Day 288 - 28 Oct 96 - Page 26


     
     1        justify the allegation that they kill lots of animals",
     2        then I am afraid my immediate reaction is "so what",
     3        because, for better or worse, I do not think the ordinary
     4        member of the public would think that, and would just
     5        shrug.
     6
     7   MS. STEEL:   Can I just say, firstly, there are a considerable
     8        number of vegetarians in this country, numbering millions.
     9        Secondly, that if you do not consider that our meaning is
    10        defamatory, that is not a problem, because the whole
    11        purpose of McDonald's bringing this case is to say that the
    12        leaflet is defamatory.
    13
    14        Now, if it would not lower the opinion in the eyes of the
    15        ordinary members of the public, then they cannot be
    16        entitled to damages and it is all right for us to say it.
    17
    18   MR. JUSTICE BELL:   I am well aware of that point.
    19
    20        Mr. Morris, if you have got some valuable point you want to
    21        make, then do, but what I am most interested to get on and
    22        hear about are the particular points - Ms. Steel said she
    23        was going to go on to chickens and I am quite happy she
    24        should do that after the midday adjournment - so I can get
    25        to grips with what the cruel or inhumane practices are.
    26
    27   MR. MORRIS:   Well, it is barbaric to kill an animal, it is
    28        barbaric to kill an animal when it is not -- killing it
    29        just because -- like a vet would put an animal down because
    30        it is suffering needlessly or something, and no one would
    31        consider that barbaric, but they would consider it barbaric
    32        to have this routine slaughter of animals for no reason
    33        other than to use them as food.  Maybe it is a kind of
    34        barbarism that is acceptable in this country, but it is
    35        still a defamatory meaning, we would say.
    36
    37        Further, what is also barbaric is -- well, when an animal
    38        dies there should be respect, when a being dies there
    39        should be respect.  There is a tradition of having respect
    40        for a grave, things like that.  Part of the barbarism in
    41        the abandonment of civilized behaviour in the treatment of
    42        animals is that the death is just purely routine, the
    43        animal is seen as a product, and that is barbaric.
    44
    45        That is equivalent to a war when your enemy is just killed
    46        and left on the battlefield.  That is not acceptable
    47        civilized behaviour, we would say; hence the phrase
    48        barbaric.
    49
    50        I want to go further.  I have some other points to make. 
    51        Maybe I could finish them after lunch.  But on the phrase 
    52        "utterly indifferent", I think McDonald's are utterly 
    53        indifferent, but they are worse than that; they are
    54        positively -- they are not indifferent, they are completely
    55        in favour of all the things that go on and they are aware
    56        of all the things that go on and all the suffering and the
    57        cruelty.  It is not as if they are reckless or anything;
    58        they positively specify the conditions that the animals
    59        need to be brought up in in order to be the kind of product
    60        they want.

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