Horses are very intelligent animals but once they reach a certain “old age” their owners seem to find no meaning in having them. Sadly, they are sold to slaughter farms, horse slaughter has stopped in the US but it continues to be a major problem outside of the United States. Horse owners would sell their horses to the slaughter barns and would have them become meat. Slaughter is also done with cows, swine, and chicken, the thing with horses is that the animal is an American icon and the meat isn’t exactly “healthy” to eat after they inject it with such harmful chemicals in the slaughter farms. When the farms started running out of horses, the slaughter houses started to buy wild mustangs that would roam freely, and eventually they became butchered. “After more than 30 years of roaming federal lands free of any threat of the slaughterhouse, wild mustangs, which have become synonymous with the spirit of the heart of the American West, can now be sold and butchered for meat if the Bureau of Land Management cannot sell them elsewhere (Edds, A15).” This was a major problem and was scaring many people at the time because of the loss in wild horses and horses in general. “The slaughter of horses for meat is not only unnecessary and inhumane but it is also harmful in many ways. (“The Facts About Horse Slaughter:  The Humane Society of The United States”).”
    

On the year of 2006 the house voted to ban the slaughter of horses for their meat, “Instead of banning it outright, Congress last year yanked the salaries and expenses of federal inspectors. But the Bush administration simply started charging slaughter plants for inspections, and the slaughter has continued (“Congress Addressing Horse Slaughter Cruelty in Federal Legislation – HorseChannel.com”).” The defenders of horse slaughter stated it offers a cheap and humane way to end a horse’s life when the animal no longer is useful. The main reason why people want to get rid of the wild horses was because ranchers started to complain about how the horses would eat their forage that was needed for their cattle. They also state that many owners cannot afford to care for an unproductive horse. I believe that just because the equine can no longer serve a purpose doesn’t mean they should be brutally killed the way they do at the slaughter farms. Farmers, ranchers, or whomever may own the horse can be thoughtful enough and care for the horse till its time comes instead of sending it off to be cut up and killed. Point is, horse slaughter is not needed, not welcome, and not healthy for both the equine and us humans.
    

It is not possible for horse slaughter to be in any way humane. “Horse slaughter, whether in the U.S. or foreign plants, was never and cannot be humane because of the nature of the industry and the unique biology of horses (“The Facts About Horse Slaughter: The Humane Society of the United States”).” Touching the topic of actually consuming the horse meat that the slaughterhouses produce, it is not safe and should not be consumed. “U.S.  horse meat is dangerous to humans because of the unregulated administration of numerous toxic substances to horses before slaughter (“The Facts About Horse Slaughter: The Humane Society of the United States”).” The ban in the US has not stopped people from sending their horses across the borders into Canada and Mexico, according to the Humane Society, leaving the number of horses sent to the slaughter have not been decreased since the plants supposedly closed back in 2007.  Horse owners need to know that there are other ways of “giving away” their horse. Re-homing is a thing and there is also adoption, more than 100,000 equines are sent to the slaughter farms each year. It is also known that horse slaughter does not stimulate the economy. “Horse slaughter plants have proven to be economic and environmental nightmares for those communities that host them (“The Facts About Horse Slaughter: The Humane Society of the United States”).”
    

The word slaughter in the dictionary is “the act of killing animals for their meat (Merriam-Webster).” Many peoples excuse for sending their horses off for slaughter is that they no longer have any use. “Defenders of horse slaughter said it offers a cheap and human way to end a horse’s life when the animal no longer is useful. They say many owners cannot afford to care for an unproductive horse (Cosgrove-Mather).” They may have an “unproductive horse” but, that doesn’t mean that they have to basically throw out an animal to get killed and get processed as food later. Horses are intelligent animals, when they don’t have a “use” for anymore, you can let it roam freely or give it to someone else. Another major problem in the horse slaughter industry is that it isn’t over and it doesn’t just take place in the United States. Equestrian slaughter farms exist across the borders of the United States, such as in Canada and Mexico. “The HSUS documented cruelty and abuse when investigators followed “killer buyers” transporting horses thousands of miles from auctions to feedlots to interstate highways. They also documented a barbaric method of slaughter on a kill floor in Juarez, Mexico. Recent documentation uncovered by horse welfare advocates demonstrates that the plants in the U.S.  were equally inhumane and riddled with gross abuse. (“Congress Addressing Horse Slaughter Cruelty in Federal Legislation – HorseChannel.com”).” Equestrian slaughter is yet to be “over” and still affects horses in foreign countries, horses everywhere.
    

Animal slaughter, in general, is a bad thing, slaughter farms abuse their animals cruelly. The main thing with equine slaughter is that these majestic animals are a major American icon and these innocent animals don’t deserve to be killed and treated the way they were being held in the US. Or anywhere for that matter, horse meat isn’t said to be exactly safe after going through the procedures and processes the slaughter farms go through. Horses should be protected and kept, not sold by the pound in your local meat market. The “industry” was going to get out of hand if it hadn’t been stopped when it was. The slaughter houses were starting to get horses out of their natural ways from the wild and butcher those when they couldn’t get horses from people. The slaughter of equines probably won’t be completely over but it can minimize and lower the endangerment of the beautiful animal because, there’s always that one bad apple to start things once again. Horses are meant to trot across the green filled hills, not to be put in metal cages with blades and scared for their lives. There should be a stop to the cruelty that is horse slaughter.