The 2084 Precept (16 page)

"Really? And how do you manage that may I
ask?"

"Marine fishing," I said. "We fish heavily
using a method called bottom-trawling. This is done using a trawl,
basically a heavy fishing net which is dragged along the ocean
floor. It functions as a plough, stirring up the seabed itself and
scaring the fish toward the mouth of the net. In fact, it is like
fishing with a bulldozer. These nets catch or crush everything in
their path, including exotic squid, sea spiders, crustaceans and
many of the estimated two million marine species we have not yet
discovered, or not yet catalogued."

"And this is also an authorized
activity?"

"Yes, Jeremy, authorized by the same elected
clowns—more of my friend's terminology—whom I mentioned before, and
implemented by those for whom killing is a profession for which
they get paid."

"And nobody tries to stop it?" he asked.

"Oh yes," I replied, "but unsuccessfully of
course. Typical of the human race, always arguing with itself.
There have been many proposals to the U.N. in recent years for a
global ban on deep sea trawling but, you guessed it, they have all
been blocked by those U.N. members who prefer to continue with the
destruction."

I stretched myself, drank some more
water.

"Anything that moves, Jeremy, anything that
moves. Even the raccoons in Germany."

"There are raccoons in Germany?"

"There are indeed, thanks to us. Raccoons
were imported into Europe in the middle of the 20
^th
century so that we could breed them and then kill them for their
fur. We created cleverly designed death factories for this purpose.
Of course, some escaped, reproduced and became a nuisance. How dare
they bother the human race like this? Who do they think they are?
And so we do what we have always done with things which bother us,
we kill them, 70,000 last year in Germany alone. Appropriately
approved by the birdbrains, flap, flap, the killers appropriately
paid, thank you very much, and everything quite as it should
be.

"Hmm. O.K. Fair enough. I think I can say
that I've had my fill on what appears to be your species'
congenital predilection for killing. But you also mentioned that
you torture millions of animals as well. Now I find that equally as
interesting. Why would you want to do something like that? Isn't
killing them enough? What exactly is it that you do, and what
for?"

Boy, is this a heavy session. I am not
exactly enjoying it to tell the truth. It is depressing. It is also
really weird to be explaining to a deranged person what it is that
actually occurs on his own planet. But in for a penny, in for a
pound, as the geiatrics still say. I looked out of the window
again. Hey, no rain! And sunshine! Intermittent, but it's certainly
a bonus, sunshine always cheers me up, you too presumably.

I took a deep breath, drank some more water,
and got back to the job at hand.

"This is an unpleasant meeting Jeremy, not
your fault, the subject matter is not very gratifying, that is all.
It is unpleasant because you have to understand to begin with that
the human race is a harsh, merciless, unpitying race. To be able to
properly understand our species' capability for unrelenting and
endless cruelty, not only toward the other more helpless
inhabitants of our planet, but also—you better believe it—toward
ourselves, you would literally need to be clinically insane."

"Which you still think I am, Peter,"
interrupted Jeremy, a broad grin spread across his wide round
face.

What a blunder, stupid of me. But deranged
or not, he is no fool, obviously not, he knows what I'm
thinking.

"Well, I wouldn't quite say that," I said,
politeness to the fore, smiling back, keep this meeting on an even
keel for goodness' sake, "otherwise you would be able to understand
what I am about to explain, which I don't think you will." I got
out of that one quite nicely, I think.

"I'll start off the easy way," I continued,
"with something that most of human beings do not in fact consider
to be torture. Zoos."

"Zoos?"

"Yes. What happens is that we kidnap,
capture is a more tender word, large numbers of land animals, birds
and fish, we place them in cages or water containers, and we
transport them away from their own natural habitats—the few
remaining ones they have—to our own world; our own soulless
concrete world, thousands of kilometers away from their homes,
different temperatures, different smells, different everything, and
we put them into prisons, often concrete ones, for the remainder of
their natural lives. They lead a cold, artificial and lonely
existence. There is nothing for them to do and there is nothing for
them to eat except what we humans give them. And then they die.
Actually, we also kill them. The slaughtering of—for
example—healthy young imprisoned giraffes and the feeding of them
to the equally imprisoned lions is a cost-effective nutrition
method used by some zoos. The international press was recently
heavily criticizing a zoo in Denmark for doing this."

