right?
Oxen, which are steered Bovine, have also plowed our fields and served us in battle and are still beasts of burden. We all know their fate.
I blame Walt Disney for the “humanization” of animals
I don’t know how we went from “treating animals like humans” to “treating them with dignity”.
Not that I think dignity is the right word to use either, but you can treat an animal with “dignity”, without pretending they are humans.
Oddly, a better term might be “humanely”. But the argument against slaughterhouses wasn’t just about inhumane treatment, it was about the idea of killing horses and then using the meat as food.
What you do with the remains has nothing to do with “humane” treatment (which is why it’s a better word than “with dignity” — which could imply that they deserve some special attention after death; we would say “treat the remains with dignity” if we were talking about human remains, but who cares what you do with a dead animal, within reason? It’s dead, it doesn’t have a soul, it’s relatives and family could care less what you do.
So kill the horses humanely, and then do what you want with the remains. That’s a more reasonable approach than shutting down the processing. Horses still have some uses, but the time when they were all virtually more valuable alive than as food is gone, at least in this country, where we have cars.
I disagree. Horses as a “race” don’t “deserve” anything. They are animals, for our use. If they were treated humanely when they did our work for us, that was what is required, and then when they are not useful for that, they should be put to good alternate uses.
You say they should be put to sleep. Once they are killed, there is no reason to care what we do with the dead bodies. If an owner wants to pretend more for their animal, and wants to bury the beast, or cremate them, and give them a funeral, it’s their business, but if they want to sell the carcass and make some money, there’s nothing wrong with that.
“I remember when Fernando, the horse that won the Derby, was slaughtered in a horsemeat slaughterhouse. I don’t think it was the US, but I remember being disturbed by it, on a purely emotional level. I had watched the Derby he won.”
Fernando was slaughered and eaten in Japan. They made sashimi out of him. What a shame.
Umm, dude, hate to break this to you.
But "putting to sleep" is just another way of saying "slaughter."
Admittedly doesn't sound as harsh, but the result is the same.
If you have a vet put a horse to sleep, disposing of the carcass is not like burying a kitten. Eating it seems a good deal more "conservative" in the literal sense of the term than burying it. Where worms and bacteria eat it anyway.
She learned how cattle move as a herd, etc. and how to get them into the kill house without terrifying them. Her methods were actually better because the cattle moved forward, peacefully.
When asked why she spent so much time and energy on it, her reply was: We are asking the cattle to give up their lives. There is no reason why they have to spend their last few hours terrified. If we can spare them that, it's the least we can do. (paraphrased)
I lived 4 months if Far East country that treated its animals like (I can't even find the word to describe it). Here's an example: I went to the store and saw a group of young men "playing" with a puppy. When I returned 20 minutes later, the puppy was dead and the young men were having themselves quite a celebratory laugh.
The cruelty with which that country treated their animals also showed up in the way they treated their wives, daughters, sons, etc.
Treat even those animals destined for death and "food" with humanely as you said. I truly believe its the least we can do.
Living behind a locked gate now,because of this threat.
We had to get the dept.of agriculture involved here to be able to sell two horse that were left here, had to feed them for over three weeks before we could sell them. Didn't come close to covering the cost of boarding (pasture)them.
The horse population is a big problem out west. My daughter rides every week at a rescue ranch that is over capacity now. All of the rescue horses I’ve seen are vibrant, young, beautiful, horses that run and jump with the best. In the past four months I have been offered two horses at basically zero cost so long as I maintain the board and Vet care. Unfortunately I can’t swing that expense. I do think the slaughter house serves a need, I just wish we could get horse buyers and horse sellers together before the animal neglect starts which many times leads to no other option but the slaughter house.
I know of a lady who went riding in the summer in the Sierra Nevada foothills.
She came back to her truck ^ trailer to find 2 horses tied to her trailer & no other information.
Thanks.
Another disastrous piece of legislation that has resulted in starving horses and the collapse of the commercial horse market.
I loved that movie, seen it several times, and now we own it.
She treated the animals humanely, but saw no problem with the idea of them being killed and eaten, just that we should do it without any unncessary cruelty. AND of course, she showed how doing it nicely was actually economically sound as well.
Am I still on the Pelosi thread?
It was a great movie.
That was in Japan
Just highlighting the word.
Sorry, if you’re looking to pick a fight, I’m not interested.
Good bye and good luck!
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