Strange Quarks

I attended an event organised by South Aussies for Animals today, titled “How to Make Drugs: new models of humane research” which showed a recently created documentary called “How to Make Drugs and Feel Great about Everything” (US) and followed this by a number of speakers from the NSW Animal Justice Party (AJP), SA Health and Medical Research Institute (SAHMRI), and Animal-free Science Advocacy (AFSA).

The basic thesis of How to Make Drugs and Feel Great about Everything was that animal models are unethical and ineffective, noting that 95% of drugs that pass animal testing fail at human clinical trial. Numerous people in the medical research and regulatory areas in the US were interviewed.

One of the people interviewed likened this to an aeroplane company saying their planes would crash 95% of the time, then continuing to spend the same amount of money on the same methods (of management, design, construction).

While I had seen that statistic, I was not aware that adverse drug reactions are the fourth most common cause of deaths in US. I don’t know how that translates to Australia.

On the other hand, it was pointed out that there are very likely drugs that are safe for people but that fail in animal testing so don’t get through to human trials. For example, if animal testing had been the gate for aspirin, it may never have seen the light of day (and for example, aspirin is toxic to dogs).

As one of those interviewed said: we keep wasting time on the wrong models, and while certain cancers in mice, for example, have been cured many times over, we we have no cure for pancreatic cancer, breast cancer, traumatic head injury, stroke in humans, just non-human animals. Another remarked that a problem with fundraising events like running for cancer cure is that it not always clear what the funds raised go towards or whether it’s effective.

Put plainly, billions of dollars spent on animal research is simply wasted because we are different enough from the animal “models” that it matters. The local speaker from SAHMRI later reinforced this by saying that nowhere is this more true than in brain research.

We have already seen a move away from animal testing of cosmetics, shampoo, soap etc.

There are alternatives for medical and drug testing too: organ on a chip, 3D bio-printing of organs based on an individual’s cells (for drug/toxin/disease testing and potentially transplants), and in silico methods such as simulation and machine learning.

Medicine is moving towards an era of personalised medicine, in ways other than bio-printing. Zarina Greenberg from SAHMRI talked about the ability of researchers to now take normal cells, such as skin cells, and to coax them into becoming stem cells (from which they arose) again that can then be differentiated into liver, lung, brain etc cells. For people with particular cancers, these cells can be used to understand personal disease trajectory and potential treatments.

Emma Hurst, from the NSW AJP talked about how she introduced a bill into the NSW parliament to have a right-to-release for animals used in medical experimentation and in particular for dogs and cats to be re-homed. This had multi-partisan support. The bill additionally capped use in animal research before release to 3 years. AJP also introduced (and had approved) a bill to outlaw smoking and forced swim tests which experts giving advice during the creation of the bill declared to be unethical and unscientific. Freedom of information regarding secrecy surrounding primate testing is next.

Rachel Smith of Animal-free Science Advocacy talked about work to review, update and strengthen the 3 Rs framework (replace, reduce, refine) including the addition of rehoming/rehabilitation (after use in research), reproducibility (consistent, repeatable results), and relevance (to human health).

As a former animal model researcher said at the end of the documentary, we should not break the principle of non maleficence, first do no harm, i.e. do not harm innocent beings including non-human animals.

South Korean farmers faced with their traditional system of animal agriculture being phased out by 2027 are calling for a longer grace period, in addition to direct financial compensation, as reported by ABC News on January 9.

One farmer was quoted as saying:

..they’re infringing upon freedom of occupational option. We can’t just sit idly.

A former farming association secretary attending a rally was quoted by the ABC as saying:

…industry workers are in their 60s and 70s, which means they are seeking retirement, not new occupations.

Some farmers quoted by ABC News admitted that:

…their businesses will naturally disappear when older people, their main customers, die. 

These are South Korean farmers, such as Ju Yeongbong, a former secretary general of a farmers’ association, and Son Won Hak, a farmer and leader of a farmers’ association.

“We do recognise that far more people do not eat dog meat compared to those who do. We do know the market is decreasing… but still, it’s our right to run a business,” said Joo Yeong-bong, an experienced dog farmer and the president of the Korean Association of Edible Dog.

Joo said: “…but still, it’s our right to run a business…”

Is it really a right to run such a business, though?

