Protecting the rights of Comet, Cupid, Donner and Blitzen

I personally know a sheep farming family here in Australia and have visited their farm and walked a mile in their shoes. Likewise I know a Sámi reindeer herding family and know their feelings about protection of the land and their reindeer.

The PETA protesters need a major reality check. I can testify from my own experience that graziers on both sides of the planet go about their business of caring for the environment, and their animals, united by love and affection for the animals they breed, feed and make their living from.

The Australian Federal Minister for Agriculture, Warren Truss, recently addressed the Victorian Rural Press Club and made some salient points on the rising divide between city and country folk, and the potential dangers brought on by this divide as the driver for the rise of food, feed and animal rights fundamentalism. Although the points were raised from an Australian perspective they are equally valid in most developed countries. Good animal husbandry practices make for increased animal production in the form of increases in the quality of the fibre, skin, meat and milk that you sell to city folk.

Consequently, the reindeer in Lapland, like the sheep in outback Australia, are mostly well looked after and if food is short during harsh winters or hot summers they are fed extra rations and moved onto areas with more favourable conditions. Traditionally the Sámi prefer to slaughter the animals themselves for their own use while reindeer for consumption by city dwellers are taken care of by mobile abattoirs. Practices are also in place to protect both sheep and reindeer from insect attacks.

They also have an interesting way of neutering the male reindeers by using a knife or in the absence of a knife their teeth to castrate the bulls.  It shares aspects with "mulesing", the Australian practice of cutting a circle of skin from the rump of a lamb to prevent fly-strike.

The fact that PETA ran a recent campaign against mulesing raises the tantalising possibility of PETA activists picketing the Greenpeace Arctic Forest and Reindeer Rescue Stations that are promoting the captivity and “abuse” of reindeer by man. When will PETA initiate a letter writing campaign from children to ask Santa to evict the Greenpeace activists that are hurting Santa’s reindeers? Maybe PETA could employ the same artist that they used in their “Did you know that Mummy kills animals” campaign to make a cartoon of a Greenpeace activist slaughtering Rudolph with a blunt knife?

Sometimes contextual knowledge and an analysis of global campaigns comes up with some surprises. In the case of Santa’s reindeers Greenpeace seems to be for people’s right to farm and against animal rights fundamentalism. If we remove the Santa factor from the Greenpeace campaign and recognise that the reindeer is the equivalent of the Australian sheep we can ensure that the Sámi and the Aussie sheep farmer both receive the recognition they are due for protecting our environment and looking after the sheep of the Outback and the reindeer of the Tundra.