Halal Burgers Anyone?

[orion5]

Interesting development in France... reverse discrimination complaint against a minority population. FYI, Quick is equivalent to our McDonalds.


BBC Link

French fast food chain Quick sparks halal burger appeal

A French council has lodged a complaint against a fast food chain that serves only meat that conforms with Islamic dietary laws at a local branch.

The mayor of Roubaix, in northern France, said the halal menu constituted "discrimination" against non-Muslims.

The Roubaix branch is one of several restaurants at which the chain, Quick, took non-halal products and pork off the menu in November. The move has triggered the latest row over France's Muslim minority.

Several deputies from French President Nicolas Sarkozy's conservative UMP party have condemned the move, while Marine Le Pen, a vice-president of the far-right National Front, warned of "Islamisation".

Their comments came ahead of regional elections in France next month, and against the backdrop of a debate over French national identity launched by Mr Sarkozy's government.

'Going too far'

In Roubaix, Mayor Rene Vandierendonck, a socialist, called for a boycott of the Quick branch, and the town council has filed a complaint for discrimination with a regional court in Lille.

"I'm not bothered by the fact that there is a halal menu," Mr Vandierendonck said. "But this is going too far because it is the only menu on offer and it has become discrimination."

Quick decided to take a bacon hamburger off the menu at eight of its 350 branches, replacing it with a halal version that comes with smoked turkey. It said the move was designed to test the "commercial interest and technical feasibility" of introducing halal menus.

The Quick manager responsible for the Roubaix branch said there had been a slight increase in business after the introduction of halal menus and that he had not received complaints from customers, AFP news agency reported.

France is home to Europe's biggest Muslim minority, estimated at more than five million people.

Debate has recently focussed on the Islamic veil, with a French parliamentary committee recommending a partial ban on women wearing Islamic face veils last month.

[PRB]

Islam is not a benign element that gives and takes. It takes.
It is about time those in France have woken up to this and are pushing back.
A country/people can lose their cultural foundation when accessed by a theopolitico entity like Islam that has rules for every circumstance.

[cback0220]

I fail to see what the problem is here. If I go to a kosher restaurant(used as an example) and they don't want to serve me pork products that is there choice. I made a conscience decision to go there knowing I would not get my fried pig fat sandwich.

How is it discrimination if you have to choose to go somewhere based on the menu. If I want to go to McDonald's and get a TOFU burger is it discrimination when they won't give it me? No, it is a restaurant serving what is on its menu.

[Pete]

Put enough Ketchup on it and even a French halal burger will taste like it's an American one.

[skylinedrive]

Quick fast food restaurants are even worse then Mickey D's ......so I don't give a shit if their Burgers are halal or not. Till very recently they never had any burgers with pork on the menu anyhow.

[hoepoe]

Originally Posted by cback0220

I fail to see what the problem is here. If I go to a kosher restaurant(used as an example) and they don't want to serve me pork products that is there choice. I made a conscience decision to go there knowing I would not get my fried pig fat sandwich.

How is it discrimination if you have to choose to go somewhere based on the menu. If I want to go to McDonald's and get a TOFU burger is it discrimination when they won't give it me? No, it is a restaurant serving what is on its menu.

I'm with cback0220 on this.



Where's the issue?

H

[11B2V]

Big picture, PRB is absolutely right.

[orion5]

It's not just about the inalienable right to order a bacon burger.

To me, the point is the bigger picture...not just the halal food, but the halal preparation process. I found this whole French skirmish interesting because after 4 years living/working in muslim countries I learned the halal food process is not that benign.

It's not just what is on the menu, but behind the scenes how the food is slaughtered, prepared, processed, transported, stored, handled and served. The animal must be bled to death and slaughtered in the name of Allah. The tools and machinery and facilities must be purified and certified. It also means ensuring your employees are fully trained and committed to proper handling of halal foods.

You can do your own halal search, if interested, but here is one quick summary from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations: link

Originally Posted by prb

Islam is not a benign element that gives and takes. It takes.

Where I agree with PRB is that I see this as the beginning of a one-way transition process.

Step 1 is offering halal exclusive food on menus, which is usually a marketing gimmick to make more money. Ah, but once that door is open, here comes the next few steps.

Step 2 will be the customer objections to the halal food, saying "you marketed it as 'halal' but it's not really 'halal' because it is not slaughtered according to Islamic law," thereby pressuring Quick to make their halal standards more strict (which changes the processes for supply chain, vendor selection, food quality and auditing, and maybe even food costs).

