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ANIMAL RIGHTS HUMAN WRONGS
Moslem ritual slaughter of innocent animals!
Introduction "Multitudes of human beings were systematically fattened for the carnivora. They were frequently forwarded to great distances by train, in trucks, without food or water. Large numbers of infants were constantly boiled down to form broth for invalid animals. In over-populous districts babies were given to malicious young cats and dogs to be taken away and drowned. Boys were hunted by terriers and stoned to death by frogs. Mice were a good deal occupied in setting mantraps, bated with toasted cheese, in poor neighbourhoods. Gouty old gentlemen were hitched to night-cabs, and forced to totter, on their weak ankles and diseased joints, to clubs, where fashionable young colts were picked up, and taken, at such speed as whipcord could extract, to visit chestnut fillies. Flying figures in scarlet coats, buckskins and top-boots were run down by packs of foxes that had nothing else to do. Old cock-grouse strutted out for a morning's sport, and came in to talk of how many brace of country gentlemen they had bagged. Gamekeepers lived a precarious life in holes and caves. They were perpetually harried by game and vermin; held fast in steel traps, their toes were nibbled by stoats and martens; and finally, their eyes picked out by owls and kites, they were gibbeted alive on trees, head downwards, until the termination of their martyrdom. In one especially tragic case, a naturalist in spectacles dodged about painfully among the topmost branches of a wood, while a orang-outang underneath, armed with a gun, inflicted on him dreadful wounds. A veterinary surgeon of Alfort was stretched on his back, his arms and legs secured to posts, in order that a horse might cut him alive for the benefit of an equine audience; but the generous steed, incapable of vindictive feelings, with one disdainful stamp on the midriff, crushed the wretch's life out."
I want to see an end to cruelty to animals. I want to see animal experiments stopped. I want to be alive to celebrate the end of hunting. I want to see abattoirs closed down and car parks full of animal transport lorries, engines dead and empty of terrified sheep, cows and other creatures. I want to see all the world's farmers concentrating on growing crops (with the wonderful side effect that world hunger will immediately end). I want all this to happen soon. I want it more than I want anything else in this life. I want it more than I want greater wealth or eternal life. If Aladdin appeared before me and gave me three wishes I would improve the odds by asking for the same thing three times: an end to all cruelty. People have been fighting for animals for centuries. But nothing positive has happened. All that effort has been to no avail. I have an irrepressible, constant suspicion that animals are treated worse now than at any time in human history. Part of the problem has, of course, been that there has been incessant in fighting within the pro-animal movement – largely, but not exclusively, through vanity and self interest. This is in notable contrast to what has happened within the animal abuse industry, where there has been almost constant agreement and an enthusiasm about working together which should be envied by the pro-animal movement.
Outdoor slaughter at the Eid-el-Kabir "festival" in France
Ingenuity and Imagination Farmers, scientists and others have shown appalling ingenuity and imagination in creating an apparently endless variety of ways to abuse the other creatures with whom we share this world.
The barbarism of the Roman circuses is as nothing compared to the barbarism of the modern vivisector's laboratory, the obscenity of the modern abattoir or the cruel indecency of today's animal factory. Slavery has stopped. Women have been emancipated. Apartheid, in all its human forms, has been roundly condemned. But the abuse of animals has accelerated. Making The Difference I want to be alive to see an end to cruelty to animals. I want to know that I have been part of the final thrust which has made the difference. I want to know that I have made a difference. Of course, I can't do anything by myself – any more than you can. But I believe that we can stop animal cruelty if we work together. If we learn everything we can from history, study our opponents weaknesses and strengths, put aside all personal vanities (and have the courage to ignore those alleged animal supporters who take every opportunity to snipe and gripe at anyone who dares to try something new) then we will have a better chance of success than ever before. If we sincerely and seriously want to stop animal cruelty we can.
But if we don't want it enough – and aren't prepared to put in the necessary effort – animals will continue to suffer for generations to come. Stopping the growth in cruelty to animals which has stigmatised this and previous generations, will become harder and harder with each year that passes. Labour Boasts And Vote Winning Promises Thousands of pro-animal campaigners put a great deal of faith in the Labour Party before the election of 1997. Labour politicians had, for over a decade, never failed to boast about their own solid pro-animal credentials. They had condemned the Tories for failing to introduce legislation designed to help protect animals. Before the 1997 general election the Labour Party made a number of very specific promises which were designed to attract and win the votes of animal lovers everywhere. They determinedly (and, it now seems, cold-bloodedly and cold-heartedly) set about winning the pro-animal vote by making a series of quite specific promises on a huge range of animal issues. In political terms these promises were made with ruthless efficiency. The Labour Party promised that they would end hunting, they promised to stop the pointless and obscene official killing of badgers, they proposed a Royal Commission to investigate (and presumably expose) the scientific worthlessness of animal experiments and they promised a ban on testing weapons on animals. They promised that vivisectors would not be allowed to use monkeys. They promised an immediate ban on hunting on Forestry Commission and Ministry of Defence land. These promises attracted many votes because the other two leading parties in Britain (the Conservative Party and the Liberal Democrat Party) offered little or nothing to animal lovers. The Conservatives, the party of cruelty, had consistently encouraged the exploitation of animals for 'fun' and profit. They had even given the police new powers to subdue anyone daring to protest on behalf of animals. And the Liberal Democrats had little more to offer animal rights supporters. The Betrayal But animal loving supporters of the Labour Party were destined to be disappointed. As soon as they won power the Labour Party reneged on their promises; they betrayed the voters who had trusted them and they betrayed the animals for whom there had been no other hope. In retrospect the Labour Party has done no more for animals than any other party would have done. In some ways they have done less. They allowed hunting on Ministry of Defence and Forestry Commission land to continue. They announced new government funded defence experiments on monkeys. They reneged on their promise to push through a ban on hunting. And instead of stopping the killing of badgers they increased government authorised badger killing. And the Labour government has, of course, actively and specifically encouraged the police to suppress dissent and to stop critics reminding the world of their broken promises.
(It is perhaps relevant to point out that the Labour government has betrayed a good many other people in addition to animal campaigners. They have betrayed students, the old, gays, the disabled and all those small groups of people who cannot easily defend themselves or fight for themselves. They have, generally speaking, betrayed people who have one thing in common: little or no influence in the corridors of power. It is perhaps hardly surprising that they have betrayed animals who, after all, do not even have a vote. The Labour Party has broken its pre-election promises to millions. If it were not impossible to take a government to court the Labour Party would be defending several million lawsuits from aggrieved voters who wanted their votes back – and damages too.) Anger And Frustration When I began to write this book I was inspired to do so by a mixture of anger and frustration. I was angry at the way that the government had got into power through lying. I felt cheated. And I knew that many thousands of other pro-animal campaigners felt the same way. I had, I confess, never believed the Labour Party's promises. Before the election I refused to support them or to encourage others to believe them. I was not convinced that the people who would be responsible for keeping the promises which were being made were honest and trustworthy. I felt that their desire for power was so great that they would do – and say – anything in order to win votes. I made all this clear in numerous newspaper articles. But my scepticism did not alter the fact that the promises were made. And I felt just as frustrated as the millions who had believed those promises, and who felt personally cheated and betrayed. My frustration has been enhanced by the fact that, for a variety of reasons, most of the British media has refused to report the Labour Party's failure to live up to its pre-election commitments. On The Record I originally intended to write a book to draw attention to the Labour Party's cold-hearted deceit in the hope that future voters would learn a lesson from what happened in 1997. I wanted to put on record exactly what had happened, and to encourage future voters to be cynical and cautious when faced with extravagant and convincing promises made by politicians desperately searching for power. And I hoped that I would, perhaps, be able to offer a few answers and some advice learnt from these events. I believe that ending the abuse of animals is the final challenge; the last main obstacle to civilisation. And I believe that in order to win the battle on behalf of animals those of us who care have to arouse massive public indignation.
Slavery was abolished because public outrage simply became too much for the politicians to withstand. Similarly, animals will not get the rights they are entitled to until the mass of people are convinced by the evidence, or more likely their perception of the evidence, that the continued abuse of animals is unacceptable.
The Good News, The Bad News And The Bottom Line The bad news is that the opposition to giving animals their freedom (and giving them back their basic rights) is supported by rich and powerful people and corporations who (largely for financial reasons) want to retain the status quo.
The good news is that those of us who want to see an end to animal abuse are in the majority. Most people want animal cruelty stopped. It is true that modern pro-animal demonstrations do not attract vast numbers of people. One reason for this is that many caring people are now too frightened of the police to stand up in public for their principles. Turning up to a demonstration to protest about the way animals are treated requires a strong commitment as well as courage. It also takes up time and costs money. I am constantly surprised not by the fact that so few people turn up to protest about crimes against animals but that so many people are prepared to give up their time and spend their money for the privilege of being pushed around by often stony-faced police officers who sometimes seem to be enjoying the opportunity to use their muscles. The bottom line is that in order to defend animals, and to gain for them their basic rights as sentient creatures, we have to change politics and change the way our modern society is organised. Taking Back Power Somewhere along the way this book changed direction. Instead of being primarily concerned with the past (and the Labour Party's failure to fulfil its promises) the spirit of the book became primarily concerned with the future. A book which had begun life as an angry and outraged attack on politicians who had broken their promises became a book in which I planned to offer new hope for the future – and a way forward out of the gloom. Back in 1991, in a book now entitled How To Overcome Toxic Stress And The 21st Century Blues (published by the European Medical Journal) I explained that we have created a society over which human beings no longer have any effective control. We have disenfranchised ourselves. That book provided me with the philosophical basis upon which I could build my proposal for winning this battle. The 21st Century Blues In order to explain why our world is so uncaring, and why animal abuse is on the increase, I must first explain why and how we have become disenfranchised – and who (or, rather, what) has taken power over our lives. When you understand why we are disenfranchised, and why animal abuse is on the increase, you will also understand why our food and water are being polluted and why the air we breathe is becoming contaminated. Strange And Difficult Times We live in strange, difficult and confusing times. In some ways – largely material – we are richer than any of our ancestors. In other ways – largely spiritual – we are infinitely poorer. Most of us live in well equipped homes that our great grand parents would marvel at. We have access to water at the turn of a tap. (Sadly, the water is deteriorating in quality and is now undrinkable.) At the flick of a switch we can obtain light to work by and heat to cook by. We have automatic ovens, washing machines, tumble driers, dish washers, food blenders, vacuum cleaners, television sets, video recorders and a whole host of other devices designed either to make our working lives easier or our leisure hours longer or more enjoyable. We can travel thousands of miles in a matter of hours. We are surrounded by the gaudy signs of our wealth and the physical consequence of human ambition and endeavour, but loneliness, unhappiness, anxiety and depression are now commoner than at any previous time in our history. Never before has there been so much sadness, dissatisfaction and frustration as there is today. The demand for tranquillisers and sleeping tablets has steadily increased as our national and individual wealth has increased. We have access to sophisticated communications systems and we have far more power over our environment than our ancestors ever had and yet we are regularly reminded of our vulnerability and our dependence on the system we have created. Most important of all is the fact that although
we are materially wealthy we are spiritually deprived. We have conquered
most of our planet, and some of the space which surrounds it, but we are
woefully unable to live peacefully with one another. The more control we
have over our environment the more damage we do to it. The more
successful we become the more miserable we are. The more we learn the
more we forget about our duties and responsibilities to one another.
