I am not sure how many of you keep some form of Kosher, but this is for those who do or are considering it. Recently, it has been in the news that Agriprocessors, the largest Kosher meat processing house in the country, has been hiring illegal immigrants, underpaying them, subjecting them to terrrible working conditions, and engaging in poor treatment of the animals as well. This is not the first, second or even third time Agriprocessors has been investigated for wrongful conduct. In fact, many people believe that Kosher meats (and other Kosher products) are produced more ethically than other foods. While this should be true, it is not. However, an organization has been formed to try to combat this problem. It is called Heksher Tzedek. Although started by the Conservative movement of Judaism, I believe it should be supported by ALL Jews who keep some form of Kashrut.

Essentially, Heksher Tzedek seeks to hold Kosher manufacterers accountable not only for Kosher standards according to Jewish law, but also hold them accountable for ethical treatment of employees, animals (if they are a slaughter house) and the environment. The idea is that ALL of these issues are part of adhering to the word of G-d.

Heksher Tzedek as a group on Facebook. Check it out and join it if you support what they are trying to do.

The sad reality is that the Conservative movement resents the Orthodox hegemony on kashrus and wants a chunk of the pie. Unfortunately to do so they had to spread lies to forward their mission. As we just finished commemorating the destruction of the Temples over baseless hatred we have the same thing again today.

In America, let alone Torah we have innocent until proven guilty. Yet, many people like the Conservative Rabbis and a MO Rabbis started making baseless claims about Agriprocessors without any facts. That is Loshon Hara!

The truth of the matter is that the meat industry in general is a very tough industry. You can't have robots do the work. The plants run 24 hours a day. No American appears to want to do the job. If you were to look at an employment history of the Americans who work there you'd see they last a week or two on average. Meanwhile hard working immigrants who get paid $10/hour and get special housing are doing very well for themselves in Iowa.

Essentially the immigration raid, was a big disturbance caused by the ineffectiveness of INF to properly set up a way to determine who is a legal/illegal citizen. If you're upset about immigrants living and working and being good people. Then you have to be outraged over the more serious problems like lack of deportation of illegals that leads to Americans getting killed.