Dishonest Pro-Shechita British Organization Lies Again

Simon "Shimon" Cohen wouldn't know how to tell the truth if his very life depended on it, and his Shechita UK organization (which also now markets itself as Shechita EU) is the most consistently dishonest Jewish community organization I've seen anywhere. And today's statements from Cohen are no exception.

 

The Daily Telegraph reports:

…Shimon Cohen of Shechita UK, which campaigns on behalf of the Jewish community for the right to carry out religious slaughter for food said: “Since January 2013 there has been a House of Lords Debate and a Westminster Hall Debate on the subject, with a third debate scheduled for Monday. Many other animal welfare concerns, such as game hunting and mechanical mis-stunning, have not been debated once in that time.”

He added: “This continued focus on religious slaughter is dog whistle politics of the worst sort and its effect is to undermine community relations. For animal welfare groups to keep pushing for a ban is wild-eyed and obsessive.”

Mr Cohen pointed out that Shechita, in which the animal’s throat, windpipe and blood vessels are cut, killing it instantly, amounts to less than 1 per cent of all slaughter in the UK, yet animal welfare groups appeared to focus on it to the detriment of other issues.

He said: “Two weeks ago a horrific film of extraordinary disregard for animal welfare at a non-mechanically stunned abattoir in Yorkshire came to light. Animal welfare campaigners called for an end of religious slaughter. Four days later a similar video was released at a conventional slaughter house and I didn’t hear one call to end conventional slaughter.

“If there is a genuine interest in improving animal welfare standards at time of slaughter, we need to look at many areas like abattoir practices, CCTV and mis-stunning. This fixation with religious slaughter beggars belief. At the moment the Muslim community is being tarred by the horrors of terrorism and these calls for a ban on religious slaughter feed into that mood music.” …

Simon "Shimon" Cohen wouldn't know how to tell the truth if his very life depended on it, and his Shechita UK organization is the most consistently dishonest Jewish community organization I've seen anywhere.

A few points:

• Animals killed through shechita (Jewish ritual slaughter) are not "killed instantly," if the definition of "killed instantly" means instantaneous death. Animals killed through shechita take anywhere from about 15 seconds to several minutes to completely lose consciousness and even longer to actually die.

 

• What Cohen deceptively does is rely on long discredited studies – often decades old, backed by the Jewish community and carried out by non-experts – that document the ritual slaughter of one animal under pristine conditions – not hundreds of animals in a commercial slaughterhouse.

 

• Cohen and his Shechita UK buddies aren't doing this accidentally. It is intentional, willful misrepresentation.

 

• Cohen talks about mis-stunning but never mentions mis-shechting, failed ritual slaughter that leaves the animal alive, suffering and grievously wounded. The rate of poorly done shechita is easily higher than than the rate of mis-stunning.

 

• Mis-stunning has been dramatically reduced over the past 15 years by better technology. The rate of bad shechita hasn't been reduced – except in plants that follow specific directions of Temple Grandin, the acknowledged worldwide expert on animal welfare and slaughter. But so far, almost the only kosher slaughterhouses that do so are those who sell their hindquarters and non-kosher kills to McDonald's and other fast food chains and are audited multiple times per year in snap unannounced audits to assure compliance with animal handling, welfare and slaughter standards. Not on that list are most of the kosher slaughterhouses Simon Cohen shills for.

 

• Mis-stunned animals – a small percentage overall – are immediately re-stunned. If that second stunning fails or is impossible, generally the animal is killed with a gun. But this scenario is rare.

 

• “Two weeks ago a horrific film of extraordinary disregard for animal welfare at a non-mechanically stunned abattoir in Yorkshire came to light. Animal welfare campaigners called for an end of religious slaughter. Four days later a similar video was released at a conventional slaughter house and I didn’t hear one call to end conventional slaughter." This is, of course, a strawman argument taht makes no logical sense. The vast majority of UK slaughterhouse are pre-stunning animals as the law requires. That one or two get caught cheating should not effect the vast majority who comply with the law. On the other hand, NONE of the kosher slaughterhouses pre-stun, pretty much none have adopted Temple Grandin's system and none have independent unannounced third party audits.

 

Here's what commercial kosher slaughter at the world's largest glatt kosher slaughterhouse, the Rubashkin family's Agriprocessors in Postville, Iowa, looked like before PETA sneaked someone in, shot undercover video and released it. As you watch it, realize that this is what Shechita UK is trying to protect:

 

 

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