As manufacturers and advertisers have deliberately translated our wants into needs so we have exchanged generosity and caring for greed and self concern. Politicians and teachers, scientists and parents have encouraged each succeeding generation to convert simple dreams and aspirations into fiery no-holds-barred ambitions. In the name of progress we have sacrificed goodwill, common sense and thoughtfulness. The gentle, the weak and the warm hearted have been trampled upon by hordes who think only of the future. Our society is a sad one; the cornerstones of our world are selfishness, greed, anger and hatred. During the last fifty years or so we have changed our world beyond recognition. With the aid of psychologists, clever advertising copywriters have learned to exploit our weaknesses and our fears and our natural apprehensions to help create demands for new and increasingly expensive products. Tradition, dignity, craftsmanship, values and virtues have been pushed aside in the search for greater productivity and profitability. It is hardly surprising that all these changes have produced new stresses and strains. The pressures to succeed, to conform and to acquire ensure that the base levels of daily stress are fixed at dangerously high levels. For twenty years it has been recognised that stress plays a vital part in the development of most illnesses but today the fastest growing illness in the world is something which I now call 'The 21st Century Blues' – a largely unrecognised problem that already affects one person in three and is spreading rapidly. The 21st Century Blues is caused by 'toxic stress'. Toxic stress is far more destructive than ordinary stress. It is created – often deliberately – by politicians, lawyers and advertisers and it is the cause of much bitterness and many frustrations. It is the cause of the deep sense of ill defined, inexplicable despair that is typical of victims of The 21st Century Blues. Toxic stress is the type of stress that is produced by advertisements which make you feel incompetent or inadequate ("You're a failure if you can't afford to dress like this." "You're a terrible parent if you don't buy X or Y for your children.") and it is the type of stress that is produced by lawyers who create laws which mean that however just your cause may be you won't be able to win. The Perils Of Progress Much of the stress from which we all suffer is created by our constant determination to progress. Our dedication to progress is one of the reasons why we have lost control of our world. Without so much progress we would have more time to enjoy our world and our lives; without so much progress we would be better able to find happiness, contentment and stability. But without progress industry would slow down, economic growth would be stifled and society would stand still. And that would not suit society at all. This is significant because it explains how we have created a world and a society which now control us. For the first time in history our present and our future are controlled not by us, not by our "leaders', but by a social structure which we have devised. Our institutions and multinational corporations need progress in order to create and gain more power. The power in our world is now vested in the institutions themselves; it is the structure of our society which controls us. Those who work for the institutions which rule our lives tell us that progress is essential but they are lying. They tell is that it is impossible to halt progress but they are lying. What they really mean is that progress is good for business, or that progress offers some advantage in terms of money or power to the part of the social structure to which they are tied. Progress is, ironically, essential to the strength of the status quo. Most people who work for institutions and multinational corporations will insist that progress means "better'. It doesn't. Progress means that people have to work harder and take life more seriously and it means more stress. Progress means that things become more complicated and more likely to go wrong. Progress means that the things which you bought yesterday (and were happy with until the advertisers convinced you that they were out of date) are useless within months. Progress means that new is always better and that the future is always going to be better than the past. Progress means that more and more people have to exchange a rich and varied, wholesome and healthy lifestyle for one which is hollow and filled with despair and loneliness. Progress means deprivation for people but strength for our social structures. Progress means that the jobs people do become more boring and less satisfying. Progress means more power to institutions and to machines and computers. Progress means more stress, more destruction, more misery and more tedium. And progress means more cruelty to animals and more damage to our planet. Are people wiser, happier and more contented now that electric toothbrushes are available? Are faster cars more satisfying than old ones? Are people more at peace than their ancestors now that the compact disc player has been invented? The truth about progress is something of a compromise. Some advances are good. Some new technology is helpful and does improve the quality of our lives. Some new developments reduce pain, suffering and stress. But society isn't interested in compromise. Society needs uncontrolled progress in order to grow. And the people who acquire their power and their status and their wealth from society's institutions do what they are expected to do. Our world is no longer controlled by people. It is controlled by the structure that we created. The truth is that progress can be a boon as well as a burden. It would be as stupid to claim that all progress is bad as to claim that all progress is good. Progress is good when we use it rather than allow it to rule our lives. Progress is neither good nor bad unless we make it so. But we no longer choose between those aspects of progress which can be to our benefit and those which may be harmful. Now that we no longer control our world we are forced to accept all progress whether we want it or not. The Hidden Price Of Education We are taught to take education seriously. We are told that the quality and extent of our education will shape and govern our lives. We are told that if we work hard at school and at college then we will reap the benefits later. "Study hard, pass your examinations and you will obtain a better job, earn more money and be able to enjoy a more luxurious lifestyle than those who spurn their educational opportunities." How many children hear that each year? It is the standard stuff of school speech days. What we are told may, to some extent, be true. But we are never told the real price that we will have to pay for our years of education. We are never told the spiritual price that society expects us to pay in return for having our lives "shaped and improved'. To understand the potential costs to the spirit and the soul it is necessary to understand the purpose of the education society offers us all. We must understand what our society stands to gain from the deal we are offered. Nothing that society offers ever comes free and an education is certainly no exception. Society doesn't want to educate us so that we become more thoughtful, more creative or wiser individuals. Society doesn't want to broaden our horizons or enhance our sense of vision. Society doesn't want to instill passion in us (that can be troublesome and inconvenient) and it doesn't want us to know how to think for ourselves (that can be costly and disruptive). What society really wants is obedience. Society knows that the obedient will work hard without question. Society knows that the obedient can be relied upon to do work that is dull, repetitive and possibly even dangerous. Society knows that the obedient are unlikely to be troubled by spiritual or moral fears. Society knows that the obedient will fit neatly into whatever hierarchy may exist and society knows that the obedient will always put loyalty above honesty and integrity. The obedient are always prepared to do what others tell them to do. And the obedient are allowed to climb higher up the ladder. But because they are obedient they always do what they are told – however high they climb. The obedient obey the boss, the politicians, the administrators and the bureaucrats. Most of all the obedient are aware of, and obey, the needs of the institution for which they work. The obedient also become good and reliable customers. The obedient obey the advertisers and buy things that they don't need. By doing so they help society to evolve and stay strong. The obedient accept shoddy workmanship and unreliability without complaint. They accept new fashions as necessary and they buy new clothes and new cars when society wants them to buy those things – not when they need them. The obedient customer is a passive customer and the passive customer is the best customer. Think back to your own education and you'll see how important obedience was. With some honourable exceptions most courses which involve a textbook and a teacher, and conclude with an examination, are designed to prevent thought and to encourage obedience. "The best part of every man's education, is that which he gives to himself," wrote Sir Walter Scott. But today we are taught to think of education as something that starts when we begin school and ends when we leave. Society doesn't want us to think for ourselves. One aim of a modern education is to harness the minds of the imaginative or potentially disruptive. Such individuals are dangerous to a smooth running society. Society's schoolteachers – the handmaidens of the system – are prepared and willing to manipulate the minds of the young because that is what society expects them to do in return for their own status in society. Education, the most fundamental force of all, is designed to help produce a neat and layered world. But the price we pay for our education is a high one. And the more successful our education is in society's terms (and the higher our subsequent position in the meritocracy) the greater the price we must pay. Your choices – or the choices that society helped you make – will have strictly defined the boundaries of your life. You may be better rewarded (in material terms) than many of those who were less capable of satisfying the system but the price you pay will be high too. The price you pay for educational success is intellectual constraint. You may pay for your success with your freedom. You may pay for your success with guilt, frustration, dissatisfaction and boredom. The modern educational system is designed to support the structure of our society but it is also a major force in the development of stress and misery. If it is true that our schooldays are the happiest days of our lives it is because by the time we leave school freedom is, for most of us, nothing more than a faint memory. Regular, mass-market schooling for everyone was originally a by product of the industrial revolution. Prior to the industrial revolution most people lived in villages and hamlets and only a relatively small percentage of the population lived in towns and cities. The first factories and industrial towns developed in England when industrial machinery such as spinning wheels, which had been installed in cottages, barns and village halls, were smashed by the Luddites; rebellious workers who believed that the introduction of machinery threatened their livelihoods. As a direct result of the Luddite activities the machine owners put their replacement equipment into specially-built 'factories' so that they could be protected against vandalism. Since public transport did not exist this, inevitably, meant that the people who were going to work in those factories had to be housed nearby. In this way the first new, purpose-built industrial towns developed. The first schools were built not to educate or to inform but because unless some provision was made for looking after children factory owners could not employ women as well as men. The development of the first towns had meant that family units had been splintered and it was no longer possible for young parents to turn to their own parents for help and support. Either by purpose, design or simple good fortune it was quickly discovered that the development of formal schooling had an additional benefit. Employers found that children who got into the habit of attending a school for regular hours during the day adapted more readily to work in a factory. Many of their parents, who had been brought up working as farm labourers, found factory work, hours and discipline difficult to get used to. Children who were accustomed to school work, hours and discipline had no such problems. Today, a formal education is still primarily designed to occupy pupils, to keep them busy and out of mischief, and to prepare them for an ordinary working life. Very little of the tedious by rote learning which goes on in schools has any practical purpose. Children are taught algebra, trigonometry and Latin – and then subjected to examinations designed to find out how well they have absorbed the entirely useless material they have been taught. The aim is to not to teach or impart learning but to produce school leavers who will feel comfortable with the standard working ritual of modern life. Schooling is a disciplinary activity rather than an educational one (although the latest and most fashionable educational methods – those which are designed to educate without work, study, labour or pain – fail even to instil discipline into pupils). Students are certainly not given information which will enable them to live independent lives. They are taught how to satisfy society's demands for them, rather than taught how to think. Children should be taught the importance of honesty, trust and loyalty. They should be taught to honour the rights of all other creatures. They are, instead, taught the importance of punctuality and blind obedience. Stop and think about it: why would society want to teach young people how to think for themselves? People who can think for themselves are likely to be a nuisance rather than an asset to a closely structured society which depends more on discipline and routine than on innovation or imagination. Students, at schools, colleges and universities, are trained to do as they are told. Is it is for this reason that rules play such a crucial part in all educational establishments. Learning to obey the rules, and do as you are told, is a more important part of most educational establishments than learning to create or to question. Most education and training is designed to make sure that people do not maximise or optimise their own skills but that they accept whatever life or fate offers. The 'society' which we have created, which now has a purpose and an agenda of its own, does not want thinking citizens. People who think are likely to threaten the status quo. There are many citizens in our society who believe (with apparent sincerity) that once their formal education is over they can stop learning. They assume that when they leave school, college or university they do so as educationally complete individuals, and that they can, from that point in their lives onwards, stop expanding, exploring and discovering. This is no accident. It is exactly what 'society' wants. The Pressure of Advertising Whatever else you do with your life you will always be a consumer. To the multinational corporations which make items as varied as motor cars, refrigerators, underwear, indigestion remedies, biscuits, coat hangers and kitchen sinks you are a consumer. In order to persuade you to become a customer the people who provide these products and services spend considerable amounts of money on trying to convince you that their products are better than anyone else's. Every day your custom is solicited in a thousand different ways – some crude and some subtle. Every day you are bombarded with advertisements telling you to buy one of these and begging you to buy some of those and explaining why your life will be incomplete if you do not spend your money on a little of this and a little of that. The professionals who prepare advertisements know very well that in order to succeed in the modern market place they must create new needs; they know that their advertising must, through a mixture of exaggeration and deceit (and through exploiting natural fears and weaknesses) create wants and desires, hopes and aspirations and then turn those wants, desires, hopes and aspirations into needs. Multinational corporations (and their advertising agencies) know that it is impossible to sell anything to a satisfied man. But, in order to keep the money coming in (and to keep the corporate beast satisfied) the advertising agencies must constantly encourage us to buy. They constantly need to find better ways to sell us stuff that we do not really need. Any fool can sell a product or a service that people need. If your shoes wear out then you will buy new ones or have the old ones repaired. If you are hungry and there is only one restaurant for miles then that restaurant will get your service. If you car is about to run out of petrol then a garage doesn't need to offer you free tumblers or a money off voucher for a car wash in order to win your custom. As far as the multinational corporations are concerned the trick is to get you to buy shoes when you don't need new shoes and to buy shoes that are more expensive than they need be; to buy food when you are not hungry and to fill your car with petrol long before its tank is empty simply because you are attracted by the offer that accompanies a particular brand of fuel. The multinational corporations want to turn your most ephemeral wants into basic needs. In order to do this their advertising agencies use all their professional skills to make you dissatisfied with what you already have. They need you to be constantly dissatisfied and frustrated. Modern advertising is a scientifically based creative art which is designed to raise the intensity of your desires and build your dissatisfaction and your fears. The advertising copywriter is hired to create unhappiness. Multinational corporations want to take away your appreciation of the simple things in life because they know that there is more profit in making things more complicated, more expensive and more unreliable. They want you to be in so much of a hurry that you eat instant foods rather than growing and preparing your own vegetables. They want you to ride in a car rather than walk or ride a bicycle. They want to make you feel guilty if you don't smell right or don't buy the right breakfast cereal for your children. They want you to feel a failure if you don't