RECENTLY, you published letters in favour of using animals for vivisection, experiments, research, or whatever it has been phrased as.

It does not matter how you dress it up, the fact remains that to inflict pain on any living creature is never justified.

People such as myself, who accept it is our duty to prevent animal abuse, will not rest until we have made it clear that animals are not for human use or abuse.

Animals are companions who share the planet. They should have every moral right to live. They should be free from pain, fear, distress and any form of human abuse.

Animals are used because some people believe they are 'less' than us. If a new intelligence came to earth and strapped you to a table and forced you to endure the pain of experimentation, could they say it was justified because they are more intelligent than humans?

Cruelty in all its forms is for real human(e) beings to condemn.

MICHELLE PICKERING, Olympia Street, Burnley.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.