No Religion On Earth Can Justify The Slaughter Of Animals For Food

Every now and then this issue seems to arrest repeated attention: Is there such a thing like “humane slaughter”? Of course, not! Killing animals can never be justified or trivialized by stunning animals shortly before their throat are cut. People who argue this way seem to wish they could justify their actions by referring to a “humane slaughter” which is an oxymoron itself. This discussion always becomes especially explosive when Islam and its practice of “halal slaughter” comes into play meaning that animals are killed without stunning them before in order to make their dying less painful. However, even this procedure arrives at the same result: The killing of an innocent animal. Read on to learn more about this highly controversial issue!

“Halal slaughter has once again stirred emotion. A study questioning the humaneness of not routinely stunning animals before cutting their throats has elicited further moral outrage. But doesn’t reserving hysteria only for halal miss the point entirely in the context of the wider meat industry? It’s a distraction from the real issue: that we slaughter animals at all. 

Debate around the ethics of pre-slaughter stunning versus halal slaughter is simply not worth having. It is nothing more than an argument for or against varying shades of heinous; a redundant and irrelevant comparison.

Stunning is often ineffective anyway, leaving the animals to die slowly in a semi-conscious state. Yet this is widely considered to be “humane”, especially by the anti-halal faction. Humane slaughter – now there’s an oxymoron if ever there was one. It is a myth, and does not exist. 

Regardless of the farming system used – whether organic, free range, halal, kosher – it doesn’t matter; animals will always be denied even their most basic needs. They live shortened lives of pain and suffering without any kind of freedom.  

We mustn’t forget that animal agriculture is an industry. It places profit as a priority, and like any other industry it cuts corners and costs, with scant regard for the animals themselves. They are treated like commodities, products, numbers and money.  

We can see quite clearly from the halal debate that the actual method of killing has become the only issue for lots of people. But it is actually just one part of a long and brutal meat production process. It’s merely the end point of a miserable existence. Animals are generally separated from their mothers at birth, fed unnatural foods and kept in cramp, squalid conditions largely indoors only to die a painful death. It’s no life.  

Exposed footage from a halal slaughterhouse in Yorkshire last year was horrific. But was it any worse than daily practices across non-halal abattoirs up and down the country? Absolutely not.  Such atrocities are not anomalies but rampant throughout UK animal agriculture, which purports to have the best welfare standards in the world. Sadly, this says more about other countries than it does about this one.

In addition, it was revealed just this week the filthy conditions endured by supermarket hens.

It’s not just about the animals. Spare a thought for abattoir workers. They see death and brutality every working day, doing the actual killing so you don’t have to. The only possible coping mechanism is to emotionally detach from the animals as living, sentient beings.”

Read the full article at independent.co.uk!