Archive for 2001
ALF Claims Credit for Lab Break-In
The Animal Liberation Front claimed responsibility yesterday for a break-in at a Sierra Biomedical Facility in San Diego, California.
In a press release, the ALF claimed it entered the building and spent “several hours” smashing equipment and destroying files. According to the communique,
No high-price contract is worth murder nor is it worth what the ALF will do to stop these murders. We were thorough and determined, they will not soon recover from our visit.
Source:
ALF Destroys equipment at San Diego Lab. Frontline Information Service, November 12, 2001.
Tags: Animal Liberation Front, California, Medical Research, Terrorism, United States
Alexander Chancellor on Post-9/11 Animal Rights Terrorism
As a number of newspapers have recently pointed out, the animal rights terrorists hardly paused at all after the 9/11 attacks to resume their criminal ways. While People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and other groups at least temporarily decided to tone things down, the Animal Liberation Front and Earth Liberation Front have continued their methods of arson and property destruction designed to intimidate those working in animal enterprises.
Writing in the Daily Telegraph, Alexander Chancellor hit the nail on the head in describing the sort of people who continue to wage this war of terrorism,
Animal rights spokesmen claim that such actions constitute neither violence nor terrorism, but are aimed at saving the lives of animals and will continue until animal “blood stops spilling.” Such people have always been much less concerned about the spilling of human blood, which may explain why they not allowed the thousands of deaths on September 11 to affect their behavior.
Well put.
Source:
Footnote. Alexander Chancellor, The Daily Telegraph, November 13, 2001.
Tags: Animal Liberation Front, Earth Liberation Front, Terrorism
Will People Buy Owls after Seeing ‘Harry Potter’?
Ananova reported last week that some wildlife experts are afraid that parents will run out and buy owls as Christmas gifts after seeing ‘Harry Potter and the Sorceror’s Stone.’ A spokesman for the Raptor Foundation told the The Mirror,
We’re very concerned youngsters may want snowy owls as pets. You don’t need any qualifications to buy one - just money.
Anyone who would buy an owl on a whim after seeing the ‘Harry Potter’ movie is an idiot who has a lot more problems than just a high maintenance raptor.
Source:
Wildlife experts fear Harry Potter will spark owl pet craze. Ananova, November 10, 2001.
Tags: Uncategorized
FIFA Takes on Dog Meat
With the 2002 World Cup slated to take place in South Korea and Japan, Fifa — football’s governing body — is pressuring South Korea to take actions against the eating of dogs.
According to the BBC, during the 1988 Seoul Olympics South Korea outright banned restaurants that served dog meat, but a soup made from dog meat is very popular.
It is unclear from the BBC story whether Fifa objects to dog meat itself or only to the sometimes cruel methods used to prepare and kill dogs used for food. Either way, someone might want to point out to Fifa that the leather used to create the official World Cup soccer balls is also produced under conditions which many animal rights activists consider to be cruel.
Source:
S Korea dog meat row deepens. The BBC, November 12, 2001.
Tags: Dogs, South Korea
Animal Rights Activists Predict More Violent Actions in the Wake of Barry Horne’s Death
Reaction to Barry Horne’s death from animal rights activists was swift and predictable — Horne was a hero and his death will likely inspire more violent actions against people in animal industries.
Ronnie Lee, founder of the Animal Liberation Front, said, “I think there are some people who would regard him as a martyr. Everyone in the animal rights movement feels a combination of sadness and anger over his death. That includes people whose thing is to carry out personal actions on animal rights abusers.”
Andrew Tyler, director of Animal Aid, said he did not condone arson but called Horne a “thoroughly dedicated anti-vivisectionist.”
Robin Webb, current ALF spokesman, said, “Barry has given his life. It will harden people’s resolve. … I can’t predict what will happen but people are becoming angry and I belive this will make them angrier. Some people are becoming more radical still.”
Scriptwriter and animal rights activist Carla Lane said, “I don’t believe in violence, arson, or anything like that, but I believe in why Barry did what he did. I hope he will make others think more deeply about it, because if someone is prepared to give their life they must have seen something that was deeply, deeply upsetting to them.”
And Kevin Jonas of Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty, weighed in to predict that violent actions would escalate. “He was a household name for animal rights activists around the world,” Jonas said. “I can only predict that his death is going to spark a reaction.”
Companies and police in Great Britain are reportedly already preparing for an increase in animal rights related terrorism following Horne’s death. During his last hunger strike, the Animal Rights Militia issued a list of 10 people it claimed it would kill if Horne died. Given the outpouring of love for such a violent individual, don’t expect the activists to pull their punches.
Sources:
Police alert after animal rights bomber dies on hunger strike. Richard Ford, The Times (London), November 6, 2001.
Animal rights activist dies after hunger strike. Ian Burrell, The Independent (London), November 6, 2001.
