Archive for January, 2006
Friends of Animals vs. The New York Theosophical Society
Friends of Animals sent out a press release on January 3 complaining about an a couple of events to be held at the New York Theosophical Society in January.
According to the press release, the first event on Jan. 5 would feature the New York Companion Bird Club and a raffle of prizes from Grey Feather Toy Creations, which apparently makes toys and accessories for birds. The worst part, however, is that,
The raffling of a “bird gym” will fund the transportation of a bigger cage for a nursing home-based cockatoo. . . .
Overall, the planned Bird Day event is a promotion of cages, not freedom. . . .
On January 14, the Society is featuring speaker Larry D.D. Clifford exhibiting a macaw. Friends of Animals is upset since in addition to holding captive birds, Clifford trains animals for Sea World and for other animal-related shows, including television work.
Friends of Animals’ legal director Lee Hall tries to appeal to the Theosophical Society’s history, saying in the press release,
The Theosophical Society’s mission is to cultivate the spiritual growth of humanity. A pioneer in its history was the acclaimed vegetarian doctor Anna Kingsford, who spoke of the inherent value of animals other than ourselves. To offer a venue for patently exploitive promotions is to flout the Society’s best traditions.
Now Hall could have cited Theosophical Society founder Madam Blavatsky, but Blavatsky was a meat eater, so best ignore her. But what about Kingsford?
Kingsford was a 19th century vegetarian and a prominent anti-vivisectionist as well. And she would certainly have been right at home in today’s animal rights movement. She claimed to have mystical visions in which she was visited by angels, traveled through time, and was given prophetic revelations such as this.
As for Kingsford’s vegetarianism, she had an interesting — but solidly Victorian England — defense of vegetarianism. To Kingsford, the problem with eating meat was that it debased human beings to the level of mere animals,
The modern advocates of flesh-eating and vivisection, on the contrary, would reverse the sentiment of the lines just quoted, and would have us
“Move down, returning to the beast,
And letting heart and conscience die”,making thereby the practice of the lowest in the scale of Nature the rule of the highest, and abasing the moral standard of mankind to the level of the habits of the most dangerous or noxious orders of brutes.
. . .
But the disciple of Buddha and of Pythagoras, the preacher of the Pure Life and of the Perfect Way, cries to humanity, “Be men, not in mere physical form only - for form is worth nothing - but in spirit, by virtue of those qualities which exalt you above tigers, swine or jackals!. . .”
Sources:
May Birds Know A World Without Cages. Press Release, Friends of Animals, January 3, 2006.
Tags: Anna Kingsford, Friends of Animals, Lee Hall
Newkirk: We Oppose All Violence Against Civilians, But Fashion Designers Are Fair Game
Ingrid Newkirk, of all people, gave a speech at a conference addressing violent conflict in the Middle East at which she said,
. . . we call all attacks on civilians, whether against Palestinians in Jenin or Israelis in Tel Aviv, what they are: War crimes.
If we want an end to violence, it means that we must first reject the slaughterhouse, the animal circus, and animal skins and remember that kindness to animals has been a cornerstone of every great religion in the history of the world.
Mohandas Gandhi, one of the icons of the nonviolence movement, taught that how we treat animals shows our ability to empathize with those who are ‘different’ from us, which is the first step toward living in peace with our human neighbors.
Leaving aside the accuracy of her claim about religion and animals, it is interesting that Newkirk declares violence against civilians “war crimes”, but as far as I know neither Newkirk or People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals has ever apologized for Dan Mathews remarks in admiration of serial killer Andrew Cunanan. Cunanan murdered fashion designer Gianni Versace, and in 1999 PETA’s Mathews, asked to name a 20th century man he loves, replied,
Andrew Cunanan, because he got Versace to stop doing fur.
Source:
Animal rights group addresses Mideast conflict. Ynetnews.Com, January 4, 2005.
