Danehy Is Narrow-Minded and Misguided; I Am Healthy and Moral!
Tom Danehy resorts to name-calling in his misguided take on animal rights (April 23). A bumper sticker reading, "Equal Rights for All Species," could have several interpretations; Danehy's is the most extreme and allows him to remain in a safe, narrow-minded state, spewing words like "nutbird" and "dumb" to sway his audience's opinion.
If he had asked, the owner of the car might have told Tom that she simply has ethical convictions that espouse a dynamic respect for all life. Maybe she's smart enough to know that a raccoon shouldn't have the right to vote; arguments made by the anti-animal-rights crowd are often this ludicrous. The bumper sticker is simply stating that all species have the right to exist without unnecessary harm inflicted by others.
We should all reflect on how humans' disrespect for animal rights has affected our environment. Eating meat has done more to harm the environment than driving cars, even SUVs. I've been vegetarian for 20 years, and I'm the healthiest person I know. I'm proud of the fact that I don't have to rape the environment for my own culinary tastes or narrow-mindedness.
Matthew Roberts
Danehy Needs to Stop Sneering, Eating Meat
It has somehow become acceptable for folks like Tom Danehy to sneer at SUV-driving, pro-animal-rights people. It was Earth Day recently, and word is out that driving cars is bad for the environment. Tom appears to say, "Let's crucify those veggie heads! See how wrong they are for having an 'Equal Rights for All Species' bumper sticker and driving an SUV?"
Meat consumption plays a bigger role in greenhouse-gas emissions than the entire transportation sector. The production and transportation of meat and dairy is much more energy-intensive than the production of plant-based foods. Animals, especially cattle, release gases like methane and nitrous oxide that are up to 30 times more damaging than carbon dioxide.
Tom is one of those people who tend to get upset when they feel they are being told what to eat, but he has no problem pointing out the "apparent" hypocrisy on behalf of the animal lover. Poor Tom.
Karen Roberts
Voting, Toothpick- Fish Claims Just Cloud the Animal-Rights Discussion
I would like to answer the question Tom Danehy posed about equal rights for all species: "What does this mean?"
You stated one thing correctly: Bumper stickers are limited by size. Although there is insufficient room to specify which rights all species should be granted, I would like to suggest that the person who placed that bumper sticker on her car would be happy with the following: the rights not to be subjected to intensive confinement, hoisted by one rear leg while alive and slit up the middle with a chain saw, jammed in the anus with an electrical prod, tied down in a rape cage to ensure expedient breeding, subjected to debeaking and declawing, have probes inserted in their cranium, and dissected and injected in a futile effort to cure human diseases brought on solely by the consumption of other animals—all because of a human reluctance to retrain their taste buds. I think you knew that these were the rights to which the bumper sticker referred.
Instead of spending your time writing columns that will ensure the status quo, why not write one that might mobilize a positive change to improve conditions and help stop human abuses toward other species?
Margaret (Peggy) Raisglid
And Finally, One Last Letter on Leo W. Banks, in Which He Is Compared to Hitler
Leo W. Banks' article represents the same superficial, nativist narrative widely available through major media outlets ("Trashing Arizona," April 2). Your "alternative" weekly would be much better served by an examination of the underlying factors that cause immigration, rather than the effects.
This article is similar to watching speeches of Adolf Hitler and then coming to the conclusion that funny little mustaches are the cause of state-sponsored anti-Semitism—it exhibits an extremely limited reasoning ability.
Furthermore, his attempt to raise the specter of Islamophobia is unconscionable and extreme. His "evidence" that "Arabs are coming" is flimsy at best. Finding three prayer rugs in the desert would provide a good indication that Muslims may have passed through the area, but as Arabs constitute only approximately 20-25 percent of Muslims worldwide, presuming that these Muslims were Arabs makes an assertion that strains the bounds of logic.
Sticking to verifiable facts is the basis of good journalism; using unverified anecdotes and making assumptions in order to stir up anti-Latino and anti-Muslim hysteria is not. Samuel Huntington and Lou Dobbs must be very proud of their bastard child.
Peyton Deane
Corrections
In "Latin Invasion" (Chow, April 16), we wrote that a Ketel One on the rocks at Sur Real costs $11; actually, a Ketel One martini is $11, wherea s Ketel One on the rocks is $9.50.
Due to a production error, the caption for the April 30 Live photo was incorrect. The picture is of The Faint, not Ladytron.
We apologize for the mistakes.
