Jack Waterford - Human Supremacist (and proud of it)

The Canberra Times Editor-at-Large, Jack Waterford, is a human supremacist of the first order.

He’s one of those human supremacists who will sneer at the very possibility that the term even exists.

He’s not the only one by any means – nor, I suspect, is he the worst example. But unfortunately, he is in a position to promulgate his speciesist beliefs through Canberra’s only daily newspaper – and he does so often.

On several occasions over the last few years Jack has devoted his various opinion pieces to belittling vegetarians and animal liberationists. (Some of those opinion pieces are still available on the Canberra Times site and on his blog - www.canberratimes.com.au/blogs/jack-waterford). He also often acts as Letters Editor for the paper so is in a position to suppress or edit pro-animal views – though I must admit that my letters get a reasonable success rate, even when I am criticising his writings.

In Waterford’s case, his attitude of human supremacy seems to stem from his childhood on a rural property where nonhuman animals were either;

1. ‘stock’ – cattle or sheep to be grown, used and killed as required,
2. more-or-less domesticated dogs and moggies – useful around the farm but, kids, don’t get too attached to them,
3. pests – any other nonhuman animals that such people believe interfere in their right to make a living off the land and their introduced ‘stock’, or
4. others – I gather a very small group of native animals who were paid the respect of being ignored.
   

You can take the boy out of the country but…

Waterford has a thing about vegetarians and regards us with mystified disdain if not real hatred. (“I learned early that vegetarianism is a fairly nutty, though harmless idea, perfectly tolerable so long as the proponent did not frighten the horses”).

Strangely, he believes that vegetarianism adopted as a ‘food fad’ can lead to veganism which can lead to support for animal rights. It is, of course, the opposite of what generally happens; learning of the cruelty inherent in producing unnecessary food and fibre from our fellow animals leads compassionate people to stop consuming meat and other animal products. It’s the concern for animals that leads to vegetarianism.

He is often very condescending toward us animal activists – apparently believing that we only ever campaign for animals that are “thought to be especially warm, cuddly or symbolic” – leaving cane toads and other less furry critters to fend for themselves. He also seems to believe that animal activists (including myself) are being ‘misinformed’ by ‘someone’. He apparently refuses to consider the possibility that we are able to seek out information and reach conclusions on our own.

His common themes also include the accusation that groups such as PETA (http://www.peta.org/) who argue for better treatment of animals are secretly aiming to make the whole world vegan. There is no secret, Jack. That’s exactly what we want (amongst other reforms). This is from PETA’s FAQ page;

“People who support animal rights believe that animals are not ours to use for food, clothing, entertainment, experimentation, or any other purpose and that animals deserve consideration of their best interests regardless of whether they are cute, useful to humans, or endangered and regardless of whether any human cares about them at all (just as a mentally challenged human has rights even if he or she is not cute or useful and even if everyone dislikes him or her)”.

Jack’s most recent rant was on November 6 (I’m sure the Canberra Times will include it on his blog site when they get around to it. They seem to be a bit behind – at least on the Opinion pages – at the moment).

On that occasion he got a bit personal, describing me as “the hapless self-appointed publicist for a vegetarian movement which would, in the natural course of things, attract little publicity or support”. Before stepping down earlier this year, I was for a number of years the duly elected President of the ACT Vegetarian Society (http://www.vegetariansociety.org.au/). I often wrote on behalf of the Society but at other times, and since stepping down, write to express a personal opinion – backed by facts where applicable. By no means a "self-appointed publicist".

As for "hapless", it’s a bit tricky to jump up and down and yell “I am not hapless” without appearing - well, bloody hapless. So I’ll just have to let people decide on that point for themselves.

He also accused me of describing him, his history and ideas as "disgusting". I have never called him names as far as I can remember (at least until now) and it would be a foolish thing to do. Many of us, myself included, shared Jack’s prejudices until we began our journey of understanding and compassion toward nonhumans. I recall, many years prior to my own vegetarianism, meeting up with a cousin who I hadn’t seen since he was a small kid only to hear he was ‘a vegetarian’. I silently scoffed – thinking that the poor bloke must be a bit soft. Sadly, he was killed in a motor accident nearly 20 years ago and I regret not being able to chat to him now and compare notes.

