EDITOR – A short story: I was 30. I had been eating meat and fish all my life. Chicken legs, wings and breasts. Steaks, roasts, beef and mutton stews. Rashers, sausages, black pudding, burgers. Lamb and pork chops, steak and kidney pie, fried liver. Salmon, cod, mackerel, hake.
In France, I’d ordered, on more than one occasion, steak tartare – a dish consisting of a heaped plate of uncooked minced beef with a raw egg yolk sat atop the mound of rotting flesh.
For 30 years, I never once thought about the food I was eating as coming from a fully alive and sentient animal. It was what I had eaten all my life.
And then, over the course of one year, everything changed. Eye-opening conversations with vegetarians and animal rights activists.
Books and articles on animal rights, on vegetarianism, on factory farming.
A never-to-be-forgotten viewing of a landmark documentary, The Animals Film, a couple of years after it had been broadcast to a stunned UK television audience.
By the end of that year – it was 1985 – I had turned my back on meat, on fish, on all animal flesh.
It took a few more years for the penny to drop on dairy and on eggs, and when the veil finally fell away, I was following a vegan lifestyle and no looking back.
I’ve been a vegan for 35 years. It was and continues to be the most positive life choice that I have ever made.
Gerry Boland,
Keadue, Co Roscommon.
Irish waters need to meet EU standards
EDITOR – We really need to clean up our rivers and lakes of pollution and the high levels of phosphate found in our waters.
It’s time, now, to finally bring them up to standard under EU law.
This pollultion deprives the waters of oxygen and fish will not survive, or other wildlife.
Farm fertiliser is one of the main problems as well as septic tanks leaking into our rivers and lakes.
These are things we must address as a matter of urgency before our salmon and trout are extinct. We need a citizen environmental group set up in West Cork to blitz pollution.
Noel Harrington,
Kinsale.
Historic milestone is barely recognisable
EDITOR – I am very saddened that a beautiful milestone is scarcely recognisable – that is, the Wilton Cork milestone. It is very important for the topography of the western side of Cork city and the county.
Our milestone dates back to 1790, the first milestone, and the post office carriage way to Skibbereen is on the milestone. It was marked with the distance of 62 – that being 62 miles on the old road. These are relics of the past, and the State has a duty to preserve our heritage, not just for the present generation, but for future generations.
This is our industrial archaeology and it needs to be protected. The topography and the beautiful milestone relates to two areas covered in your newspaper – Innishannon (14) and Skibbereen (62).
The local authority must address this immediately as it is their duty.
Tomás Ó Scannláin,
Baile an Easpaig,
Corcaigh.
Nursing home charges ‘another fine mess’
EDITOR – It seems we are recently been faced with another political debacle in relation to questionable charges levied on residents of nursing homes.
Again actions of civil servants must be reviewed and questioned. Perhaps the victims may need to take legal advice as there may well be a case of conspiracy to defraud these nursing home residents.
In addition, there is the matter of taxpayers’ money used to defend the actions – another matter which could well be abuse of taxpayers’ funds. Where was the oversight on government spending in this case?
As a famous comedian once said ‘another right mess you have got me into.’
Michael Moriarty,
Rochestown.
