Halal

Today I'm writing about Islam, in lieu of a book we're reading in English class, and it's the perfect opportunity for me to explore a little bit of the Qur'an, as it might apply Saud Hunter from the previous post. In his brief bio on Instagram he mentions that he is Muslim, and so I wanted to explore how hunting, meat (or just killing animals in general), is addressed in the Qur'an.

As many of you probably know the Qur'an sets out some outlines about what kind of food is halal, or allowed to eat. Halal meat must comply to the following standards:

- The name of Allah must be mentioned at or around the time of sacrifice.

- The animal to be eaten must not be one that died by itself, or be strangled to death, beaten to death or has fallen to its death.

- The animal must not be killed by goring attacks i.e. by horns, arrows or stabbed to death, or has been eaten by other animals.

- Consumption of blood is prohibited, therefore must be drained.

- Pigs are forbidden for consumption.

- In addition, all methods or procedures that make the process of death easier and painless should be utilised.

**I didn't include all of the requirements for the sake of brevity, but for more information the site above was quite informative.

Essentially, the animal must be healthy and must be killed by a specific cut to the throat. The main purpose of requiring food to comply to those standards is so ordinary humans understand that the animal is a sacrifice and it’s a privilege granted by Allah. It’s so that we don’t take an animal’s death for granted, and we respect and thank the animal for dying so that we can eat.

Now, halal requirements have some implications in the modern world, in which many animals are pre-stunned by an electric current before slaughter. The current doesn't kill them, but rather renders them unconscious so they feel less pain and stress in the moment of slaughter. The issue arises when some Muslim religious leaders oppose pre-stunning on the grounds that pre-stunning violates the requirement of being "healthy" at the time of death. But many others point to the last requirement I have posted when saying that pre-stunning is totally acceptable. According to them, the Quran also says that the sacrifice of an animal should be as merciful as possible, and pre-stunning ensures a less painful death.

Happy, organic, halal chickens on Norwich Meadows Farm

In fact, some Muslims, like farmer Zaid Kurdieh, believe halal meat should be wholly organic. This ensures the animal is healthy (minus antibiotics) and lived a happier life than in would have in, say, in a feedlot. Kurdieh believes that the word “merciful” should apply to the animals’ lives and not just the way they die. The animal's quality of life matters just as much, because all animals deserve to be treated kindly and be provided with what they need to lead a natural, stress-free life.

Otherwise, the only difference between halal meat and non-halal meat is the fact that it’s been blessed, because if the animal was abused its whole life, we can forget all about "mercy". The halal requirements on the website of Mr. Kurdieh's farm, Norwich Meadows, are quite interesting and much more interwoven with organic obligations.

The emphasis on a merciful death also has implications about the animals Saud Hunter kills. His habits seem to be against the Quran, because his animals are dying in “violent” means. However,

I would say the wild animals he kills lived a much healthier life than the majority of animals killed in a US slaughterhouse. The antelope from the previous post lived its whole life free with its herd, eating grass instead of grain like it’s supposed to, running around as much as it wants, according to the rules of nature. And once it’s killed, it won’t pass through an industrial slaughterhouse only to be processed and eventually possibly be thrown away once it spoils because it wasn't bought or eaten. That antelope will likely be used much more efficiently, so I think that making sure the animal didn’t die in vain is an act of great respect that many cows in our own backyards aren't getting.

So if we apply requirements for meat to be halal to Saud’s situations, there is at least an argument we can make to say that the meat is halal. Of course, I don’t know exactly what goes on when he hunts or whether or not he even intends for the meat to be halal, but it seems to me that he respects the animals and the Qur'an's requirements enough to treat them with the dignity every creature on earth is entitled to.

Feedlots

WARNING: some pictures in the following post may be graphic and/or offensive.

One of Saud Hunter's controversial pictures on Instagram

A week or two ago, I was surfing my Instagram feed and I stumbled upon a very interesting page owned by a Saudi man in Africa, named Saud Hunter (I’m not sure Saud is his real name, and I wasn't able to find his last name). I was drawn to his page because of the pictures he posted, pictures of him playing with lion, black leopard, and cheetah cubs. But he also posts pictures like these:

Yes, I know. That’s gross. And he’s received tons of heat for posting these pictures, and for hunting altogether. But I'm going to talk about Mr. Saud and why we should hold off our criticism later on. For now, let’s take a look at some pictures that are even more concerning than a dead antelope.

Aerial view of Coronado Feeders, Texas, by Mishka Henner

This is a bird's-eye-view picture of concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs), commonly known as feedlots, taken by British artist Mishka Henner. These are the facilities in which cows are kept before taken to the slaughter; the animals are fed grains (mostly corn) and usually antibiotics, because they live on top of their own poop and their abnormal diet doesn’t make for the strongest immune systems. If you can see them, the tiny specks within the squares are the cows and the giant form suspiciously resembling a dissected kidney is a waste pool of blood and other cow refuse.

This informational video seems to paint feedlots in, at the very least, a neutral light. But in my opinion Henner’s pictures speak the truth: feedlots are bad for so many reasons. Most of these reasons can be placed under two categories, since feedlots are damaging to the environment's health and to the consumer's health, not to mention to the poor cow.

Let's first look at another of Henner's pictures and consider the environmental impacts of a CAFO. (This source from the CDC is even better for more information.)

Tascosa Feedyard, Texas

That sulfur-green manure pool can't be good, can it? Usually, on smaller-scale farms, manure can be a very useful and healthy soil fertilizer. However CAFOs produce so much manure (about 500 million tons according to the USDA) that it can't possibly be spread around neighboring farms, and so it's left in dumps such as the one above where the manure liquefies, producing a number of toxic gases. These gases include hydrogen sulfide, methane, and nitrous oxide, which account for about 20% of greenhouse gas emissions due to human actions and contribute to local air pollution. 

So the pool looks disgusting because it smells disgusting. But the liquefied manure can also seep into groundwater or run off during heavy rains to pollute rivers and wells, contaminating them with bacteria like E. coli and killing fish populations. As we know, water is becoming an increasingly more valuable resource in our world of nearly 7 billion people. Water is not something we can afford to sacrifice to the unhealthy practices of CAFOs. 

Next, I'd like you to consider the effect that beef from a feedlot might have on the consumer (i.e. you and me). As you can see, the cows have no access to grass, living close to each other and walking around in their own manure. Because this lifestyle tends to lower their immune response, the cows are also given antibiotics. Sustained use of antibiotics presents the risk of creating antibiotic-resistant foodborne bacteria, like Salmonella, that may be transmitted to humans. Also, I'm willing to bet that the cows are fed GMO (genetically engineered) grains, which is a story for another day but is also a point of contention when it comes to consumer health.

In all honesty, it's not really known whether or not meat from feedlots is unhealthy in itself, excluding the possibility of foodborne diseases, or even if antibiotic-resistant bacteria poses a significant public health risk. But even so, I'd like you to look at the pictures above and think about whether or not that looks like the origins of delicious, natural meat in comparison to sustainable, smaller, free-range farms. 

So which is grosser now? Saud’s antelope or a Texas feedlot? 

Please keep this post in mind when I examine Saud Hunter's situation soon.