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.