Tags: Dan Mathews, Ingrid Newkirk, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals
Another PETA Staffer With a Name Change Gimmick
Nineteen-year old People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals staffer Chris Garnett garnered a bit of press at the end of 2005 by legally changing his name to KentuckyFriedCruelty.Com.
This is, of course, simply a copy of an earlier stunt when Karin Robinson supposedly changed her name to GoVegan.Com. Of course, she only used it for about 15 minutes — when she sends letters or gives interviews to newspapers, she goes by Karin Robinson.
Presumably, Garnett will abandon his moniker the minute after media outlets stop writing about it.
Source:
Teen’s New Name: KentuckyFriedCruelty.Com. Associated Press, December 30, 2005.
Tags: Chris Garnett, Karin Robertson, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals
Activists Complain about Mitt Romney’s Canned Hunt
Animal rights activists are up in arms after Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney bagged some quail on a hunting trip while on a trip to Georgia.
According to the Boston Herald,
. . . the political outing backfired when it was revealed the birds had been fenced in.
Humane Society of the United States’ Michael Markarian complained about Romney hunting at the Cabin Bluff animal preserve, telling the Boston Herald,
Many of these private hunting preserves are basically providing drive-through killing animal opportunities. These animals are often tamed and bred on the property, fed by people and accustomed to people. They have no chance of escape. It’s like shooting fish in a barrel.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals spokeswoman Jennifer McClure told the Boston Herald,
Stalking and shooting animals is a cowardly, violent form of recreation, and if Romney wants to keep his political career alive, then he should stop supporting this dying blood sport.
Right, because hunting really killed the careers of politicians such as George W. Bush and John F. Kerry.
Anyway, opponents of such animal preserves like to call them canned hunts or refer, as the Boston Herald does, to the fact that the animals are fenced in. But this sort of criticism is silly in the case of preserves like Cabin Bluffs which sits on no less than 45,000 acres.
That’s one incredibly large can.
Source:
Mitt under fire for hunt: Romney catches flak after quail kill. Dave Wedge, Boston Herald, January 5, 2006.
Tags: Canned Hunts, Georgia, Humane Society of the United States, Hunting, Jennifer McClure, Massachusetts, Michael Markarian, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, United States
Ringling Bros. Touring Group Eliminates Tiger Act
In an effort to try to stay relevant given all the entertainment options Americans have at their fingers, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus has unveiled a new format for one of its touring groups that includes eliminating its tiger act altogether.
Ringling Bros. chief executive Kenneth Feld said the elimination of the tiger act was not a concession to animal rights activists, but rather an attempt to appeal more to the core audience of circus goers which Feld told the Tampa Bay Tribune constitutes mothers with young children. Other changes include a more theater-like environment including a 24-foot video screen. Ringling Bros. other touring group will keep the tiger act until the results of this experiment are available to the company.
According tot he Tribune,
But in a clear message to those who criticize Ringling’s treatment of animals, the elephants get speaking roles on the 24-foot video screen. Someone gives the animals voiced-over words, telling audiences that their act is based on naturalistic behaviors of elephants and poking fun at the animal rights issue.
University of Texas professor Janet Davis, however, told the Tribune that the elimination of the tiger act is a victory of sorts for the animal rights movement,
The animal rights groups have won in a way. There is less emphasis on animals in the new show.
Certainly animal rights groups were opposed to the tiger act, but this is no more a victory for animal rights groups anymore than the decline in the number of hunters is, even though they are both trends the animal rights movement is happy to see.
Rather they are both changes brought about by larger cultural, social and economic changes in the United States. Frankly, I’m surprised that as many people visit circuses every year as apparently do to keep Ringling Bros. and other circuses going.
Source:
Ringling In A New Era. Randy Diamond, Tampa Bay Tribune, January 5, 2006.
Tags: Circuses, Ringling Brothers, Tigers, United States
Karen Davis Reviews Book on Chicken Slaughter Houses
United Poultry Concerns’ Karen Davis recently posted her review of Steve Striffler’s, Chicken: The Dangerous Transformation of America’s Favorite Food to AR-NEWS. Striffler’s book is published by Yale University Press and is an account of time he spent working at a slaughterhouse to research his book.
