The Rabbit Hell of Keifer Gray

I wonder if pet shops sell thousands of rabbits in the run-up to Easter. I suppose they do. I've just come across an enthralling article by Thomas 'Keifer' Gray, an engineer from Houston, Texas. In it he demythologizes the long-eared layabouts once and for all: "Although some people and organizations, such as the House Rabbit Society, might like you to believe that rabbits make great companions, I have determined that, while bunnies might look cute and cuddly, in reality they are ill-tempered, destructive, boring, unrewarding animals which, in my opinion, make poor pets." The article, well worth reading (see below) if you're thinking of keeping a rabbit, triggered a fair amount of hate mail, some of it, according to Gray, "undecipherable". But whatever Gray's detractors might say, there is no denying the suffering the Gray family endured at the hands of these creatures - and for so little reward. Caveat emptor, some would say; but it takes a brave man to challenge a mindset so widely held as to be nearly sacred, and this is what Gray has done in the case of unquestioning knee-jerk bunny-love. As for me, we never had rabbits when I was a child - cats, dogs, a chameleon, parrots, but never a rabbit. I quite enjoyed Enid Blyton's version of Brer Rabbit, but I loathed Peter Rabbit. And I successfully resisted Watership Down. Read Thomas Gray's article here. And here's a selection of 25 rabbit recipes for every occasion, supplied by Sheila Crompton of the Bolton Ferret Welfare Society. It's a brutal world, isn't it.