Melissa Etheridge: Americans want Congress to shut down the horse slaughter industry
“The history of mankind is carried on the back of a horse.” - author unknown
Horses have helped settle and protect this great country. Now it’s our turn to help them. Not everyone knows that our nation’s horses are in great peril every single day. You hear about wild horses being in danger, but I’m talking about domestic horses — the ones you find on farms and ranches across the United States.
While growing up in Kansas, horses were a big part of my childhood. The freedom and love I felt for my horse have helped shape who I am today. Then my dad brought home a guitar, and the rest is history, so to speak. But I am speaking out because my heart breaks knowing what’s happening to our beautiful horses every day in the U.S. I am asking our lawmakers to save them from the cruel fate of slaughter.
This past year, more than 60,000 American horses were shipped to Mexico and Canada to be slaughtered for human consumption in Europe and Asia.
Horses suffer on these horrible trips. They are shoved into cattle trucks with no food or water. Many die before arrival or end up with broken limbs and await a slow, painful and horrific death.
Despite common misconceptions, horse slaughter is not humane euthanasia, and there is no such thing as an unwanted horse.
More than 90% of the horses shipped to slaughter are healthy. People known as “kill buyers” look for healthy horses to meet their quota for meat production, because they are paid by the pound. These kill buyers buy rescued domestic horses at auction, very often outbidding people who are looking for a new riding horse. These horses don’t need to suffer the terrible fate of slaughter. There are plenty of people who want to give them a good home.
It can also be dangerous to consume horse meat. Horses are given dangerous drugs — fly spray, dewormers and countless other medicines with warnings on the labels saying not to use them on animals raised for human consumption.
Horses have carried Americans into war to protect our country. They are healers, teachers, therapists and companions. They do not deserve to be treated so inhumanely. There are hundreds of therapeutic equine programs across the country, where rescue horses are used as incredible therapy animals for children with disabilities, veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder or addiction anxiety, and more.
Passage of the Safeguard American Food Exports or SAFE Act currently in Congress would mean a permanent and immediate ban on both the slaughter of horses in the U.S. and the export of live horses for slaughter abroad.
I am so thankful for my friend Chris Heyde in Washington, D.C., who started the 501(c)(3) nonprofit Animal Welfare Institute’s national campaign to end horse slaughter. I’m also grateful for my friends Siri Lindley and Rebekah Keat, founders of the 501(c)(4) nonprofit Horses in Our Hands, and to all those who got involved and are calling their legislators.
More than 80% of Americans agree that these beautiful animals should not be slaughtered for human consumption. This is a bipartisan issue.
There are currently 231 cosponsors of the SAFE Act in the House, more than enough to pass the bill if we could get House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to bring it up for a vote. Each week our elected officials fail to act on this bill, thousands of horses are subjected to unimaginable cruelty.
Please write your legislators. Congress, please hear us and stop the slaughter of horses.
Leavenworth, Kansas, native Melissa Etheridge is a Grammy Award-winning singer and songwriter.
This story was originally published September 8, 2020 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Melissa Etheridge: Americans want Congress to shut down the horse slaughter industry."