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Humanists

Ban Ritual Slaughter

The British government has been advised that the production of halal and kosher meat causes serve suffering to animals and should be banned immediately.

“The report from the Farm Animal Welfare Council shows that the time has come to put ethical values above religious ones”, commented Roy Saich of the Humanists.

“It can never be ethical to cause unnecessary suffering to humans or animals, and this report shows that the production of halal and kosher meet does just that. This bears out common observations and is why Humanists have long called for ritual slaughter to be banned”.

“Religious spokespeople like the Muslim Council of Great Britain may try to deny that it causes suffering, but it is time that ethics overruled religious rights in this matter, as in all others. Suffering is more important that religious sensibilities”, continued Mr. Saich. “There is no imperative for Muslims or Judaists to eat meat produced in this manner.

“There is no reason why they should not simply abstain from eating meat altogether if they do not wish to eat the same meat as the rest of us”, continued Mr. Saich.

“Humanists will be lobbying to end the legal exemption which allows suffering to animals for halal and kosher meat.

“If ritual slaughter is less cruel than pre-stunnung, and independent scientific evidence were produced to that effect, its supporters should campain for it to be used in all cases. Why do they not provide the evidence? Then Humanists would support their contention”, he concluded.

Keith Porteous Wood said in a statement on behalf of the National Secular Society:-

The slaughter of cattle without stunning them in advance is banned in the UK on welfare grounds, except only for religious slaughter. Religious slaughter is now carried out on a huge scale, and some university canteens serve only ritually slaughtered meat. Other major cattle producing countries such as Australia and New Zealand no longer permit slaughter without pre-stunning.

There may have been valid justifications, for example on grounds of hygiene, for such practices a thousand and more years ago, but these must be reformed to adapt to modern knowledge - few obey religious injunctions not to eat shellfish or not to wear clothes of blended cloth. It would be better if they were to adapt to modern conceptions of humanity. Other religious authorities (even in Saudi Arabia) accept pre-stunned meat fulfils Halal requirements, so it is a pity that their equivalents cannot do so here.

I do recognise the great sensitivity, especially in the Jewish community, over this issue, perhaps fuelled by Hitler’s ban on religious slaughter, ironically on animal welfare grounds. But this does not justify one scandalous vilification I have seen of opponents of ritual slaughter as racist: if that were true, they would be attempting to outlaw all ritual slaughter. Yet neither FAWC nor the National Secular Society propose this, simply for it to be carried out in a more humane way.

And if, as I suspect, scientific tests find no materially greater suffering on ritually slaughtered poultry, there will be no pressure to outlaw it.

The arguments put forward by the Board for the Protection of Schechita (such as two processes [stunning and slaughter] – are bound to be more cruel than one) are selective and intellectually questionable.