The New York Times City Room blog has a story about the fourth goat in four months to be found wandering near the Hutchinson River Parkway in the Bronx. We learn that animal rescuers were befuddled by the wandering goats because they didn’t have metal tags in their ears or the spray paint that indicates they’re from live markets.
The goats were all taken to Farm Sanctuary, an animal rescue organization. The article suggests a possible explanation:
While the goats could have been dumped sick animals or live-market escapees, a number of neighbors have called animal-care officials to speculate that the goats might be part of the sacrificial rituals of Santeria, a religion created several centuries ago by West Africans enslaved in colonial Cuba and imported to New York City in the 1940s.
“The neighborhood where these goats are being found, there are a lot of Santeria, people who practice Santeria,” said Susie Coston, the national shelter director for Farm Sanctuary. “They’ve seen skulls and obvious sacrificed animals before.”
Various people alleging the same thing are mentioned. And we learn that animal sacrifices are controversial and inspire court cases. We even get this graphic depiction, after which we learn that the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that this religious sacrament is protected by the First Amendment:
For years, animal groups stopped ceremonies, rescued chickens, goats and lambs, and had the practitioners, known as santeros, arrested. Santeros kill animals, usually by slicing their carotid arteries, in rituals for major events like birth, death, marriage and the initiation of priests. The blood is used as an offering, and in most cases the sacrificed animals are cooked and eaten.
But while we get tons of perspective from animal rescue groups, there is literally not one practitioner of Santeria whose views are included. We don’t even hear from a professor or other expert who could speak about Santeria. And finally, I’m unclear how these live, wandering goats are related to animals killed as part of a religious sacrifice. Maybe we could just get some explanation on that front.
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Comments (14) |
October 15, 2009, at 7:14 pm
Mollie, of course the answer is obvious: if something is going on that you don’t like, blame religion. And if you don’t know the answer to something then speculate.
October 15, 2009, at 7:22 pm
Well, just try to find a Santeria practitioner willing to be interviewed. Don’t know if there are spokespersons for the religion. And I really don’t think there are First Santeria Churches on street corners.
A religion practiced largely in apartments and storefronts is most likely not going to have large animals to sacrifice. Especially ones that can fight back like goats can. If you have ever tried to get a goat to do anything, you will realize the unlikliness of the Santeria connection. Maybe it has something to do with Voudoo. Or some other exotic religion. But I doubt it.
October 15, 2009, at 11:23 pm
Actually, there’s a Santeria group in Hialeah, Florida, which brought the animal sacrifice issue before the Supreme Court some years back. They are quite public and would almost certainly have been available for interview. There are also various Religious Studies academics who have studied Santeria — findable through the American Academy of Religion.
The Hialeah case was really interesting. The local ordinance prohibited killing animals for religious purposes only, while allowing commercial slaughterhouses within the city limits. So it was blatant repression of a minority religion. And freedom of religion is seamless — if they can repress somebody else’s religion today, they can repress yours tomorrow.
Kudos to Mollie for the open-minded curiosity of this post!
warmly / Judy
October 15, 2009, at 11:27 pm
Unless they could have had some better reason than wandering goats, I don’t feel the reporter should have bothered with the Santeria connection on the hearsay of neighbors. Even goats were found with their throats slashed, it does not mean it’s Santeria. As the article says, in most cases the animal is cooked and eaten as part of the ritual it is involved in.
October 15, 2009, at 11:31 pm
I meant to say, “if goats were found” not “Even goats”, sorry.
October 16, 2009, at 1:00 am
In our city, there is a herd of feral goats.
It’s blamed on the Hugenots, though, not Santeria practitioners
http://www.bilberrygoatheritagetrust.com/
I tend to agree: until they find out where these goats came from, leaping to the conclusion that someone had been keeping them in their backyard for ritual sacrifice is stretching it.
October 16, 2009, at 9:12 am
I think the reporter did a pretty good job of just stating the facts, although without a comment from a local Santeria “spokesperson” its inclusion is incomplete, and the headline extremely questionable. (Editor! Editor!)
Last year 6 goats were rescued in NYC, so 4 is on a par with 3 months to go in the year. The unusual part is that they’ve all been found in close geographical radius. What are the odds? It can’t just be a coincidence—or can it? (The answer dear Editor is YES it can.)
However, from the point of view of selling papers/capturing eyeballs, the Santeria angle is the most exotic/interesting part of the story, despite the lack of any evidence to support the speculation that Santeria adherents had anything whatsoever to do with the 4 live goats. The speculative nature of the neighbors comments gets lost under the details offered about the religion—and that headline.
On the plus side, not everybody knows what Santeria is—and if the neighbors mentioned it then it needs to be explained. Not everybody has a clue how animal sacrifice figures in its belief/practice. Again, it’s explained simply and dispassionately.
October 16, 2009, at 9:29 am
The usual, obvious, and humdrum explanation for largish exotic animals running around loose with no ID is that somebody bought them as a cute baby as a pet, then released them when they were too big to deal with. Baby goats are adorable; grownups, not so much.
No no wait, must be Santeria sacrifice escapees. Much more likely.
October 16, 2009, at 10:50 am
This makes it sound like the enslaved West Africans were imported to New York in the 1940s. I assume the intention is that Santeria was imported to NYC in the ’40s.
Yes, the barest mention of Santeria requires, for journalistic integrity, a quote from a member of that community. They’re out there.
October 16, 2009, at 12:35 pm
created several centuries ago by West Africans enslaved in colonial Cuba and imported to New York City in the 1940s
We were still importing slaves to New York in the 1940s? Who knew?
October 16, 2009, at 1:13 pm
[…] has totally got my back this week. She looked at coverage of the James Ray sweat-lodge deaths, and debunked one-sided press speculation that roaming goats were Santeria sacrifices. “But while we get tons of perspective from animal rescue groups, there is literally not one […]
October 17, 2009, at 5:18 am
Yes, they are out there, and not hard to find, and some are even academics. I do see this as an improvement over ten years ago, when it was not only blamed on Santeria, but Santeria was referred to as “[insert ethnicity] black magic.”
October 20, 2009, at 9:45 am
Actually, a brief search using the right term and I find that it would seem Santeria does include some kind of rituals in connection with the Biblical custom of a “chivo expiatorio” (scapegoat). Didn’t do any in-depth reading, because I’m at work.
So yeah, I guess they might be letting certain goats go, on purpose.
October 21, 2009, at 1:19 am
As a practicing Ifa Priestess. I can say with great certainty that the goats roaming NYC could not have been part of any Santeria ceremony. The goats used for any Santeria religious ceremony are sacrificed and in the majority of the cases they are cooked and their meat is eaten by the individuals attending the ceremony.