EVER since witnessing – as a 12-year-old – the sickening slaughter of calf by a rabbi who slit the animal’s throat and impassively watched it in its death throes, I have sworn off religiously-slaughtered meat, and have gone to great lengths to avoid all kosher and halal produce.
So you can imagine my disgust when – a couple of weeks back – the BBC Radio 4 consumer affairs programme, You and Yours, reported – in an overall tone of approval – that an increasing number of supermarkets in the UK were stocking ritually-slaughtered meat to sweeten their Muslim clientele. The programme contained not one word of criticism of this barbaric form of slaughter.
But then came the backlash. Last Friday You and Yours reported that it had received a substantial number of emails and letters from people deeply concerned that halal meat was entering our food chain. I, of course, was one of the many who emailed the BBC to complain.
According to You and Yours, halal meat “accounts for around a quarter of the UK’s meat trade”. When Muslim’s make up only three percent of the UK population it follows that a good deal of this meat is finding its way into institutional catering operations and food outlets not trading as halal establishments.
This is quite unacceptable.
Tim Buckley of Suffolk was one of those who complained to the BBC:
Nowhere was the point put that halal meat produce involves unnecessary cruelty. The animals have their throats cut when conscious ….
And Dale Godfrey said:
I think many people who quietly note the rise of in halal meat, especially in public catering, would be horrified if they realised what this meant in terms of animal welfare.
You and Yours spoke to Masood Khawaja of the Halal Food Authority, who gave an assurance that “slight electronic stunning” is permitted in halal slaughter.
The animal is only stunned to be immobilised. The animal should not be dead prior to slaughter (sic). All the flowing blood should be drained out of the animal because flowing blood is not allowed in Islam.
He pointed out that a Muslim prays over the animal at the point of stunning and slaughter.
So that’s OK then.
But You and Yours also made clear that “not all animals are stunned prior to slaughter”.
There is a debate in the Muslim community as to what constitutes halal meat. Some groups like the Halal Monitoring Committee do not consider stunned animals to be truly halal.
It is legal to kill unstunned animals in European Union countries because religious exemptions have been put in place to accommodate the dietary requirements of Muslims and Jews. This is outrageous, and just another sickening example of how groups can get special treatment simply by playing the religion card.
You and Yours asked the Food Standards Agency whether there was a requirement to indicate that meat is halal, and this is the answer it received:
If a meat product is labeled and marketed to a consumer as halal, the animal would have to have been slaughtered using this method. If the meat is not intended for the halal market, there is no law that requires the method of slaughter to be on the label.
This no doubt means that institutions such as hospitals, schools and prisons would rather ALL their meat be halal. This would be more cost effective than having to cater separately for Muslims, but such a policy is a clear violation of the rights of those who do not want to consume halal produce.
Finally, what do you do if, like me, you are passionate about curry, but don’t want halal meat?
The choice is to prepare your own, bite on the bullet and go vegetarian - or walk into a restaurant and demand pork!
According to You and Yours the majority of Indian restaurants in the UK are Bangladeshi-run, and Bangladeshis are Muslims. The programme suggested that between 70 percent and 99.9 percent of these establishments serve halal meat.
Depressing, ain’t it?
5 Comments
Typical - the rights of the religious are zealously protected, and the rest of us left to fend for ourselves. If atheism were a recognised religion (if you’ll pardon the oxymoron) this would never happen. Suddenly the spoof internet “religions” such as the Invisible pink unicorn or the flying spaghetti monster seem to make a modicum of sense. If these non-religions gat get the same status as religions, then things like this might get sorted….although the risk is that the non-religion becomes a religion, thus defeating it’s own objective!
P.S. keep up the good work !
Rog
This is part of why i went vegetarian recently. I find the whole “meat trade” be be vile. I would have no problem killing and eating, for example, a deer that lived wild and which was cleanly shot. What i object to is the treatment of animals as “products”, to be packaged, transported and treated in a way that you would never treat a human - even if they cant talk, they can still feel pain, and they can definitely feel fear. People need to consider what they are eating, rather than just seeing it as another packaged good from the supermarket
More and more people of faith are moving to a place of compassion for animals. In fact, a Muslim Imam was one of over 30 faith leaders from more than 20 faith traditions who came together last year at Best Friends Animal Society in the US to initiate dialogue about our spiritual relationship with animals. What followed was, “A Religious Proclamation for Animal Compassion,” unveiled last November in the historic Cannon Caucus Room at the Capital in Washington, D.C. (Visit http://www.network.bestfriends.org/religion to read and endorse the proclamation)
These assembled leaders all agreed that such things as animal exploitation, in all of its horrendouse forms, must cease. However, we must stand in solidarity and support their efforts if our voices, on behalf of the animals, are to be heard. We must be an example to the greater faith community that these barbaric rituals must cease.
I am a Muslim vegetarian, but not for the reasons of the halal method of slaughter, which is not discussed properly in this article by the author.
The method, if followed ABSOLUTELY STRICTLY would guarantee an pain-free death for the animal.
Perhaps the author should be reminded of the original rules for halal slaughter:
So what makes meat halal?
The principles of halal can be split into 3 areas;
The actual slaughter
The welfare of the animal
The state of the slaughterer.
The Slaughter
The following procedures constitute the ideal procedure for slaughtering an animal…
The animal is given a drink of water and is to be placed lying down facing Mecca
(note: how many animals in Europe are transported to Italy in searing heat without water or rest, mainly equines : Source: Viva )
The animal must be calmed (compare with animals crammed in western abattoires)
The animal is not allowed to see other animals going to slaughter or being slaughtered and ideally not let to smell other animals’ blood (again Western mass-marketed abbattoirs are the worst for separating animals).
The animal can at no time see the knife
The knife must be razor sharp
A prayer must be read and the intention to take the animal’s life for the correct reasons must be made
The neck must be slit in one clean pull of the knife cutting through the skin and oesophagus right to the back of the neck
The animal must be held securely until all life has left it.
So why am I vegetarian? I am vegetarian purely because, like the millions around the world who follow faiths OR are faithless, who do not know where their meat comes from, now abstain from eating meat. Yes, a lot of Muslim slaughterers do not follow the correct procedure above, and have become copies of their Western counterparts in selling animals for mass consumption and as commodities.
Islam is often depicted as cruel and barbaric, and this picture which looks like it has been taken somewhere in the Indian Subcontinent is typical of igniting hostility to a religion which treats its animals with respect and compassion.
I am surprised that Spain and other countries still enjoy barbaric rituals -animal cruelty purely for games and leisure, and that religions are the first to come under attack from uninformed vegetarians.
Perhaps the author should re-read a few pointers before attacking both the Jewish and Muslim faith.
I would suggest Channel 4’s Slaughter in the Abbatoir.
Sincerely
Jasmine Hadi
BBC
how could you?
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[...] Her bizarre conviction by a court in Paris – her fifth – arose as a result of the animal rights campaigner arguing that Muslims should stun animals before slaughtering them during the annual Aid al-Kabir blood-letting festival. (See earlier Freethinker report here). [...]
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