Step 3 will be the complaints that the food is still not 'halal' because those employees preparing it aren't trained/certified in Islamic dietary law (which changes the hiring/training/management process).

Step 4 will be the objections that the Quick kitchens are not really 'halal' because the tools/utensils are not purified according to Islamic dietary law.........and so on and so forth.


As an example of the above, KFC started offering halal meat in some of its UK restaurants in 2009, which was quickly followed by Muslim objections: link

However, YMMV. Be interested to continue to hear all of your opinions on this.

o5

[Richard]

Restaurants cater to their majority clientele. Ever go to a McDonald's outside the US? Different menus abound. Even here in the US - the menus vary somewhat regionally and locally. Some McDonald's I've stopped at in the US don't even offer my favorite - the classic Double Cheeseburger - ChiCom jihadi MFers have infiltrated everywhere.

IMO - this is just another non-issue being made into something more than it should be - I wonder if the good mayor of Roubaix isn't FN* and it's an election year over there, too?

And so it goes...

Richard's $.02

* National Front

[orion5]

Originally Posted by Richard

I wonder if the good mayor of Roubaix isn't FN* and it's an election year over there, too?

Richard, you're right. Regional elections in France in March. Definitely the mayor is using this as a political opportunity.

[skylinedrive]

Originally Posted by Richard

Restaurants cater to their majority clientele. Ever go to a McDonald's outside the US? Different menus abound. Even here in the US - the menus vary somewhat regionally and locally. Some McDonald's I've stopped at in the US don't even offer my favorite - the classic Double Cheeseburger - ChiCom jihadi MFers have infiltrated everywhere.

IMO - this is just another non-issue being made into something more than it should be - I wonder if the good mayor of Roubaix isn't FN* and it's an election year over there, too?

And so it goes...

Richard's $.02

* National Front

That was also my first thought, but the good mayor is a socialist in fact ( which would be more or less the same then a progressive Democrat in the US, definitely not a commie)!
I'm deeply ashamed that I post something positive about France , even more ashamed that I post something positive about socialists......but many left wing french politicians view the ongoing "islamization" with mixed feelings. In France there is not the traditionnal divide inbetween the right, or even extreme right and the center and left, when it comes to the relations with the muslim population!
In fact many frenchmen from the left of the political spectrum are afraid for their concept of "laicité" = strict separation of religious beliefs and public life, furthermore they see the core "valeurs républicaines" ( valors of the republic?) threatened, "liberté, égalité, fraternité" and all.

So in France a left wing politician can be as rabbidly anti-islamist as a FN politician.

[Pete]

France's halal meat - is it the real thing?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11176949

"......Halal food is big business in France, and is growing fast. With the largest Muslim population in Europe at about six million, France's halal market it is already reckoned to be worth 5.5bn euros (£4.5bn) - twice the size of that for organic food.

While the burgers served at Quick are genuinely halal, experts have doubts about much of what is sold elsewhere.

Rachid Bakhalq, the owner of a halal supermarket in Nanterre, a suburb to the north of Paris, says the market is swamped with bogus products.

He told me "80% - most of the halal products based on meat - are not halal at all."......"

That Halal you're eating just might not be Halal. If there's a franc to be made.......

[lindy]

The vast majority of the street vendors in Manhattan offer halal meat (kabobs & such) and it's pretty much the norm up there.

I wonder if the Mikey Dees in Michigan offer halal burgers?

On a side note, regarding the halal process...my personal experience (as a guest) has been a lamb, a dirt road, a sharp knife, the whole "there is no god but God" phrase, and processing the lamb just like we do deer in the States.

Again, my experience was that is the halal "process" is a sham. No different than a "believer" strapping a bomb to himself and going into a crowd all in the name of the religion of peace.

YMMV.

[Saoirse]

This started back in February when the chain decided to use halal meat because the muslim population was complaining about there not being any halal meat on the menu.

http://vladtepesblog.com/?p=19482

And course, now the muslims are complaining that the uproar about using halal meat is stygmatizing them and the french consumer group is denying that using halal meat is nothing more than economics.

[Richard]

...the Mikey Dees in Michigan...

What's a 'Mikey Dee'? I was up in Michigan recently - Ypsilanti, Ann Arbor, Dearborn, Detroit - and saw no such place.

Personally, I found Zingerman's Deli (Ann Arbor) and Alcamo's Market (Dearborn) well worth visiting whenever you're up that way and the urge to eat strikes.

Richard's $.02