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November 28, 2002
"I did not have sexual relations with that bird"
[Fear the kind of search strings that I'm going to get from that title...]
As is customary every year, the President of the United States pardons a turkey (in this case, two) from future harm, leaving them to live out their lives at a petting zoo somewhere. This year's remarks can be found here.
Once, just once, I'd like to see him sentence all the other turkeys to death.
The idea of pardoning a turkey seems like such an innocent and "fun" thing to do, but no one seems to think it absurd that the President should have to pardon a turkey. Doesn't a pardon imply that there was some wrongdoing to warrant a death sentence? If it doesn't then it presumes that the natural outcome of every turkey to be murder by abattoir, doesn't it?
I'm not a militant vegetarian -- or a vegetarian at all -- and am fully willing to kill the animals that I eat if I have to, but the turkey pardons strike me as patently silly. It's a shame that people don't look deeper and realize the implications behind the publicity stunt: animals die for your table dressings. The least you can do is have respect for those that are about to die.
Posted by KinCross at November 28, 2002 11:07 AM