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Kosher sign
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Lawmakers in the Austrian state of Lower Austria are considering a bill that would restrict the sale of kosher meat to observant Jews. Officials say the law would somehow protect the welfare of animals.

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Charles Oliver is a contributing editor at Reason.

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  1. Rat on a train

    Do they have to wear some symbol on their clothes for identification?

    1. Radioactive

      Not yet, but they do all have to live in the same neighborhood, and something about the shower facilities?

  2. Mickey Rat

    So does only apply to Kosher meats or does it also apply to halal as well? The butchering methods are similar.

    1. Scarecrow Repair & Chippering

      RTFA: both.

      1. Wizard4169

        The Wiener Zeitung did not say whether the draft decree extends also to halal meat as well as kosher meat.

        I did read the article.

        1. If an animal is slaughtered to meet BOTH standards, then it is known as “kolal”… Someday, if we GMO the Australian koala, such that it will chew its koala-cud and have cloven hooves, then the meat of such will be know as “Kolal Koala”.

          I bet ya did NOT know THAT!!!

        2. Scarecrow Repair & Chippering

          You are right. I latched on to “Jewish and Muslim religious laws require animals …” and got the wrong impression.

  3. gaoxiaen

    Papiere, bitte.

  4. Waldh?usl, the animal welfare official from Lower Austria, is the state’s only cabinet minister from the populist Freedom Party, which was created by a former Nazi SS soldier in the 1950s and opposes immigration from Muslim countries.

    Oh boy.

  5. Fuck you, Shikha (Nunya)

    Why hasn’t anyone from Austria tried this before now?

  6. E. Damaskine

    Please research how kosher meat is produced.

    1. This might be relevant if you trust PETA…

      http://www.peta.org/features/agriprocessors/ (Wasn’t being done right here).

      Then see this…

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shechita

      At a casual glance, IMHO the method of killing sounds humane if done right and quickly…

  7. However, I do wonder what is / are the acceptable Kosher way(s) in which one can humanely dispatch a vampire?

    Mallet and stake through the heart?

    Silver bullet?

    Asphyxiation by smothering in garlic?

    Inquiring minds want to KNOW, dammit!!!

  8. lap83

    “Officials say the law would somehow protect the welfare of animals.”

    like pigs named Napoleon who stand on their hind legs?

  9. Tom Bombadil

    Is “Lower Australia” in the North or South? I’ve heard things are upside-down Down Under.

    1. But this is Austria not Australia…

      1. It does however bring to mind the question of, in the upside-down world of Down Under, would the Kosher-slaughtering Dude need to stand on his head and do the rituals upside-down, to compensate for the Down-Underness?

  10. SRoach

    Regrettably, this WOULD reduce the incidence of Kosher slaughtering, regardless of how humane it might, or might not, be. It would tend to make Kosher less economically viable, for having too few remaining customers in all but the largest markets.
    Clever stealth way to force the Jews out of the smaller towns and villages.

    1. Echospinner

      Looks like there are about 3 kosher butcher shops all in Vienna. That is a fair number for a community that size. Most of the customers are likely not strictly observant or even Jewish. That is true of the kosher places where I live. Some might come in because they have the best pastrami or something and maybe buy a few other things. A law like this would obviously drive them out of business.

  11. Deconstructed Potato

    Kosher and Halal slaughter is superstitious BS. Those great big machines that animals are locked into and rotated while they bleed out, still alive, are all constructed in the name of a magical covenant with God made thousands of years ago. You can believe whatever you want, naturally, but multilating babies’ penises, using archaic methods of ritual slaughter; this may all have had some long-forgotten practical implications for hygeine out there in the levantine desert, millenia ago, but now it’s just superstition and tradition (i.e. a collective habit). This is my obnoxious, Dawkinsesque, likely very unpopular two cents.

    For a start, it’s probably not “cool” for a Reasontarian commenter to let slip that he may have some vestiges of compassion left trickling through his cold, steely libertarian veins, especially for animals. Also, perhaps it’s also not kosher (pun!) here to say anything critical of religion, as if exercising my 1A to call BS on someone else’s 1A is somehow a violation of their 1A(?!) How bout no? Well there it is; another internet comment that can be read a thousand ways by a thousand idiots. Can you tell I’m on my period? I’d better have one of those long ritual baths before hubby can make the geshlekt on my knish again.

  12. Echospinner

    Austria proposing a law requiring Jews to register…where have I heard this before?

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