ANTHONY King, in his reply to Susan Smith’s denunciation of the Blenheim Game Fair (Letters, August 8), completely misconstrues the insidious nature of propaganda.

The public are hardly likely to witness scenes of gratuitous cruelty at such an event, but such cruelty is nevertheless endemic in all such bloodsports, and these forms of recreational sadism invariably take place far from prying eyes.

Mr King also imagines that the violence perpetrated against other humans is on much the greater scale, when the reverse is palpably the case.

There are laws to protect vulnerable human beings, while there are also laws to protect those who abuse animals. What little legal protection is afforded to other creatures is rarely enforced and such laws are largely ignored with impunity – the Hunting Act being a case in point.

The EU is currently subsidising bullfighting to the tune of £30m annually, much of it from British taxpayers, to renovate bull-rings and to rear bulls for the corrida.

Tony Moore, of ‘Fight Against Animal Cruelty in Europe’ says that, thanks to the EU support, organisers of Spanish blood fiestas are now able to kill 15 or 16 animals in a fiesta, rather then the traditional one or two.

Here in the UK, David Cameron is setting back the cause of animal welfare by a generation by sanctioning the slaughter of our badgers, supporting mega factory farming of pigs and dairy cattle, allowing meat from GM animals to be sold unlabelled, refusing to prosecute slaughterhouses where illegal atrocities have been filmed, sending live pigs to China, and allowing markets to operate without veterinary supervision. He is also intent on overturning the ban on hunting with hounds.

Mr King also ignores the proven connection between cruelty to people and cruelty to animals, and brainwashing young people into such indifference to suffering will diminish them as human beings. Still, as long as he and his family are having a good time that’s all that matters.

PETER LANGLEY Windmill Road Headington, Oxford