Stop The Slaughter

ANC Webmaster wrote:
> Many U.S. horses are brutally killed in U.S. slaughterhouses to be served on
> dinner plates in Europe and Asia. And we are letting it happen, through our
> silence.
<snip broken link>

Most of those horses are old, sick, or injured. Euthanizing an animal
still costs money, unless it's DIY with a bullet. While shooting one's
own horse is something some people can manage, many others cannot.
Hiring a vet to do it will run about $250. Hiring a backhoe to bury it
will run about another $100. So it's about $350 out of pocket. Selling
the horse to the slaughterhouse brings in money, say $500 in the pocket.
Such small sums do matter, particularly in small farming/ranching
operations. If you had a bottom line to consider and a horse that was a
drain on resources, which end of that $850 spread would you take?

Equine slaughterhouses solve two strong demands. Even if you can reduce
by half the demand for horsemeat, there will still be many horse owners
who need a way to dispose of their old, useless, lame animals.

Shutting down the slaughterhouses only leads to blackmarkets for those
who want horsemeat. Banning slaughter operations will only increase the
likelihood and frequency of sound, healthy horses being slaughtered for
food rather than old, weak ones. The biggest source of meat will be from
stolen animals because quality becomes an even more important factor to
consumers forced to pay blackmarket prices.

Many times when "symptomatic relief" is sought, the solutions offered
are actually worse than the problem. Shipping horses even further on
crowded trucks, trains, or ships to Mexico or Argentina is even less
humane. Nevermind shipping horses where it's illegal to slaughter them
and where "back alley" blackmarket conditions prevail.

If you really care about the welfare of horses, it's far better to
prevent blackmarket conditions which would result in the slaughter of
much healthier horses. Even as distasteful as it seems, the
slaughterhouses may be the most acceptable interim solution until demand
for horsemeat is reduced.

Beltex and Dallas Crown Packaging operate the two horse slaughterhouses
in Texas. Feel free to write their headquarters in Belgium. And don't
forget to petition the EU to work on reducing European demand for horsemeat.