to find myself shouting IT'S NOT ABOUT THE HORSE MEAT

[ICBINEG]

It's about companies not having the faintest idea what is in the food they sell!

Drugs, contaminants, carcinogens, allergens etc.

If you don't even know it is horse not beef then how can I trust it doesn't contain milk and hence will not kill my DNephew if I happen to feed it to him?

The same goes for toys. If you don't know who actually made the parts and from what then how do you know it isn't smothered in lead/anything else that is extremely harmful to children?

I predict a future filled with product and toy recalls followed by lawsuits until retailers wake up to the fact that we WILL blame them when a burger/toy they sold us harms the health of our children.

I anyone thinks it's just about it being horsemeat, tell them that Findus lasagne, cottage pie and moussaka have been taken of the shelves in French supermarkets.

I agree that the issue is about the fact that they are not sure what is in the food, which as you say, can cause serious issues for some. My cousins kids are severely allergic to several things, they could die if something is in their food that shouldnt be. Its not about not wanting to eat horse meat.

However, I did have an argument with my dad about it as he doesnt agree that there is no moral difference between eating horse, and eating cow, or pig, or dog or hamster come to that! I am not a veggie, but I rarely eat meat and I dont think that I can kick up a stink about one animal dying to feed me and not another.

I don't know if anyone remembers the awful situation in China a few years ago. Criminals were selling adulterated baby milk, and many babies starved because their milk contained nothing of nutritional value - these were well fed (seemingly), well cared for, loved children.

I thought that something like that could never happen here. Now I am less sure.

just thinking of the china baby milk scandal too

there is something in the papers this morning about cat meat - is this correct has anyone else seen about cat meat? I can't re find the article

I'm sure they DID know - or someone along the line did. A nice cost cutting measure there, and I bet those were the horses that are sent to market 'not fit for human consumption' due to the drugs they have received shortly before death. Nice.

So glad we get our meat from the butchers, where they receive half a cow/pig etc, KNOW what it is (and usually from which farm it came from), and cut it up in the shop to be sold!

which paper ivykaty44?

I was on a thread where most posters it seems use the same utensils for their pet food as human food. And couldnt see the problem. And said that pet food is fit for human consuption.

That was 1 week before the recent food scandals erupted.

I have been itching to say guinea pig anybody?!

Didnt realise anybody would eat it.

The other horsemeat thread I am currently on, a poster says lots of people are not bothered about horse.

And I think they eat rats in China?

So maybe to some, meat is meat.

[have been wondering what I would knowingly eat tbh]

Think I wouldnt eat guineapig.

Though I guess if you are very hungry, you would eat just about anything that is put in front of you.

YANBU. If I thought that moustache-twirling Findus execs were saying "Ooh, horse meat is cheaper than beef, let's put that in our lasagne, no one will notice" then I'd be cross, but not scared. It's the fact that they didn't know that scares me.

What bothers me the most, Lady, is what the Food Standards Agency are doing?
Isnt that why they exist? To test our food, or to test the supermarket testers?

I have long since given up believing that we know exactly what is in our food, correct labelling or not correct labelling.
I am well aware that there are unscrupulous people out there putting things in our food that shouldnt be there.

But where are the testers?

It was like that with financial scandals.
The people supposedly keeping an eye on things, are, quite frankly, not up to the job.
[in that case, apparantly, the people overlooking the financial industry are not so bright as the finance people, and that is where they end up, if they are not so bright]

Maryz
Not thought of things in that way before!

What about fish Maryz?

I cringe when I feed my goldfish, fishfood.
Seems all wrong.

YADNBU! Was talking to my boss about this yesterday. Will read the thread properly now :o

not sure how much meat you would get from a cat - but surely it must be as much as a chicken - around 1.5kg would be a sunday dinner and roughly 3ilb of meat for a family of four.

But how much meat you get from one cat isn't the point is it as it would probably be used for things like chicken nuggets or lasagna where they don't use a great deal of meat in any case.

Has mcdonalds been tested to see if there irish beef is really beef as the Irish horse meat burgers were not beef

My DH muttered something about McDonalds meat being ok as the source is ok apparently?

its not about the horse. for goodness sake, eat the horse.
its about the lies. don't charge me for beef if i'm getting horse. don't tell me its beef when i'm getting horse.
and exactly where are they getting the horse? horse farms? old horses from wherever they go nowadays?

i haven't eaten beef (knowingly) since 1988. i'm just waiting to hear that the chicken i've been feasting on is actually dog.

Heard on the beeb earlier that apparently Romania passed a law a few months ago banning horse and carts from the roads, which caused a massive influx of horses in slaughter houses.

And to me, actually, it is about the horse.