Riding Meat

Horseracing. That's still a thing. Once a year the Grand National happens and Britain's papers  are filled with pictures of women in hats and disingenuous headlines that refer to the death of some horses as a 'Tragedy' despite the fact that it is really more of a Formality, and is anything but unexpected. Two horses were injured so badly they had to be put down at Aintree last weekend; the same thing happened to five horses at Cheltenham last month. This is par for the course.

The races are sick. That's obvious. But the systematic cruelty of the industry behind them is less well-publicised. The champs that get to die at Aintree are only the tip of the iceberg: Around 380 horses can be expected to die each year on courses or in training, and around 2,000 will be slaughtered before that stage if their bodies are found to be 'unsuitable' -  sometimes it's hard to be a woman. I mean horse. In terms of inhumanity and waste, horseracing can be compared to factory farming, but this isn't for food, it's for fun.


The Grand National has been adapting the courses a little bit to try and cut down on the corpse-count, but since everything about horseracing is cruel, the practice should be scrapped, not reformed. Inbreeding and the stresses of jumping over fences (a noble cause!) leave the majority of racehorses with conditions including gastric ulcers and bleeding lungs. And as this report explains, vivisection is being used as a method of finding solutions to this problem. Inflicting suffering to  find a cure for suffering that is completely unnecessary. If we don't allow fox-hunting or bullfighting, then why is this bloodsport still legal?

Especially considering the only part most people are interested in is Ladies' Day. Hooray for an opportunity to call women fillies and pore over photos of them while saying how stupid they look! And people pay to be treated like that. Fair enough if they enjoy themselves, though they might have a rethink if we renamed the event Whoresracing, and laid bets on who would turn up the least dressed and orange-est. I'm not sure if the people who make the Telegraph's Worst Dressed List get taken out and shot, but it would be keeping with the spirit of the occassion.

Hey vivisectionists, why so tense?

"Why don't you make your blog about something interesting, like vegetarian recipes? That way,  people might read it."


"Shut up, Mum."



Two good things happened last month. I mean, good in my opinion: Wales decided to scrap its proposed badger cull, and it was revealed that all relevant ferry companies and 64 airlines are refusing to import lab-animals to Britain. This has happened as a result of what the BUAV refer to as 'reasoned argument allied to letter writing by our hundreds of thousands of supporters.' On the other hand, ex-Labour Minister Lord Drayson said that medical research was being 'choked off' by 'extremists' who target 'weak links' in the chain of the animal-transporting industry. The violence of Drayson's language suggests a campaign of intimidation of which no evidence is provided, but it is clear that the pro-vivisection movement feels threatened.


Writing on the 14th of March, respectively for the Times and the Guardian, Drayson and the BUAV's Michelle Thew both claimed (in Drayson's words) to be  'speaking out for science and democracy.' Both plausibly claimed to have public opinion behind them: given this country's conflicted attitude to animal welfare, it isn't difficult to believe that the majority of people are 'against causing suffering to lab animals' but in favour of animal research.

The benefits of animal testing are also debatable. Some scientists argue that it is the only way to ascertain  the effect of medication on an entire body, not just specific cells; others consider it to be increasingly outmoded and ineffective in the treatment of human bodies. What I take from Drayson's article, in which he claims that the loss of just 1% of Britain's lab animals will directly and definitely cause 'more people to suffer and die', is the sort of sensationalism and emotional blackmail that is stereotypically the domain of animal rights activists.


Here is a selection of responses to Thew's article from the Guardian online comments section.


"This fluffy bunny flim flam attitude doesn't help anyone."


"Perhaps if you spent a little more time paying attention in Science lessons, and a little less going "Awwww, look at the little fuzzy-wuzzy... he's so cuuuuute" you'd realise..."


"You are regarded as nutters by the large majority of the population."


 "Is it only the fluffy ones you want to protect?"


"I once asked one of these anti-testing loonies who she'd save from a burning house first: a child or a mouse."


"God, I lived with one of these anti-vivisection loonies at university. They are so unpleasant...muchelle, we need to experiment on animals to save lives. I hope that you refuse any treat for any illnes or disease you have in the future. If not, you are a hypocrite like PETA's vice-president because she uses insulin, a medication derived from animal testing."

Well, I've got hurt feelings.



I've chosen the most extreme and least fair responses to show that the tactics of hysteria and intimidation can be found on both sides of the vivisection argument. I also feel these remarks demonstrate the problems that rational animal rights campaigners have in being taken seriously. The trolls quoted above rely on dismissing both the value of animal lives and the intelligence of anybody who cares about them.


Why do they get so angry? Well, if they believe in the medical efficacy of animal testing, fair enough.  No one likes cancer, heart disease or Alzheimers, no one wants to pass up any chances of finding cures. But the aggression shown towards people who are really only encouraging progress - focusing on the development of humane and accurate research, moving on from the brutal techniques of the past - seems to me like a sign of cowardice. These commentators, whose general attitude is basically considered normal and not 'unpleasant', refuse debate, and, by belittling the motivations of anti-vivisectionists, close their eyes to the full moral difficulty of the animal rights question.


