Reply #89: Yea, all kidding aside, it was a pretty dumb move

[Xipe Totec]

I agree with the chem/bio hazard concerns, and the fact that the teacher did not maintain proper discipline. I just don't agree with criminalizing this act based on cultural norms of what constitutes a food animal or a pet.

I remember a story from a last year where Hispanics moving in to Georgia were causing some cultural clashes in their neighborhoods. It seems that a Hispanic family had recently moved to GA and was keeping live goats in their back yard. The neighbors complained to the police who visited the family and informed them it was illegal to keep farm animals in a residential neighborhood. The family apologized and said they would take care of the problem. They did. They slaughtered the goats and hung the carcasses from the clotheslines, as is the custom in some areas in Mexico and South America (I know, I've been there and seen it). Naturally, the neighbors were outraged and called the police a second time. Only this time they were informed that there was no law against slaughtering animals for food in your own back yard, only a law against keeping them alive.

Oh well...