have the latest clothes on your back and the latest gadgets in your home. Their advertising is most successful when it persuades you to forget your real needs and to replace them with wants. Even if you don't have the money to spend on new cars, kitchen furniture, clothes and other goods so cleverly advertised you will not escape. Advertising, designed to inflame your desires, will show you services you cannot buy and things you cannot have. It will create wants and then turn those wants into needs. Advertising creates frustration and disappointment, envy and dissatisfaction. If you are too poor to buy the things which are advertised you will never discover that the products on offer are unlikely to satisfy the promises made for them. In the hands of the multinational corporations (and their human slaves) advertising is the symbol of modern society; it frequently represents false temptations, hollow hopes and unhappiness and disenchantment; it often inspires values which are based on fear and greed. In short, the multinational corporations deliberately use advertising to make people disatisfied and unhappy. How Fear Creates Stress Your ancestors lived in a world about which they understood very little and where they were constantly in danger. They had many things to be afraid of: death, pain, starvation and being eaten alive by wild animals to mention but four. We, in contrast, should lead relatively fear-free lives. But all the evidence firmly shows that fear plays a much bigger part in our lives than it ever played in the lives of our ancestors. Why? Probably because society (our unseen controller) needs us to be frightened. Fear is a powerful driving force which helps to push us forwards. Fear encourages us to accept things we do not like, to do work we do not enjoy and to spend money on things we neither want nor need. Fear cripples us but keeps us compliant. Fear is one of the most potent of all forces and it used to control us and to manipulate our emotions. Consider health for example. You are encouraged to worry about your health in a thousand separate ways. Listen to the experts arguing about what is bad for you and you will soon feel twinges of fear nibbling at you. Most of the time your fears are created and maintained by people who have a vested, commercial interest in exploiting your fears so that they can sell you something. The companies which make caffeine-free coffee tell you the virtues of drinking caffeine-free coffee – and warn you of the hazards of drinking ordinary coffee. The people who make low-fat products warn you of the hazards of eating high-fat products. Companies selling herbal remedies tell you how dangerous doctors can be. Companies making sweeteners warn you of the dangers of eating sugar. Companies involved in the marketing or distribution of sugar warn you of the danger of sugar substitutes. Lobbyists, marketing experts and spin doctors all distort the truth in order to promote a particular message, create a special type of fear and sell a product. Fear is everywhere and is constantly used by people who want to manipulate you. Fear isn't just used by the multinational corporations. Politicians and police chiefs frighten you about street violence in order to encourage you to give them more power. Politicians make you frightened of your enemies abroad for the same reason. (These days when politicians find themselves under pressure at home they invariably start a war abroad. Margaret Thatcher discovered the electoral value of a war when the Falkland's conflict helped her win an election. Was it a complete coincidence that Bill Clinton sent American aeroplanes to bomb Iraq just at the same time that his peers were discussing whether or not he should be impeached?) Television and radio means that you can be frightened more speedily and more effectively than ever before. Fear helps our society to sustain itself and to increase its power. We Have Lost Control Science fiction writers have, in the past, written about a future in which man loses power over his world because computers and robots have taken control. That hasn't happened. But we have, unthinkingly and unknowingly, lost power in a quite different way. We have lost power, and handed over control of our lives to an untouchable, nebulous, almost indefinable force. We have handed over control to institutions, organisations and multinational corporations which use our educational system to teach us to obey authority and which skilfully use advertising to create needs and fears. If you carefully examine the way the world is being run at the moment you could reasonably come to the conclusion that most multinational corporations, and most governments, are more or less exclusively controlled by ruthless, James Bond villain style psychopathic megalomaniacs. What other explanation could there be for the fact that drug companies make and sell drugs which they know are both dangerous and ineffective? What other explanation could there be for the fact that food companies make and sell food which they must know causes cancer and contains very little of nutritional value? What other explanation could there be for the fact that arms companies sell products deliberately designed to blow the legs off small children? What other explanation could there for the fact that tobacco companies continue to make, promote and sell products which they know kill a high proportion of their customers? And what other explanation could there possibly be for the fact that bureaucrats, civil servants and politicians allow all this to happen? There is another explanation for all these things. For the very first time in history the main opponents of justice and fair play, the proponents of abuse and tyranny, have no human form. We have created new monsters: new monsters which we cannot see or touch. (We cannot see or touch them for the excellent reason that they do not exist in reality). For the first time in history we have succeeded in creating a world, a society, which now exists solely to defend, protect and develop itself. We have created a society whose institutions have acquired power of their own. These institutions – governments, multinational corporations, multinational bureaucracies and so on – now exist solely to maintain, improve and strengthen themselves. These institutions have their own hidden agendas and the human beings who work for them may think that they are in control but they aren't. I now believe that the biggest threat to the survival of the human race (and the planet upon which we live) comes not from the atomic bomb, or the fact that we are steadily destroying the very fabric of our world by polluting our seas, our rivers, the air we breathe and even the space which separates us from other planets, but from the fact that we have created a social structure in which we, as human beings, now exist as mere drones. It is this new social structure which is pushing us along at a great speed and 'forcing' us not only to destroy our environment but also to abandon all those moral and ethical values which it is reasonable to expect to be fundamental in a 'civilised' society. It may be a little difficult to accept the concept of institutions having agendas of their own but the reality is that this is exactly what has happened. The people who appear to run large institutions, and who themselves undoubtedly believe that they are in charge, are simply institutional servants. Consider, for example, the chairman and directors of a large multinational pharmaceutical company. These well paid men and women will regard themselves as being responsible for the tactics and strategy followed by the company for which they work. But in reality it is the company itself – an institution which only really exists on paper – which is in real control. Every multinational company has a constant thirst for cash. In order to satisfy bankers, brokers and shareholders companies need to produce quarterly figures which show a nice big, fat profit on the bottom line. The people who work for our imaginary drug company may think that they are in control but in reality they aren't. The directors have to do what is in their company's best interests. If they don't then their company will falter and that can't be allowed to happen. The company, the unimaginably powerful corporate demon, must come first. So, for example, if the directors find that one of their products causes lethal side effects they may, as human beings, feel ashamed about this. Individually the directors may want to withdraw the drug immediately and to apologise to the people who have been injured by their product. But this course of action would not be in the company's best short term interests. Withdrawing the drug would doubtless cost the company money. Research and development costs would have to be written off. And apologising would expose the company to lawsuits. So the directors, acting in the company's best interests, must keep the drug on the market and deny that there are any problems. In these circumstances the company (a non-human entity which only exists on paper) is in control. The decisions are made not in the interests of people (whether they be customers or directors) but in the interests of the corporate "being'.
The problem is compounded by the fact that, big as they are, multinational companies have no souls and no sense of responsibility. Moreover, they never think beyond the next set of quarterly figures; they are ultimately ruthless and (since they are inanimate and bloodless) utterly "cold blooded', but they are also ultimately short sighted. Big institutions, like computers, are inherently, irretrievably, stupid. They do not realise that their behaviour will, in the long run, lead to their total destruction – partly because it will annoy and alienate their customers and partly because it will eventually result in the deaths of many of their customers. By and large, the men and women who run large drug companies, arms companies, food companies and genetic engineering companies don't really want to destroy the world in which we all live. They know that their families have to breathe the same air as you and I. They know that they too need good food, clean drinking water and a healthy environment. However, despite the evidence being to the contrary the people who run these companies probably think that they are doing good and useful work. They have denied the truth to themselves in order to avoid coming face to face with a reality which would probably drive them insane if they accepted it. It is only through denial and self deceit that most of the men and women who work for tobacco companies can continue to sell a product which causes so much misery and so much death. Adolf Hitler killed fewer people than the big tobacco companies have killed. But I doubt if many of the people running big tobacco companies think of themselves as evil. I have met men and women who run large organisations (such as drug companies). Some recognise that what they are doing is immoral and they excuse themselves with such trite and shallow phrases as "If I didn't do it someone else would" and "I've got to pay the mortgage". These are, of course, variations on the same excuses favoured by the men and women who operated the gas chambers during the second world war. (The brighter and more sensitive individuals usually see through these excuses in the end; they often become depressed.) But many men and women who work for drug companies quite honestly and sincerely believe that they are doing useful and indeed valuable work. They have become so deeply institutionalised, and are driven so completely by the needs of the corporate beast, that they genuinely feel no shame about what they do. They have rationalised their actions and denied to themselves the truths which are apparent to outside observers. Occasionally, this constant denial and self deceit breaks down and absurdities appear. For example, British Members of Parliament have, as members of an institution, consistently voted to allow multinational corporations to pollute our drinking water and to tamper with and pollute our food. And yet MPs themselves, as individuals, are so conscious of the value of the pure food and clean drinking water that in the House of Commons they have arranged to be given spring water to drink and to be fed on organic food which has not been genetically modified. The men and women who vote to allow our water to be polluted and our food to be genetically modified are voting as representatives of institutions rather than as representatives of people. They know that they are creating a world in which the food is unfit to eat and the water unfit to drink. But they can't stop it happening because they are operating for the benefit of institutions rather than people. Suppressing The Truth The huge organisations which now run the world have developed identities, strengths, purposes and needs of their own. And in order to continue to grow in size and in strength those organisations need to ignore or suppress as much of the truth as they can – and to ignore the truths which they cannot suppress. Obviously, the people who work for those institutions must also ignore and suppress the unpalatable truths (and they must find ways to hide from the reality of what they are doing). How else can anyone explain the fact that the (supported by politicians) huge corporations have decided to continue to damage the ozone layer – despite knowing the consequences? How else can anyone explain the fact that because antibiotics are being consistently and deliberately and knowingly used irresponsibly infectious diseases are once again a major cause of death? How else can anyone explain the fact that genetic engineers are creating foods which may or may not be safe to eat? How else can anyone explain the fact that drug companies keep on producing – and selling – products which do more harm than good? The industrialists, the politicians and the administrators who allow these things to happen are just as vulnerable to the consequences of their actions as you and I. They – and their families – cannot buy immunity to the problems which they are creating. The amoral but all powerful institutions we have created are not responsible for all the horrors of our world, of course. They are certainly not responsible for all the awful things we do to animals. Men and women who hunt, for example, do not hunt because they are forced to do so by an institution. They hunt because they obtain pleasure from killing and they have failed to recognise the pointless, cruel barbarism of what they do. But a very high percentage of the cruel things which we do to animals are a result of institutional needs. For example, the continued survival of the meat
trade is a result of the fact that the demands and needs of meat
producing, packaging and marketing institutions have taken precedence
over health and moral concerns and now have control over our lives. It
has been known for decades that meat causes cancer (and a whole host of
other deadly disorders). And it has also been known that if people
became vegetarian and stopped eating animals world hunger would be a
thing of the past simply because our resources could be used more
productively. There is no question that every human being in the world
would benefit if meat eating stopped. No meat industry spokesmen would
dare to debate this issue in public because they would inevitably lose.
But many large and profitable companies would go out of business if people no longer ate meat. And so the needs of the institutions take precedence over the needs of the people. The selfish, self-centered, amoral materialism which has characterised political life for the last few decades, and which has simultaneously accompanied a downfall in morality, can no longer be seen as just another unfortunate blip in human development. The horrors of today will not be easily conquered, and will not be conquered at all unless we acknowledge the breadth and depth of the exceptional problem we now face. Some years ago Dr Albert Schweizer saw the first signs of what has happened. "Another hindrance to civilisation today," he wrote, "is the over-organisation of our public life. While it is certain that a properly ordered environment is the condition and, at the same time, the result of civilisation, it is also undeniable that, after a certain point has been reached, external organisation is developed at the expense of spiritual life. Personality and ideas are often subordinated to institutions, when it is really these which ought to influence the latter and keep them inwardly alive." We cannot trust our existing politicians, or the systems which they wrongly believe they control, and so what is the point of trying to persuade them to do what we want them to do – and what is right? I have come to the conclusion that we have only one option: to take back the political power which is rightfully ours. If we are to change our world, and to replace greed and deceit with truth, kindness and courtesy we have to take action. Nothing will happen unless we want it to happen – and then make it happen. If we are to re-introduce a sense of morality into our world, and end cruelty to people and animals, we have to take back power from the institutions which now rule our lives. If we are going to take back power from the weak, spineless and unthinking politicians and corporate yes-men who serve our controlling institutions with such uncritical faithfulness we have to create our own political force. If we are to end animal cruelty then we have to recreate the way our world is run. We need a political revolution. And that is what this book is all about. Vernon Coleman, Devon 1999 Part One: Abuse And Hypocrisy
"We need another and a wiser and perhaps a more mythical concept of animals...We patronise them for their incompleteness, for their tragic fate of having taken form so far below ourselves. And therein we err, and greatly err. For the animal shall not be measured by man. In a world older and more complete than ours they moved finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendour and travail of the earth. " Henry Beston Chapter One: The Final Outrage
l like animals. Most of them are more intelligent, more charming, more faithful and more fun than most people and all Conservatives. Animals were not made for human beings to use any more than women were made for male amusement, or black people were made to work for white people. The struggle for freedom for animals is as important a struggle as any struggle ever fought. Animal abuse is the last great outrage and yet most people are so accustomed to the excruciating suffering of animals that they take little or no notice. They comfort themselves with the false belief that animals have no feelings and, therefore, do not suffer.
