In the movie Notting Hill William Thacker (Hugh Grant) has just had a fight with Anna Scott (Julia Roberts) and his chums are trying to cheer him up.
So they unleash a string of potential bedfellows. The girls are all rather strange “Where is the booze? Come on Will, let’s get sloshed!” one of them declares as she storms into the lounge.
In the movie Notting Hill William Thacker (Hugh Grant) has just had a fight with Anna Scott (Julia Roberts) and his chums are trying to cheer him up.
So they unleash a string of potential bedfellows. The girls are all rather strange “Where is the booze? Come on Will, let’s get sloshed!” one of them declares as she storms into the lounge.
But it’s a rather sweet-looking brunette who takes Will’s cherry after she refuses to eat from the fruit platter because “those fruits have got feelings.”
“So they have been…” “Murdered yes,” she completes Will’s sentence, adding that as a fruititarian, she can only eat fruit that has fallen from the tree.
“Poor carrots!” Will exclaims. Poor carrots indeed! Poor politicians too, you might add. It is they who have to indulge the excesses of human eccentricity when it comes to human rights.
It’s not enough that the right to life, education, health, dignity, privacy, clean air and happiness is guaranteed; now people want their pets’ rights enshrined in the law as well.
A few days ago in Switzerland for example, one of the world’s most liberal electorates rejected a proposal to provide lawyers for animals.
Animal rights groups had argued that without lawyers, many cases of animal cruelty went unpunished. Fortunately for those who’ve occasionally locked up their dogs, 70% of the voters rejected the proposal in the referendum.
Most were particularly exasperated by the idea of having their taxes pay lawyers’ fees just so a neighbour’s tomcat could afford the best representation before a judge.
Indeed, most Swiss voters argued that their country had more than adequate legal protection for animals. For example, it’s against Swiss law for social animals like budgies, pigs and goldfish to be kept alone, cows and horses must have regular and all year-round exercise outside the barn; while dog-owners must take courses to learn how to take care of their pets!
In 2002, Germany became the first country to guarantee animal rights in its constitution. Article 20A of Germany’s Basic Law now reads that: “The state takes responsibility for protecting the natural foundations of life and animals in the interest of future generations.”
We have also heard of eccentrics like Leona Helmsley, who bequeathed $12-million to her maltese, Trouble who probably earned his name for regaularly biting staff members. So when will all this reach our shores?
Well, it might already be here. There are for example, sections of South African society that frown upon the idea of keeping a guard dog or a cat simply to harvest mice.
They’re still in the minority, but so where the Christians 2000 years ago. The real test for South Africa will come when we pit our slightly different traditions when it comes to animals.
Western tradition mostly favours animals as pets; while the traditional African traditions view animals as tools: donkeys, guard dogs and food.
That war is coming, and you can bet that hot-heads like Juju Malema will take on the debate. For myself, I am just grateful I am not Swiss, or I’d be jail.Here I was thinking that if you got fed up with your goldfish, you just flush it down the loo.*
* No animals were hurt during the writing of this article. Sim Kyazze writes in his personal capacity
