Dutch Muslims & Jews united together

[Grey Fox]

Why is pain such a problem for animals that are being slaughtered?

Those aren't dogs skinned alive for experimentation. They are cows being killed to be cut up & eaten, not torture.

[Barrister]

To that extent, I would agree that those asking for the exemption to be removed should have to show that

A) Halal slaughter is in fact more cruel than stunning slaughter, and
B) That the imposition on Orthodox Jews by removing said slaughter methods is not so significant that it should be maintained.

I thought it was interesting that in France (I think it was in France anyway) they banned it and the courts decided that since Jews could get kosher food from other sources, it was not an imposition to ban it in France. That struck me as a rather odd legal position to take.

Well, I think you'd be required to show that halal slaughter is noticeably, or significantly, more cruel.  If the difference exists, but is fairly trivial, I don't think that's much of a basis for a ban.

[Viking]

Peer Reviewed Evidence

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17972-animals-feel-the-pain-of-religious-slaughter.html

One thing i don't get, if under anethesia the body sends signals that aren't felt doesn't that mean when the animal is unconscious (through throat after the 2 seconds mentioned) you wouldn't be able to tell if it feels pain?

I haven't read the paper, so I am speculating. You can anesthesize on the brain end rather than the nerve end, that the pain signal is sent but not recieved, which seems to be the procedure described. The article refers to 2 minutes of pain signals. The muslim apologist says it takes 2 seconds for the animal to pass out. The significant content of the paper seems to be that the religious slaughter methods cause much more pain than apologists claim.

[Razgovory]

No, the question is whether to end a religiously motivated exception permitting, what for non-muslims and non-jews would be considered, cruelty to animals.

I don't see much evidence of cruelty.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110408/ap_on_re_eu/eu_netherlands_ritual_slaughter_ban

The Royal Dutch Veterinary Association has come out in favor of banning the practice.

The organization said in a position statement it believes that during "slaughter of cattle while conscious, and to a lesser extent that of sheep, the animals' well-being is unacceptably damaged."

adding dutch vets to my list.... What I can't understand is that when ALL national veterinary associations conclude that slaughter without stunning to be cruel people keep arguing that slaughter without stunning can be humane?

This is argument by assertion.  How is it unacceptably damaged?  From what I found, the Kosher method renders a cow unconscious in a matter of seconds.

I doubt all national veterinary associations conclude this.

http://www.mustaqim.co.uk/halalstudy.htm  This study done by German veterinary weekly in the late 1970's seems to indicate that both methods are fairly similar from the point of view of the animal.  In fact, the ritual slaughter may be less painful then the captive bolt.

The slaughter in the form of ritual cut is, if carried out properly, painless in sheep and calves according to the EEG recordings and the missing defensive actions.

[grumbler]

Peer Reviewed Evidence

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17972-animals-feel-the-pain-of-religious-slaughter.html

Animals feel the pain of religious slaughter

    15:40 13 October 2009 by Andy Coghlan
    For similar stories, visit the Food and Drink Topic Guide

Brain signals have shown that calves do appear to feel pain when slaughtered according to Jewish and Muslim religious law, strengthening the case for adapting the practices to make them more humane.

"I think our work is the best evidence yet that it's painful," says Craig Johnson, who led the study at Massey University in Palmerston North, New Zealand.

Johnson summarised his results last week in London when receiving an award from the UK Humane Slaughter Association. His team also showed that if the animal is concussed through stunning, signals corresponding to pain disappear.

The findings increase pressure on religious groups that practice slaughter without stunning to reconsider. "It provides further evidence, if it was needed, that slaughtering an animal without stunning it first is painful," says Christopher Wathes of the UK Farm Animal Welfare Council, which has long argued for the practice to end.
Stunning result

In most western countries, animals must be stunned before they are slaughtered, but there is an exemption for religious practice, most prominently Jewish shechita and Muslim dhabiha. Animal welfare groups have long argued that on welfare grounds, the exemptions should be lifted, as they have been in Norway.

Johnson's work, funded by the UK and New Zealand agriculture ministries, builds on findings in human volunteers of specific patterns of brain electrical activity when they feel pain. Recorded with electroencephalograms, the patterns were reproducible in at least eight other mammal species known to be experiencing pain.

Johnson developed a way of lightly anaesthetising animals so that although they experienced no pain, the same electrical pain signals could be reliably detected, showing they would have suffered pain if awake.