Animals – and other non-human creatures – are treated with no more respect than grass, rocks or ripples on a pond. Non-human creatures are regarded as outsiders with no rights other than to serve our human purposes. They may be (and are) beaten, tortured, humiliated, maimed, starved, imprisoned, robbed of their dignity, chased and killed for fun, boiled or skinned alive, eaten and generally abused. Non-human creatures – however wise, however sensitive – are regarded as mere commodities, to be bought and sold like oranges or gold or ears of wheat. Humans seem to take a perverted delight in thinking of new ways to abuse the inhabitants with whom they share this planet. Signposts To The Nature Of The Human Spirit People are at their truest when treating animals. The man who is a bully to other human beings will bully his dog. The man who is kind to animals will be kind to people. The way we treat animals provides signposts to the nature of the human spirit. Many people refer to the animals with whom they share their homes as 'pets' but I do not like the image it portrays. Animals are not pets and we do not own them. We share a world together, that is all. We give and we receive. The animal abusers rule in our society because they are violent and aggressive people. Their illusions and prejudices dominate our society. The rude, the selfish, the ruthless, the bigoted, the cruel, the intolerant, the hard hearted, the hateful and the savage have conquered the earth. The world is divided into two sorts of people: the sensitive and the insensitive. The sensitive suffer for everyone. They don't hurt other creatures but they suffer the pain for the harm done by the insensitive. Hunters, vivisectors, butchers and so on are the insensitive, brutal barbarians of our society.
The animal abusers are the ultimate narrow-minded, tunnel-visioned provincials; full of arrogance and misconceptions. Savage tribes were provincial in that they regarded all strangers as barbarians to be robbed or eaten or both. Today the animal abusers are the ultimate provincials. They do not see or accept that we do not have unique rights over the world but must share it with those other creatures who live upon it. Prejudices – Ancient And Modern Back in Roman times any non Roman who committed a heinous crime against a Roman would be executed. If a slave trod on his master's foot he would lose his head. But a Roman could commit any crime against a non-Roman without fear of retribution. This happened because the Romans saw themselves as the centre of the universe. The Greeks felt much the same as the Romans did in that a Greek could do more or less what he liked to a slave but a slave would be punished severely if he offended a Greek. And the same is, of course, true of the Jews. The Romans, the Greeks and the Jews (and many other groups of people) behaved in this way because they had not grown out of their primitive, barbaric view of the world. They never really imagined that their victims could suffer in the same way that they could. They did not think of their victims as having senses, or of being capable of thought. A slave was much like a sandal – something to be bought, used and thrown away when no longer wanted. In modern times white Americans, South Africans and Australians have all behaved in the same way when dealing with black people. They behaved in this way partly because they had not evolved away from their barbaric origins and partly because white men and women felt that to give black people rights would be economically inconvenient. They protected themselves against the absurdity of this crass reasoning by refusing to acknowledge that black people could think, or reason or suffer. And, of course, for centuries men of all races have behaved in a similar way towards women – refusing to give them equality for many years and arguing that this was excusable because women were not equal. Blind Egoists The way in which human beings now exploit and abuse animals (and other living creatures) is no different in principle to the way in which the Romans treated their slaves, the Americans treated non-white races and the Victorian Englishman treated 'his' women. In every case the underlying problem is the
same: the exploiters see the world from a provincial, small minded
standpoint. Those who exploit have inherited from barbarians and savages
the utterly self centered belief that they – and they alone – are
blessed with wisdom and imagination. They are narrow-minded, bigoted
bullies, blind egoists who cares only about themselves and their own
tiny world. And they try to support their bigotry and their prejudices
with pseudo-scientific nonsense which bear no resemblance to the truth.
The black man was regarded as having no rights other than to serve the white man. The sheep is regarded as having no rights other than to serve mankind. People who like animals, and who have been sickened by the barbaric way evil-spirited farmers, tyrannical scientists and other barbarians exploit them, have been campaigning against the establishment and for animal rights for a long, long time. Two and a half thousand years ago Buddha taught that it is as bad for a man to murder a sheep as to murder his father. ("Both equally love life and fear death. In this there is no difference.") After all murder is murder is murder is murder. Those who love animals are widely regarded (particularly by politicians, scientists and pseudo-intellectuals) as irrational, sentimental, Bambi-hugging bunny lovers. The gentle and the humane have for too long been regarded as merely weak and ineffectual. The laws and regulations which currently exist to 'protect' animals are conveniently designed so as not to inconvenience humans. The laws and regulations governing the use of animals in experiments are so weak and ineffectual, and so poorly policed, that they might as well not exist. The laws authorise cruelty and oppression more than they try to prevent it. Our laws relating to animals are a sheer disgrace. Experimenters can cause whatever pain they like to animals as long as the cage in which the tortured animal will be imprisoned afterwards is a certain modest size. To make life easy for the animal abusers there are so many exceptions to the rules, and so few 'checks' to make sure that the rules are being obeyed, that even the regulations which do exist are little more than cosmetic in nature.
Laws which exist to stop hunters shooting animals are usually only there to make sure that the animals in question are not wiped out completely. (Although in France recently when hunters were asked whether or not they would approve of a ban on hunting during "la periode de reproduction animale" a headline in the newspaper Le Monde announced that only 79% of hunters would agree to respect a ban during this period. No one seemed perturbed, surprised or even alarmed by the fact that if you look at this survey the other way it shows that 21% of hunters are so short of functioning cerebral tissue that they wanted to continue to kill animals during the breeding season too. The hunters did not even understand that if you stop animals from breeding you soon won't have any animals left at all.) The Barbaric (And Hypocritical) British As a nation the British pretend to like animals. Britons often claim that they love animals – and attack foreigners for being cruel. But, by and large, the British have nothing to be proud of. The British claim to be deeply offended when they read about the nasty Spanish mistreating donkeys or chasing bulls through their streets. They moan about the way Asians eat dogs. And they cringe when they see photographs of Canadians killing baby seals.
But the British are no better than these barbaric and ignorant foreigners. Britons treat animals with just as little respect as the citizens of any other country. They slaughter them for food. They persecute and torture them for their amusement and entertainment and they subject them to the most hideous atrocities in the false name of science. The British are, in truth, just as barbaric as the Spanish, the Chinese, the Canadians and the Asians. In a way, British animal abusers are worse for
they are hypocrites: they claim to love animals.
Vivisectors are the ultimate hypocrites. Some, who perform viciously brutal experiments on animals, claim to have family pets which they love. Would those who perform and support animal research donate their own pets for laboratory research? If not – why not? Hunters claim to love animals. So do farmers. But how can any of these possibly have any understanding of the meaning of the word "love'? Here are just a few examples of the cruel way animals have been treated over the years in Britain.
Chapter Two: Three Varieties Of Abuse Animals are sensitive and emotionally labile creatures who experience the same kinds of feelings that humans experience: happiness, sadness, hope, fear, love, compassion and shame. Cruelty to animals is a moral and ethical
outrage; it is the greatest crime of our time. And yet animals are
abused today in three main ways: the meat industry, vivisection and
hunting.
The Meat Industry Britons breed animals, stuff them into lorries and carry them for days without providing anything for them to eat or drink. We cage them in tiny boxes, move them about soaked in their own urine and knee deep in their own excrement, scare them senseless and then slit their throats and eat them – tonsils, intestines, shit and all.
Pigs, who died in transit, dumped behind a truck at the slaughterhouse Next time you're on a journey keep an eye open for a lorry taking animals to a slaughterhouse. It doesn't matter where you are, where you've been or where you are going – the movement of animals is now big business. All over Britain animals are constantly on the move. There probably won't be anything printed on the side of the lorry to tell you what is in inside, but the lorry will have wooden, slatted sides and through the gaps you will be able to see the terrified faces of cows, sheep, chickens and other living creatures being transported from farm to abattoir. There may be a leg or two sticking out in between the slats because the animals will have almost certainly been herded into lorries without either respect or care. The lambs and calves crammed into transporter lorries are just as terrified as any child would be under those circumstances. Their mothers are just as much in mourning as any mother would be. When slaves were transported from one nation to another they were branded and herded into overcrowded containers. We do the same thing with animals today. The animals are crammed into the lorries so tightly that if they get stuck in a difficult position they have to stay that way until the journey stops many hours or even days later. Imagine how you would feel if you had to travel for 24 hours with one of your legs sticking out through your a slightly open car window. Imagine it. Think about it. The horror in these transporters is so great that the spiritual stench of it clings to the woodwork and the metalwork. If you are sensitive to animals you can feel and hear the pain and the fear whenever one of these trucks comes near. While travelling recently I stopped at a petrol station where an animal transport lorry was parked. As I got out of my car I heard the plaintive, heart wrenching cries of the sheep inside it. I filled my tank, paid at the kiosk and then felt myself drawn irresistibly, and against my will, towards the lorry. To my astonishment when I looked inside the lorry was empty. The cries I had heard had been real. But there were no animals in the lorry.
Downed cow left to suffer overnight in the parking lot of a stockyard. To make matters worse the animals being transported invariably travel in tiers. The more animals you can cram into a lorry the bigger the profit will be. And although animals aren't usually fed or watered while they are travelling animals, like all living creatures, need to pass urine and faeces from time to time. In a way the animals on the top tier are relatively lucky, I suppose. The animals underneath are constantly showered with urine and faeces raining down upon them from the terrified creatures above them. Moving and killing animals is big business but it is also a truly barbaric business. Animals die, unattended and uncared for where they have fallen. Some sheep freeze to death in winter and some die from heat exhaustion and thirst in summer. As long as the numbers who die don't rise so high that the transportation process becomes unprofitable no one cares.
Animals may be moved about many times – so that farmers, transport people and meat companies can make money from cross border subsidies. Animals are shipped from steel pen to auction house to steel pen to slaughterhouse. Thousands of animals die from "shipping fever'. Sheep and lambs are so stressed that they collapse and die. Chickens are packed into tiny cages. Pigs have their tails cut off (without an anaesthetic, of course) to prevent stress induced tail biting. Animals shipped to the Middle East are eventually killed in a brutal ritualistic style of slaughter. The people who are involved in moving and killing animals are truly the dregs of our society. These are the sort of people who would have happily operated German gas chambers during the Second World War. 250,000 Murders Every Hour Animal transport is big business because approximately 2,000,000 animals are murdered every working day in British abattoirs. That's 250,000 murders every hour, 4,167 murders every minute and 69 murders every second. Animals are supposed to be stunned before they are killed – so that they aren't conscious when their throats are cut. But stunning is a pretty ineffective business. The people who do it aren't trained – not, at least, in a way that I would regard as proper training – and too many animals are conscious and terrified when they are killed. (It is surely not irrelevant that more than half the abattoir owners in Britain have a criminal record.) Moreover, there is now evidence to show that the electric shock which is allegedly used to knock animals unconscious may fail to work properly. Even after they have been stunned animals do feel intense pain. They are paralysed. But they can feel pain.
Downed pig (pig too sick even to stand) and a dead
pig left behind in a slaughterhouse holding area.
Even if stunning worked well not all animals would benefit for not all animals are stunned before killing. The law allows Jews to slaughter all the animals they kill without stunning them first. It is called ritual slaughter. Some ritual. Think about this: the animals killed for consumption by Jews are quite conscious when their throats are cut. This is such a barbaric ritual that I'm surprised there isn't someone dancing around in war-paint and feathers while the killing is being done. In Britain around 60,000 cows and calves, 30,000 sheep and lambs and 2,500,000 hens are killed by Jewish slaughterers every year. Since not all the meat obtained from killing animals the Jewish way is eaten by Jews the meat which is left over can be sold for ordinary consumption. So, whether you are Jewish or not, if you eat meat there is a good chance that the meat you buy comes from an animal which was killed in this truly cruel barbaric way. How Jews can support what happens in slaughterhouses in their name I do not understand. I cannot imagine that any god could possibly condone such activities. (This has, incidentally, absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with race or religion. I will probably be accused of being anti semitic by bigots who do not understand that my objection to ritual slaughter has nothing to do with religion and everything to do with respect for animals.) "It is often said that if slaughterhouses were made of glass most people would be vegetarians," wrote Jeffrey Masson and Susan McCarthy in their vitally important book When Elephants Weep, adding that: "If the general public knew what went on inside animal experimentation laboratories, they would be abolished." But, as Masson and McCarthy point out slaughterhouses are virtually invisible because that is what the public want. People know what goes on inside abattoirs but they do not want to be reminded of the horrors perpetrated in their name. Enough To Make You Proud Imagine. You are taken from a field where you are living with your family. You are separated from your surroundings and your loved ones and you are crammed into a lorry. You are then driven for hours in discomfort, without food or water and in a constant rain of urine and faeces to a slaughterhouse. There are you kept waiting – afraid and uncertain. Finally, you are taken into a blood stained building where your throat is cut. You then slowly bleed to death, terrified, confused, and in pain. It may take you minutes to die. Doesn't it all make you proud to be human. Proud to a member of the Master Species?
