One of the above stories is a fake. Sadly, it’s the last one. Now don’t imagine that for some reason I’m picking on the Greens: I hear the insouciant Right drivelling on about why QE and austerity can work together, and come away with exactly the same feeling – that such folk believe the tooth fairy is real, we just can’t see her, because she spends most of her time nibbling cheese on the moon.

But I mean really, c’maaawwwn: how can you give human rights to a thing to which we are related via a tree-twig that existed 15 million years ago? Not only that, but what kind of fluffy is it that insists I should not be cruel to tiny single-cell things invisible to the naked eye? But most important of all, how dare we – this tragi-comic and insignificant little skin-rash on the face of one speck of dust circling a mature star – itself but one of 100 billion in our galaxy, and that in turn one of 300 billion others – award ourselves rights?

Rights are about assumed entitlement – one of my bêtes noires. We have no rights at all as a species, but we do have duties. We have a duty to our fellow humans to try and be compassionate: and – being ineluctably omnivorous – a duty to be humane in the way we kill our prey. This is because we have large brains (an evolutionary accident – nothing more) and so should be above cruelty.

But every day in every way, we prove beyond a scintilla of doubt that we are a species capable of killing for fun – for the sheer spectacle of the event. Such was at the core of the Roman Coliseum’s Games, and we have not evolved one millimetre since then. We are, let’s face it, merely the brightest thug on the planet.

This is what’s wrong with the Greens’ outlook, and why they gravitate so naturally to the Big State bollocks we get from New Labour….or Hollande’s PS in France, or one day perhaps Tsipras’s Syriza in Greece. All such Parties owe their heritage to patronising middle-class nineteenth century intellectuals unconsciously convinced that ordinary people are so dumb, they need to be looked after by a protector. Hence Orwell’s Big Brother – whom, by the way, he always assumed would be of the Left, not the Right.

There is rich stand-up to be had in this. So I’ll close with some tonight.

“Do you like pets? I like pets. But they’re such a tie, int they?

I have a pet carrot. I call him Ginger. He’s no trouble at all: he doesn’t bark, and he doesn’t eat the neighbour’s cat. But he’s such a tie. I can’t just bugger off in the motor home for two weeks, because he might well have died from dehydration by the time I get back.

I couldn’t live with meself if that happened. My friends say I should just eat Ginger and be done with it. But you know what it’s like – you raise these things from carrot seed, and eating them…well, it’d be like cannibalism wouldn’t it? I mean, Ginger’s sentient. Carrots have feelings too, you know.

My brother says I should go on a vegetarian diet….but I’m already on one. Rarely a day goes by that I don’t eat at least one vegetarian. Many’s the time I’ve sat chewing on a bit of forearm and thought, ‘that’s the thing with vegetarians, the meat tastes cleaner and it’s much lower in fat’. It’s not like eating a rat at all. Rats will eat anything. That’s why they taste like shit.

But it seems the Green Party wants rats to have human rights. I’m not sure I’ll be voting Green if that’s the case. I mean, that’s tantamount to saying that I must let a rat share my table. There are drawbacks to such ideas, and I’m beginning to wonder if the Greens have really thought this through. The sort of problems I foresee are things like biting children who then die of septicaemia. Or bubonic plague. That sort of thing.

Have you ever noticed what a funny word ‘tantamount’ is? It sounds like a large breed of South American spider. I think ‘Invasion of the Tantamounts’ would make a very interesting horror film. Mind you, not quite as horrific as going to the Green Party Conference, and reading placards that say things like ‘Home Rule for bacilli’ and ‘Ban Tantamount smacking now’.

Enjoy the rest of the weekend.

Earlier at The Slog: And yes gold, it’s time to Come on Down!