South Korea’s parliament has endorsed landmark legislation outlawing the country’s dwindling dog meat industry, as public calls for the ban have grown sharply amid animal rights campaigns and worries about the country’s international image.

Some angry dog farmers said they plan to file a constitutional appeal and launch rallies in protest, suggesting that heated debate would continue.

ABC News, January 9 2024

The ABC News article goes on to say that:

Dog meat consumption, a centuries-old practice on the Korean Peninsula, is neither explicitly banned nor legalised in South Korea.

Recent surveys show more people want its ban and a majority of South Koreans don’t eat dog meat any longer.

But the surveys also indicated one in every three South Koreans still oppose the ban even though they don’t eat dog meat.

On Tuesday, the National Assembly passed the bill by a 208-0 vote.

President Yoon Suk Yeol’s government supports the ban, so the subsequent steps to make it law are considered formality.

The bill would make the slaughtering, breeding, trade and sale of dog meat for human consumption illegal from 2027, and punish such acts with two to three years in prison.

But it doesn’t stipulate penalties for eating dog meat.

So, while this is obviusly positive news for anyone who thinks dogs should not be consumed by humans, can we now expect a growing black market in dog meat to emerge in South Korea, just as there is a Moon Bear bile black market in Vietnam, now that the bear bile industry is being dismantled there, in some cases willingly, by former bear bile farmers?

In 2019, the Humane Society International was quoted as estimating that “…nearly 30 million dogs are killed just across Asia every year for human consumption”. A dog is slaughtered every second, somewhere in Asia, e.g. Vietnam, South Korea, and the Philippines. (SBS News)

Many people in Western countries are likely to be horrified to learn that dogs are consumed for food in South Korea and elsewhere, in addition to being used to create leather goods in some places, such as China, as shown in this undercover investigation.

But can you just imagine what would happen if the Australian government not only decided to phase out the caged hen system in 2036, and live sheep export in a few years’ time (fulfilling an election promise), but in addition (changing only one word from a quote above):

…to make the slaughtering, breeding, trade and sale of pig meat for human consumption illegal from 2027, and punish such acts with two to three years in prison.

Just imagine the public outcry!

As it is, the egg industry wants an additional decade, and given the mood so far, some members of the sheep industry will quite likely start looking like those farmers who have been protesting in South Korea soon enough. This is despite the live export by sea of sheep, cows, goats, and deer having been phased out by our neighbour, New Zealand since April 2023. NZ can still export by air and so will Australian sheep farmers, so it’s still not an end to the trade as a whole!

It’s possible to have sympathy for such opposing voices from the point of view that no-one wants to see anyone’s livelihood threatened or for peoples’ mental health to suffer. But sometimes, change is necessary for there to be progress toward a better world.

It was an argument with an old friend about the annual Chinese Yulin meat festival that accelerated my thinking about the difference between what we in Australia vs other countries, think of as livestock.

But the uncomfortable, fundamental question is simply this…

Is there an important difference between dogs, cows, pigs, sheep, goats, or deer?

They’re all mammals, like us. They care for their young, show fear, feel pain, and each in their own way, express emotion.

That some may be considered smarter than others is immaterial.

That they are sentient, feeling creatures is not immaterial.

I suspect that the majority of people in Australia, if asked: “would you eat a dog?”, would look at you as if you were insane and disgusting, while at the same time considering eating pigs, sheep or cows to be normal.

That we consider some animals to be friends and others to be food or fur is at least in part, an accident of the circumstances of our birth, the culture we have been raised in.

As Peter Singer declares in his book, Animal Liberation:

I am no more outraged by the slaughter of horses or dogs for meat than I am by the slaughter of pigs for this purpose.

In a very mundane sense, stripped of any notions of reverence, culture is the accumulated beliefs, practices and norms of people, doing things over a long enough period of time that they can say to themselves and to others: “this is what we do and it’s what we’ve always done”.

The same is also often true for the religion people are born into.

But are cultural practices and beliefs always moral and worthy of respect? Sometimes, saying things like “we are upholding our cultural practices by doing XYZ”, when laid bare, is not much different to saying “we are doing XYZ, because that’s the way we’ve always done things around here”.

See the Five Monkeys Experiment for a nice illustration of this.

Are all our laws moral?

Slavery was once legal, widespread and socially acceptable.

Homosexuality was once illegal and in some places, it still is.

