I am not surprised by the new independent marketing survey findings on attitudes to hare coursing in Ireland. According to the latest poll, more than two thirds of people in the Republic favour a ban on this inhuman and barbaric practice. The poll findings show that the muzzling of coursing greyhounds is widely perceived for what it was and remains: a cynical PR exercise designed to take the “bad look” off the blood sport. It eliminated the dramatic tug-of war scenes that attracted so many top newspaper photographers and revolted most decent people.

Why do so many of us look the other way when horrendous abuses and injustices are being committed under our very noses? Maybe it's an unsavoury part of human nature that we find it easier to ignore or pretend we don't see things that we know are wrong and causing great suffering to our fellow human beings.

How naïve it was to believe that the scene of panic and wanton cruelty witnessed in a County Meath schoolyard recently was an isolated incident. The sight of a stag, panting, pain-wracked, and covered in muck, being chased by a pack of salivating vicious hounds, upset and frightened the pupils.