March 2001

The disease is animal killing

Arjunanatha dasa

the following piece was e-mailed to and read out on John Turner's Radio Bristol phone-in, at the height of the UK foot & mouth crisis.

Dear John,

The endless cycle of health problems in this country's livestock farming industry has a simple cause: treating animals as an expendable resource that we can do what we like with, including kill.

All these lethal diseases (Foot & Mouth, BSE, Salmonella,....), and others, worse to come, are the fault of governments and ourselves for allowing the sickening slaughter of millions of animals every day.

The only safe and sustainable farming policy is a humane one based on a dignified partnership with nature. This excludes chemical fertilisers, hormones, wholesale misuse of antibiotics, and meat production, and includes the revival not only of organic methods, but also the use of oxen rather than tractors for power, without which bull calves have no economic use, and will inevitably be destroyed.

Cows give us milk, just like our mothers, so to kill them is akin to matricide.

If anyone is truly concerned about the health of themselves, their family and the countryside, they should become vegetarian.

yours,

Arjuna Krishna-Das