Davis is unhappy that Striffler focuses so much on the plight of the workers in the chicken plant rather than the chickens. Typical of Davis view is this account of her exchange with Striffler,
In his preface, which Striffler defended to me as “not [intended] to educate readers about the technical details of killing a chicken” (so it’s okay to bungle the facts?), he writes: “I do not feel sorry for Javier [a worker in the plant] or the chickens. I have worked in a plant before, and stabbing chickens is a relatively easy job. Many workers would be glad to trade places. And the chickens are there to die.”
Granted, a job where you get to sit on a stool and stick, as it were, “sitting ducks” for eight hours beats most other jobs at the plant, where the majority of workers, a third of them women, are forced to stand on their feet for eight hours and perform ruinous physical labor. As for invoking the fact that the chickens are “there to die” to justify lack of pity for them, ask yourself if this logic works regarding, say, terminal cancer-ward or nursing-home patients — “I don’t feel sorry for these people; they are here to die.”
The comparison of chickens for slaughter to nursing home patients might be shocking if Davis hadn’t previously compared victims of the Holocaust to Nazis or infamously maintained that the 9/11 attack likely reduced the level of suffering in the world because most of those killed were likely meat eaters.
Source:
Chicken: The Dangerous Transformation of America’s Favorite Food, Review. Karen Davis, January 4, 2006.
Tags: Chickens, Karen Davis, United Poultry Concerns
Don’t Tell Joan Dunayer: Scientists Use Wasps to Detect Chemical Weapons
Researchers at the University of Georgia-Tifton have been exploring an interesting way to check for trace amounts of explosives or chemical toxins — they’re using wasps of all things.
The wasps, Microplitis croceipes in this case, is trained using conditioning methods to detect a chemical odor. According to USA Today,
To do their work, five wasps — each a half-inch long — are placed in a plastic cylinder that is 15 inches tall. This “Wasp Hound,” which costs roughly $100 per unit, has a vent in one end and a camera that connects to a laptop computer.
When the wasps pick up an odor they’ve been trained to detect they gather by the vent — a response that can be measured by the computer or actually seen by observers.
The wasps are able to detect chemicals when exposed to concentrations as low as four parts per billion.
Researchers hope to go to pilot testing soon and could have commercially available applications of their wasp research available within 5 to 10 years.
Just don’t tell activists like Joan Dunayer who think even insects should be given the benefit of the doubt when it comes to rights.
Source:
Scientists recruit wasps for war on terror. Mimi Hall, USA Today, December 27, 2005.
Tags: Georgia, Insects, Joan Dunayer, United States
Controversy Follows Plans for British Dogs to Compete in Irish Coursing Contests
In 2004, hare coursing was outlawed in England, so what are coursing dog owners to do? Some of them are taking their dogs to Ireland where coursing is still legal.
Half of the 32 places at Ireland’s Seamus Hughes International coursing tournament in Sevenhouse, Co Kilkenny, are reserved for British dogs and the National Coursing Club is advertising the event on its website according to The Times Online.
And, of course, where there are British coursing dogs there are inevitably British animal rights protesters.
Activists are also making the trip, with Fight Against Animal Cruelty In Europe’s Tony Moore one of a number of British animal rights activist who will make the trip to Ireland to make their view on coursing known.
Moore told the Times Online,
Whlie there is a natural link between the countries because of the strong Irish connection to coursing in England, this seems wrong. Ireland doesn’t need the problems that these hunting people bring. I don’t think the farmers over there want them either.
The Times Online also quoted Aideen Yourrell of the Irish Council Against Blood Sports who is organizing a protest against the competition,
This is very worrying. We have heard that more than 300 people are traveling to attend the event. This is like a consolation prize for them losing the Waterloo Cup (a British coursing event held since 1836), but English coursers coming over here puts extra pressure on our hare population. Coursing has been suspended in Northern Ireland already because studies there have shown a shortage of hares.