"And why do you create these zoos,
Peter?"

"We do that so that our human offspring can
gawk at the animals, some adults too. But usually only once or
twice during our lifetimes."

"You put these animals into prisons for the
whole of their lifetimes, just so that you can look at them once or
twice?"

"Yes, that is precisely what we do. As I
told you Jeremy, we do whatever we want with them. We don't think
there is anything wrong with it. It is our God-given right, you
see. We also capture animals in order to put them into cages in
places we call circuses. These animals are put through strict
training programs to force them to perform tricks which go against
their nature, but which are fun for our offspring to watch. And
because the tricks are unnatural ones, the training has to be
strenuous and disciplined and it frequently involves the infliction
of pain as often and as severely as necessary. For example, the
only way to get an elephant to do a handstand on command, Jeremy,
is to train it by beating its genitals and ears with an iron bar.
This usually works. The animals are then released from their
prisons from time to time and compelled to perform in a small arena
in front of screaming human children, after which we lock them up
again until the next performance."

"You do this to them, destroy their lives,
just in order to amuse your children?"

"Mainly yes, but there is also a sprinkling
of adult humans who like to be amused in the same way."

And do you really need to amuse yourselves
in this way?"

"Need? No, of course we don't need to,
Jeremy. The problem lies with our mentality, we convince ourselves
that we
do
need to do it, we need to amuse ourselves and our
offspring in this way. It's real fun. We have decided that other
forms of entertainment, those not involving animals, do not
constitute a wide enough variety for us on this planet, and so we
have to do this as well. Plus, they're only animals, what on earth
is all the fuss about? That is our attitude toward the whole
matter, Jeremy. Same as with the animal actors."

"Animal actors?" asked Jeremy. He wasn't
raising his voice, he was clearly interested, but there was a touch
of bewilderment about him, amazement perhaps, maybe even
stupefaction.

"Yes, well…we also capture animals and
transport them here to be actors. Mainly chimpanzees. We also
imprison them in cages of course, put them through disciplined
training programs, dress them up in our clothes and force them to
be actors in our movies and commercials. Very funny, we think."

"And may I ask," said Jeremy, "for how long
you force them to do this?"

"Well, in the case of chimpanzees, they last
about six years as actors. At around that time they become too
strong-willed, too willful. Too stubborn. And so, as thanks for
their contributions, we then either kill them, or we put them
behind bars for the remainder of their natural lives. Which can be
for up to around forty years."

"Poor unfortunate creatures," murmured
Jeremy.

"Perhaps, Jeremy, but those animals are the
lucky ones, believe me. We do far worse things. We put other wild
animals into even tinier cages and these cages are in places we
call laboratories. Cold, barren, lonely places. Minuscule cages.
And we permanently hold over 200 million of them like this,
including primates, and they never, ever, see the light of day
again."

I finished off my water, went and fetched
another bottle from the table, brought one for Jeremy too.

"These creatures are locked in and subjected
to horrific experiments, living a life of such pain, fear and
loneliness that it is impossible for us to imagine. Not that we
attempt to, of course, we are not interested, why should we be? As
I have mentioned, the human being uses them to test the effects of
things like new household products, new cosmetics, new medicines
and anything else he feels he would like to test. These animals are
forced to inhale toxic fumes, they are subjected to corrosive
chemicals, they are force-fed pesticides, they have electrodes and
other objects surgically implanted into their bodies and also into
their brains. And they are often operated on, sometimes repeatedly,
usually to remove a certain organ or organs for inspection. Many of
these creatures are also dissected and, whether you want to believe
it or not, sometimes while still alive. Those animals which don't
die as a result of these loving ministrations end up being
poisoned, blinded or worse, and any survivors are killed afterwards
anyway. Others simply die from the cancer or other horrific
illnesses we have injected them with. The end to a life of psychic
terror, incredible pain and heartbreaking loneliness. Many of them
literally go mad, they spin around and around non-stop in circles,
they rock permanently back and forth, many constantly self-inflict
major wounds by repeatedly biting themselves, and most of them
shake with unimaginable terror whenever a human being walks past
their minuscule prison. And this life of theirs can, and often
enough does, go on for as long as fifteen years. Or even more, for
all I know."