Jack Waterford is not just wrong in his attitude to nonhumans and those who speak up for them but seems to delight in displaying that wrongness. He also comes across as a condescending bully – in one infamous article implying that he had the urge to smash us over the head with a 12” bolt.

It’s a shame he uses his position of influence to vilify animal libbers and vegetarians - particularly at a time when moving away from a diet based on animal products would benefit us, and nonhumans, in so many ways.

Cage Free = Cruelty Free?

As mentioned in an earlier post, a few weeks ago I had the privilege of attending the launch of the Choose Wisely campaign breakfast at Parliament House. After seeing a video on the fight to have battery cages banned, particularly in the ACT, we were invited to enjoy our breakfast which included, naturally, free-range eggs which, we were assured, were ‘cruelty-free’.

Now I am the first to urge consumers to buy free-range eggs in place of cage eggs. I have previously been involved with the Free Range Canberra campaign run by Animal Liberation ACT. Even so, there is no way that I could ever describe either barn-laid or free-range eggs as ‘cruelty-free’.

Let’s put aside for the sake of this argument the sad fact that many eggs sold as free-range are simply not. To my way of thinking, if eggs are labelled ‘cage’ you can be sure that the hens who laid them have lived in hell whereas eggs labelled ‘free-range’ mean that there is at least a good chance that the hens had some freedom during their short life.

But let’s go back to the start of the process. Whether layer hens are to spend their lives in cages, barns or with access to grass outdoors they all come from the same hatcheries. The fertilised eggs that are used by these hatcheries are laid by breeder hens who spend their shortened lives in sheds similar to broiler sheds. The hens lead stressful lives with an unnaturally high mating rate. In a more natural flock, the proportion of roosters to hens is much lower than the proportions maintained by these commercial breeders. Frequent matings result in severe feather wear and injury for the hens. Also, it is not uncommon for breeders to kill all the roosters after several weeks and replace them with young roosters to accelerate the rate of fertilisation. For an insight into layer breeder sheds see http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=RbmTHILGL1M

‘Worn-out’ breeders go to be slaughtered for second quality foods.

On hatching, about half the chicks are male. These males are of no value so are killed – either by being tossed into a bin to be gassed or by being thrown into the spinning blades of a macerator.

No matter what type of production system they are destined for (cage, barn or free-range), chicks may be subjected to painful beak trimming with a hot blade.

Finally, again regardless of the system used, hens in commercial layer flocks are culled after about 15 to 18 months – their peak laying period. They are transported, often for many hours in open trucks, to be slaughtered for second grade human and pet food – or maybe just fertiliser.

Avoiding cage eggs is a good start but regardless of the egg production system used, there is no such thing as a cruelty-free commercial egg.

Animal Liberation and the RSPCA

The President of Animal Liberation ACT (AL ACT), Mary Hayes, and I were invited to this morning’s Parliament House breakfast launch of Choose Wisely – the new RSPCA initiative designed to reduce the number of cage eggs consumed in Australia. I got a guernsey due to my previous involvement with AL ACT and its Free Range Canberra (FRC) campaign.

The morning started badly – no soy milk for this vegan’s coffee (“we do have skim milk, Sir”). Then it got worse; in announcing the launch of Choose Wisely, RSPCA ACT CEO, Michael Linke, acknowledged the past work of others in seeking to have cages banned in the ACT including the Greens MLA Dr Deb Foskey but, sadly, neglected to acknowledge the ongoing work of AL ACT. He made no mention of AL ACT’s role in the 1997 attempt to legislate against the cages and its more recent “Free Range Canberra” campaign which led to the introduction of last year’s revised Bill by the Greens. Ah well.

“Choose Wisely” is a term that has been used for some time by the RSPCA but now has a new logo and its own website http://www.choosewisely.org.au/. It is intended to persuade organisations to move toward the use of cage-free eggs. Those that do will earn the right to display Gold, Silver or Bronze logos depending on their degree of progress in eliminating cage eggs from their businesses. InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) was announced as the first ACT business to commit to the move toward cage-free eggs as part of the RSPCA campaign.

The campaign will also encourage consumers to support such businesses and to use RSPCA supplied calling cards at other eateries – leaving them on the table to encourage the café to change its buying habits.