Some people are frightened of widening the boundaries of ethical responsibility. Making decisions is much easier if we focus solely on human needs, to the exclusion of animal welfare. It is as natural to do that as it is to prioritise people's immediate comfort over the protection of the environment, or people close to us over people we don't know. Campaigns like the BUAV's threaten the progress of medical research, in its current models. They demand change and development in social, scientific and humanitarian practices. It is a daunting prospect.

In the Loophole

Part One

2012 looks like it’s going to be a good year for broken promises. Back in July 2011, when this blog and I were young, Lynne Featherstone made and later reaffirmed a pledge to ban the practice of animal testing in the making of household products. This story, like most animal-related policies, floated briefly into the media’s field of vision like a dead fish bobbing to the ocean’s surface before sinking away to rot in obscurity. Now it transpires that the government is considering weakening its policy by permitting manufacturers to use ingredients that have been tested on animals, so that the ban will only apply to finished household products.

This government seems to have settled nicely into a long-beloved paradigm for dealing with animal rights: make a pledge, wait a bit, then break it, or introduce a loophole so big that there’s more hole than law. In March 2010 Featherstone stated in Parliamentary Questions that the ban would apply both to finished products and all ingredients, ‘although in practice mainly the latter are tested’, so she can hardly be unaware of the extremity of the planned betrayal. Animal testing will insinuate itself into the household cleaning industry in much the same way that eggs from battery farms have been allowed into the market through the back door, as ‘liquid’ ingredients, even while the ‘solid’ products can’t legally be sold.

Cameron’s government shows an incredibly healthy lack of respect for the birds and the beasts, as well as the British voter: neither its own laws nor public opinion (about battery farming, vivisection or, for example, Andrew Lansley’s death-and-glory healthcare reforms) will stop them from doing exactly what they want, which apparently is to destroy every form of welfare. If you can think of one nice thing that this government does, please send your answer to me on a postcard.


Part 2

I am exaggerative, but it’s fair to say that the majority of elected representatives seem to be actively against most measures in favour of animal welfare. The movement for banning animal-tested cosmetics is not controversial, but it is embattled. A law banning it, agreed on in 1993 and meant to be put in effect in 1998 was delayed first to 2000, then to 2002, and now its promised fulfilment in 2013 looks likely to be delayed by another 10 years. This issue is currently in the hands of John Dalli, European Commissioner for Health and Consumer Policy, who in 2011 told the Humane Society that he ‘would not commit to supporting a legislative ban on selling animal tested cosmetics.’

Supporting measures like this is not worth a politician’s effort, because it alienates businesses while gaining no significant political rewards, and backtracking generates little scandal. The impermeability of the British media to animal rights can be demonstrated by the fact that an open letter to Dalli from Leona Lewis, sent on Valentine’s Day and asking him to support the ban, barely got any attention. Leona Lewis! Don’t pretend you don’t know who she is. I certainly do.

The question is, can anything save the Humane Society’s ‘Cruelty-free 2013’ campaign if celebrities can’t? They’ve got some really good ones – even Ricky Gervais has taken time out from calling people mongs to fight the good fight. The government isn’t interested, the media isn’t interested – perhaps the public isn’t very interested either. But I’m not the first one to be troubled by the arrogance that leads politicians to break promises, not in the face of overwhelming necessity, but simply because they know they can get away with it.

Unapologetic: Ricky Gervais is not ashamed of his third nipple.

Notes on a Pledge

Yesterday Lynne Featherstone reaffirmed the  reaffirmation she made on the 29th March 2011 of the government's pledge to ban the use of animal testing in the making of household products. VP awaits concrete action, but is not holding her breath.

 The initial pledge, made in the coalition's 2010 programme for government was taken from the Lib Dem Manifesto, and is the only one of three pledges therein to have made its way into the coalition programme. Given the general reluctance of the Conservatives to engage in animal welfare (compared to the other main parties, Tory MPs have shown the least support for animal protection EDMs), it seems unrealistic to expect any quick movement on the testing ban, although it is an obvious and uncontroversial move. I suspect many people  would be surprised that a practice that has been banned in the production of cosmetics is still officially acceptable in the production of washing-up liquid.

It turns out there are ethical products that can be identified by a 'leaping bunny' logo. Ever  heard of it? Thought not. The brands associated with the BUAV 'Cleaning up Cruelty' campeign (2008) can be found on their website, but not in any supermarket I have ever been to. Admittedly this is because I have only ever been to Tesco (the Co-operative and Marks and Spencer are predictably virtuous) but then, I am a  woman of the people.

And there is a benighted minority who don't go to expensive supermarkets, or moniter ill-publicised Home Office statements. Animal rights, as an ethical issue, is less prevalent  than it seems, and vivisection more so. The recherche nature of the brands that have voluntarily opted out of the use of animal testing, or ingredients whose production involves it, reflects the problem with consumer-led morality: going about your business without unknowingly propogating cruelty and exploitation involves more money and research than most can spare. Especially over  such an unglamorous issue as household cleaning.