So did you convert to veganism during “Veganuary”? Well, if you’ve been won over by its baseline ideology to outlaw meat eating, whatever about wearing woolly jumpers, here are a few questions I have. Firstly, let’s say a carnivorous prohibition was announced tomorrow, as in legislation was passed to expunge livestock farming in Ireland, how much would it cost to make affected farmers redundant and who’d pay for it?

Secondly, if it’s agreed to gradually decommission livestock farms (over a period of years), would this wind-down policy happen with a steady relaxation in breeding to effectively make farm animals extinct or not? Oh, I’d say not. Because presumably vegans believe all animals, including you and me, have a right to procreate freely. So I’m sure they wouldn’t stand over a legislative mass cull or slaughter.

Okay, lets say cattle, sheep, pigs, goats, hens, deer, ducks, geese, turkeys and farmed snails are freed from the “slavery” of the farm into the wild.

Who feeds cattle and sheep, whatever about the rest of them, in winter?

What about stock management? Didn’t a vegan once tell me on my radio show that farmers were sexually assaulting bulls by castrating them? So that rules out that form of birth control. Fine, but what impact would the obvious swell in the cattle population have on the environment, all that extra methane in the atmosphere and dung washing into the rivers? Who’d do the squeezing anyway? By the way, who’d shear the sheep or bury and render fallen animals?

What about keeping on top of TB, swine fever and bird flu? Who’d help cows calve and sheep yean, and who’d bottle feed orphaned lambs? If a cow couldn’t stand up after calving, should she be just left there, or do vegans agree with euthanasia? Actually, here is a question, are vegans pro-life or pro-choice?

The questions are endless. What would we do with the land?

Would Ireland’s 110,000 or so farm families comfortably earn a living from just growing corn, Christmas trees and elephant grass?

What would happen to the annual €1.3bn CAP payments which flush the rural economy? What about machinery manufacturers, marts, dairy co-ops, meat plants, wool merchants, vets, feed mills, butchers, contractors, fertiliser companies, food processors, and artisan entrepreneurs not to mention shoe shops? Has any vegan economist done the maths on this, including the lien on social welfare payments?

Let’s get real here. If even moderate vegans can’t answer these simple, albeit hypothetically silly, questions rationally, they should just go their merry way, eating and wearing what they like. Also, would they please stop aggressively imposing their religion on the majority and ridiculing the rest of us with macabre nonsense in the process? Such a pity there wasn’t a strong, sensible voice to make any realistic and fundamental points on RTÉ’s Claire Byrne Show a few weeks back. CL

Overly confident

Who does Martin O’Neill think he is? His continuous petulant attitude towards RTÉ’s Tony O’Donoghue (and I’m sure other scribes) must be an embarrassment to the FAI. The man is paid a fortune, although he’ll not have a proper game to prepare for until this time next year. So he should be well able to take questions from professional reporters doing their job. Having said that, and as I’ve said before, nowadays interviews with pesky managers and monotone players in team sport are just a waste of airtime. So I suggest RTÉ forgets about interviewing O’Neill in future. His sarcastic tone wouldn’t be missed by genuine football fans. He’s managed to make Roy Keane come across as friendly.