The IHG move will mean some 200,000 eggs per year in the ACT will be RSPCA–accredited cage-free eggs instead of sourced from caged birds. But will that make a difference? The Pace Farm facility in the ACT produces some 60 million eggs per year so even if IHG have been using all ACT eggs up til now the change will only affect about 0.33% of the ACT facility’s output.

This move is more symbolic than practical so it will really only make a difference if it leads other businesses and individuals to change their buying habits. Let’s hope that RSPCA and IHG can get some media coverage.

The Animal Liberation movement and the RSPCA have had their differences – and they continue to do so. According to http://www.rspcawatchdog.org/ (the Animal Lib point of view), “Despite the hard work of volunteers, RSPCA management consistently fails animals.” The RSPCA South Australia site (http://blog1.rspcasa.asn.au/2007/01/12/animal-liberation-front/) gives the other perspective. It says “we fundamentally differ from the animal liberation movement in the methods we use”.

But the differences are not restricted to methodology – the RSPCA also differs from the AL movement in what it regards as cruel. At breakfast this morning after seeing a DVD showing the horrors of battery cages we were invited to enjoy our hot breakfast which included cage-free eggs, bacon and chicken sausages – proclaimed joyously as all ‘cruelty-free’. This is where we differ. The RSPCA believes that it’s ok for humans to use animals – to breed them, incarcerate them, separate mothers from their babies, perform surgical procedures on them, transport them and, of course, slaughter them – as long as it’s all done ‘humanely’.

Does this mean that Animal Liberation and the RSPCA can’t work together? I don’t think so. As an Animal Liberationist I see the RSPCA as on the right track – but just a bit further back. Still, by being more conservative than Liberationists they are more likely to gain support from the general public as well as from politicians and businesses.

The local RSPCA ACT folk have been supportive on the battery cage issue – even if a little ignorant of AL ACT’s efforts and achievements – and I think this initiative deserves AL’s support. They are a far bigger organisation with a lot more money to spend than most Australian AL groups. Besides, once they achieve this goal of finishing off battery cages they will most likely have come to see the cruelty inherent in the barn system and refocus on it.

By the way, had the RSPCA been more aware of AL’s Free Range Canberra campaign they’d have seen that FRC recruited businesses long ago to commit to free range eggs (http://www.freerangecanberra.org/restcafe.htm).

They would also have been familiar with this calling card.

On a final note, after breakfast we were treated to a speech supporting the new campaign by Senator Gary Humphries who has apparently changed his spots somewhat since his days in the ACT Legislative Assembly where in 1997 he opposed the Greens’ Bill to ban battery cages on the basis of the possible loss of the Parkwood facility and its jobs from the ACT as well as “the weaknesses that the alternative schemes of egg production being suggested by the Greens might have in terms of animal welfare”. Good to see you catching up, Senator.

Y Fish?

I have devised a new sport. I’m planning on taking the family down to Garema Place in Civic one lunchtime where there are plenty of magpies hanging around the café tables looking for scraps.

We’ll bait some hooks with raw meat and cast them to the birds. Once we coax one to swallow the bait and get the hook embedded in its mouth or throat we’ll start to haul it in. It’ll probably try to fly off so we’ll get some great sport as it fights to get away.

If it’s still alive by the time we reel it in we might let it go – catch and release is the go these days. It might even recover after its painful, stressful experience. But if it’s big enough to eat we’ll just drop it into a plastic box and tightly seal the lid so that the animal can slowly die from lack of oxygen.

Sounds disgusting doesn’t it? No one would allow it. So why the hell do we allow – even promote – the identical thing to be done to other small animals, i.e. fish?
Scientific evidence shows that fish feel stress and pain in the same way as other animals such as birds (see Science below).

It may not be absolutely proved that angling hurts fish (and the angling groups are pushing that line) but the mere fact that they may should be enough to stop the so-called sport now. The onus of proof is definitely on the anglers to prove that what they do cannot hurt the fish – or the live bait they use for that matter.

We should never confuse an animal’s inability to express its pain and suffering with its capacity to suffer. Just because fish have no voice and do not have facial expressions we can’t assume that they are not suffering.

I suspect that if these animals could scream or had legs that enabled them to run back to the water it would change the attitudes of at least some fisher-folk. I can’t imagine a lot of anglers chasing after a screaming fish as it ran back to the water.

