If not bigotry, then at least hysteria. Egyptian authorities have ordered a mass cull of that nation's swine as an anti-swine flu protection measure. Trouble is, all the pigs are farmed (understandably) by the nation's Coptic Christian minority which, unlike the Muslim majority, do not see the animals as unclean. There is no public health reason for Egypt to kill these 400,000 animals! Excerpt:
"Our pigs are healthy. They are our capital and they have no diseases," said Adel Ishak, who feeds his pigs from the rubbish he collects in Manshiet Nasser, northeast of Cairo."We remind Hosni Mubarak that we are all Egyptians. Where does he want us to go?" added 46-year-old Gergis Faris, another pig farmer. "We are uneducated people, just living day by day and trying to make a living, and now if our pigs are taken from us without compensation, how are we supposed to live?"
How indeed? Or does that matter to the government and the Muslim majority of Egypt?
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iam Coptic and i believe the president command to kill the pigs cuz it's Christian's.
Since pigs are generally unclean, and unfit for human consumptiion, would it not be better to encourage a healtier diet for all people of this earth. Nuts, chicken, duck, vegtables are all good sources of nutrition.
I've found that if you heat the flesh of swine to a sufficient temperature, it becomes quite edible, even fit for human consumption. The problem you might be having is in failing to cook the pig flesh. I hope this clears things up!
I have been checking on this swine flu tracking website http://www.swine-flu-tracker.com/ on and off for the last couple of days now and its kinda scary seeing how it this strain of flu is spreading.
Seeing as how the Egyptian government responded to the bird flu crisis by slaughtering both muslim and christian farmers' birds en masse, I doubt it's bigotry.
They saw it worked the first time around and applied the same solution this time around. Bad science, sure. Bigotry no.
UmmSqueakster, I think you can still find chicken to eat in Egypt right now. However in the pigs case they destroyed them forever. A health spokesman confirms that culing the pigs is not related to the swine flu, it was just a for general health reasons! As a Christian growing up in Egypt it doesn't surprise me I knew how negative our Muslim friends thought of us eating pork .....
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