Interview. The Guardian (London), November 6, 2001.
Animal activists mourn their martyr dies in hunger strike: Firebomber dies after fourth hunger strike bid to change vivisection policy. Sarah Hall, The Guardian (London), November 6, 2001.
Companies on alert after death of activist: Animal rights group wars of violence. Jimmy Burns and David Firn, The Financial Times (London), November 6, 2001.
Firebomber dies on hunger strike. Philip Johnston, The Daily Telegraph (London), November 6, 2001.
Tags: Andrew Tyler, Animal Aid, Animal Liberation Front, Animal Rights Militia, Barry Horne, Carla Lane, Great Britain, Kevin Jonas, Robin Webb, Ronnie Lee, Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty, Terrorism
Animal Research Leads to Stunning Advance in Nanotech Medicine
It’s long been a staple of science fiction — cure a disease such as diabetes by injecting extremely tiny nanotech machines into the body that will automatically regulate insulin level. Now, however, thanks to medical research with animals, this scenario is now science fact and likely to head to tests in human beings within a few years.
Bioengineering researcher Tejal Desai has managed to create a nanotech device that essentially cures rats afflicted with diabetes. Desai’s method involves injecting the diabetic mice with extremely small machines that contain insulin-producing cells.
The major obstacle to such an approach is that the bodies of both animals and human beings will launch an immune system attack against the insulin-producing cells. Desai gets around this by including tiny pores in the nanomachine that are only 7 nanometers across — wide enough to allow insulin to leave the nanomachine, but too small for antibodies to invade and attack.
Once in the bloodstream, the nanomachines should last a lifetime, meaning an insulin nanomachine would essentially be a cure for diabetes.
Desai’s next step will be long-term studies of her insulin nanomachines in small animals, followed by tests on larger animals such as chimpanzees.
Source:
Tiny capsules float downstream. Kristen Philipkoski, Wired, October 29, 2001.
Tags: Diabetes, Medical Research, Rats
Barry Horne, 49, Dead In Hunger Strike
Great Britain’s Prison Service has reported that animal rights terrorist Barry Horne, 49, died in a Worcester hospital on November 5 after a short-lived hunger strike. The official cause of death was liver failure.
In 1997, Horne was sentenced to 18 years in jail for carrying out a series of arson attacks in Great Britain. Horne’s stiff sentence was directly related to the depravity of his crimes which seriously endangered human lives. Horne built incendiary devices, placed them in cigarette packs, and then hid them in stores that he claimed promoted animal cruelty. In one instance, for example, Horne hid a cigarette pack bomb in a leather bag that was subsequently purchased by a woman. The woman allowed her young children to play with the bag before the bomb was discovered, and only sheer luck prevented several deaths in this and many of Horne’s other criminal acts.
In 1998, Horne went on a hunger strike that lasted 68 days and also brought Horne near death. That was the longest of several hunger strikes Horne started during his 5 years behind bars.
Source:
Animal activist dies on hunger strike. The BBC, November 5, 2001.
Tags: Barry Horne, Terrorism
How Many People Will Die from Mad Cow Disease?
As I noted last year, although initial predictions suggested that tens of thousands of people would die from variant Cretuzfeldt-Jakob disease (Mad Cow Disease), so far the number of new cases and deaths have been extremely small. Now, a new study suggests that in the worst case scenario only a few thousand people will contract the disease — not the 100,000 or so predicted by other researchers.
A lot depends on how existing numbers are interpreted. So far, very few people have been diagnosed with vCJD. From 1995 to 1999, for example, there were only 61 cases of the disease diagnosed in Great Britain, with 55 deaths. Altogether, only about 100 people have died from the disease.
Still, researchers at the Imperial College predict that as many as 100,000 people could die from the disease. This is predicated on the view that large numbers of people were exposed to Mad Cow-infected beef, but simply have yet to show any symptoms of the disease. Researchers published this month in Science offers an alternative view — that few people have contracted the disease because few people actually consumed Mad Cow-infected beef.
In their study, the researchers conclude that even if 12 million people in Great Britain were exposed to the disease, the incubation period in most cases would be far longer than current human life spans. They estimate that the total number of vCJD cases will be somewhere between a few hundred and several thousand.
“Even in the worst case scenario, there are never likely to be more than 100 cases of vCJD pre year,” researcher Huillard d’Aignaux told Reuters.
Sources:
UK study predicts fewer human ‘Mad Cow’ cases. John Griffiths, Reuters, October 25, 2001.
vCJD ‘epidemic’ might be waning. Pallab Ghosh, The BBC, October 26, 2001.
Tags: Mad Cow Disease
Animal Rights Protesters in Arkansas Show True Heart of the Movement
Surprise, surprise, surprise. Animal rights activists associated with Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty have long been extolling and promising violence, and in their big protest (if you consider 180 or so activists a major protest) against Stephens Incorporated, they tried to follow through on those promises.
