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The four, who have been convicted of terrorizing the owners of a guinea pig raising farm and stealing the body of a beloved family relative to coerce the farm to shut down, are getting 12 years. Good. That’s the least they deserve for putting the farm family and their neighbors through years of living hell.

But what really got me was their ages. I assumed these vegan thugs would be in their late teens or early twenties. But they are all in their mid to late thirties. One would hope by that age critical thinking would set in, rejecting the idea the ability to feel pain is what confers moral value, or at the very least, the wisdom of age would reject the idea that fervently held utopian beliefs entitled them to engage in vigilantism.

I am growing convinced that many of the more violent adherents to animal rights just want an excuse to tear things down—and the use of animals by humans provides the pretext. In this sense, they are akin to the anarchists of the early 20th Century. It isn’t that they really care about “the animals.” They are just filled with rage and loathing.


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