This really was hard going. Really hard.
Jeremy was now just sitting there looking at me. He wasn't saying
anything, anything at all. Another swig of water, carry on.

"All of this happens in company
laboratories, private laboratories, university laboratories, school
biology classes and so on. Much of it is subsidized by every single
one of us taxpayers, thanks to the decisions taken by the
birdbrains, flap, flap, as to what should be done with the
taxpayers’ money. As you can see, this is something we humans
really
excel at, torturing and killing. We are really very
good at it, very good indeed. And I include myself, I am part of
the human machine, I pay my taxes."

Jeremy had now decided he had another
question. "But surely," he said, "not all of you hold these views?
Some of your fellow humans would describe your views as an
exaggeration I would think."

"What views?" I asked.

"O.K., the facts you have mentioned. Surely
some of them are overstated?"

"No, they're not. You'll be doing some
research, Jeremy, you'll be able to check it out."

"But I would nevertheless still hazard the
guess that there are plenty of humans who view these facts in
differing ways."

"Oh yes, you're quite right on that one
Jeremy, quite right. There are plenty of people who view this whole
thing as fully justified. They say the suffering is exaggerated by,
wait for it, ‘
do-gooders
’. These people hold directly
opposing views to those who would like to have it all stopped. But
there it is, you see. Never has the human race ever agreed on
anything, there is nothing we won't argue about. Look at our
politicians, flap, flap, any day you want, in any country you want.
Arguing, arguing, arguing and arguing; that, basically, is what
they do. And sometimes we do our arguing with weapons, then we call
it war. And so yes, there are those who support all of this, the
terrible torture is O.K. if it's for the benefit of the human race,
these things are necessary, a bit unfortunate for the victims, but
there you go, life is tough. And even if I were to mention other
examples, I could take the bears, there are still those who would
say how terrible it is, and there are still those who would say but
that's just the way it is, that's the way it has to be, it's all
unfortunately necessary."

"The bears?"

"Yes, the bears. Let me tell you about the
persecution and torture of the bears, broaden your picture a little
bit for you, Jeremy. This is a form of criminal torture which only
the fascinating human race could be capable of, yes, and like all
other activities it requires the involvement of the usual three
types of human being for it to be able to occur. Just a reminder as
to what the three types are. First of all, the torture of the bears
is formally approved by the various bunches of pin-striped assholes
who run things on this planet, we simply cannot function without
them by the way. Flap, flap. The torture itself is then carried out
by those among us who are happy to do it, usually for money—and
there are always plenty of those about no matter where you care to
look, and no matter in which era you care to look, including today
of course—and finally there are the masses, the majority of the
population in each of their applicable regions, who have freely
elected the sit-on-your-ass birdbrains into their secure, well-paid
positions, in order for them to do, more or less, whatever they
want."

I looked directly at Jeremy. He was sitting
there quietly, adjusting his tie, patiently waiting for me to
continue. A moon-shaped poker face.

"On this planet, Jeremy, the masses actually
believe they have a say in what goes on, because they are allowed
to vote. Not for whomever they wish, oh no—they are given a small
list of names from which they are allowed to select—but they truly
believe that they have a hand in influencing events. And then they
find out that the guys they voted for have lied to them, they have
not done what they had faithfully promised to do, they have also
done what they had faithfully promised not to. They have committed
immoral acts, sexual and otherwise, they have sent young people off
to get killed in faraway wars, they have even started wars
themselves for goodness' sake. And then they—the masses—start to
complain. Which they shouldn't. They should keep their mouths shut.
They put these guys into power, they stopped their opponents from
putting
their
guys into power, they are the ones who caused
it all, they should therefore quite simply shut up. But all of
that, Jeremy, would be another story."