Re: The Bigger, Badder, Even More Serious Thread [3]

[David H]

I made myself watch one bull fight in Barcelona years ago. It was horrible, but at the same time I have to admit it was glorious in the truest sense of the word.

The respect for the animals was evident in everything that was done. It felt ancient, like I was watching a ritual that had it's roots in the time of cave paintings, in a time when men fought bison and cave bears one on one with spears.

Part of me would like to see the "sport" end because of the brutality, part of me would be tremendously sad at the loss of such an ancient ritual, and part of me even now thinks that if I were a bull I'd rather go out fighting in a ring than be walked down a chute in a mechanized slaughterhouse.

I dunno......

[Norc]

[halfwise]

the point about walking into a slaughterhouse I think is one most of us try not to think about. Yet some bulls (such as the one above) simply were not created to be made a spectacle of.

It's not clear any of them deserve to die in a slaughterhouse either. I keep going back and forth between vegetarianism and meat eating. It's hard to come from Texas and turn down barbecue, but every now and then I see something like this bull and I swear off meat until I forget and slip back into my old ways.

[halfwise]

researching this it seems it may not be what it says it is, but like all internet research you never know.

http://www.animalliberationfront.com/Practical/Entertainment/BullfightersRemorse.htm

[Norc]

i love meat too much to be a veggie, though i know that slaughter in Norway are EU regulated and pretty human (just a bullet, and it's not as crammed) although i don't eat chicken with ease, i know how short they live and the injuries they suffer on their way to slaughter.

[Pettytyrant101]

Ive been in a slaughterhouse twice, and both times were over 20 years ago so before all the legislation there is now about humane practice.
These days the animal is killed instantly with a bolt to the brain before its slaughtered.
When I was there they were taken up by the back hooves alive and had their throats slit.
I didnt mnd the smells, but the noises were pretty distressing.
And I am not sqeamish about such things- we used to have to skin dead lambs so we could tie the fleece onto live ones that had been abandoned, that way the mother who had lost a lamb would get the scent of her own from the fleece and adopt the orphaned one.
But I have to say I wasnt to keen on the slaughter house.
But it didnt stop me eating meat- I didnt like it but it seemed necessary- without it no farm that I helped out on, no sheep, no lambs. No nothing.

[azriel]

I know that in the real world,there has to be a turn around of livestock. Humans eat meat & thats that. I cant physically kill anything tho! And anyone who can,walks off to do it again & again is amazing to me !, Il happily eat fruit/veg/nuts etc only. Lamb breaks my heart as they are SO cute & happy bouncing around, they are just babies & then it "Bonk" time ! Same as Veal, I just cant eat it, I choke ! My friend,in his youth,worked in an abbatior & he said the screams of the pigs will never leave him, & that was 30yrs ago when he did that job, Im leaving this thread As I now feel sad, & sick

[Pettytyrant101]

If its any consolation Azriel we used to send at least half of the lambs to the slaughter (99%of the males usually), a few of those would also be hand reared as the mothers had died in birth or abandoned them, but the others were kept for the flock to live out long, full and esentially free lives on the hillsides, with the added bonus of delivired food in the winter and innoculation from disease and protecion from pests- so those who do make up a flock get a good life for a sheep.
And no lambs to the slaughter, no reason to keep those flocks. So in the end you would have a lot less sheep in the world.
Its not really any different from some species who have thousands of offspring just to ensure one or two make it to adult hood.
Only difference is in this case we are the predator necessitating that.
But thats nature for you.

[halfwise]

It's a good point that there's actually more of these animals around because we eat them. but it's better if we eat less so more effort can be expended on giving them real lives rather than being raised in boxes.

[Pettytyrant101]

The ones I dealt with were sheep on a hill farm, the area the flock could cover in the top fields would be 20 miles or more, if they wanted too.
Most dont, they tend to stay wisely were they know the assistance and food will be when it gets tough.
No boxes except when they were transported, or for tricky births which had to be done in the old cattle byres, either those up on the hill or in the barns at the farm if possible.

Weird thing is, if you walk far enough beyond the top hills, up onto the moors and peat bogs at the top and on towards the glens beyond, you can occasionaly meet feral sheep. Escapees.
And sheep normally are about the most scared of everything animal imaginable, their favourite survival technique is to try to hide under one another.
But feral sheep are a whole dfferent matter. They stand their ground and stare you down.
They somehow give you the impression they are wearing a leather jacket and shades and chewing on a matchstick.
Its quite disconcerting being menaced by a sheep.