The team first cut calves' throats in a procedure matching that of Jewish and Muslim slaughter methods. They detected a pain signal lasting for up to 2 minutes after the incision. When their throats are cut, calves generally lose consciousness after 10 to 30 seconds, sometimes longer.
Cut-throat practice

The researchers then showed that the pain originates from cutting throat nerves, not from the loss of blood, suggesting the severed nerves send pain signals until the time of death. Finally, they stunned animals 5 seconds after incision and showed that this makes the pain signal disappear instantly.

"It wasn't a surprise to me, but in terms of the religious community, they are adamant animals don't experience any pain, so the results might be a surprise to them," says Johnson.

He praised Muslim dhabiha practitioners in New Zealand and elsewhere who have already adopted stunning prior to slaughter. They use a form of electrical stunning which animals quickly recover from if not slaughtered, proving that the stunned animal is "healthy", thereby qualifying as halal.
Pressure drop

Representatives for both faiths responded by claiming that stunning itself hurts animals. A spokesman for Shechita UK says that the throat cut is so rapid that it serves as its own "stun", adding that there is abundant evidence shechita is humane.

"Shechita is instantaneous, and due to the immediate drop in blood pressure and [oxygen starvation] of the brain, the animal loses consciousness within 2 seconds," he says. "It conforms to the statutory definition of stunning, in that it is a process which causes the immediate loss of consciousness which lasts until death."

Ahmed Ghanem, a halal slaughterman based in New Zealand, says that blood doesn't drain properly from stunned animals, although this has been countered by recent research at the University of Bristol in the UK.

Ghanem cites a 1978 study relying on EEG measurements led by Wilhelm Schulze of the University of Hanover, Germany, apparently concluding that halal slaughter was more humane than slaughter following stunning. But Schulze himself, who died in 2002, warned in his report that the stunning technique may not have functioned properly.

Journal reference: New Zealand Veterinary Journal, vol 57, p 77

The NZVJ isn't available online.

Thanks.  This is the most scientific article offered yet, and would seem to shift the burden to those who want to allow exemptions from the practice of stunning.

[Viking]

While I can see fighting to get the law thrown out or modified for all, I don't feel comfortable supporting individuals fighting to keep only their exemptions. Perhaps I'm reading the articles wrong, but from what I can see, I only see this: "Dutch law required animals to be stunned before being slaughtered but made an exception for ritual halaal and kosher slaughters."  Does that mean that I can't slit an animal's throat for a non-religious reason?

The exemption that is being repealed is the exemption that allows Muslims and Jews to slaughter without stunning. They are not being prohibited from slaughtering by exsanguination, they just have to stun the animal first so it doesn't feel the pain.

[grumbler]

Yes, I already addressed this, and basically agree. The onus is on those who want to remove the exemption to provide evidence that the exemption does not satisfy current standards of cruelty weighed against freedom of religion.

I misunderstood your position, then.  So... nevermind! 

[Berkut]

Peer Reviewed Evidence

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17972-animals-feel-the-pain-of-religious-slaughter.html

One thing i don't get, if under anethesia the body sends signals that aren't felt doesn't that mean when the animal is unconscious (through throat after the 2 seconds mentioned) you wouldn't be able to tell if it feels pain?

I haven't read the paper, so I am speculating. You can anesthesize on the brain end rather than the nerve end, that the pain signal is sent but not recieved, which seems to be the procedure described. The article refers to 2 minutes of pain signals. The muslim apologist says it takes 2 seconds for the animal to pass out. The significant content of the paper seems to be that the religious slaughter methods cause much more pain than apologists claim.

I think the methodolgy is basically that the anesthitize the animal. This does not stop pain signals, but does mean that the signals are not received. *Not*, I think, the same as being unconscious.

So they are basically saying that the claim that halal slaughter is painless i untrue. Halal slaughter does not (of course) include anesthetizing the animal.

Stunning, however, actually removes the pain signals altogether. Of course, that is only effective when it is done properly, and given the speed at which modern plants operate, it is questionable how often it is done properly. It isn't much of a solution if it only works 90% of the time because the person doing the stunning has to do it 300 times an hour, and if he screws up - to bad, animal is carted away into the process anyway. Which is what the article Raz posted suggests happens, at least in some cases.

Of course, I find the idea that kosher slaughter is somehow immune to those same efficiency pressures pretty spurious as well. They might be better, but I am sure that "kosher" slaughterhouses have their incidences of cutting corners as well.

[Viking]

No, the question is whether to end a religiously motivated exception permitting, what for non-muslims and non-jews would be considered, cruelty to animals.

