In the first hour of today’s show we heard about the Swansea University academic who asserts that as vegan lifestyles increase in popularity, phrases such as: kill two birds with one stone, hold your horses and opening up a can of worms, will become outmoded.

Animal rights charity Peta has already been pushing for harm-free alternatives for some time and has a list of suggestions that people could use so not to cause offence to vegans, horses, eggs or guinea pigs.

Can you really cause offence to an egg – apart from eating it, that is?

Peta says on its website: ‘While these phrases may seem harmless, they carry meaning and can send mixed signals to students about the relationship between humans and animals and can normalise abuse.

Teaching students to use animal- friendly language can cultivate positive relationships between all beings. Historically, the resources required to obtain meat meant it was mainly the preserve of the upper classes, while the peasantry subsisted on a mostly vegetarian diet. As a result, the consumption of meat was associated with dominant power structures in society, its absence from the plate indicating disadvantaged groups, such as women and the poor.

To control the supply of meat was to control the people.’

Well I must say I never knew that before!

Being a Tuesday, Margaret Mills returned and told us today about the youngsters, known locally as “THE ARTFUL DODGERS”, who apparently terrorised the citizens of Southend just after the end of the First World War.

Listen again here to what Margaret had to say about these miscreants: –

See you again next week,
Scott