Hung upside down by shackles, thousands of chickens are killed every hour at the slaughterhouse.
Brutal, Crude And Merciless The butcher's shop is the ultimate human disgrace; as much an indignity to man himself as it is to the slaughtered creatures whose blood decorates its every surface; their skinless corpses hung, as though with pride, from hooks in the window. Walking past a window in which skinned corpses are displayed is nauseating. Every sensitive council should immediately pass a law insisting that butchers cover up their windows and serve their awful wares behind closed doors. I have no doubt that if there was a market for such delicacies the crude, ruthless and mindless 'people' who operate and work in these shops would happily sell babies' brains, young boys' hearts, breasts sliced from teenage girls' bony chests and feet hacked from young mothers. Butchers are, inevitably, a hard-hearted group: insensitive and bloodthirsty, with no redeeming features. Given half a chance they would happily sell the corpses of the elderly, brought fresh from the killing rooms of hospitals and hospices in their neighbourhood. Jean Jacques Rousseau, the French philosopher, argued that butchers (whose daily trade is death and who cannot, therefore, be regarded as being blessed with the normal quota of compassion) should not be allowed to sit on juries or testify in court.
Hanging upside down and shackled by their
feet, turkeys enter the slaughterhouse.
Butchers are a dying breed. Good riddance to them all. Farming, too, is a brutal, crude, merciless business. Chicks never see a hen and hens are kept in tiny battery cages. (Those who eat eggs often argue that hens lay more eggs than they can hatch. But hens exhaust themselves by laying so many eggs simply because their eggs are taken away from them.) Dairy cows are artificially inseminated. As soon as they give birth their calf is ripped away from them. Calves are kept chained in tiny stalls and fed on a chemical rich diet for veal production. The mother's milk is sucked out along rubber tubes and sold by the massive dairy industry. Farmers defend the practice of taking milk from cows by arguing that without its calf the cow has milk to spare. They do not question their right to take the calf from the cow. They argue that the calf can be given other food. They do not understand that no milk is as good for a calf as its mother's milk. They continue to pump the milk out of the cow until the poor creatures becomes weakened and exhausted. Sheep are forced to breed at an unusual and unhealthy rate so that their lambs can be sold for extra profit. And sheep are shorn not only in the early summer (when they may be hot and uncomfortable and welcome a few months without a heavy fleece) but also, quite cruelly, during the winter when they need the warmth their own wool provides. A Contemptible Breed Like many sentient individuals I loathe farmers. I regard them as a contemptible breed with more front than Blackpool and with as poorly developed a sense of personal responsibility as modern politicians. When, entirely through own stupidity and greed, they created the Mad Cow crisis their instinctive reaction was not to apologise to their customers, or to wring their hands and beg forgiveness, but to demand compensation from the government. The Mad Cow scandal should have awakened us all to the fact that most farmers – like the rest of the huge army of slimy good for nothings involved in the dead animal business – are postulant, crooked, self-centered, stupid and greedy, concerned only with their own profits.
In intensive dairy states like California, the
offspring of dairy cows are raised in crates at calf ranches. The
males are commonly used for beef or veal, while the females are used
to replace worn out dairy cows in the milking herd.
But the eternally damned farmers are so skilful at manipulating politicians and the media that they have actually managed to make many people feel sorry for them. Open your newspaper or turn on your television set and you will probably discover that the farmers, the butchers and the abattoir workers are, yet again, bleating about financial losses, redundancies and bleak futures. "We have screwed up yet again so you will have to give us money to make sure that we don't suffer financially" is the oft repeated communal cry from terror stained farmyards all over the nation. And the government, accustomed to handing out taxpayers' money to rich farmers, immediately complies. "Whoops, oh dear," the politicians cry. "How terrible for you. How much money would you like? Will it be all right if we send round a lorry load of the stuff on Thursday?" "Send the lorry direct to the bank," say the farmers wearily. "We can't be bothered to handle it ourselves." You will, of course, have noticed that the individuals who contracted Mad Cow Disease were not offered compensation by the government or the farmers. And no one will be more surprised than I am if their families ever receive any compensation. (In late 1998 the British Labour government announced that it was going to give farmers another £100 million in compensation. This time much of the money was intended for hill farmers who were said to be 'suffering' because the lambs they were forcefully taking from their mothers and selling were fetching just 25 pence in livestock markets. It is difficult to understand why the Labour government should feel this need to compensate farmers rather than to suggest that they might be better occupied finding some other more gainful and less barbaric form of employment.) Manipulative Money Grubbers For years now farmers, and others involved in the meat business, have taken risks with the lives of those who buy their products simply to make an extra few billion pounds profit. It was the farmers – manipulative money grubbers that they are – who chose to feed their animals with the food which created the problem. Years ago those in the animal murdering business could have protected themselves – and the meat eating world – from the horrors of Mad Cow Disease. They could have taken tougher, stricter action. But they didn't. They – and the government – falsely insisted that there wasn't a problem.
Constantly rubbing against their wire
cages, egg laying hens suffer from severe feather loss.
Even if they didn't know for certain that there was a problem coming (and I think they should have known) they should have realised that there was a big risk. What would happen if any other businessman cut corners, took risks with his customers' lives and caused widespread panic and chaos? Would he expect his customers to pay for all his losses and give him compensation to make sure that he didn't lose any money? Or would he start looking for a sharp lawyer to protect him against the lawsuits that he knew would soon start thudding through his letterbox? Why are farmers (and the rest of the meat industry) treated in such a special way? Why were the people in the animal murdering business pitied during and after the Mad Cow Disease fiasco? Why did the taxpayer have to help them out? Why did you and I have to fork out our hard earned cash to pay for their greed inspired error? In short, why, in the name of a blood soaked abattoir worker's apron, were Britain's farmers given compensation for this self created problem? If the weather is bad does the government bale out the tourist industry? If village shops are put out of business by new superstores are they compensated? (These are, you will note, not problems which are self created. But nor are these industries which cause mass murder. Inexplicably, it seems that governments prefer to help an industry which causes its own problems and is responsible for an uncountable number of deaths.) If you buy a lottery ticket and you don't win do you expect the government to refund your stake money? If your house is worth less than you paid for it a few years ago are you going to go running to the Exchequer for financial help? The farming industry created Mad Cow Disease by turning herbivores into carnivores (actually, into cannibals). It was their financial problem – not ours. But the animal abusers have a huge amount of power over the current political system. Ignorance, Stupidity And Greed Apart from trying to feed us beef, milk and lamb contaminated with Mad Cow Disease our farmers have been working hard to ensure that our meat contains plenty of chemicals, drugs and hormones, that many of our eggs are infected and that just about everything that comes fresh from the farm will be contaminated with chemical sprays, fertilizers and pesticides. The overuse of antibiotics on farms has helped create a world in which infections are now rapidly increasing. I also believe that the reckless use of other drugs and hormones has contaminated farm products for decades. The over use of fertilisers, pesticides and other chemicals has polluted our water supplies and poisoned thousands of consumers. (There is some irony in the fact that although the tobacco industry has had to put warnings on its products, farmers – the other major cause of cancer in our modern society – just get bigger and bigger subsidies.) By getting rid of hedgerows and spraying their deathly crops with chemicals farmers have managed to do probably irreparable damage to our bird life. So, it is clear, if you want to win government support you simply have to screw up people's health, kill millions of animals in as cruel a way as possible and cause probably irreparable damage to the environment. Politicians will then give you whatever you ask for. Today, farmers are messing around with genetically manipulated animals and crops because they see more ways to increase their profits. They don't give a damn that they are playing a dangerous game and that they are likely to produce permanent and terrifying changes in our world. Farmers don't give a fig for your health or your children's health. All they care about is profits. A Doomed Trade The meat trade is doomed. There is now 22 carat gold evidence available to show that people who eat meat are far more likely to get cancer and die young. (Indeed, since it is impossible to be sure that the animal the meat eater consumes doesn't itself have cancer there is a good chance that the nice juicy steak into which the meat eater tucks with such relish could well contain a nice juicy lump of cancer in the middle of it. "How do you like your cancer cooked, sir?" "Mustard with your fried cancer, madam?")
Eating meat is bad for you and bad for the rest of the world too. When the meat trade is finished there will never again be any need for human beings to starve. Feeding cattle uses up vast quantities of grain and good land and meat eaters are directly responsible for the starving millions in Africa and Asia. Perhaps, in a few years time restaurants will have meat eating sections and vegetarian sections in the same way that they now have smoking and non smoking sections. The meat eaters will be crammed at the back in dark and dingy corners. Meanwhile, those of us who want to change the world, should remind meat eaters that if they eat bits of animal flesh they cannot be practising Christians, Catholics or Jews. (The bible says: "flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat." Does anyone seriously believe that even the barbaric Jewish method of killing can empty every drop of blood from an animal's body?). Abuse In The Name Of Science We also abuse animals in the name of science. Every thirty seconds another thousand animals are tortured to death in laboratories around the world. Cats, kittens, puppies, dogs, monkeys, rats, hamsters: you name the species they torture it and kill it. How much difference is there between performing an experiment on a primate and performing the same experiment on a child?
Beagle used in burn
experiments
The scientists who perform animal experiments, and their supporters, claim that what they do helps human beings. This is, of course, a lie. The evidence shows quite clearly that no animal experiment ever helped a human being. Moreover, animals are so completely different to people that experiments on animals are dangerously misleading. I find it impossible to escape the conclusion that thousands of experiments have been conducted on animals for money, personal advancement or intellectual curiosity. It is disingenuous to claim that scientists are any different to barbarians watching cock-fighting, bull-fighting or other spectacles of abuse. What difference is there between those who torment animals in the name of science and the sort of people who abuse children, beat their wives or bully the weak. Drug companies use animal experiments to get new products on the market without testing them properly. If tests show that a new drug causes cancer in five animal species the company will dismiss the evidence as irrelevant – because animals are different to people. But, apparently without embarrassment or shame, they will then use the one experiment which shows that their new drug doesn't cause cancer in a sixth species to get their product on the market. (Cosmetic companies use animals in a variety of ways. Countless rabbits have had chemicals dropped into their eyes in pointless and unnecessary 'toxicity' tests. But it is in so-called 'medical research' that animals are most widely used. And it is 'medical research' which so often provides the excuse for the terrible things researchers do to animals.) Primates are killed so that hunters can capture their infants and sell them to British vivisectors who are paid with money contributed by British taxpayers. Special breeding facilities produce millions of mice, rabbits, rats, cats and other animals. The animals are kept in small, sterile cages – separated from one another's comfort. The people who perform experiments on animals are largely incompetent and stupid. Their experiments are always worthless and often badly done. Successive Home Secretaries have protected vivisectors by claiming that all applications for licences to experiment on animals should be treated as "confidential'. The result has been that those who oppose animal experiments have never had the opportunity to question the validity of experiments before they have started.