[David H]

But feral sheep are a whole dfferent matter. They stand their ground and stare you down.
They somehow give you the impression they are wearing a leather jacket and shades and chewing on a matchstick.
Its quite disconcerting being menaced by a sheep.

These are the sheep shamans. They KNOW!

[halfwise]

Then there's being surrounded by a herd of cows. They just stand there, slowly chewing their cud, staring at you, with unreadable menace.

I much prefer heifers. At least you can tell they are having fun. But full grown cows haven't an ounce of humor in them.

[David H]

They just stand there, slowly chewing their cud, staring at you, with unreadable menace.

...or unreadable love. Or maybe they're the same emotion for cows. They're very zen, cows.

I much prefer heifers.

To each his own. Just watch out if there's a bull in the pasture is all I'm sayin'....

[Mrs Figg]

thats a very sad story Chris and I hope that poor animal wasnt killed.

[David H]

This makes me both sad and furious!

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/may_june_2013/features/over_the_line044512.php

Over the Line

Why are U.S. Border Patrol agents shooting into Mexico and killing innocent civilians?

By John Carlos Frey
____________

..................
Fatal shootings by Border Patrol agents were once a rarity. Only a handful were recorded before 2009. Even more rare were incidents of Border Patrol agents shooting Mexicans on their own side of the border. A former Clinton administration official who worked on border security issues in the 1990s says he can’t recall a single cross-border shooting during his tenure. “Agents would go out of their way not to harm anyone and certainly not shoot across the border,” he says. But a joint investigation by the Washington Monthly and the Investigative Fund at the Nation Institute has found that over the past five years U.S. border agents have shot across the border at least ten times, killing a total of six Mexicans on Mexican soil.

There is no doubt that Border Patrol agents face a difficult job. Between 2007 and 2012, twenty agents have died in the line of duty; most of these deaths were the result of accidents, but four were due to border violence. For instance, in 2010 Agent Brian A. Terry was struck down near Rio Rico, Arizona, in the Border Patrol’s Nogales area of operation, by AK-47 fire after he and his team encountered five suspected drug runners. In 2012, Agent Nicholas J. Ivie was shot by friendly fire after being mistaken by other agents for an armed smuggler.

But following a rapid increase in the number of Border Patrol agents between 2006 and 2009, a disturbing pattern of excessive use of force has emerged. When I first began to notice this spate of cross-border shootings, I assumed that at least some victims were drug traffickers or human smugglers trying to elude capture. But background checks revealed that only one had a criminal record. As I began to dig more deeply, it turned out that most of the victims weren’t even migrants, but simply residents of Mexican border towns like Jose Antonio, who either did something that looked suspicious to an agent or were nearby when border agents fired at someone else.

In one case, agents killed a thirty-year-old father of four while he was collecting firewood along the banks of the Rio Grande. In another, a fifteen-year-old was shot while watching a Border Patrol agent apprehend a migrant. In yet another, agents shot a thirty-six-year-old man while he was having a picnic to celebrate his daughters’ birthdays.

As the debate over immigration reform heats up on Capitol Hill, increased border security will likely be the condition of any path to citizenship for the millions of undocumented workers now living in the United States. This makes scrutinizing the professionalism of the Border Patrol all the more urgent. The picture that emerges from this investigation is of an agency operating with thousands of poorly trained rookies and failing to provide the kind of transparency, accountability, and clear rules of engagement that Americans routinely expect of law enforcement agencies.

So far, the Border Patrol’s cross-border shootings have yet to attract much international attention. If they continue, however, it is easy to imagine the U.S. not only being assailed by human rights activists around the world, but also compromising its standing to pressure other countries, such as Israel, to refrain from firing on unarmed citizens across their borders.

[halfwise]

Very little involved in dealing with the border patrol could possibly be considered a shootable offense. Something is very wrong.

[Pettytyrant101]

The Church of Scotland has got itself some flack for a paper to be debated at their annual assembly.

The Israeli government has criticised the Church of Scotland over a report which questions the divine right of Jews to the land of Israel.
Israel's ambassador to the UK said it was "truly hurtful" and could "mark a significant step backwards for the forces of tolerance and peace".
It stated there has been a widespread assumption by many Christians, as well as many Jewish people, that the Bible "supports an essentially Jewish state of Israel".

Biblical promises about the land of Israel were never intended to be taken literally, or as applying to a defined geographical territory, thereport argued.

Instead, it said: "They are a way of speaking about how to live under God so that justice and peace reign, the weak and poor are protected, the stranger is included, and all have a share in the community and a contribution to make to it.

