Animal rights activists in Coimbatore point out man-made cruelty

COIMBATORE: A group of activists held a demonstration at the Race Course here on Saturday, urging people to stop consuming animal products and allow animals to roam free.

They held signs reading “Dairy destroys motherhood,” “Meat is murder,” and other powerful messages. The activists chanted slogans such as “Animals deserve freedom, just like we do.”

The event featured an activist sitting in a cage to make people empathize with the animals' plight and show them how humans deny animals their freedom while enjoying their own. The activists explained how animals are used and exploited in various industries, such as artificial insemination of cows and buffaloes, separating calves from their mothers in dairy farms, beak trimming and crushing day-old male chicks.

“The reason for so much cruelty, abuse and violence is that we view animals as resources and not as sentient beings,” says Samaran Thamarai, one of the organizers.

Mini Vasudevan, one of the organisers, added: “Casteism, racism and many other prejudices inflict suffering on our fellow human beings. Likewise, our belief that we are superior to animals and can do whatever we want with them, and choose which animals have the right to live and which do not, causes unimaginable suffering to billions of animals – a form of discrimination called speciesism.”

(Speciesism refers to the assumption of human superiority that leads to the exploitation of animals.)