The fact that the dog meat trade will soon be illegal in South Korea has no bearing on whether it is now or ever was moral.

Do we really need laws or gods to tell us what is right and wrong?

Can it be that something is moral in one place but not in another, or does it seem more likely that it is just considered illegal or culturally acceptable in one place and time but not another?

If you subscribe to rules-based ethics, what you consider to be right and wrong depends upon the rule, e.g.

• Have dominion over all the creatures of the earth, vs
• prevent unnecessary suffering and death.

If you take your moral guidance from holy books, you are doing what you think gods are telling you to do, which may or may not be the same as what’s right.

Consequentialist ethics tend to focus more on the concrete than the abstract. Suffering and whether or not to consider others as a means to our ends, are the key variables in the moral calculus here.

I discovered when we suffer, we suffer as equals, and in their capacity to suffer, a dog, is a pig, is a bear, is a boy.

Philip Wollen

On the morning of Sunday, March 16 2024, I attended a rally to protest against the continuation of duck hunting in South Australia following on from the failed duck hunting review by the SA Labor government.

The new season began on the day of the rally and finishes at the end of June, sunrise to sunset. A maximum of 10 ducks per day per shooter can be killed. Tens of thousands of ducks and other birds will be killed. More will die slowly of their injuries.

I don’t really enjoy going to rallies or protests and there are many things I’d rather be doing. But this is the kind of protest I feel compelled to attend.

Short speeches were given by long-time animal welfare advocate Tammy Franks (SA Greens), the new Animal Justice Party candidate for Dunstan (by-election in a week) Frankie Bray, and Steven Langley from Birds SA.

Members of the public stopped to listen and watch for a minute during the event.

This was followed by a short silence in consideration of the birds being killed or wounded at that very moment, and a walk from the steps of parliament house to Victoria Square along the footpath with simple signs and “ban duck hunting” vocalisations.

It was an orderly, non-disruptive display by a bunch of people (hard to know how many: between 50 and 100 I’d say) who just want to see an end to unnecessary carnage. The message to government was simple: ban duck hunting.

It was all over in an hour. Will anything change? Probably. Eventually. Will the public be better informed? Perhaps.

On the website of the Sporting Shooters’ Association of Australia (SSAA) in the article “A beginner’s guide to duck hunting“, there is a section titled Ethics, containing statements such as (my emphasis):

Ethics is conducting yourself in a sportsman-like manner and treating other hunters with respect.

Don’t squabble over ducks. Sometimes, especially when shooting on big swamps, more than one hunter will fire at a duck. There is nothing more childish than two grown men fighting over a dead duck. The simple solution is to walk away and go back to hunting.

The only time a duck should be shot on the water is when a wounded duck has to be humanely dispatched. The shot should only be taken when it is safe to do so.

SSAA

“Treating other hunters with respect”.

But not ducks or other birds?

“Nothing more childish than two grown men fighting over a dead duck”?

How about killing a duck in the first place?

“When a wounded duck has to be humanely dispatched”.

Dispatched? At least be honest and use the word “killed”.

Humanely? There is no humane way to kill an animal that didn’t want to die.

At the end of the article we have this:

Duck hunting is a challenging pastime and once you have experienced it, it will get in your blood and you will never tire of it. The beautiful smell of the wetlands, the sound of the whistling wings of passing ducks – to a duck hunter, that is the elixir of life.

SSAA

This makes it sound like a romantic adventure, but omits one tiny thing: the killing and maiming part.

Reminiscent of “I love the smell of napalm in the morning” from the movie Apocalypse Now.

These sorts of speciesist statements are a reminder of how far there is to go.

It’s all about the hunters apparently, reportedly less than 1% of the SA population. Everyone else (including people and birds) be damned!

Tell them the truth and let them decide for themselves.

Naomi Negata, The Expanse

I’m a regular listener of the weekly ABC Radio National show (via podcast) Coronacast. Dr Norman Swan and health reporter Tegan Taylor have been evidence based, trusted advisors on COVID-19 and other nasties (as Tegan puts it), vaccines, masks, and ventilation since soon after the start of the pandemic.

I love the show, its roughly 10 minute duration, no-nonsense approach, and attempts at comedic levity.

The title of the episode on August 16 2023 was Hello furry mammal are you the next pandemic?

