Denver voters can reject two misguided ballot measures and send a strong message to animal welfare advocates that Colorado will not bully our ranchers and hat makers out of business.
Initiated Ordinance 308 would ban new textile fur products like mink fur coats and beaver skin hats from being sold inside city limits and Initiated Ordinance 309 would ban slaughterhouses from operating inside city limits.
Both ordinances were brought forward by animal rights advocates who are part of a nationwide movement to stop the slaughter of all animals across the United States whether it’s for fur coats or food.
We disagree vehemently with the premise behind this movement. Killing animals for food and clothing is not inherently cruel. Although, we’ve seen disturbing evidence across the United States of animal cruelty at chicken, pig, cattle, and sheep farms, ranches and slaughterhouses.
So then the question becomes: Is the only slaughterhouse in Denver – a lamb processing facility called Superior Farms in the Globeville neighborhood – guilty of animal mistreatment?
So far, we have not seen any evidence of mistreatment.
Aidan Kankyoku with Pro-animal Future points to a 2019 undercover investigation done at a Superior Farms lamb slaughterhouse in California as evidence that the Globeville facility is guilty of animal cruelty. The video of the fully grown lambs being slaughtered is hard to watch. The animals thrash after their throats are cut struggling to survive as they bleed to death over the course of several minutes, but that has been the harsh reality of animal slaughter for all of human existence.
Both the California facility and the Colorado facility use high-powered electric stun guns to knock the animals unconscious before their throats are cut. Kankyoku says reports from slaughterhouses across the country show that the stunning is often ineffective and animals suffer needlessly while they bleed to death.
But there is no evidence that the Superior Farms facility in Globeville is guilty of failing to properly stun animals. This facility is not on some “worst offenders” list of slaughterhouses. Shutting down this one slaughterhouse makes no sense unless you agree with the premise that Americans should not be eating meat because killing animals is an unnecessary evil. Killing animals is hard and gruesome but it is a necessary part of the animal food chain.
Americans should demand that the U.S. Department of Agriculture improve and enforce the Humane Methods of Slaughter Act. Kankyoku, who lives in Denver, said animal welfare advocates have been asking for decades for small changes such as unannounced inspections and large changes such as banning high-speed slaughter so workers can take their time and reduce suffering. Nothing has come of their advocacy.
That frustration has spilled over to a ballot measure that would close a facility that likely is treating its animals as humanely as possible given that the goal is to kill the hundreds of animals arriving every day as quickly as possible and to process their skin and meat into useable parts for distribution across the world.
But the facility is also providing good-paying, steady jobs to about 160 people directly and is supporting Colorado ranchers who bring their livestock to the facility from across the state. The facility provides lamb to local restaurants and grocery stores. Colorado lambs getting shipped further away only to get shipped back as meat would be worse for the environment and the economy. Would the treatment of those lambs be better in another facility? Superior Farms developed its process for killing the animals with the consultation of Temple Grandin at Colorado State University, who is a known advocate for animal rights.
Perhaps Superior Farms needs to slow down its animal processing speed, but it certainly doesn’t need to be shut down.
Meanwhile, the fur ban comes on the tail end of a successful social movement that began with civil disobedience in New York in 1985. Today, very few people wear fur, and even fewer buy luxury fur products new. Neiman Marcus stopped selling fur clothing in 2023.
We fear this fur ban in Denver, however, will have no discernable impacts on Louis Vuitton and other couture shops that can simply move outside city limits but will impact people like Coleen Orr. Orr makes cowboy hats from beaver pelts and the products would no longer be able to ship through Denver to her store in Adams County.
Simply put we are not endorsing the fur industry but we also aren’t endorsing the anti-animal husbandry message ingrained in a fur ban.
Please vote no on these two ballot measures to support Colorado’s western roots.
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