Eyes sewn shut with sonar
device attached to "Britches"
It is hardly surprising that, with drug companies relying so heavily on animal experiments, one in six people in hospital are there because they have been made ill by doctors. Vivisectors receive vast amounts of money (much of it provided by from drug companies but a good deal of it provided by the government) but have produced consistently worthless results. The only consistent factor about animal experiments is their pointlessness. Some years ago I conducted a survey of British doctors which showed a great scepticism about, and disapproval of, animal experiments. Here is a summary of the results of that survey:
Despite many claims to the contrary, vivisectors regularly break guidelines for animal care. I have in my possession a photograph of a monkey in a laboratory which has the word 'crap' written on its forehead. Vivisection is nothing more than a form of pseudoscientific black magic whose practitioners have promised much but who have in reality constantly obstructed medical progress. It is no coincidence that vivisectors frequently refer to the animals they torture and kill as being 'sacrificed'. I believe that vivisectors – and there are 20,000 in Britain alone – are the sort of people who have in the past enjoyed experimenting on blacks or Jews. If society currently allowed it I have no doubt that vivisectors would happily take Jews and the mentally ill into their laboratories instead of (or, as well as) baboons and chimpanzees. What difference is there in the mental make up of a serial murderer and a vivisector. And yet vivisectors often expect, claim (and receive) respect in our society. Those who oppose vivisection are expected to prove that animal experiments are unnecessary and without scientific value. In any sane and just world it would be the job of the vivisectors to prove that their work was essential and valuable. (Something they would not, of course, be able to do.) The vivisectors' entirely false claims that their barbarous and merciless experiments are of value (and their utterly immoral argument that the end justifies the means) are accepted without question because to question them would be to force ourselves to face difficult and painful truths. Vivisection is totally supported by just about every section of the British establishment. Organisations which oppose vivisection are denied charitable status whereas organisations which have charitable status, and can, therefore, claim all the associated tax benefits, are allowed to campaign vigorously for vivisection – and perform vivisection too!. What sort of world is it which gives special charitable status to organisations which abuse animals and yet denies charitable status to organisations which want to save animals? I've been arguing for a complete ban on animal experiments for years. The supporters of vivisection now refuse to debate with me for one very simple reason: they always lose. In the autumn of 1998 I began a guest appearance on a two hour long nationwide radio programme by challenging vivisectors and vivisectionists to name one disease for which a cure had been found through vivisection. Despite the fact that many vivisectionists telephoned the programme not one managed to come up with a disease which for which vivisection had been an essential or integral part of the research process. I wasn't surprised. Vivisection is useless, always has been useless and always will be useless. I loathe and despise scientists who perform animal experiments. I think they are truly beyond understanding, forgiveness or redemption. I believe they are the grown up, authorised versions of those evil eyed, spotty faced children who somehow obtain warped, distorted pleasure from pulling the wings off flies or peppering passing cats with airgun pellets. Who, other than vivisectors, could argue that animals do not cry or moan or whimper in pain but are merely "vocalising'. How could any sane, sentient being not feel disgusted by what goes on in animal research laboratories? There can be no moral or ethical justification for the legalised mayhem which, worldwide, results in the slow, painful destruction of around 1,000 dogs, cats, kittens, puppies, monkeys, rabbits and other animals every thirty seconds. In Britain, where nearly 3 million experiments are performed every year on cats, kittens, dogs, puppies and other animals there are just 21 inspectors to make sure that vivisectors obey what rules exist about animal treatment. The Home Office claims that the effectiveness of this tiny group of inspectors: "depends upon ability to gain the respect and cooperation of the scientific community as, to function, inspectors must have unfettered access to the current and future plans of scientists". This seems as odd to me as a statement that the effectiveness of the police: "depends upon the ability to gain the respect and cooperation of the criminal community as, to function, inspectors must have unfettered access to the current and future plans of criminals". Why, I wonder, should vivisectors, arch animal abusers, be treated with such tenderness. A Hollow Excuse The excuse which is always offered for this evil business is that animal experiments help doctors treat human patients more effectively. "If it's the health of my kid or the lives of a thousand cats and dogs then the dogs and cats have to be sacrificed," said one young father I know. "Why would scientists do animal experiments if they weren't useful?" demanded a misguided young mother. "I don't want to know what they do," she added quickly. "But I'm sure they wouldn't do what they do if it wasn't necessary." Those who believe that animal experiments are useful exhibit a rather pathetic mixture of ignorance and naivete. They don't want to know the facts because the facts are too awful to contemplate. Ignorance And Naivety The ignorance and naivety is widespread. One BBC producer refused to broadcast an interview in which I had described experiments involving dogs. "They didn't use dogs," the producer apparently said after talking to the people who had done the experiments. "They only used dog tissue." The sad and savage but, I believe, undeniable truth is that no experiment performed on an animal has ever saved a human life. Animal experiments are so unreliable that no doctor with a brain larger than a pea would ever trust any so called evidence obtained by an animal researcher. On the contrary, I believe that animal experiments are not only entirely useless but that they are a major cause of human illness, misery and death. The evidence for these stout and possibly startling assertions is not difficult to find. I can give you the names of dozens of frequently prescribed drugs – widely used around the world – which are known to cause cancer or other serious diseases when given to animals. But this evidence is ignored because doctors know damned well that the fact that a drug causes cancer in an animal has no relevance to human beings. When a drug company tests a new drug on animals it does so because it cannot lose. If the experiment shows that the drug does not kill the animal the drug company can claim that its tests have shown the drug to be safe. On the other hand if the experiment shows that the drug does kill the animal the drug company will dismiss the research evidence on the grounds that animals are different to people. The drug companies win every time. People (and the animals, of course) are the innocent losers. Animal experiments are done because they are useful – to the drug companies not people. Animal experiments give drug companies no-lose evidence which will be accepted by governments around the world. Drug companies know that extensive testing on human beings would be costly and time consuming. More important: many new drugs would never obtain a licence for widespread use if the pre-launch tests on people were too extensive (because dangerous and possibly lethal side effects would undoubtedly be discovered at at an embarrassingly early stage). If animal experiments were banned the drug companies would lose billions of pounds a year in lost revenue. The thousands of scientists who perform and support animal experiments will deny all this, of course. What else are they to do? You can hardly expect them to admit that their evil but well paid work is inspired by corporate greed and self interest rather than more noble motives. The fact is that they do not have the strength of spirit to turn their backs on the big money offered by the drug companies. And many know that if they admit that animal experimentation is flawed beyond redemption they will be admitting that they have wasted their lives. Some of them undoubtedly want to believe their own propaganda. Those who possess some vestige of a conscience probably only sleep by denying to themselves the horror of what they do. Scorned, Laughed At, Ruined And Imprisoned History is full of examples of original thinkers who have been scorned, laughed at, ruined and imprisoned for daring to be creative and original and (most heinous a crime of all) for having the temerity to question (and therefore threaten) the status and authority of the establishment. Socrates was condemned to death for being too curious. Dante was condemned to be burned at the stake. The works of Confucius were still banned in China two and a half thousand years after his death. Spinoza was denounced for being independent and every schoolchild knows about Galileo's battles with the Church. Paracelsus was the greatest influence on medical thinking since Hippocrates but the establishment regarded him as a trouble maker and persecuted him all around Europe. (He is still regarded with considerable fear and distaste by the medical establishment which, on the whole, prefers not to acknowledge his existence or his importance). Semmelweiss, the Austrian obstetrician was ostracised by the medical profession for daring to criticise filthy medical practices. Thoreau was imprisoned for sticking to his ideals. Wilbur and Orville Wright were dismissed as hoaxsters by the Scientific American, the US Army and most American scientists. When Wilhelm Röntgen discovered X rays his achievement was described as an elaborate hoax by one of Britain's most eminent scientists. The relationship between a diet low in vitamin C and the development of scurvy was first described in 1636 by John Woodall. James Lind reintroduced the idea in 1747 but it wasn't until 1795 that the British Admiralty decreed that lemon juice should be part of every sailor's diet. Only God can possibly know how many sailors died as a result of this appalling example of cooperative prejudice. The inventors of turbine power, the electric telegraph, the tank, the electric light, television and space travel were all laughed at or ignored by the scientific establishment. William Reich's books were burned by the Nazis in the 1930s and by the American government in the 1950s. (The Federal Food and Drug Administration was still burning his books in 1960). More recently Dr Dean Ornish, was who responsible for devising a safe, effective treatment programme for heart disease that depends upon a vegetarian diet, exercise and relaxation was denied funds by the American National Institutes of Health and the American Heart Association. The irony about science (which is ostensibly a search for new truths) is that most members of any scientific establishment seem dedicated to opposing real progress and suppressing original thought. There is room for original thought and originality in most areas of intellectual thought except science; the one area which one might suppose would depend almost exclusively upon original thinking. One can attack existing political or economic theories with some freedom but any scientist with a new and original idea is likely to be regarded as a dangerous crank rather than an original scientist whose ideas may be worth evaluation. When I said on the radio recently that I thought that it was vital to maintain an open mind another panellist on the same programme commented that in his view: "Open minds are empty minds." This grossly prejudiced viewpoint is quite common among many of the world's best known scientists and, together with a misplaced sense of professional loyalty, helps to explain why the vast majority of new and original ideas are dismissed out of hand, and their authors sneered at and dismissed as cranks and nutcases. Anyone who opposes the use of animals in experiments will be marginalised and dismissed as out of step with the scientific establishment. The fact that the scientific evidence shows, without any doubt whatsoever, that animal experiments are entirely worthless, does not seem to be regarded as relevant by the illogical and prejudiced supporters of vivisection. They have each taken their thirty pieces of silver and are loyal to their paymasters. More Than Just An Evil Abuse Animal experimentation is the most evil manifestation of animal abuse. Even if it were useful I would oppose it on moral and ethical grounds.
Cat with electrode implant, rescued from Texas Tech university But animal experimentation is more than just an evil abuse of animals (terrible though that is). It is one of the main reasons why doctors are now as big a cause of illness and death as are cancer and heart disease. Animal experiments are not merely part of a major scientific cock up. They are part of a huge, international conspiracy. The aim is simply to make money. And the price – the lives of millions of animals and people – is considered acceptable. Remember: animal experiments kill people as well as animals. (It is interesting to note that animal experiments may sometimes be performed in order to enable companies to continue damaging human beings. For example, dogs, who would never voluntarily choose to do anything so stupid and self-damaging, were forced to smoke cigarettes in bizarre and utterly pointless experiments. I have a suspicion that these experiments were done to show that the tobacco companies were generously using their own money in order to investigate the links between tobacco and cancer while at the same time holding back the moment at which it would have to be admitted that tobacco did cause cancer in humans. Animal experiments are often used in this way.) Those who support the use and abuse of animals in the name of science will, it seems, stop at nothing. I have spent most of my life campaigning against injustices to human beings and animals and have become accustomed to attempts at intimidation but none of my campaigns have ever attracted quite so much violent, uncontrolled, snarling hostility as my campaign to stop animal experiments. I oppose the use of animals in laboratory experiments – one of the great growth industries of our time – for numerous reasons. I believe with all my heart and soul that animal experiments are morally, scientifically and ethically wrong. What right can scientists possibly have to torture, burn and cut animals of other species? What excuse can there be for such obscene cruelty?
