Shelves Empty as Three Plants Stop Beef Production

[AlphaCentauri]

Source: TJD

In developments that are already crippling the availability of kosher beef in large parts of America, three of the nation’s five largest slaughterhouses producing kosher beef halted production in the first week of November.

All eyes have been on the nation’s largest kosher slaughterhouse, here in Iowa, which stopped producing beef last week due to a series of legal problems and arrests at its parent company, Agriprocessors. That company, which filed for bankruptcy November 4, also owns a slaughterhouse in Gordon, Neb., which is thought to be the nation’s fifth-largest plant producing kosher meat. While little attention has been paid to the Gordon plant, local officials told the Forward that it stopped operating in October.

Then, in unrelated developments, executives at America’s third-largest kosher beef slaughterhouse, located in Minnesota, told the Forward that production there was brought to a complete halt due to a fire and to problems with insurers.

“We’re not killing anything right now,” said Bill Gilger, CEO of North Star Beef, which is located in Buffalo Lake, Minn. “We’re adding to the shortage of kosher beef, having nothing to do with what is going on in Postville, but just to do with our own situation here.”



Read more: http://www.forward.com/articles/14523/

[DJ13]

1. They were caught using child labor

Thats why they closed them down.

[DeposeTheBoyKing]

2. "We're not killing anything right now"

That right there has almost made me decide to become a vegetarian. I've flirted with it, but I do love my beef and chicken.

[kestrel91316]

3. Vegetables have to be killed for us to eat them, too.

There is no escaping death. And we ALL live because other lives are taken to sustain us.

Don't take life needlessly, and give thanks when you do take life. Whether it's animal or vegetable.

[superconnected]

6. Vegetables are not sentient beings like cows are. The cow doesn't want to die.

[geckosfeet]

11. Plants don't "want" to die either. They go to an awful lot of trouble to

grow and reproduce in some very inhospitable places.

And this whole idea of sentience being the criteria for when it is ok to kill leads to some very inconvenient situations.

[cobalt1999]

19. Exactly.

Plants fight as hard to live as any other living entity on this planet.

[XemaSab]

24. Two things:

Some plants are annuals, and have a naturally very short life span.

Some plants, such as fruit trees, we only eat part of, so eating part of the plant doesn't hurt the plant.

Comparing eating plants with animals is not a valid comparison (and I'm the person who laid awake for a while this morning worrying about the plants in the garden. :P )

[dysfunctional press]

12. "the cow doesn't want to die"

how do you know that? maybe a lot of them suffer from depression and would be happy to sluff off the mortal coil.

[Freddie Stubbs]

13. Then perhaps they should be given Prozac and

sent to counseling.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

14. Welfare mooms?

:hide:

[SpiralHawk]

16. Sluff off this mortal coil?

[Scout]

23. i daresay the cow doesn't know a thing about death

i agree it doesn't want to feel pain or fear, but i really don't think it knows about death

:eyes:

[superconnected]

36. Even spiders recoil and try to save themselves from death.

the cow knows. :eyes:

[dixiegrrrrl]

33. How can you tell if a plant is not sentient?

Actually, seems some science types actually did make measurements of plants reaction to
"danger".
Google around sometime, you may be amazed.

[Psephos]

8. Well and nicely said n/t

[liberal N proud]

10. I love it

Veggies have to be killed too.

:rofl:

[alfredo]

28. I never had to chase a carrot, and bib lettuce never struggled against

my knife.

[Oak2004]

31. That's because

A) Plants defend themselves using toxins and external barriers (thorns, shells), not movement. They're plants (as in planted, stuck in one place), not animals (as in animated, moving rapidly).

B) Plants, it turns out, can signal each other when they are under attack, to let others of their own kind know it's time to ramp up toxin production.

C) We have organs that are very nearly dedicated to removing plant toxins from our system, as well as a boatload of enzymes dedicated to the purpose.

D) Carrots and lettuce are domesticated vegetables, which means, among many other things, that we've bred them to minimize their defenses. Wild carrots and lettuce are much less edible (and I say this as someone who is very knowledgeable about edible wild plants, and who has harvested both).

