Famed correspondent Prince Charlie lauds the development of doubled-backed headless swine, suggesting science will yet raise animal theology to a new level.

                                                          "If I Didn't have
Brain"

 
Prince Charlie



It has come to my attention that the Swine Breeders of America have made
considerable progress in breeding the brain out of the beast. Their
advertising agency captures this announcement in  the slogan: "No brain, no
pain." 

This development is so elegant, so simple, one wonders why it has taken so
long to uncover. As has been reported in this space before, noted
psychologist Dr. Z. Meadow Lark has said it would be easier for humans to
consume barnyard animals if they didn't look so cute. This is why, in Lark's
opinion, McDonald's goes to great lengths to dress cows in skirts and Easter
hats and deliver these lovelies to unsuspecting children in the form of
Happy Meals.  Kids are led to believe that the cows are having a picnic.

But lark has also noted that adults are not always taken in by these tales
of blissful burgers. Some-approximately 1 out of 1.8 thousand-do ask the
pimply faced kids behind the counter where the meat actually comes from. The
answer, learned by rote at McDonald U, is from Happy Cows. That satisfies
most of the queries. Still, some consumers are not taken in by the sight of
cows walking hoof in hoof on the way to Farmer Brown's outdoor swimming
pool.

These are the people the Swine Breeders want to reach. To that end they have
created a pig without a head. That's right. This headless swine does, as
Shakespeare anticipated, actually make the beast with two backs, which face
each other, curly tails at the ready, butts marching  into each other with
meaty abandon. 

As Dr. Lark reminds us, "We are not forced to go eyeball-to-eyeball with a
beautiful young pig or calf that have been plucked from manger scenes.
Instead, we can look at the animal as a source of pleasurable meat.  
The  animal has no brain and therefore feels no pain. Since the swine
doesn't know whether he's coming or going, we humans are let off the hook.
No longer can we be called murderers."

Though environmental Nazis are already  criticizing the Swiners for
tampering with Mother Nature, this development might have other merciful
outcomes. We know mad cow disease occurred when unsuspecting happy cows ate
the brains of sheep that was home to a now-diagnosed wooly, bully madness.
If sheep didn't have brains, this terribly disease might not have happened.

There are other environmental advantages. Next to the genitals, heads of
slaughtered animals are very difficult to dispose of. Other than certain
Asian cultures that buy eyelashes and chin hair for sexual aids, there is
not much demand for head.-except as a kind of hamburger helper in certain
down-market brands of cat food (Kitty By Cow and the like).

Some cultures are up in arms about this. Scots, who often have animal brains
with their evening tea, consider the headless swine an attack on their
culture as vicious as when the English crawled over Hadrian's wall on their
bellies.

The Irish don't  like this headless horseman either. Rural Irish fear that
the Sunday afternoon tradition-sitting in a group and picking a hog's head
clean-will soon become a thing of the past.  

Culture might lose this round. Science will soon be in a position to give us
mindless meat from animals without a clue. No longer do we have to feel the
pain associated with slaughtering these innocents. And no more guilt.

The Environmental Nazi Party (ENP) has responded with the slogan: "Animals
also have souls."  Dr. Lark thinks this is a brilliant response and that it
will force marketers to be more sensitive to animal theology. "I suggest
McDonalds build a marketing plan around this idea. Perhaps showing Happy
Cows sauntering down a village lane to church."

Of course, without a head the animals will never actually move. They will be
frozen in time in front of the church, listening to the same old litany they
can neither hear nor understand.

"Perfect," says Dr. Lark. "Now we're talking theology."