Thank you, Mr Watson, for responding to my last letter.

Some of my "fans" (including meat eaters) have been missing the ensuing antagonistic repartee which negates your supposition that there are many more like you who are "sick to the back teeth" of my letters!

I'm not sure whether your criticism is directed at Mailbox for publishing my letters or vegetarianism and "its related subjects" ("Too much space given to vegetarian's views", Mailbox, April 13).

We may be "free to choose what we eat" because we "are at the top of the food chain", but with so much advertising in favour of the very powerful meat and dairy industries, it is little wonder that people are indoctrinated and are unable to "think outside the box".

Does being at the top give us the right to treat other animals as commodities whose only justification for existence is to be used in experiments, for food, clothing or our entertainment?

Mr Watson, I do have a life and I am content knowing that another life hasn't been taken to sustain it.

With reference to carnivorous/omnivourous animals, Mr Watson asks: "Why are the rules so different for humans?" Do animals incarcerate their prey in vast numbers where they rear it in the smallest possible space; manipulate it to grow as quickly as possible in the shortest time?

Is their prey given drugs?

Does it become diseased and crippled and is it then transported in crowded lorries to slaughterhouses?

Is the finished "product" then presented in clingfilm, jars, packets or tins which disguise the fact that it was once a living, breathing sentient creature?

Mr Watson, the rules are certainly different for humans because humans are capable of far greater cruelty, greed and destruction than any animal!

I shall only consider it time to "give it all a rest" when there is an end to the suffering, abuse and cruelty to the creatures which share this planet with us.

Elizabeth Allison, Aylestone.