The topic of zoonosis was discussed (my highlighting, here and elsewhere below):

Tegan Taylor: And so to today’s topic, Norman, zoonoses is a word that we all became rapidly familiar with at the beginning of the pandemic, it’s when diseases come from the animal kingdom into humans and vice versa, although we are part of the animal kingdom. And it’s one thing that we have to continue to watch, especially as we become so incredibly globalised. And in the context of farming, it’s often a breeding ground not just for the animals that are being farmed, but also for potential pandemics. And it’s something that scientists are watching particularly closely at the moment because of avian influenza.

Norman Swan: Yes, and actually a new paper on COVID-19 in mink, you might remember that 2020, 2021 there were these mass slaughters of mink in the Netherlands and Denmark, because what they showed was that there was COVID-19 to a very significant extent, maybe 60% or 70% prevalence in some mink populations, farmed mink, and that it was getting into humans and humans were reinfecting the mink, so there was what they call reverse zoonosis.

Tegan Taylor: Where we are giving it to the animal.

Norman Swan: Yes, that’s right and at least catching it from the animals. And this is where the worry is with these zoonoses, and we’ll come to flu in a moment, is that you get intermingling of viruses and the virus pops out as a very different virus. And that could be a source of another pandemic in the future.

They move on to H5N1, an influenza strain that has long been watched by disease outbreak authorities.

Norman Swan: Which is why they slaughter these populations because you want to reduce these populations. Fur is a discretionary item but food isn’t, which is why pig farms become very interesting.

Tegan Taylor: So that’s coronaviruses broadly in mink but hasn’t there been flu in mink as well?

Norman Swan: Yes, a recent report from Finland of fur farms…so these are farms that have foxes, mink and raccoon dogs. Remember raccoon dogs?

Tegan Taylor: They are very cute.

Norman Swan: They are very cute, but they carry coronavirus, as we know from the market story in Wuhan. So this is a survey from Finland very recently showing that the avian flu has spread into these populations of mink, foxes and raccoon dogs. So for those who like to be technical about this, this is influenza A and the type is H5N1 avian flu.

…

But this is where it starts to get very close to human beings because particularly mink are thought to be very similar.

And then there’s pig flu, swine flu, and swine flu is again…a survey in Cambodia of pig farms has shown an enormous variation of swine flu amongst pig populations, about 4,000 nose swabs from pigs, also looking at humans as well, and found that these mass variations of swine flu in the pig population, and also evidence that you’re getting reverse zoonoses, that humans are infecting the pig population. This is what happens. And food is not a discretionary item like fur.

Soon thereafter, we have this exchange:

Tegan Taylor: Yeah, it is a pretty confronting reminder of where food comes from, and not just the impact on animals, also the impact on humans.

Norman Swan: But we are slaughtering chickens, we have slaughtered millions and millions of chickens on chicken farms to prevent the spread of avian flu. And the potential is there to do that for pigs as well. But these are food sources, protein sources that are needed by the world’s population.

Tegan Taylor: Should we be rethinking our farming methods if we want to be controlling for future pandemics?

Norman Swan: The interesting contrast is between flu and COVID-19, we actually have quite good…it’s not brilliant, but we have quite good influenza monitoring systems. So we’re picking it up in pigs, we’re looking at pigs, we’re picking it up in mink farms in Finland, what we’re not doing is systematically surveying for COVID-19. If we’re picking it up, it’s almost accidental along the way on PCR testing. And so we’re not monitoring all emergent viruses.

Notice that Norman’s response to Tegan’s question is to change the subject to virus monitoring in pigs and mink. But the question was not about virus monitoring, but whether farming methods should be reconsidered.

Then there are statements like this in the exchange:

• “Fur is a discretionary item but food isn’t.”
• “And food is not a discretionary item like fur.”
• Chickens and pigs “…are food sources, protein sources that are needed by the world’s population.”

Tegan’s question about rethinking our farming methods is important and one that few seem to want to seriously consider the implications of.

Of course it’s true, as Dr Swan says, that food isn’t a discretionary item, but the source of that food, of protein sources, does not have to be animals.

So, fur vs food as discretionary items is a false dichotomy.

I would really like to hear Tegan’s question considered further on Coronacast.

