Terence Blacker: Deadly animal virus causes activists' rage

It is sometimes difficult to resist the notion that many of those who feel most passionately about the rights of animals have picked up some ghastly virus, perhaps while rescuing beagles from a laboratory, that has eaten its way into their brains. Certainly some of the behaviour of activists bears more resemblance to that of a dog with rabies, or a heifer suffering from Mad Cow Disease, than that of most normal human beings.

This week it has been Joan and Peter Freeman, in mourning for their 29-year-old son John, who have been their target. John's death had been reported in the press because he was, it was thought, the first person to have succumbed to the effects of pasteurellosis, or rabbit flu, which he acquired when a blister on his thumb was infected by a rabbit, which he had just shot.

Within days of their son's funeral, Mr and Mrs Freeman began to receive anonymous calls. John's death had been the rabbit's revenge, said one. Another implied that, as one who shot rabbits, he deserved to die. "We are just ordinary people," a bewildered Mr Freeman told the press. "The only reason we have accepted publicity is so that others can be aware that this disease exists."

But the type of call received by the Freemans, it turns out, is a regular tactic of activists. When a 13-year-old boy was killed in a shooting accident in Devon last year, his mother received hate mail. Before that, the grave of a guinea-pig farm owner's mother-in-law in Staffordshire was dug up and her body stolen.

It is not quite enough to put this kind of behaviour down to boredom, misplaced idealism or even shared insanity. The organisation and scale of the campaigns suggest that they are motivated by more than spite, that some kind of moral argument, however oafish and simple-minded, lies behind them.

Perhaps a clue lies in the photograph of John Freeman, which appeared with reports of his death. A big, healthy, smiling, open-faced young man, sitting beside his cloth-capped grandfather in the front of a Land Rover, he must have seemed, to a pasty urban warrior, like the enemy incarnate - a typical, cruel country-dweller who would glory in the death of an innocent bunny. No wonder the rabbit exacted its terrible revenge upon this cheerful, ruddy farmer's son.

For the campaign of hate is essentially directed against the countryside. The idea that there are thousands of people like John Freeman, who live and work with animals and know that death is part of living on the land, annoys the activists immeasurably. They are more likely to loathe a man who shoots rabbits so that his cattle will have grass to eat than someone, sitting in an office, whose company rears cattle behind closed doors.

For the activists, it is crueller to shoot a rabbit or a fox in order to protect livestock than to keep a dog, unexercised, in a small flat, or to lock up small rodents or birds in cages. It would be unthinkable for them to deploy the kind of tactics directed against Mr and Mrs Freeman in a less rural setting - against, say, parents whose son has been infected while poisoning rats beneath the streets of London.

The rage is bigger and wider than can be explained by any specious philosophical stance about the inalienable right to life of all animals. It is about space, and a way of life and the gnawing, bitter resentment felt by a few misguided people who use a fake morality to justify their own cruel behaviour.

Whitney joins the axis of evil

There has been no response as yet from Whitney Houston's people to the breaking news that she was once the pin-up of Osama bin Laden. It must be a tricky call, PR-wise. On the one hand, it is nice to catch the eye of a famous man; on the other, Whitney, left, would not want to be considered part of the axis of evil.

The revelation, contained in a new book called Diary of a Lost Girl by Kola Boof, will have done Osama's credibility no harm at all. When not planning global destruction, the head of al-Qa'ida apparently used to enjoy watching Miami Vice and The Wonder Years, or leafing through Playboy. He did tell Boof that he would have to have Whitney's husband killed, but that can probably be put down to the innocent, macho posturing of a lovestruck terrorist.

With a grave expression fit for a report from Darfur or Gaza, newsreaders introduce the headline story of the week: in five years, virtually everyone in Britain will look like Billy Bunter. The obesity crisis is upon us. There then follows the inevitable footage from the high street, with the camera following a few vast, trouser-stretching behinds as they waddle along or catching a tubby tot cramming its fat face with a hamburger.

How do those presenting these stories keep a straight face? The temptation to say, "Talking of which, you're putting on a few love-handles yourself, Huw" must be almost irresistible. And here, perhaps, is an answer to our latest crisis: laughter.

A bit of gentle mockery, preferably from slim, toned celebrities, would soon restore the nation's health. We need more obsession with looks, not less.