Harvard waterboards, kills monkey

At Harvard Medical School Southborough Facility some 1800 primates are kept. Recently one was killed in an extended tortured fashion when he was (accidentally?) left in his cage during an aggressive "cleaning" process. Here is my letter to Harvard President Drew Faust and Medical School Dean Jeffrey S. Flier:

"I write to express my sorrow and dismay at the neglect, torture and killing of primates at Harvard's Southborough Facility. The time has passed when such atrocities as the recent killing can be done with impugnity. The inquiry and fines that may be levied are an example that even the most conservative forces in society recognize the kind of immorality that was formerly done in secret, distorted in reports, and justified in public relations double-talk.

Most such "animal" studies as those at Southborough are misguided, poorly performed and unnecessary. The most enlightened vision of science and the earth is moving beyond torturing or killing creatures in the guise of "studies." We are not ON the earth; We are OF the earth. We live WITHIN the animal/plant/water/microbial life of the earth. We cannot live without it. A platelet shift in consciousness must be the next step in our evolution.

With every day we see more clearly that imprisonment and torture of beings such as practiced at the Southborough facility is not the solution or the way for the web of life to continue on this planet.

The same developments that created civilizations and enabled the ascent of humans as the apex predators on the planet gave us two conflicting opportunities. One was the technology to eliminate or imprison entire species for food, clothing, medical "study," industry and ornament or because we wanted exclusive use of the land they occupied. Another opportunity was slow to arise but is now at our doorsteps: through thinking and observation we began to see the web of life as we never did before. There is no defensible reason to continue the method of earlier and more primitive mankind by imprisoning, torturing and killing members of other species.

No one of these killings is simply a killing. We humans cannot survive if we continue our outdated approach to the other inhabitants of the world.
We ignore the welfare of other planetary species at the expense of our human spirits, our human life and the human future.