Another ABC RN podcast is Big Ideas. A recent episode of which was titled COVID, Zoonotic diseases, and the next pandemic. The intro starts with this:

Throughout human history, infectious viruses have moved between animals and humans without much fanfare. These are known as Zoonotic diseases. But every so often, they set off a chain reaction that can’t be contained, like the bubonic plague, or COVID-19. But the collective experience of COVID has given the world many lessons about what to — and what not to do — the next time there’s a Zoonotic leap. So what are those lessons, and is humanity able to not repeat the same mistakes?

The host, Olivia Willis, interviews Eddie Holmes, NHMRC Leadership Fellow and Professor of Virology in the School of Medical Sciences, University of Sydney, and Kris Helgen Chief Scientist and Director of the Australian Museum Research Institute (AMRI).

After an interesting interview, Olivia asked asked Eddie and Kris this question:

In thinking about stopping the next pandemic, I’d love to get both your perspectives on what you think is the single most important step right now to stop that happening.

Eddie responded by giving three things, two of which he thinks are doable:

1. Make universal vaccines rather than the virus strain specific vaccines we have now.
2. Stop the live animal trade or have better regulation and testing for viruses on a regular basis.

The third thing he says, is stopping the consumption of meat. He admits that he is being “controversial”, and thinks it won’t happen. In his words:

Consumption of meat is the number one thing for climate change and for these emergents. It’s a really big thing, right. I hate to say it. But it really is. And that, I think, would have a major effect on the number of viruses we are exposed to.

Kris immediately followed on from Eddie’s comment by saying that:

And that reliance on meat has to do with land clearing, it has to do with the wildlife trade, it has to do with all these types of things.

Eddie agreed enthusiastically, then continued with:

Factory farming too. In countries like Australia, the pig industry is continually a threat for influenza virus and other viruses too, and these animals are kept in huge numbers…and foot and mouth…would wipe out that industry very easily. So, our reliance on meat which is getting bigger…in terms of climate change, it’s just amazing. The beef industry, particularly. The effect that has on climate change is absolutely enormous.

This brings us back to Tegan’s question about rethinking farming methods.

Yet another ABC staple is Landline. In a recent episode, in addition to a story (one of a number recently) attempting to improve the image of the live export industry (cattle in this case), there was a story about the scale of the livestock sales business and the enormous number of cattle regularly trucked into stockyards, sometimes thousands of kilometres, from various parts of Australia and sold at auction to customers in Australia and other countries.

This reality along with the enormous number of animals in factory farms probably informs Eddie’s skepticism about the likelihood of ending meat consumption.

Although elimination is highly unlikely (an understatement) in the near future, significant reduction should not be, and we as consumers have control over this.

As a vegan, I obviously want to see meat consumption reduced primarily for the sake of the animals, but climate change and health (pandemic risk, anti-microbial resistance risk, preventable diseases of lifestyle) are also incredibly important factors, and if attention to these things helps get us to a net reduction of suffering, that’s fine with me.

Although there is an increased awareness now, even compared to a few years ago, I don’t know whether we’ll do enough towards climate change mitigation, better health outcomes, or reduced animal suffering in my lifetime. I’m not currently optimistic.

Something has to change, if for example, we want to reduce the pandemic risk and mitigate the worst effects of climate change.

It’s up to us though, and no-one is coming to save us from ourselves, as Carl Sagan’s Pale Blue Dot always reminds us.

Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not.

Dr Seuss, The Lorax

I love the mountains, that’s why I never go there.

(anonymous)

Peter Singer relates the following story in his book, Animal Liberation:

Soon after I began work on this book my wife and I were invited to tea—we were living in England at the time—by a lady who had heard that I was planning to write about animals. She herself was very interested in animals, she said, and she had a friend who had already written a book about animals and would be so keen to meet us.

When we arrived our hostess’s friend was already there, and she certainly was keen to talk about animals. “I do love animals,” she began. “I have a dog and two cats, and do you know they get on together wonderfully well. Do you know Mrs. Scott? She runs a little hospital for sick pets…” and she was off.

She paused while refreshments were served, took a ham sandwich, and then asked us what pets we had. We told her we didn’t own any pets. She looked a little surprised, and took a bite of her sandwich. Our hostess, who had now finished serving the sandwiches, joined us and took up the conversation: “But you are interested in animals, aren’t you, Mr. Singer?”

We tried to explain that we were interested in the prevention of suffering and misery; that we were opposed to arbitrary discrimination; that we thought it wrong to inflict needless suffering on another being, even if that being were not a member of our own species; and that we believed animals were ruthlessly and cruelly exploited by humans, and we wanted this changed.

