Quote:
In a show of sisterly concern, her Tory shadow, Theresa May, weighed in to deplore university research “which downplayed the extent of trafficking” for prostitution and was cited in Nick Davies’s Guardian report along the same lines. Not only did Harman agree, (citing a dreadful case in passing), she revved up. “I take this opportunity to deplore the reporting in the Guardian … those involved should be ashamed of themselves.”
Unbelievable – so she condemns the research, not for the methods used, but purely because they came up with results that did not fit her view?

Passing to my own comments, Zebu is a great word, as you say, but I think you overplay your hand when you complain that people describe its flesh as beef. Hillaire Belloc, in his Moral Alphabet, began his Z entry with:

This Zebu, which like all Zebus
I sacred to devout Hindoos …

Clearly, Hindus regard Zebu as a breed of cattle, and quite rightly so, since you mention yourselves that they can be crossed with other such breeds. OK; some crosses between closely related but separate species ‘mule out’. All (or almost all) individuals are infertile, with each other and both parent species. Now it may be that in S America and elsewhere the owners of the herds arrange a mating whenever they want a calf, but I hae’ me doots. I suspect that they have large herds of the crosses, which they breed according to the usual principles of animal husbandry.
Although Zebu look distinctly odd if you’re only used to UK cattle (I remember my first sighting of them in Malaysia), that is only a question of familiarity. They are, I suspect, a race, or sub-species, of kine. For that matter, wolves, dogs, jackals and coyotes are all one species, and will interbreed naturally. Did I mention dogs? Suppose you were a Monster from Outer Space and, having been courteously received by us humans, were presented with a Great Dane, a St Bernard, a Pekinese and a Chihuaha. You might possibly guess that the first two were different breeds of the same species, but I think most likely not as regards the latter. As for all four being fully interfertile – No way! Yet it would be no great trick to inseminate artificially either of the first two with either of the second. Exactly what you’d get, and how many, I’ve no idea – most likely a lot, but they’d all be dogs. The other way round would be messier, as you’d have to use IVF and a surrogate – but I suspect those that made it would look very like the first litters, and breed with them by normal means. You’d surely get some problems with whelping, through throwback puppies, but veterinerary caesarian section ain’t exactly rocket science. (Nor is selective breeding, though it requires rather more finesse.)
Of course, describing imported Zebu or cross-Zebu meat as British must be wrong, but had the cattle been born and reared in the country, I’d have no objection. After all, suppose you were to visit a London restaurant and there consume a superb, guaranteed British, sirloin steak; would you complain if the waiter couldn’t say for sure if it was Hereford or Holstein?
Even more relevant, would you (other things, such as freedom from disease and pollutants being equal) rather eat your favourite cut from a young Zebu(cross) steer that had been bred and nurtured for the table, in whatever country, or a 25-year-old Jersey milch-cow who had been slaughtered because the last attempt to breed from her had failed?
Coming closer to home, I happen to work at a site which employs a stupendous mix of races. Among my colleagues are a huge black man (nearer seven feet than six, and heavy with it) and an even taller but somewhat slighter Pole. There’s also a small-boned Fillipino who barely tops five feet. I regard all three as men, and surprisingly enough, such is their opinion of me (not a big claim).

My other bone of contention with you lies with your reference to the ‘promise to pay’ on UK banknotes. When I was still in short trousers (which is to say, well before either of you gentlemen were born, and the name on the notes was L K O’Brien), I asked my father exactly what that meant. This was a pound, so what was the point of promising to pay a pound for it? He explained to me how the word ‘pound’ in this context meant originally a pound of English silver pennies, there being in those days 12 pennies to the ounce, 12 ounces to the pound (rather than sixteen), also twenty shillings to the pound. So what did it mean? I forget his exact answer, but not too long afterwards I substituted my own – an empty form of words, rather like the grandiloquent expressions on my passport, or the promise to ‘love’ in the CofE marriage service.
Aho! This is not the point to commence a discussion of the topic of ‘fiat money’. Other things aside, I’ve had a long, hard day and I’m dead drunk. (Had I been sober, this e-mail would have been shorter, less verbose,and more cogent. It would also have been more grammatical, and contained fewer typos and spelling mistakes.)