So you know, this applies to all meat, not just seafood. This is what kosher meat is. A happy animal makes for a happy meal. Drain the blood and kill it fast.
I couldn’t eat sushi at all until I moved to a bigger city, which has a much larger asian population.
And I am extremely picky about chicken, and frankly cannot eat red meat.
I grew up reform Jewish and knew about keeping kosher but never did myself, and never appreciated the actual taste difference in deli meats was due to the stress hormones.
Whatever the reason, it is one of the more humane methods. It is specifically designed to cause a rapid drop in blood pressure that leads to rapid unconsciousness and death.
Whatever the motivation, other than using chemical sedation, it is one of the most humane ways to kill an animal.
I agree a quick death was the design intent, but as applied in modern kosher factories the letter of the law has been stretched to break the spirit. Things like hanging cows upside down so the guy with the killing knife could find their jugulars more quickly is not humane to the animals. And the non-kosher modern standard for cows of a bolt to the head is even faster than bleeding out a jugular. Still humane concerns over miss rates, but at least for cows I don’t think kosher is any better.
(Side note that other required parts of kosher meat like salting to draw out blood and removing the ligament Jacob tore when wrestling with the angel have, as post-death activities, no relationship to humaneness of slaughter.)
So you know, this applies to all meat, not just seafood. This is what kosher meat is. A happy animal makes for a happy meal. Drain the blood and kill it fast.
I couldn’t eat sushi at all until I moved to a bigger city, which has a much larger asian population.
And I am extremely picky about chicken, and frankly cannot eat red meat.
You can taste the suffering.
I grew up reform Jewish and knew about keeping kosher but never did myself, and never appreciated the actual taste difference in deli meats was due to the stress hormones.
tmyk
Just FYI, kosher is just a way of slaughtering coming from the Bible, it’s not particularly humane to the animal.
Whatever the reason, it is one of the more humane methods. It is specifically designed to cause a rapid drop in blood pressure that leads to rapid unconsciousness and death.
Whatever the motivation, other than using chemical sedation, it is one of the most humane ways to kill an animal.
I agree a quick death was the design intent, but as applied in modern kosher factories the letter of the law has been stretched to break the spirit. Things like hanging cows upside down so the guy with the killing knife could find their jugulars more quickly is not humane to the animals. And the non-kosher modern standard for cows of a bolt to the head is even faster than bleeding out a jugular. Still humane concerns over miss rates, but at least for cows I don’t think kosher is any better.
(Side note that other required parts of kosher meat like salting to draw out blood and removing the ligament Jacob tore when wrestling with the angel have, as post-death activities, no relationship to humaneness of slaughter.)