Otherwise, we said, we were not especially “interested in” animals. Neither of us had ever been inordinately fond of dogs, cats, or horses in the way that many people are. We didn’t “love” animals. We simply wanted them treated as the independent sentient beings that they are, and not as a means to human ends…

Singer goes on to say:

The portrayal of those who protest against cruelty to animals as sentimental, emotional “animal-lovers” has had the effect of excluding the entire issue of our treatment of nonhumans from serious political and moral discussion. It is easy to see why we do this.

If we did give the issue serious consideration, if, for instance, we looked closely at the conditions in which animals live in the modern “factory farms” that produce our meat, we might be made uncomfortable about ham sandwiches … and all those other items in our diet…

This book makes no sentimental appeals for sympathy toward “cute” animals. I am no more outraged by the slaughter of horses or dogs for meat than I am by the slaughter of pigs for this purpose.

Singer’s declaration that he and his wife are not particularly interested in animals, nor do they consider themselves to be animal lovers, might seem odd to someone who has in mind some vegan or vegetarian stereotype.

I have much greater empathy for animals than I did before becoming vegan. But mostly I just want to leave them alone to live their lives.

They need their space. So do we. Some of us more than others.

I like to see and listen to the birds in my backyard, smile at the sight of ducks down by the river, or watch grey headed flying foxes (bats) on their nightly migration in our suburban area.

The fundamental paradox is that many people who have pets, such as cats and dogs, would never want to see them harmed and may even declare that they detest animal cruelty in general, and yet they consume animals that someone else has killed on their behalf.

Which is more difficult to understand?

• Not treating animals as a means to our ends.
• Treating some animals as friends, but others as food or fur.

As reported by the ABC on August 31 2023, in good news for ducks, recreational duck hunting is likely to be banned in Victoria from 2024.

The inquiry had more than 10,500 submissions, a record for a Victorian parliamentary inquiry.

It can only be hoped that South Australia, Tasmania, and The Northern Territory follow suit if a precedent is set. Currently, this is only a recommendation to be considered by the Victorian Government within 6 months.

The ABC News article mentions Steven Threlfall, a life member at Shepparton Field and Game, saying:

…for him, hunting was a family tradition that went back generations. He said we was disappointed to hear the recommendations but not shocked.

He raised concerns that a ban on duck hunting could soon spread to include other forms of recreational activities.

Such arguments from tradition pop up surprisingly often. But what does saying that something is a tradition mean here? This is the way we’ve always done things? I like this thing and so has my family for many decades? Because I want to?

Should tradition, the way we’ve always done things, liking something, be considered more important than someone’s life, just because that someone isn’t a member of your own species?

Next we encounter something, well, bizarre:

A number of building unions have threatened to walk off the job if duck hunting is banned, warning it was an affront to their members.

“More than 85 per cent want our union to campaign for the right to enjoy the outdoors, including their right to hunt,” CFMEU assistant secretary Derek Christopher said.

The right to enjoy the outdoors?

How about going for a walk in the outdoors?

The right to hunt? An affront?

What about the right of ducks to, I dunno, stay alive?

Or is being shot and left for dead not enough of an affront for you?

And this…

“The government must work with shooting groups and unions to secure a native bird season based on science, history, culture and working-class values,” Electrical Trades Union secretary Troy Gray said.

Stringing a few words together like science, history, culture, and values doesn’t necessarily yield a meaningful sentence.

And, if you add “working class”, that doesn’t automatically make everything permissible.

Then we have this:

Other recommendations included transforming hunting reserves into state recreation reserves, whilst also allowing traditional owners to continue to hunt ducks.

“There is clearly a need to improve the protection of sites of Aboriginal cultural heritage in State Game Reserves,” the report said.

And now, here comes something truly gobsmacking (my highlighting below)…

Not all in Labor agreed with the report.

Upper House MP Sheena Watt wrote her own minority report urging the sport to be allowed to continue due in part to the improved mental health outcomes hunting provided.

“We can’t promote mental health on the one hand and deny working people the opportunity to take part in an activity that clearly has positive mental health outcomes on the other,” she said. 

The Yorta Yorta woman said hunting as a cultural practice and an expression of identity for Indigenous people should be given more weight.