Dogs at Carolina Biological Supply Company We should never forget that in the false name of science one thousand kittens, cats, puppies, dogs, monkeys, rabbits and other animals are tortured and murdered every thirty seconds. They are isolated, subjected to agonising pain, ignored, maltreated and left to die in laboratories around the world. By any standards of morality this must be wrong. It is all made worse by the fact that animal experiments are totally useless and of no use to anyone concerned with scientific truth. If vivisection were stopped tomorrow it would never be introduced again because no one would ever be able to find an argument supporting its introduction. Animal experiments are so barbaric and so unsupportable on moral, ethical, scientific or medical grounds that once they are stopped no one will ever dream of letting them start again. Vivisection is the greatest abuse of our time and I find it difficult to understand the minds of those who practise and support this evil activity. The only reason that vivisection has not yet been stopped is that the battle of words has to be fought not just against waves of commercially sustained prejudice but also against apparently endless seas of ignorance and indifference. Animal experiments are done in our names. Those who have done nothing to stop this evil, barbaric and pointless cruelty do not deserve to sleep at night. How We Can Really Learn From Animals Animals can help doctors save human patients. But through observation – not experimentation. Many vertebrates – including monkeys, pigs and elephants, use plants as medicines as well as food. Sick animals seek out and eat plants which they know will help them; they eat some plants, they hold others in their mouths (doctors call it buccal absorption) and they rub yet others onto their skin (doctors call that topical application). Ethiopian baboons who are at risk of developing schistosomiasis eat fruits, which are rich in a potent antischistosome drug. Chimpanzees in Tanzania use a herb which has a powerful antifungal, antibacterial and antinematode activity. If they just ate the herb it wouldn't work because the valuable compound would be destroyed by stomach acidity. So they hold the leaf in their mouths in the same way that angina patients are encouraged to hold glyceryl trinitrate in their mouths to expedite absorption. Kodiak bears apply a drug topically which helps to kill parasites. They scratch the root into their fur. European starlings combat parasitisation to their nests by fumigating incubating eggs. Lethargic chimps with diarrhoea treat themselves with a herb. Howler monkeys use herbal medicines to control birth spacing and to determine the sex of their offspring. We can learn an enormous amount by watching other animals. But instead of watching these sensitive, intelligent and thoughtful creatures the vandals in white coats cage them, torture them and kill them with all the scientific sense of youthful hooligans tearing the wings off butterflies. In a generation or so our descendants will look back at the vivisectors and wonder not just at the sort of people they were, but at the sort of people we were to let them do what they did. Animal experiments must stop. And they must stop now. For your sake; for your childrens' sake; and for the sake of the animals the vivisectors kill. Just For Fun Britons also abuse animals for fun. We complain about bear baiting in Asia and about bull fighting in Spain. But we are in no position to condemn. In Britain people put on fancy dress and ride around chasing foxes, stags and other animals to their death. They do this primarily as entertainment but claim that they are trying to preserve the countryside. If challenged and threatened with an end to hunting they sulkily threaten to kill their horses and hounds if their fun is stopped. They don't even have the courage to admit that they are merely blood thirsty psychopaths who get a kick out of killing. Hunting continues in Britain because it was preserved by a Labour government, despite the fact that the people and parliament opposed this barbaric remnant of our infant civilisation. A year after it dramatically refused to help a private members bill to ban hunting (in November 1997) the Labour government blocked any prospect at all of a ban on hunting being introduced into parliament. It was reported that the government (the same Labour government which had, when in opposition, stated its total commitment to banning hunting) feared that outlawing hunting would damage Labour's popularity in rural areas. The stag or the fox being chased by a pack of yapping hounds and a bunch of ignorant rural yahoos on horseback is just as terrified as you would be if you were being chased by a gang of bloodthirsty hooligans on motorbikes. Hunters (whether they hunt with gun or on horseback) and hunt supporters are, without exception, wicked and barbaric people. When two men on a drunken hunting trip failed to find any deer they cold bloodedly murdered a deaf, black man instead. Typical and probably 'normal' behaviour for a hunter. J. Howard Moore tells a sad story about two moose in his classic book The Universal Kinship. The two moose had been tracked by hunters all day long and towards the end of the day one of the moose was finally killed by a rifle shot. Instead of running away, the remaining moose lowered its head and sniffed at its dead companion. It then raised its head high and bellowed loudly. The ruthless hunters shot it. When the hunters reached the two moose they found that they one they had shot first had been blind and that the second moose, which had stayed with it even after death, had been acting as its pilot. Waterfowl mate for life but human beings randomly shoot one and leave the other to mourn. The waterfowl which is left behind often falls into a deep depression.It may die slowly of starvation. Hunters and their supporters are the sort of people who used to run the slavery trade just a few score years ago; they are not a sensitive group and they find it difficult to understand words such as 'empathy' and 'respect'. Hunters are pretty stupid and most of them aren't very good shots either. French hunters shot 45 of their fellow hunters dead in one recent season. More than 100 hunters were seriously injured by other hunters. A Dirty Fight The last few years of the fight for animal rights is going to be a dirty fight. Those who want to continue abusing animals – whether for money or for fun – fight foul. Although my campaigning on behalf of animals and people has always been entirely legal I have been followed by private detectives, my life has been threatened and my telephone has been tapped by those who want to silence me. I have, of course, also been subjected to a considerable amount of legal harassment. In my experience supporting animal rights seems to attract a particularly virulent type of opposition – partly, I suspect, because this is the last great moral debate of our times (and many people feel guilty and slightly uncomfortable about the side they have chosen to support) and partly because the commercial forces which are dependant upon continuing animal abuse are large and powerful. I do not approve of or support the use of violence in the fight against cruelty animals. In particular, I do not approve of the use of violence against animal abusers. When you fight against violence with violence you simply double the amount of violence. But I do think that it is curious to note that when South African civil rights leaders used violence in their fight for justice and equality they were regarded as folk heroes and greeted with adoration by those who undoubtedly regard themselves as free thinking radicals. But whenever animal rights protestors have indicated a willingness to take relatively modest action against property in their fight against animal abuse they have aroused almost unrelieved opposition from those same self-styled, free-thinking radicals. It seems that the rules vary according to the battle being fought. The battle against apartheid threatened virtually no institutions outside South Africa but the battle against animal abuse threatens numerous large, profitable institutions. Many of Britain's self styled free thinking radicals are, it seems, more closely allied to the needs of the establishment (and the controlling institutions) than they might like us to think. Left wing pseudointellectuals and their broadsheet champions are not quite as left wing or as intellectual as they like to think they are. There are going to be some surprising and unexpected casualties in the last great civil rights battle. It isn't just the pseudointellectual regiments of the false left who are going to have to face some unpleasant truths as the battle against animal cruelty continues. Many other groups are going to suffer too. For example, official Catholic teaching is that animals are here for man to use in any way he sees fit: to eat, kill for fun or play around with in the laboratory. Many Catholics believe that it is a sin to show affection to animals. Jews kill animals for food in the most barbaric way imaginable. And sanctimonious Christians frequently inform me that it is perfectly all right to treat animals in any way we wish because they don't have souls. Some exponents of the Christian religion teach that non-human races have no reason for their existence other than to serve man. They offer no evidence to support this arrogant and outrageous suggestion. Tragically, too many citizens who might have the potential to care, pretend that none of this is happening. They close their eyes, partly because they are ignorant of the truth about the way animals are abused, partly because they are still subject to long established prejudices in favour of human beings, partly because they are frightened (the animal abusers are rough, ruthless and powerful people with a lot of money to spend on preserving their power) and partly because they do not believe that anything they do can possibly change the way things are. Complacent And Sanctimonious I met a stranger recently who was, so he told me, a religious man. He had an aura of complacent, sanctimonious superiority. He asked me why I spent so much of my life fighting battles and trying to change the world. "Why, for example, do you put so much effort into trying to stop animal experiments?" "I want to stop the cruelty," I told him. "Ah!" he said, smiling and pointing a finger at me. "But what is cruelty?" I stared at him for a moment. I had not thought the concept in need of clarification. I thought of Gertrude Stein. Cruelty is cruelty is cruelty is cruelty. "Unjustified violence causing unnecessary pain," I suggested. "If someone pours a toxic chemical into the brain of a conscious cat I would call that cruelty." "But the act of cruelty may be an act of kindness. How do you know that goodness does not come out of those experiments which you abhor?" he demanded. "Even if good did come out of them – which it does not – I would not consider them justifiable," I said. He leant forward across the table and smiled. "Isn't this enjoyable?" he said. "I do find debate so invigorating, don't you?" I sat on my hands. "If one experiment on one rat could banish all human diseases it would not be justified," I told him. "Oh," he said, clearly surprised. "If you support animal experimentation then where do you draw the line? A cat is more intelligent than a baby. Do you support experimentation on babies? What about the elderly? The insane? Do you think that Mengele's work was justified?" "Ah, now that is unfair," he said, suddenly rather put out. But still he smiled. I began to feel that he was a man in whose vocabulary passion did not figure largely. I found him loathsome, contemptible and vapid but there was nothing there to hate. He was that most nauseating of creatures: a not very bright pseudo-intellectual. "The world must be allowed to change at its own pace," he said. "Over thousands of years if necessary. That is the only type of change that will last." I stared at him. "But slavery was abolished through protest," I argued. "Ah," he said. "But has anything really changed? Are not today's citizens just as much in bondage as those slaves of yesterday?" "Women have the vote and apartheid has been smashed," I pointed out, numbed by the temerity of a man who could equate the slavery of the clock, the daily bus and the monthly wage packet to the slavery of the whip and outright ownership. I rather fancied that the man at the end of the whip would swap his bloody scars for the right to choose a seat on the 8.15 to Paddington. "Change came about because people protested," I said. He shook his head. "I suspect that these changes would have eventually occurred without all the fuss and shouting." He smiled smugly. "The only true way to improve the world is to encourage each individual to become a better person," he said. "Otherwise when you banish one evil another will come in its place." "But if you say nothing there will always be evil!" I protested. "Even if 99% of the population become good the 1% of psychopaths who are left will disrupt and destroy and spread evil." "Then we must wait until they too are turned to goodness," he replied. This was clearly a man of apparently unending patience where the pain and suffering of other creatures was concerned. I stared out of the window; frustrated, angry and saddened by this man's deep callousness and the extraordinary extent of his self delusion. I felt sickened by his complacent, comfortable, patronising smugness; nauseated by his unquestioning, uncaring, unseeing mediocrity. No vision, no passion, no love. He seemed full of self satisfaction and he exuded complacency. "Of course," he said, "I do concede that you may be partly right in what you say about animal experiments." "But if you concede that I am partly right," I said, "don't you want to do anything to right the wrong that exists? If one lamb, one puppy, one kitten, one mouse is treated cruelly do you not feel an urge to do something?" He looked at me without comprehension. His eyes were empty of true understanding or compassion. A religious man but a man without a soul. I knew he did not understand. I felt then, and still feel, almost suffocated by sadness; a great universal sadness. I am no biblical scholar but I found myself remembering the scene where Jesus Christ walks into a church and finds it packed with money lenders and merchants (probably selling the early equivalent of postcards, slide sets, videos and souvenir ashtrays). Christ loses his temper, pushes over all the tables and throws out the money lenders and the merchants. My sadness is that there are millions like that stranger; he is no rarity in this world. They are driven by a philosophy of avoidance. Avoid responsibility. Avoid conflict. Avoid action. Cross over the road to avoid the blood, the embarrassment or the involvement. Too often, those who claim to have strong religious principles do not seem to be driven to fight very hard (if at all) for the downtrodden and the underprivileged. Ignorance can be forgiven but wilful avoidance cannot. Those who neatly sidestep responsibility and produce pseudo-intellectual arguments designed to justify their silence in the face of injustice can never be forgiven. Those who go through life blinkered to injustice and to the pain and suffering of others condone cruelty. It is their silence which allows cruelty. I like animals. And so does my god.
Animal being prepared for head transplant
Part Two: Excuses, Excuses
A monkey is held rigidly in a blood-spattered restraining chair. Note the dried blood which has seeped around the area where the brain has been exposed and implanted with electrodes and other devices. "What you do not like when done to yourself do not do to others. " Confucius Chapter One: They Claim That Animals Are Not Sentient Creatures "...man and the higher animals, especially the primates, all have the same senses, intuitions, and sensations, similar passions, affections, and emotions, even the more complex ones such as jealousy, suspicion, emulation, gratitude and magnanimity; they practice deceit and are revengeful; they are sometimes susceptible to ridicule, and even have a sense of humour; they feel wonder and curiosity; they possess the same faculties of imitation, attention, deliberation, choice, memory, imagination, the association of ideas, and reason though in very different degrees. " Charles Darwin There is really only one underlying reason for animal abuse. There is only one reason why Labour broke its promises – and why animal abuse continues. The bottom line, the real reason why Labour betrayed animals and voters alike, is a five letter word beginning with M and ending in Y. But animal abusers have, over the years, offered an almost endless series of well rehearsed, oft-repeated pseudo-arguments to excuse their barbaric behaviour. These excuses have been frequently used to help a modern Labour government which must, at times, have come perilously close to shame and embarrassment. For example, those who abuse animals frequently claim that animals do not need or deserve special treatment because they are not 'sentient' creatures – in other words that they are not conscious creatures with the capacity to suffer and/or experience enjoyment or happiness. A similar argument was used by those who supported slavery. The slavery proponents argued that Negroes did not blush because they were incapable of shame and were, therefore, not fully human. Interestingly a number of animals and birds have been observed to blush when excited (and do, therefore, satisfy these traditional requirements for 'human' behaviour). The Tasmanian devil, the turkey, macaws and monkeys are among the creatures known to blush. (Macaws, for example, have been reported to blush when accidentally falling while clambering down off a perch.) It was also argued that black people were not capable of looking after themselves or their own interests because they were irrational. This was regarded as a good excuse for keeping black people in "protective custody', and for exposing them to unlimited abuse. Animal abusers are similarly inventive (but shallow) when attempting to excuse their cruel behaviour. Showing an extraordinary level of inconsistency and intellectual emptiness supporters of animal abuse have claimed, when defending fox hunting, that although animals are not sentient and have no feelings they 'enjoy' being hunted. It is difficult to see how anyone can possibly hope to sustain the argument that animals who are not sentient can 'enjoy' anything but the supporters of animal abuse are full of contradictions, double-speak and self-deceit. People who deny that animals can suffer will also claim that animals can be cruel. (How can an animal be cruel if the animal to which