The proposed end of the world is upon us, Muslims have finally taken Subway. Well, actually, 185 out of their approximately 1500 UK stores sell all-halal meat (that's around 12%) and have replaced pork products, such as bacon rashers, with turkey substitutes.
If you don't know what halal meat is, (click here for a better explanation/more details) it is the Islamic process of slaughtering meat by draining the blood entirely from the animal. The animal must not be harmed prior to slaughter (so, that rules KFC out), and must be killed quickly. It is also turned to face Mecca and the name of Allah or a prayer is spoken in order to thank God for the meat. For those with limited imagination, it's probably where James Cameron got the inspiration from for the grateful slaughter scene in Avatar.
Anyway, here is how the likes of the Daily Mail and the ever-ridiculous Britain First has sensationalised this practice and are using it to create hatred towards Islamic customs. The Daily Mail wrote
"Traditionally in halal abattoirs the throats of the animals are cut while they are fully conscious - an act many campaigners say is inhumane and needlessly cruel."
Although said campaigners have mysteriously* (*conveniently) not been named, I would also like to question the apparent "inhumanity" here. Firstly, there is no evidence that halal slaughter is more painful than conventional slaughter (please do read Mehdi Hasan's thoughts on this, here). The halal-slaughtered animal "quickly loses consciousness" from having its throat slit, whereas in other slaughter it is essential that it is rendered unconscious with a shock before death. Now, I'm not here to debate whether being electrocuted or cut is a more painful way to go - the fact is it is slaughter and it can never be nice. Moreover, the Subway meat is going to be stunned prior to halal slaughter, so why are you whining, exactly?
What I'm concerned with is that these so-called animal rights defenders don't seem to care that barn-laid chickens have their beaks removed at birth, for instance, or that in battery farms they have absolutely no room to flap their wings, and can barely do that because they're bred to be top-heavy and are generally disabled. I don't see anyone crying over the conveyor-belt slaughter process which 'conventional' slaughter thinks is fine, or the animal cruelty battery animals in particular face. I apologise for ranting, but if you're so bloody worried about animal rights become a vegetarian. Animals are consumed on a systematic basis and that is a fact.
But, I don't see the DM, or any of these people who allegedly care about the poor halal-slaughtered animals, giving a shit about any of this. That's because compassion for animals in this scenario is just a facade for Islamophobia. We can witnessa similar sort of proud nationalism and Muslim-smearing in campaigns like this banned BNP video, which dehumanises Muslims to an un-precendented and frankly disgusting level:
(If you want to get through the video, probs best to turn the sound off, that child singing haunts my nightmares.)
But it's not just nutters like the BNP who are hating on Muslims. 'Respected' Atheist Richard Dawkins (@RichardDawkins) has been waving the flag for ages, what with his previous scoff at the numbers who have been to Oxbridge, he recently (5th May '14) retweeted a really informative post. I was unable to embed said tweet, but here's the picture.
I suppose this represents the entirety of Muslims in Science presently? Great that you have used such an unbiased, logical, professional argument there. It looks like it's been put together on photoshop by me, for god's sake - only I wouldn't be seen dead using Comic Sans. But, I digress.
To me, halal meat tastes no different to any other meat, so I cannot comprehend the outrage of people who object to its use in supermarkets, Pizza Express or Subway. And, as for the dreaded loss of pork, why not go to the other 1,315 stores which still sell it. But, I understand for the likes of Britain First, the BNP, UKIP and the Daily Mail, it is the principle. "They come over here, they eat what we eat!" amiright? Well, tell that to the 33,000 or so other *American* Subways in countries all over the world.
Get more deets from Subway right here.
Interesting post, I can see what you mean about the compassion for animals being a wafer sliced facade for Islamophobia. It just seems to me that it's a bit unfair considering the fact that the main places they would do this are places with larger ethnic minorities and as an ethnic minority myself it seems like we're all being generalized.
ReplyDeleteIt's actually against a Sikhs religion to eat meat that's not been killed by one strike, so now I can't eat meat at Subway branches/ Pizza express places that have halal meat. Would you not say that it would just be easier to have the choice there instead of changing the whole thing to suit one religion?
Also, would you mind if you lived in an area where you couldn't get pork because all the local stores had cut it in a similar fashion ?
Thanks for your comment :) from what I understand, halal slaughter must be done with one cut though? But I understand there perhaps should be a choice, but my only thoughts are that Subway just found it didn't sell enough pork in these stores to justify supplying it.
DeleteHi Ginny, I got linked here from your Facebook. I appreciate the general theme behind your article, 'people using pretty much anything to promote their xenophobic hate' including animal rights it would seem. Clever, as very few people would stand up and say they are against animal rights. But for them to be apposed to Halal (not even proved to be inhumane) they should first be attacking the other crueler forms of slaughter going on. All true, proving further the likes of Britain don't care about the animals and its purely a vehicle can to justify their extreme right-wing racist behaviour.