I’ve been through Australian Mental Health First Aid training twice in the last 3 years, and I’m 99.9999999% sure that the “sport” of shooting ducks or maiming them and leaving them to die a slow death was never once recommended as a way to treat depression or a means by which to promote positive mental health outcomes.

But the bit that really upsets me, makes me furious actually, is the last part of this statement by the MP:

…hunting as a cultural practice and an expression of identity for Indigenous people should be given more weight.

Cultural practice? Expression of identity. What, like stoning wombats?

Given more weight?

So…

IF hunter is "traditional owner" THEN hunting = True ELSE hunting = False ?

This sort of selfish, evil nonsense plays right into the hands of the Liberal No campaign for the Indigenous Voice to Parliament we have to vote on in a few weeks, almost as if it’s deliberate sabotage.

I received an email recently from SA Liberal MP Jamie Stevens in which he said (my highlighting below):

We have spent decades breaking down inequality and building a nation and society with fundamental principles of equal rights and treatment for all. To reintroduce into our constitution principles that treat Australians differently based on their race, gender, sexuality, religion or any other attribute is objectionable to me. The strength of our democracy is that every Australian has an equal status in the decision making processes of our nation and our government. It is a national shame that upon becoming a federated nation in 1901, Indigenous Australians were not given the right to vote. Treating them differently in our Constitution was wrong then, and my values hold that it would be wrong to do so again through this proposal.

On the one hand, while this has the appearance of being reasonable, it misses the point that there is currently a gap between life outcomes for many indigenous people and that equal consideration of the interests of indigenous and non indigenous Australians is something to be examined and corrected where inequality exists. But, it must also be acknowledged that there are others in Australian society who are also disadvantaged, and the idea that in general, one person in Australia is treated no differently to any other is demonstrably false; missing from the list ending in “any other attribute” above, is financial status.

But, I digress…

On the other hand, while it may be a minority view, if the kind of advice given to the government of the day by a current indigenous Labor MP is: shoot ducks to improve the mental health of indigenous people, I could be forgiven for seriously questioning whether to vote yes in the Voice referendum. Despite my own confusion, I’m basically on the Yes side, but don’t give me reason to think I should not be, don’t make me teeter on the edge!

Time for some Plain Speakin’ as Shaun Micalef used to say on Mad as Hell…

Well done Yorta Yorta Labor MP Sheena Watt. A win for Team Misanthropy! Has it occurred to you that your speciesist worldview actually represents a repetition of the sins of the white settlers who invaded your ancestors’ home? But you’ll never see that because you’re so blinded by the belief in your own importance!

I wonder what The Greens would say about the Labour MP’s words? I’m sure that some Greens MPs would be horrified.

I know what the Animal Justice Party would say.

But enough! The claim that the working class underdogs of Australia, indigenous or otherwise, have some special cultural or traditional “right” (an extremely overused word) to murder (for any reason) sweet, innocent ducks who just want to live their lives unhindered by unhinged humans, is WRONG plain and simple.

No compromise. No argument. End of story.

I’m normally keen to understand other people’s point of view.

Not on this matter. Sorry.

Quite a few years ago, before I was vegan, I spontaneously did my best to scare the bejesus out of a youngish couple on a walk near our local river by yelling obscenities at them when they let their dog off his/her leash allowing the dog to run after a duck and chomp down on the duck’s neck. I’d hate to think what I would do, or at least, what I would want to do if I saw someone shooting a duck…

This whole issue gets to the heart of the problem, the reason I can’t stop thinking, talking, and writing about this stuff, when I’d much rather focus on other things.

At the heart of the problem is the misguided belief that we are at the centre of things. Even before I was vegan I didn’t believe that, but I couldn’t figure out what I was missing.

What I was missing was the simple notion that no-one should be treated as a means to an end, no matter what their species, that the interests of animals, human and non-human should be given equal consideration, and that we should not tolerate suffering being inflicted on any sentient creature.

That’s it. Is this really so unreasonable?

The greatest ethical test that we’re ever going to face is the treatment of those who are at our mercy.

Lyn White, Director of Strategy, Animals Australia

It’s important to be able to playfully poke fun at yourself and others, to laugh at your own expense, even while sometimes still challenging societal and cultural norms. Points of disagreement don’t have to involve vitriol. There’s plenty of that to go around these days. Here’s one attempt…

*Dominion