Should Birds Be The Only Diseased Creatures To Be Incinerated?
Dear Prime Minister Martin and Fellow MP's:
Undoubtedly, you have heard the latest about the Avian Flu crisis in the area just outside the Greater Vancouver region: the entire population of over 19 million chickens, turkeys and specialty poultry will be destroyed as soon as possible. Those birds infected with the disease will be incinerated. Here are a few other points that you may or may not have heard
about:
(1) Farmers in the area have been told that the disease originated in flocks of wild ducks and geese and that both the wild animals and farm to farm traffic have helped to spread the outbreak. Poultry farmers are co-operating with the planned mass extermination but some are now wondering if the entire situation will repeat itself after the mass kill and next cycle begin. They are asking, in other words, if the mass kill is the answer because there is no way (aside from some adaptation of George W.'s missle defence system) to stop wild ducks and geese from entering the area and triggering a new outbreak.
(2) A number of people, including the leader of B.C.' s Green Party, are saying that the cause of the problem is the very nature of intensive poultry farming. In other words, the cause is keeping large numbers of birds on small acreages. In their view, reducing the numbers of birds on these small acreages and giving them more access to natural conditions is the answer. The problem with this argument is that the area has not just large numbers of birds on each acreage, but extremely large numbers of bird farms all over the area. It would be virtually impossible to disperse 19 million birds and maintain the same population of 19 million in more natural conditions. In other words, maybe the Green Party and other like-minded people might ask whether there are just too many birds and too many farms in the area. Might Avian Flu and the ease with which it has spread be not just a little whisper in our ears from Mother Nature? To put the matter another way, might there be a limit to the livestock carrying capacity of this and any other area?
(3) And going one step further, others are asking if there might there be a limit to the human carrying capacity of this and every other area? This is a very uncomfortable idea for many people to entertain. In fact, a B.C.
Agriculture specialist simultaneously bemoaned the problems poultry producers were having and extolled the human diversity that this area of Canada had achieved through its recent mass immigration policies. This person was quick to point out that immigration had doubled poultry production (with ensuing economic spin-offs). But he would not concede that the inflow in less than 15 years of 800,000 people (most of whom are immigrants whom, he stated, have a peculiar dietary demand for
poultry) might be a major contributing factor to the current Avian Flu disaster. In other words, others are saying that the opinion of the agriculturalist and those like-minded (that diversity was a goal that reigned far above the environmental and health concerns of the people of this area) does not make sense.
(4) And, finally, some people are reminding everyone of some basic research conducted at the University of British Columbia about ten years ago. The ecological footprint concept, developed there, established the idea that every human requires a minimum amount of land to be supported.
(It could have said the same thing about livestock.). The concept generated considerable debate, but it laid to rest the commonly-held idea that this planet (and any section of it) could support, with impunity, unlimited numbers of people. (It could have said the same thing about livestock.) In other words, these people are saying that the introduction of mass immigration policies was a very reckless and foolish thing. To put the matter in another way, they are saying it might be a very good idea to incinerate the diseased creature called mass immigration and its hand maidens, diversity and multiculturalism, along with their victims, a significant number of the 19 million birds on poultry farms in this area.
Best wishes,
Dan Murray,
Immigration Watch Canada
