Whingeing Aussies.

Recently I read with interest and not a little delight that greyhound racing is to become illegal in the Australian state of New South Wales from next July. Today I read another piece in which certain Aussies (owners and trainers, you understand) were whingeing like hell about it.

‘Greyhound racing is an integral part of Australian culture; it’s traditional, for Pete’s sake! It’s taking away a whole third of what proper Aussie blokes bet on. The government only wants to sell off the tracks to make mean money. Think of all those poor people who will lose their livelihoods; some of them are in tears. It’s terrible that this should happen just to serve a political agenda.’

So why is it happening? Well, because a recent TV documentary exposed the mind-boggling cruelty that is endemic to the world of Aussie greyhound racing (as it probably is elsewhere, I imagine) and a lot of people were rightly horrified. Small animals used as bait to be chased and torn apart to train the dogs. Dogs being abused. Large numbers of them put down because they didn’t make the grade, and some of them drained of blood before they were euthanized.

C’mon, Aussies. It’s a shame that some people will have to find another way to make a living, but if the old way routinely involved horrendous cruelty to animals, my sympathy is severely limited. And it isn’t serving a political agenda at all, is it? It’s serving an ethical one.