I don't see much evidence of cruelty.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110408/ap_on_re_eu/eu_netherlands_ritual_slaughter_ban

The Royal Dutch Veterinary Association has come out in favor of banning the practice.

The organization said in a position statement it believes that during "slaughter of cattle while conscious, and to a lesser extent that of sheep, the animals' well-being is unacceptably damaged."

adding dutch vets to my list.... What I can't understand is that when ALL national veterinary associations conclude that slaughter without stunning to be cruel people keep arguing that slaughter without stunning can be humane?

This is argument by assertion.  How is it unacceptably damaged?  From what I found, the Kosher method renders a cow unconscious in a matter of seconds.

I doubt all national veterinary associations conclude this.

http://www.mustaqim.co.uk/halalstudy.htm  This study done by German veterinary weekly in the late 1970's seems to indicate that both methods are fairly similar from the point of view of the animal.  In fact, the ritual slaughter may be less painful then the captive bolt.

The slaughter in the form of ritual cut is, if carried out properly, painless in sheep and calves according to the EEG recordings and the missing defensive actions.

from the article I quoted

Ghanem cites a 1978 study relying on EEG measurements led by Wilhelm Schulze of the University of Hanover, Germany, apparently concluding that halal slaughter was more humane than slaughter following stunning. But Schulze himself, who died in 2002, warned in his report that the stunning technique may not have functioned properly.

Not to mention the earlier link I had to a story where the German Vets association calls halal and kosher slaughter cruel and calls for it to be banned.

[Berkut]

Yes, I already addressed this, and basically agree. The onus is on those who want to remove the exemption to provide evidence that the exemption does not satisfy current standards of cruelty weighed against freedom of religion.

I misunderstood your position, then.  So... nevermind! 

To be fair, my original point was that the onus was on those who demand the exemption - I changed when Malthus pointed out that the exemption already exists, so not surprising that you would be confused.

[Razgovory]

Ghanem cites a 1978 study relying on EEG measurements led by Wilhelm Schulze of the University of Hanover, Germany, apparently concluding that halal slaughter was more humane than slaughter following stunning. But Schulze himself, who died in 2002, warned in his report that the stunning technique may not have functioned properly.

And he is the counter example of your New Zealand study.

In a bold response to a New Zealand study that concluded that slaughter without stunning causes pain, Dr. Grandin said that the knife in the study was shorter than those used in schechita, uncertainty whether the wound was kept open like in schechita, and the sharpening of the knives was done by a mechanical device rather than on a whetstone. It was studies like these that led to the banning of schechita in New Zealand.

http://matzav.com/dr-temple-grandin-reaffirms-humaneness-of-kosher-schechita

Temple Grandin is a well know,animal welfare activist and has even been praised by PETA.

[Razgovory]

And if the stunning technique can't be assure to work reliably in laboratory conditions, why should we except it to work reliably in field conditions?

[Barrister]

Of course, I find the idea that kosher slaughter is somehow immune to those same efficiency pressures pretty spurious as well. They might be better, but I am sure that "kosher" slaughterhouses have their incidences of cutting corners as well.

Are there any industrial-scale kosher or halal slaughterhouses?

I thought that demand for such meat was fairly limited even amongst Jews and Muslims, so I assumed it was done on more of a craftsman scale.

[Razgovory]

Of course, I find the idea that kosher slaughter is somehow immune to those same efficiency pressures pretty spurious as well. They might be better, but I am sure that "kosher" slaughterhouses have their incidences of cutting corners as well.

Are there any industrial-scale kosher or halal slaughterhouses?

I thought that demand for such meat was fairly limited even amongst Jews and Muslims, so I assumed it was done on more of a craftsman scale.

Not in the US.  There was an attempt at a Kosher industrial butchery but it didn't work and they closed it.

[garbon]

While I can see fighting to get the law thrown out or modified for all, I don't feel comfortable supporting individuals fighting to keep only their exemptions. Perhaps I'm reading the articles wrong, but from what I can see, I only see this: "Dutch law required animals to be stunned before being slaughtered but made an exception for ritual halaal and kosher slaughters."  Does that mean that I can't slit an animal's throat for a non-religious reason?

The exemption that is being repealed is the exemption that allows Muslims and Jews to slaughter without stunning. They are not being prohibited from slaughtering by exsanguination, they just have to stun the animal first so it doesn't feel the pain.

I think my point wasn't clear.  Would I be allowed under the current exemption to slaughter an animal by exsanguination without stunning?  What makes me uncomfortable is supporting an exemption for specific religious groups...as it seems to belie the fact that the law isn't actually needed.