Horse Advocates Meet In OKC To Discuss Slaughter House Issue

Animal advocates from across the U.S. met in Oklahoma City and on-line Tuesday to talk about horse meat.

Tuesday, April 3rd 2012, 7:59 pm

By: News 9


Animal advocates from across the U.S. met in Oklahoma City and on-line Tuesday to talk about horse meat.

Horse slaughter is legal in the U.S. again, but they want to stop horse slaughter from happening here in Oklahoma.

Currently, horses are not being slaughtered for meat in Oklahoma or any state, but they can be sold and shipped to other countries for slaughter and food.

The horse experts who met on Tuesday told News9 slaughter supporters are trying hard to get slaughter houses here in Oklahoma. Far too often, here in Oklahoma, we see horses in need of rescue sick, abandoned and abused.

Some say it wouldn't be this way, if we had slaughter houses.

"That's them trying to scare Americans into thinking we actually need horse slaughter plants," Simone Netherlands said.

Simone Netherlands went online from Oklahoma City to show what anti-slaughter/anti-breeding groups say is really happening. She is the managing director for www.respect4horses.com, and wants to raise awareness and educate animal lovers and horse breeders.

"They leave the old, sick abused horses so it's exactly the opposite of what they're saying," Simone Netherlands said.

It's not hard to find horrific images online of over bred, unwanted horses sold, stacked and hauled to Mexico for slaughter, then sold to overseas markets in Asia and Europe.

"Never even thought of eating horses," Rhona Grammer said.

Rhona Grammer thinks her neighbors are pro-slaughter and sees them selling a lot of healthy horses, so she came to learn more.

"I feel passionate about horses, I was raised in Ireland and had horses since I was a little girl," Grammer said.

She can't imagine anyone in Oklahoma would be for slaughter, but Netherlands says a small percentage think of horses as products.

"That's not who we are as Americans, 80 percent are against horse slaughter," Netherlands said. "If we open horse slaughter plants, why not just open dog and cat plants? Cause we're doing it for this foreign industry."

Opposers say there is another way. There're plenty of horses that need good homes, and horse owners can pay to have their horses put down if they're too sick or old. Or contact your lawmakers and tell them you don't support horse slaughter.

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