Police had set up a 3 foot barrier to separate the protesters from the Stephens, Inc. building. Late in the afternoon, while one activist shouted “The Battle of Little Rock has begun” over a bullhorn, several demonstrators — pushed at the barrier and attempted to climb it, at which point police apparently used force, reportedly including stun grenades, rubber bullets, and pepper spray, to control the crowd.
Estimates of the number arrested ranged from 10 reported by an Arkansas television station two a couple dozen reported by the Associated Press.
Earlier in the day the activist, many of whom refused to give the press their last names, showed up at the homes of at least two executives of Stephens Inc. to protest. Police were well-prepared, however, with plenty of police at several points along the march and a police helicopter circling overhead (hint — maybe police in Great Britain should take a look at how police can prevent violent hooliganism while still allowing people to peacefully protest).
Animal rights activist Ryan Courtade (who still can’t make up his mind which side he’s on), quickly sent out an e-mail describing the events and, in my opinion, accurately assessing the state of the animal rights movement,
Our movement needs to take a step back and reanalyze itself. What happened today is not acceptable. If we have to force Stephen’s to drop it’s financial back [sic] of HLS from Terrorism, and Fear, then we are no better than the lowest form of life. We need Stephen’s to drop financial back because of what they are doing to animals. We need to speak in a unified voice, and not with terror.
Sure, but lets be honest — there is no animal rights movement today that is separate from this sort of violence. The handful of animal rights organizations willing to condemn these sorts of actions can be counted on one hand, while even a group like the Humane Society of the United States stoops to hiring advocates of terrorism and violence.
The problem that folks like Courtade face is that the animal rights movement already waged its nonviolent campaign and it lost big time. People do care about animal welfare, and they are certainly more aware of animal issues than they were 20 years ago, but the animal rights movement has been heard and soundly rejected by the overwhelming majority of Americans. People may disagree about the most humane way to kill a cow, but few Americans consider killing a cow for food to be inherently immoral. People may be concerned about the fate of animals used in medical research, but nobody except Ingrid Newkirk is going to go along with letting a premature infant die just to preserve the life of a calf whose lung tissue is used to make the infant’s lungs work more efficiently.
The rhetoric is stale and played out — all the animal rights movement has left are its arsonists and agitators. It’s ironic that even as SHAC should be riding high with its claimed successes at driving HLS out of business, its leaders (as well as the rest of the animal rights movement) seems to have an air of increasing desperation. Even PETA’s nutty campaigns are becoming less and less imaginative and, more importantly, the shock value is simply no longer news.
Look at the protest against Stephens. After hyping this protested practically every week on animal rights mailing lists, and garnering extensive publicity for itself, the best SHAC can do is convince a little under 200 activists to travel to Arkansas? No wonder they have to resort to intimidation and fear — without it, they’d be irrelevant.
Source:
In response to the Stephen’s demonstrations. Ryan Courtade, E-mail communication, October, 29, 2001.
Animal rights activists picket. Tim Taylor, Times Record (Fort Smith, Arkansas), October 29, 2001.
Demonstrations turn violent. KARK News 4, October 29, 2001.
Activists clash with police in Ark. Melissa Nelson, The Associated Press, October 29, 2001.
Tags: Arkansas, Huntingdon Life Sciences, Medical Research, Ryan Courtade, Stephens Group, Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty, Terrorism, United States
What Kind of Message Are We Sending to Our Children?
In an advertisement carried in Animal People, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals president Ingrid Newkirk takes a moment to claim that Americans are not teaching their children to empathize with others, since most Americans continue to practice violence at the dinner table. But mainly Newkirk wants readers to know that at times like these, many people — for some odd reason — aren’t as focused on animal rights issues, but don’t worry, PETA will be there to remind them.
Newkirk writes,
Sadly, people tend to forget animals in times of human crisis, which will make our work even harder. People don’t remember that animals in slaughterhouses and laboratories experience such horror and pain every day. Please help us, now more than ever, incorporate kindness into daily life and strive to gain respect and protection for even the smallest and most despised among us.
We don’t have to feel powerless; we can reduce the violence in the world.
Contact us for a free “Raising Kind Kids” brochure. And, please, practice nonviolence at the dinner table by going vegetarian.
Gee, Ingrid, what kind of message did you think you were sending when you helped animal rights terrorist Rodney Coronado? Was it a message of compassion that was on your mind when you said
I find it small wonder that the laboratories aren’t all burning to ground. If I had a more guts, I’d light a match.
If children are receiving a message that political differences justify political violence, that message is coming from PETA and other animal rights groups who insist on shouting that view every chance they get.
Source:
What messages are we sending
our kids about compassion?. Ingrid Newkirk, Animal People, Fall 2001.
Tags: Ingrid Newkirk, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, Terrorism