UNHAPPY THANKSGIVING A November 19, 2001 story in Canada's National Post revealed that "dumb farm animals" are smarter than they look and that they actually feel pain. Duh. According to the Post: "Cows have the ability to reason. Sheep have remarkable memories. Pigs have sensitive feelings." http://www.canadapost.com Canadian researchers have demonstrated that dairy cows are more sophisticated than farmers realize. Even more remarkable is that this story has been re-posted in the "NEWS" section of one of the largest Internet dairy websites, Dairy Action. http://www.dairyaction.com In other words, farmers no longer have any excuse or rationale to deny that their pain-inflicting use of brutal and inhumane farm techniques ultimately end the lives of 27 million feeling, reasoning, sensitive living creatures each day with sharp knife blades sliced through the flesh and muscles of these animal's equally sensitive throats. According to the Post report: "Sheep, for instance, have remarkable memories, a recent British study suggests. Pigs have sensitive feelings, Canadian research shows. They engage in clever, even deceptive, behaviour -- such as when young bulls feign disinterest in cows in heat until dominant bulls are out of sight. And, when over-stressed, they can exhibit disturbing social behaviour..." The Canadian animal scientists study farm practices that milk drinkers and meat eaters would rather not know, such as: "The pain felt by 12 million piglets castrated in Canada each year without painkillers; the trauma and distress experienced by young heifers thrown into milking parlours a day after they give birth; the plaintive calls of hungry, lonely calves in their stalls." Scientists have analyzed the unusually high-pitched squeals of young piglets being castrated within two weeks of birth and conclude that the animals are in enormous pain and should be given painkillers. Take a moment to appreciate the source of each food item on today's Thanksgiving plate. If you are a canine-eating Korean, did the dog yelp in pain during death? If you are an ice cream-slurping American, did the calf cry in fear when she was separated from the cow so that her mother's milk could then be sold to fatten the unweaned human? In the spirit and consciousness of a universal force that unites all creatures into an eternal oneness and recognizes greater degrees of similarity between mammalian species than difference, does it matter who causes pain to another and who ends up eating who? Is there a cumulative scorecard tallying the pain and suffering that you individually inflict upon all others? Do you give thanks to the turkey or the lamb or the piglet?