ReplyDeleteBut there are things you've taken way out of context:
"But it's not just nutters like the BNP who are hating on Muslims. 'Respected' Atheist Richard Dawkins has been waving the flag for ages."
What the hell is this?!? Richard Dawkins is not attacking Muslims due to racism. He is attacking religion as a whole. He's spent the last 10 years attacking christianity and for the most part people have found that to be all fine and dandy, as soon as he turns to Muslim, there's uproar!
The point he was making was that Muslims have contributed much less to the scientific community, and to prove he isn't calling them dumb, he says this is relative to the muslims of the middle ages. Implying this is a choice of theirs. Also, how can he be 'hating' when he is just relaying facts. For how large muslim community is, very few nobel prizes have been awarded to them relatively. Fact. I think its madness to put Dawkins and the BMP in the same category. He doesn't want Muslims 'out his country' he just wants their metaphysical beliefs, and all other metaphysical beliefs, out the way so the human race can get stuck into to some good-old hardcore science! Something I also follow.
Anyway, until the Dawkins bit i liked your article (and the other one on why to vote UKIP). People are ignorant, everyone has a fundamental hate for out-groups, its evolutionary. Only with societal conditioning can this be reduced, something the media aren't helping with.
thanks, I appreciate your thoughts, glad you seem to agree with the main argument.
DeleteIn regards to Dawkins, I follow him on Twitter and the amount he attacks Muslims as oppose to other religious groups is disproportional. This picture I have used is just one instance of him using a bad source for his reasoning. I also completely disagree with his somewhat bigoted views that religion is a completely bad thing, which I would align with the BNP's (and other groups') bigoted views that immigration is point blank a bad thing. I'm not going to go into an essay here but Dawkins completely disregards any positive points Islam specifically has to offer, as well as benefits the religion has made to modern day science. Instead he lazily posts this kind of rubbish and people blindly agree that all Muslims are backwards, which to me is Islamophobia. His arguments are completely biased and to a certain extent as ridiculous and right-wing as UKIP or the DM.
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ReplyDeleteHi Ginny,
ReplyDeleteWas going to start a rant myself but to be honest this is very well written and I agree with most of your points of view, especially regarding animal cruelty. And yes whilst I too am guilty for at first spinning that all subway stores won't sell bacon it is in reality not that many and they are in majority Muslim populated areas where we would all expect there to be Halal only meat to meet the demand and respect the culture. Only thing about the animal cruelty is to read around a little on quite how painless and peaceful the process is, 'The Halal Catering Company' is probably not the best unbiased account of how Halal meat is prepared but reading around it sounds about right and your points on the animal cruelty aspects are dead right and more important at the end of the day.
The only thing I can possibly think to add is that the other side of the argument is the principle of other religions or, if they are still naive to the reality of animal cruelty and slaughter as you pointed out, some animal activists should still have the right to make the decision to choose between halal and 'normally' if you like slaughtered meats.
I respect other cultures and other people's practices but I don't like, as I'm sure they don't, not having the choice between the way I like and the way they would like. Whilst I agree with you entirely that the BNP and extremist view that they come here they eat what they are given is wrong, I think it is also wrong to take the left wing approach of bending over backwards and changing our lifestyles for someone else. why not accommodate both or as subway have done offer Halal only in the areas where the demand is high for it?
The Pizza Express approach and the big supermarkets it appears also to force it on everyone, often without making it clear or marked at all, seems not only a basic breach of trading standards laws but also simply slides the balance too far the other way.
Then again, in reality balance seems impossible in most cases but we are ALL individual and entitled to our own views so long as we respect the rights of others. 'Social conditioning' as another comment maker put defeats the point of everything the human race has existed and still exists for.
Thanks for the informed interesting article,
Andy
Hi, thanks for your comment. I wanted to use a website which has the most expertise on the subject, hence using the Halal catering. I understand your point about it possibly being biased though, so I would encourage anyone to look it up for themselves to find your own opinions on it, but from what I see that website is informative and impartial.
DeleteI understand your point that Subway, supermarkets, etc. should give you the choice and should be transparent about their labeling. But this may not always be practical for the company which is why I assume they haven't. Personally halal to me is no more harmful to animals than traditional slaughter, and I tried to argue here that people are being outraged for the wrong reasons - not for animal welfare but for another culture impinging on ours.
Which leads me to your next point. I don't think we have bent over backwards. Personally I'd rather places served meat which everyone could eat and if that means just being halal (like a lot of Nandos, Chicken Cottage, etc.) then I'm fine with that. These places also stun the animal before slittiing their throats so it is more like a hybrid of our traditional slaughter and halal anyway.
But thanks for your comment, you make an interesting point, and thanks for reading :)
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