The wonderful story of life on this planet, told in our genes, is that every one of us are blood relatives, plants included. We all descend from the same ancestor. And we have much more in common than many of us humans have been willing to consider.

I don't think there's anything "wrong" with vegetarianism. I vacillate between vegetarianism and limited meat eating, myself. But neither do I think there's anything "wrong" with meat eating. As animals, we're parasitical: we live off the food energy accumulated by other life. As humans, we've found ways to modify some life forms to make them more cooperative about being preyed upon, but that does not alter the fact that we live by eating our blood relatives. And in turn someday we will be food for our extended family.

[alfredo]

32. I'm not a vegetarian either. Some plants need to be eaten to reproduce.

A tree is becoming extinct because the DoDo is extinct. It depended on that bird to crack the seed case so it could sprout.

Read "The Botany of Desire" by Michael Pollan.

[Ignis]

29. Three words: Central. Nervous. System. (nt)

[Liberalynn]

18. That particular line

made me wonder what they else they were killing besides cattle to begin with?

I mean "anything" is pretty vague. :rofl:

[Ignis]

30. Beef's hard to mimic, but there are good chicken analogues.

I recommend either Quorn or something from the Morningstar Farms line if you're looking to reduce your intake of chicken meat.

I've been a vegetarian for a long time now, but a very similar moment to the one you describe above is what pushed me over the line. It's very easy in this society to distance ourselves from the dirty business of killing while we're eating meat. But once you make the connection in your head, I found it difficult to ignore.

Good luck, and thanks for the honesty, whatever you decide. :hi:

[DBoon]

4. I almost read that as "Beer" production

and thought, "Thank God I drink wine."

[MikeStl]

5. “We’re not killing anything right now,”

Gee they must not know what to do with themselves, their thirst for blood unquenched.

[superconnected]

7. Yeah, it sounds like they'll go work for blackwater next.

[gabby garcia]

17. lol

seriously!

[azurnoir]

9. Heck not to worry Halal meats can be substituted

quite plentiful in the Twin Cities area, the slaughter methods are the same and for the same reasons, not mention lamb and goat are also available.
There is an Arab grocery that sells its items with a sticker that says- "Halal equivalent of Kosher"

[customerserviceguy]

15. I've always thought it strange

the the most fundamentalist versions of Islam and Judaism have such similar rules, yet such complete hate for each other.

[Cronus Protagonist]

21. Similarity breeds contempt among religions

:P

[dysfunctional press]

22. the whole ban on pork thing had to do with trichinosis...

if people might get sick and die from eating something, best to have their gods tell them not to eat it.

[customerserviceguy]

25. There are quite a few other similarities as well

Treatment of women comes to mind immediately, such as inferior status, fear of menstruation, etc.

[bean fidhleir]

34. Not so. It had to do with swine being competitors with us in desert regions.

The late anthro Marvin Harris worked it out. That's why the proscription against eating pigs (which would require raising pigs) doesn't apply in any other religions - just the desert-spawned ones.

[Cronus Protagonist]

20. Let them eat pork!

Or cake. :P

[XemaSab]

26. Kosher slaughtering is disgusting

The animals are hung upside down from a moving conveyer and their throats slit.

Conventional slaughter is more humane.

[walktall7]

27. Out of curiosity

My understanding and having seen some conventional slaughter is that the animals (cattle) are stunned, hung on the track and then bled out by a cut with a knife to the neck. It sounds very similar to me, but I have to admit I don't know much about the kosher aspect other than it also includes having the animal bled out. My apologies for the graphic nature of this question.

[SOS]

35. Good!

Agriprocessors was a revolting company and their demise is welcome news.
Their plants should be permanently shut down and the owners sent to prison.

[bean fidhleir]

37. What's somehow even more awful is the way the rabbinical associations

have glossed over Agri's misdeeds. Ugh!

But yes, their licenses to operate should be pulled, and the owners sent to prison. But of course that hardly ever happens to the nobility - and business owners are capitalism's barons and counts and princes.

[bitchkitty]

38. GOOD. n/t