"The 'promised land' in the Bible is not a place, so much as a metaphor of how things ought to be among the people of God. This 'promised land' can be found - or built - anywhere.

"The desire of many in the state of Israel to acquire the land of Palestine for the Jewish people is wrong. The fact that the land is currently being taken by settlement expansion, the separation barrier, house clearance, theft and force makes it doubly wrong to seek biblical sanction for this."
The report said that the enormity of the Holocaust "has often reinforced the belief that Israel is entitled to the land unconditionally."

"There is guilt among Western Christianity about centuries of anti-Semitism that led to discrimination against the Jews, culminating in the total evil of the Holocaust," it suggested.
The Israeli ambassador to the UK, Daniel Taub, said: "This report not only plays into extremist political positions, but negates and belittles the deeply held Jewish attachment to the land of Israel in a way which is truly hurtful.

"If a document of this nature is adopted by the Church of Scotland it would mark a significant step backwards for the forces of tolerance and peace in our region."

Ephraim Borowski, director of the Scottish Council of Jewish Communities, described the report as an "outrage to everything that interfaith dialogue stands for"
Abraham H Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League in New York, described the paper as "stunningly offensive".
He said: "The paper's blatant one-sided perspective falsely conflates the political state of Israel and the religious significance of the Land of Israel for both Jews and Christians. The selective citation of Biblical scripture in order to question Israel's legitimacy is an affront to Jews around the world and to the State of Israel."

A spokesman for the Church of Scotland said it "has never and is not now denying Israel's right to exist; on the contrary, it is questioning the policies that continue to keep peace a dream in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory."

He added: "This report is against the injustices levelled against the Palestinian people and how land is shared. It is also a reflection of the use or misuse of scripture to claim divine right to land by any group.

"The Church of Scotland is called to speak out against injustice. Whether people are being exploited by pay-day loan companies or through low wages and poor conditions, or because of benefit changes and actions of the powerful across the world, the Church of Scotland seeks to support just and peaceful solutions.

"With this in mind, the Church of Scotland will continue to work for freedom and justice for all who live in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory."- BBC

[Eldorion]

Ephraim Borowski, director of the Scottish Council of Jewish Communities, described the report as an "outrage to everything that interfaith dialogue stands for"

I'm trying to be fair here, but I have to wonder if this guy includes Muslims in his ideal of "interfaith dialogue".

[Pettytyrant101]

For a national Church the Church of Scotland has always been quite progressive. They had female deacons from the 1880's and female preachers from the 1940's onwards and full ordained female ministers from the 1960's onwards.
Sadly they have been less sure over homosexuality- although next month they will announce the Churches official position- either homosexauls who are married will be allowed to be ministers, or else they will come out saying only a man and women can be married.

But like all religion in Scotland they have had their time and its drawing to an end at long last-

'Membership has fallen by more than two-thirds in the past 40 years. Last week, the Humanist Society of Scotland claimed there would soon be more humanist weddings than Church of Scotland weddings north of the Border.' - The Scotsman

[Pettytyrant101]

UKIP must be partying hard I reckon.
Since they won some council seats the Tory party have gone into internal meltdown. With party big hitter after big hitter coming out in the press saying there should be a referendum on Europe before the next election not after.
Cameron meanwhile is in America and still trying to peddle his line that he will renegotiate with Europe- and only if the renegotiations fail and the UK doesnt get all the opt outs it wants from things like the Human Rights Act, then we get a referendum.
At th epress conferenc today he even enlisted Obama to back his position inan attempt to stop his party forcing an early referndum on the country.
Problem with Camerons position is that everyonne and their cat knows the rest of Europe is a little busy on the economic front right now and none of them have any appetite to waste months and months renegotaing with the UK treaties they consider long signed, done and dusted.

And of course if there was a referendum before the Scottish one on Independence it could change everything.
England would vote the UK out. And that would be disastrous for Scotland as we are up to our eyeballs with Europe on energy, agricultre and fishing policies.
And we dont have the immigration, ethnic/racist problems anything like they are in England it seems.
Scotland is trying to increase immigration.

[Eldorion]

I would totally immigrate to Scotland.

[Pettytyrant101]

And youd be welcomed- especially round this neck of the woods- we have experience with you lot! (Study hard get yourself a ridiculously well paid job in the oil business and you can immigrate here in a heart beat)

[CC12 35]

i could just walk over there


not that I'm going 2 do that



it's quite a long way to walk from the gower

[Pettytyrant101]

Yup thats about as far away as you can get and still be Welsh!

[CC12 35]

apart from the whole of Pembrokeshire