The district youth council organizes a workshop on animal ethics in the Grafing youth initiative. Constanze Kölbl, 18 years old and FSJlerin at the KJR organizes and moderates it.
SZ: Ms. Kölbl, let’s be honest: when you walk past a chicken grill, doesn’t your mouth water?
Kölbl: Of course it smells good there. Still, the smell doesn’t whet my appetite. Rather, I have pictures in my mind’s eye of how the animals unfortunately had to endure their life, which was unfortunately not worth living and was much too short.
It could be an organic chicken grill.
It is true that organic animal husbandry is better than conventional animal husbandry. Nevertheless, most organic chicken farms are still a long way from what could be described as real animal welfare.
“Why we pet cats and torture cows” is the title of the KJR workshop on this topic. You want to provoke, don’t you?
The title is deliberately chosen to be provocative. But things are as they are: Miezi the cat is a beloved member of the family, has a cozy place to sleep and everyone would be incredibly sad if something ever happened to her. Beef cattle number 2304 lives only 200 meters further. His most basic needs are ignored. Chances are high that it’s standing and sleeping in its excrement. In a few months it will be killed in the slaughterhouse to be served to Miezi’s family. You can open the comparison, I think, why do we rate animals with similar characteristics and similar sensitivity to pain so differently?
Is that only an issue in “Western” culture?
There is a racist accusation that dogs are eaten in China. In Hinduism, cows are considered sacred. Elsewhere, cats are considered mystical and would never be allowed into the home. Which animals people eat, which they pet and which they don’t want to have anything to do with seems to be based primarily on culture and also on a fairly arbitrary basis. I want all animals to have a right to life – not just the ones we find cute.
Opinions can be divided about eating meat. But awareness of animal welfare has increased significantly in recent years, hasn’t it?
To a certain extent I would agree. Animal welfare is really a big issue, especially for many younger people. Of course, this also has an impact on consumer behavior. But animal welfare labels, which are often used as counter-arguments, are a bad joke: Then the animals are penned up a little less brutally here and there. Of course I’m happy about every improvement. But in most cases we are still miles away from a species-appropriate attitude.
How is the seminar going?
In Friederike Schmitz, we have been able to win a philosopher and publicist who is quite well known in the animal rights scene as a speaker. With her we want to deal with the questions of animal ethics. in an open debate. Sometimes in small groups. For example, is it enough just to improve the husbandry conditions – or do we need to phase out livestock farming? Of course, many of us have a very critical attitude towards eating meat. That’s why we would be happy if people came who associate negative things with veganism. Because the most important thing for us is a good discussion.
“Why we pet cats and torture cows”, animal ethics workshop on Thursday, July 7th at 6 p.m. in the youth initiative Grafing. Admission is free, registration via https://www.surveymonkey.de/r/R7VNJ9D or on [email protected]