According to Kilkenny Today, however, “greyhounds in Ireland which compete in coursing meetings are muzzled to protect the hares.”
Sources:
War against hare coursing crosses the water to Ireland. Mark Tighe, The Sunday Times, January 1, 2006.
Stand-off looms at Sevenhouses. Kilkenny Today, January 4, 2006.
Tags: Aideen Yourrell, Farm USA, Fight Against Animal Cruelty In Europe, Great Britain, Ireland, Irish Council Against Blood Sports, Tony Moore
Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road . . . In a Wheelchair?
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals seems to be running out of ideas. Consider this rather lame protest planned against KFC,
A giant wheelchair-bound “chicken” will repeatedly cross the road in front of a local KFC to lead a protest against the companyÂ’s abusive treatment of chickens. Other PETA members will distribute leaflets to passersby, and one activist will wear a body screen TV showing shocking video footage of factory-farming abuse . . .
. . . Chickens are excluded from the only federal law that protects farmed animals—the Humane Slaughter Act. KFC drugs and breeds chickens to grow so large that many become crippled from the weight of their massive upper bodies.
Get it? Chickens are crippled by their weight, so the chicken has to cross the road in a wheelchair. Yeah, Ingrid, whatever.
Bruce Friedrich provides the obligatory quote,
KFC stands for cruelty in our book. If KFC employees abused cats or dogs the way they abuse chickens, they could be thrown in prison for felony charges of cruelty to animals.
Yeah, and if the average undergraduate abused logic half as often as PETA, he or she could flunk out of college in just a couple semester.
BTW, since PETA is so insistent these days that it has nothing to do with violence or terrorism, it is worth pointing out that the press release notes that PETA has received support from a number of celebrities including Chrissie Hynde. You remember Chrissie — she’s the one who a few years ago provided a justification for murdering those involved in animal industries,
The last resort is for someone to go in and actually take these guys out. Maybe it will have to be an out-and-out assassination. When no one will listen anymore, then individuals have to take the law into their own hands and it can get very ugly.
Can’t imagine where people get the idea that PETA advocates for and approves of violence.
Sources:
Giant ‘chicken’ in crosses the road to protest KFC in Reading. Press Release, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, January 3, 2006.
Tags: Bruce Friedrich, Chickens, Chrissie Hynde, KFC, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals
Morrissey: Meat Is Murder, But Violence Against Animal Researchers Is Just Fine
Former Smiths frontman Morrissey believes meat is murder, but in an interview with True-to-you.net, Morrissey explains that he believes violence against scientists and fur farmers is completley justifiable.
Responding to a question from a reader asking, “What would be your message to the world to make life better for animals on our planet?”, Morrissey replied,
With people in the world such as Jamie Oliver and Clarissa Dickson Wright there isn’t much hope for animals. I support the efforts of the Animal Rights Militia in England and I understand why fur-farmers and so-called laboratory scientists are repaid with violence - it is because they deal in violence themselves and it’s the only language they understand - the same principals that apply to war. You reach a point where you cannot reason with people. This is why the Animal Rights Militia and the Hunt Saboteurs exist. They are usually very intelligent people who are forced to act because the law is shameful or amoral.
In England, animals are hunted to the point of extinction, and then a great effort is made to save and reintroduce animals, and once they are re-established, they are then hunted back to the point of extinction. Everybody needs to hate something, it seems.
The Animal Rights Militia is a violent group of animal rights extremists that has regularly threatened “violent retribution” against scientists, fur farmers and others in animal industries unless they abandon their work.
In 1998, the ARM issued a list of 10 people it would murder if imprisoned animal rights terrorist Barry Horne died while on a hunger strike. Horne survived that hunger strike but died ina subsequent hunger strike in 2001.
Source:
Questions Answered. True-to-you.net, January 4, 2006.
Tags: Animal Rights Militia, Morrissey, Terrorism