it is supposed to be cruel cannot suffer? Ignorance And Abuse The intellectual abuse and slander of animals has had an effect. Many people now don't care a damn about animals because they do not think of them as sentient creatures. It is this ignorance which is partly to blame for the fact that the cruel and abusive are allowed to continue to be cruel and abusive. Sitting in a pub one day I couldn't help overhearing a telling conversation at the next table. A woman told her quite respectable looking companions how a friend of hers, a laboratory scientist experimenting on animals, had got fed up with anaesthetizing the rats he was using. And so, she said, instead of giving them a chemical anaesthetic he used to swing them around by their tails and knock them out by banging their heads on the workbench. She illustrated this hideous manoeuvre several times with a slick hand motion. She and her companions then laughed heartily. If a teenage thug had been spotted doing this he would have been taken to court. But I believe that this sort of thing is a regular occurrence in laboratories, which are almost exclusively populated by sickening and barbaric psychopaths. I still find it frightening that the woman in the pub, and her mindless companions, thought the evil actions of this vivisector were simply funny. But it is that sort of mindless approval of what goes on in laboratories that ensures that nothing changes and that animals continue to be abused. Challenge At the start of 1997 Melvyn Bragg, a British television and radio presenter (who was later made a Lord by the Labour government), was reported to have claimed that animals have no feelings (and that it was, therefore, perfectly acceptable to hunt them to death). I challenged Bragg to debate whether or not animals have feelings live on a weekly radio programme which he presented. I also asked any other TV or radio presenters prepared to broadcast the debate to contact me. When I heard nothing from Bragg I tried to make the debate more interesting by challenging him to a £20,000 debate with the subject: "Do Animals Have Feelings?" I suggested that Bragg should argue that animals don't have feelings while I would argue that they do and that those listening to the debate should be invited to choose the winner (with the votes being counted by an independent authority). I also suggested that both of us put up £10,000 – with the winner of the debate receiving the £20,000. (I promised to give the £20,000 to anti vivisection campaigners). I heard nothing from Mr Bragg and as far as I know he has not repeated the alleged comment that animals have no feelings. Animals Have Moods And Feelings Anyone with an even modest intellect and a capacity to observe should know that animals have moods and feelings just the same as human beings do. And why shouldn't they? Why should human beings be so unique in that regard? (There is surely something odd and illogical – although undoubtedly convenient for their purposes – about animal abusers assuming that animals and people are similar enough in anatomical and physiological terms for vivisection experiments to be of value but, at the same time, assuming that animals have no emotions. But then there is something odd and illogical about most things that the animal abusers do.) The available scientific evidence proves that although animals are very different to human beings in physiological and anatomical terms (so different as to make vivisection experiments worthless) animals show a similar range of intellectual skills and emotions to human beings. They are not the same intellectual skills and emotions but that doesn't make them invalid. Animals do not recognise one another by name or clothing (as we often do). But they can recognise one another by smell, by sound and by instinctive skills which we either do not possess or have lost through not using them. Animals Are Sentient The truth, as anyone who is capable of reading and observing will know, is that animals are not only sentient but also exhibit many of those qualities which racists like to think of as being the preserve of the human race. (I think it is perfectly fair to describe those who claim that all 'good' qualities are the exclusive property of the human species as exhibiting a form of racism. The word 'speciesism' is, it seems to me, accurate but rather clumsy. We talk about the 'human race' and so, presumably, acknowledge that there are other 'non-human races'.) One of the absurdities of the discussion about hunting which has raged for recent years in Britain has been the sight of apparently intelligent people arguing about whether or not animals which are hunted suffer physical pain and/or mental anguish when they are being pursued to the death. How can there possibly be any debate? Those who do express doubt about this are telling us a great deal about their own innate lack of understanding and compassion, and their inability to learn from simple observation. If observation is not enough there is more than enough scientific evidence to show that birds, mammals, fish, reptiles and crustaceans all have nervous systems and all suffer pain. Darwin showed that fear produces similar responses in both humans and animals. The eyes and mouth open, the heart beats rapidly, teeth chatter, muscles tremble, hairs stand on end and so on. Parrots, like human beings, turn away and cover their eyes when confronted with a sight which overwhelms them. Young elephants who have seen their families killed by poachers wake up screaming in the night. Elephants who are suddenly separated from their social group may die suddenly of "broken heart syndrome'. Apes may fall down and faint when suddenly coming across a snake. If a man shouts at a dog the animal will cower and back away in fear. Animals Can Communicate Animal abusers sometimes assume that it is only humans who can communicate with one another. This is total nonsense. Even bees can communicate. They can tell one another the direction, distance and value of pollen sources quite a distance away. Animal abusers generally dismiss animal noises as simply that (noises) but scientists who have taken the time and trouble to listen carefully to the extraordinary variety of noises made by whales have found that there are patterns of what can only be described as speech which are repeated from one year to another. It is generally assumed that parrots merely repeat words they have heard without understanding what they mean. This is not true. Masson and McCarthy report how when a woman left her parrot at the vet's surgery for an operation the parrot, whose name was Alex, called out: "Come here. I love you. I'm sorry. I want to go back." The parrot clearly thought that he was being punished for some crime he had committed. Another parrot, in New Jersey, US saved the life of its 'owner' by calling for help. "Murder! Help! Come quick!" cried the parrot. When neighbours ran to the scene of the crime they found the parrot's 'owner' lying on the floor, unconscious, bleeding from a gash in his neck. The doctor who treated the man said that without the parrot's cries he would have died. The same parrot woke his owner and neighbours when a fire started in the house next door. How arrogant the animal abusers are to assume that human beings are the only species capable of communicating with one another, and of formulating a formal system of language. Vivisectors frequently laugh at the animals they torture and abuse. The concentration camp guards in the Second World War laughed at their victims and called them lice and rats. The vivisectors talk about 'sending a mouse to college' when they want to raise funds for experiments. We have the power to do what we will with creatures of other species. But no one has given us the right to abuse our power in this way. Civilised people respect, rather than abuse, the power they are given. Animals feel complex emotions. But the animal abusers claim that because animals do not satisfy our human criteria for intelligence small animals do not deserve any sympathy or understanding. It is but one step from this to arguing that unintelligent humans can be used for experiments, eaten or abused in any other selected way. Human beings who have taken the time and trouble to do so have found that they have been able to communicate well with chimpanzees and numerous other animals. It is known that monkeys can grasp the concept of numbers and can learn to count. Primates will often strive to make the peace after a hostile encounter. And uninvolved primates may help begin and cement the reconciliation. And yet vivisectors are given legal licences allowing them to do horrific things to these animals. Who gave human beings the right to hand out licences to torture? Capable Of Love Animals, like people, are capable of loving their partner, their families, their children, their leaders, their teachers, their friends and others who are important to them. An ape will show exactly the same signs of love and affection when dealing with her baby as a human mother will when dealing with her baby. Both will look longingly, tickle and play with their baby. Both feed their young, wash them, risk their lives for them and put up with their noise and unruly behaviour. Anyone who doubts that animals love their young should stand outside a farm yard when a calf has been taken away from a cow and listen to the heart breaking cries of anguish which result. Who knows what inner anguish accompanies those cries? Even fish will risk their lives to protect their young. In his seminal work The Universal Kinship (first published in 1906 and now largely forgotten) J. Howard Moore described how he put his hand into a pond near the nest of a perch. The courageous fish guarding the nest chased Moore's hand away and when Moore's hand was not removed quickly enough nipped it vigorously. Lewis Gompertz, who lived from 1779 to 1861 and was a potent champion of the rights of blacks, women and the poor (and, indeed, all oppressed human beings) was also a powerful champion of animals and was a founder of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. (Quite early on he was forced out of the Society.) In his book Moral Inquiries On the Situation Of Man And Of Brutes Gompertz wrote: "From some birds we may learn real constancy in conjugal affection, though in most instances their contracts only last for one season, but how strict do they keep this. They have no laws, no parchments, no parsons, no fear to injuring their characters, not even their own words to break in being untrue to each other: but their virtue is their laws, their parchments, their parsons, and their reputation; their deeds are their acts, their acts – their deeds: and from their own breasts do they honestly tear down to line the beds of their legitimate offspring." Gompertz described an incident illustrating the wisdom of blackbirds. "I observed a male blackbird flying about in an extreme state of agitation," he wrote. "And on my going to discover the cause of it, the bird retreated from me as I followed it, till it stopped at a nest containing a female bird sitting upon her eggs, near which there was a cat: in consequence of this I removed the cat, and the bird became quiet. After that, whenever the cat was about the place, the blackbird would come near my window, and would in the same manner direct me to some spot where the cat happened to be stationed." Gompertz, who also wrote about a male blackbird which had attacked a cat which had caught its female partner, reported three true incidents which illustrated animal kindness and wisdom. The first concerned two goats which had met one another on a narrow path between two precipices. There was no room for the two goats to turn or pass and so one of the goats lay down, allowing the other to walk over it. The second incident involved a horse who had been hurt by a nail when he had been shod. Finding it painful to walk he had gone back to the farrier and shown him his hoof. The third incident involved a sheep dog who jumped into freezing cold water and successfully rescued another dog who had been floating on a lump of ice. "I would now fain ask," wrote Gompertz, "if all this does not show reason and virtue?" J. Howard Moore described how monkeys adopt the orphans of deceased members of their tribe and how two crows fed a third crow which had been wounded. The wound was several weeks old and the two crows had clearly been playing 'good Samaritans' for some time to keep the injured bird alive. Darwin wrote about a blind pelican which was fed with fish which were brought to it by pelican friends who normally lived thirty miles away. Strong males in a herd of vicunas will lag behind to protect the weaker and slower members of their herd from possible predators. Before slavery was abolished black people who fell in love were regarded as enjoying simple 'animal lust' as a result of 'animal attraction'. Who on earth (or, indeed, in heaven) gave us the right to make such judgements about black people or animals? When black people formed life long pairs this was dismissed as nothing more than an a response to an 'instinct'. The same thing is said about animals (with just as little evidence to support it). Who gives humans the right to argue that animals do not show emotions? Animal abusers sneer and say that animals which seem to show love are merely acting according instinct. But who says? Where is the evidence for this claim? Why do animal abusers have the right to make statements with no evidence whatsoever in support? Why don't the animal abusers follow a consistent line and argue that human mothers who show love for their human babies are merely following their instincts? (Of course, animal abusers change their views when it suits them. Even vivisectors and hunters, who claim that animals have no feelings, will often claim to be loved by their companion dogs and cats.) There are numerous, well-authenticated stories of animals risking their lives to save their loved ones. And animals will put their own safety second to protect their friends. One herd of elephants was seen always to travel unusually slowly. Observers noted that the herd travelled slowly so as not to leave behind an elephant who had not fully recovered from a broken leg. Another herd travelled slowly to accommodate a mother who was carrying her dead calf with her. When the herd stopped to eat or drink the mother would put her dead calf down. When they started travelling she would pick up the dead calf. The rest of the herd were accommodating her in her time of grief. Gorillas too have been seen to travel slowly if one of their number is injured and unable to move quickly. Remember this unquestioning generosity next time you are trapped in the midst of a crowd of selfish and impatient human beings travelling by car, train or aeroplane. Powerful Memories Many creatures have memories which humans might envy. Ants retrace their steps after long journeys and can recognise other ants after months of separation. When a limpet has finished roaming it will return to the exact spot on the same rock where it had been settled previously. Birds fly back year after year to the same nesting spots – to within the inch. Fish, too, return to the same stretch of water to hatch their young. Horses used in delivery routes frequently know exactly where and when to stop – and for how long. Squirrels who have buried nuts months before can find them without hesitating. J. Howard Moore reported that an elephant obeyed all his old words of command on being recaptured after fifteen years of freedom in the jungle. He also reported that a lion recognised its keeper after seven years of separation. A snake which was carried a hundred miles away from home managed to find its way back. There is plenty of evidence, too, to show that many creatures other than human beings have powerful imaginations. Spiders will hold down the edges of their webs with stones to steady them during gales which have not yet started. Cats, dogs and horses and many other creatures are believed to dream. Parrots may talk in their sleep. Horses frequently stampede because they are frightened by objects (such as large rocks or posts) which are no threat to them. This must show a sense of imagination because the horse, like a child, has created a terror out of nothing. A cat playing with a ball of wool is imagining that it is playing with its prey. We always tend to think the worst of animals (and other creatures). We assume that they are stupid and our interpretation of their behaviour is based upon that ill founded prejudice. It is, for example, generally assumed that the ostrich sticks its head in the sand in the assumption that when it cannot see the rest of the world, the rest of the world cannot see it. But where is the evidence for this theory? Could it not be equally possible that the ostrich sticks its head in the sand because it cannot bear what there is to view in the world around it?
Primate used in Deafferention Research.
All pictures were added to the article by The Gnostic Liberation Front.
A Nation and Civilization are judged by
its treatment of animals !
If there is a God He certainly is NOT the God
of this earth !
More Articles About Animal Abuse On This Website:
Man's Best Friend Horribly
Betrayed By Man!
THE ANIMAL LIBERATION MOVEMENT:
Dog-and-cat-eating--The shame of Korea Animals and Pets Man's fellow Creatures and Chance of Redemption. Gnosis And Animals - Our Strange Inheritance
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Rainbow Bridge
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In The
Arms Of An Angel
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ARE WE REALLY SUPPOSED TO FORGIVE
THE EVIL IN THIS WORLD?
Reposted From:
Rumor Mill News Website
Posted By: Gnostic
Saturday, 1-Jan-2011
...I have been reading here the last few days on the subject of
forgiveness
even for those that are truly damning this world into their
financial prison play pen
even more than it already has been. This really is an
interesting subject
because most people are not willing to believe or even
conceptualize
what is their own lack and resolve that could change them into
the very thing
that they so hate.
I see it all the time where people will point the finger and
completely ignore
their own failures because they see in themselves a completely
different personage
than those that they feel are dark and evil... Yet they do not
realize that so often
they parody the very thing they hate, but for some reason they
do not see it in themselves.
My question is, how much would it take for anyone to start
becoming
like the very thing they hate. And the answer my friends is
quite shocking, it would only
take a few degrees in any direction to begin to direct yourself
into the very selfish acts
of war, hate and dominion over others...Continue
