Burger anybody. Options

[Exhausted]

What a revelation that Tesco have been selling burgers with a high percentage of horse meat. If I were French, I might find this acceptable but when something is sold in the UK as a Beefburger then that's what the public should get, not a Horseburger. Happy to say that we don't shop there or at Iceland who also were a bit guilty of the same thing.

Can we trust the supermarkets when one of the majors stoop to such tricks. They said they didn't know but it was interesting to hear in the report that the animal product came from Europe but through a manufacturer in the UK. I'm reassured by the fact that the product was not harmful to the Tesco customers but.........

[Spider]

As somebody who is a horse lover I find recent events (horse in burgers) disturbing. Let us hope that the culprits are brought to justice and dealt with harshly. A collective European response will solve this problem. This will do a lot of damage to the meat trade, not only in this country but across Europe.

[blackdog]

As somebody who is a horse lover I find recent events (horse in burgers) disturbing.

The horses are going to die anyway, why not eat them?

The worrying issue about the current scandal is that there are people out there prepared to break the law by selling cheaper meat as beef, when it isn't. Leading to the worry that they might not care about hygiene and food safety issues either.

I wouldn't mind eating horse, but I expect the packaging to tell me I am buying horse.

[Simon Kirby]

The horses are going to die anyway, why not eat them?

Something like 6 Billion people in the world alive today, and they're all going to die - so why not eat them? I'm guessing you'd choose not to, but the thrust of your argument is that it's all just protein. You might choose to eat horse, but there'll be people out there who would find eating horse morally or emotionally distasteful even where they have no objection to eating dead cows, and they're entitled to their view.

[blackdog]

Something like 6 Billion people in the world alive today, and they're all going to die - so why not eat them? I'm guessing you'd choose not to, but the thrust of your argument is that it's all just protein. You might choose to eat horse, but there'll be people out there who would find eating horse morally or emotionally distasteful even where they have no objection to eating dead cows, and they're entitled to their view.

The thrust of my argument is that horse meat is a common foodstuff eaten in many nearby companies, a fair amount if which is produced in this country and exported. Why add all those food miles - why not eat horse? Okay some will be squeamish about it, many are squeamish about eating other meats. I'm not suggesting anyone should be forced to eat horse, or that it should be sold as beef. As long as the product clearly shows it contains horse meat I see no reason why it shouldn't be sold.

Would I eat people? I would have some concern about whether many of us are fit for human consumption and would certainly worry about the idea of slaughtering people for food. Cannibalism is illegal, which would certainly deter me - philosophically I don't really see why we shouldn't make use of a good source of meat if it exists (soylent green anyone?). But no, I think my squeamishness level falls somewhere between horse and man.