Science
Dr Lynne Sneddon at the Roslin Institute, near Edinburgh, Scotland said “To demonstrate pain perception it was necessary to prove that the fish’s behaviour was adversely affected by a potentially painful experience and that the behavioural change was not a simple reflex response. Our research conclusively demonstrated evidence of pain perception”. - Fish do feel pain scientists say http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/2983045.stm

Similarly, Dr Victoria Braithwaite, of Edinburgh University’s school of biological sciences says “The evidence I have presented suggests that fish do have the capacity to experience pain and fear” - Fish Pain Perception http://www.aquanet.ca/English/research/fish/vb.pdf

For more, see FishingHurts.com

What if dogs laid eggs?

I wonder what would happen if dogs laid eggs? You know – the sort of eggs that humans have somehow come to believe they need to eat for good health.

Would we tolerate them being kept by the thousands, 2 or 3 per cage in stinking, filthy, vermin infested sheds like those in West Belconnen?

Would we be content with these dogs standing on wire mesh for their entire, egg-laying lives (say 12 -15 months), forced to push their heads through the wire to eat and drink?

Would we ignore the fact that the dogs weren’t fed for the last few days of their lives in order to save costs?

Would we turn a blind eye to the thousands who have their legs broken when they are hauled out of the cages to be crammed into crates then driven in an open truck to an abattoir somewhere near Geelong – over eight hours away?

Would we be happy that hundreds of ‘spent’ dogs that escape or are dropped during this ‘depopulation’ fall into the huge pile of their own waste to drown or to be trapped unable to move and left to die?

Would the ACT Government defend such a factory as the “single-largest contributor to Canberra’s primary production sector” – despite it paying less that $10 per week for the land?

Would the RSPCA and police be more prepared to act on such blatant cruelty if the victims were dogs – rather than chooks?

Filthy Battery Cages in the A.C.T.

You may have seen Jamie Oliver’s recent TV show on eggs and chicken meat. If so, you’d have seen him stroll through a huge, modern looking battery egg production shed. We saw the shiny, clean metal of the cages and heard him say that there was no strong smell. As bad as these shiny cramped cages are for the hens, many older battery cage facilities, including the Pace Farm Canberra sheds at Parkwood (Macgregor West) are far worse.

They are filthy, stinking hell-holes full of manure, cobwebs, mice and rats and have a stench of ammonia and manure that can knock you over.

I’ve been to the Parkwood sheds twice.

Each visit coincided with Pace Farm de-populating (emptying) one or two of their sheds. They do this after about 12 to 15 months when it is determined that the hens have passed their peak production.

It’s not a matter of monitoring each hen and retiring her when she's past her prime, they pull all 20,000 to 30,000 hens out of the shed on the designated date.

These so-called ‘spent hens’ are yanked out of the cages which they have shared with one or two others for over a year and passed by their legs down a bucket-line of casual workers then crammed into crates to be taken by truck to be slaughtered for second quality meat products including pet food and stock feed (for example, see http://www.greatplainsprotein.com/)

In the process, some hens are dropped or escape from their cages. Many of these end up in the manure piled up on the ground level of the sheds below the cages – the accumulated droppings of the thousands of hens over the previous year.

These hens are supposed to be retrieved. The ACT Domestic Poultry Code of Practice section 12.7 states, “Where birds are found to have escaped into the manure area under cages they must be captured as soon as practicable on the day of observation and returned to cages or destroyed humanely”.

But they are not worth a lot to Pace so are left to fend for themselves.

On my first visit, there were many birds in the manure who had obviously been there for some time as they had hard balls of manure built up around their legs making it difficult for them to walk. On the second visit, the manure was wetter and many birds were stuck fast – some drowned or drowning in the more liquid sections of the manure.

The fermenting, stinking manure will be scooped out by a front-end loader in the following days before a fresh load of young hens are crammed into their homes for the next year or so.

The cages shown in Jamie Oliver’s show were bad enough, denying the hens the opportunity to be hens, to spread their wings, dust bathe, nest etc. But the Pace cages in Canberra are even worse.

If you still eat eggs – please make sure you buy free range eggs, preferably from a certified organic supplier.

Better still – give them up. They are not necessary.