Making Sense of Nepal’s Gadhimai Animal Massacre
Animals: Tradition - Philosophy - Religion Article from All-Creatures.org

FROM

Donny Moss, Their Turn
December 2014

Please use Compassion in World Farming’s email form to send a letter to the Nepalese government demanding that Gadhimai slaughter be outlawed: Tell the Nepalese Government and demand that the terrible Gadhimai slaughter festival must never happen again.

Every five years, Hindus from India and Nepal participate in Gadhimai, a ritual slaughter that takes place in Nepal. During the two day ritual, which took place in late November, practitioners chopped off the heads of approximately 300,000 thousand buffalo calves, goats and other animals as a sacrifice to the goddess of power, Gadhimai.

Global efforts to prevent the 2014 Gadhimai failed, but the media and activists shined an international spotlight on the massacre before it began. And, once it started, the 12,000 police officers hired to protect the killers were unable to block the cameras, raising even more public awareness. Pressure is mounting on Nepal to outlaw the ritual.

Actress Joanna Lumley at Gadhimai Protest at Nepal Embassy in London
[click on image to enlarge]
(photo: CIWF)

Because Gadhimai is so violent, one would think that just a small number of people would participate, but, in 2014, the animal holocaust attracted 5 million Hindus.

[click on image to enlarge]
(photo: Reuters)

We can, and should, point a finger at the Nepalese and Indians who participate and expose their crimes, but we should also acknowledge that they are no worse than the millions of people who torture and kill animals in other countries around the world.

Annual Pilot Whale Hunt in the Faroe Islands
[click on image to enlarge]
(Photo: Sea Shepherd)

We could, and should, point a finger at Hindus, but we must also acknowledge that people from other religions torture and kill animals in the name of God.

Observant Jews swing and sacrifice hundreds of thousands of chickens before Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement
[click on image to enlarge]
[for more, visit Alliance to End Chickens as Kaporos]

What is it about the human species that makes us kill gratuitously – for reasons that have nothing to do with our survival? How is it possible that the most intelligent species is the one that is destroying the planet? How did we become so violent? Where did we make a wrong turn? Did it all start with Eve and that god-damn apple?

Please use Compassion in World Farming’s email form to send a letter to the Nepalese government demanding that Gadhimai slaughter be outlawed: Tell the Nepalese Government and demand that the terrible Gadhimai slaughter festival must never happen again

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