HighestWelfare.Humane.Assured.GoodPractices.Vegetarian. Regenerative.Flexitarian.Lies...
What is the difference between No Welfare, High Welfare, and Highest Welfare when they all require animals to die? Only human comfort, NONE protect the actual animals. The most humane, ethical, and honest Webster-defined "welfare" is NOT exploiting animals - not using, not wearing, not eating, not killing - animals. The only meaningful position is vegan, everything else is just how humans euphemize animals' required suffering and violent deaths: no human exploits animals because they honestly believe that NOT exploiting animals is UNethical or INhumane.
“An open letter to non-vegan holiday hosts” Dr. Casey Taft
Wikimedia Commons
Source Vegan Publishers
By Dr. Casey Taft
As Thanksgiving fades into the background and you prepare to see your vegan family member for upcoming holidays, I’d like to say a few things that your loved one may not be able to. I’m not writing this letter to anger or shame you, but rather to encourage you to attempt to develop greater insight into what’s going on with your loved one.
To set the stage, allow me to engage you in a thought experiment that I’d like you to really take seriously. Imagine that you’re going to a holiday event that’s serving a roasted cat as the main dish. Imagine the host “preparing” the dead cat, removing her guts, inserting bread crumbs into her anal cavity, and placing her body in the oven. Later, when the cat is fully cooked, you sit at the table watching others carve up the cat while making merry as if they weren’t eating a cat in front of you. (I’m assuming you’re not partaking in dining on the cat in this scenario.)
End scene. Is the thought of participating in this event upsetting to you? How do you feel about the participants? If you’re like most people, this scenario would be profoundly disturbing. Welcome to the world of being vegan during a non-vegan holiday.
An important aspect of the vegan ethic is that we view all sentient animals as being the same and equally deserving of life. We make no distinctions between the value of a turkey vs. a cat. vs. a dolphin vs. a dog vs. a cow.
The only thing that truly distinguishes these thinking, feeling animals from one another is what we have been taught about their “use.” Society views killing and eating turkeys as acceptable, while other animals are considered off-limits for consumption.
For vegans, all animals are off-limits for consumption, since all think and feel; all have a desire to live, just like us. There is no difference between species in the mind of a vegan. Vegans have unlearned the arbitary distinctions among them, and so it’s every bit as upsetting to witness harm done to a turkey or pig as it is to witness harm done to a cat or a dog. We no longer see a difference like non-vegans do, and many of us have built relationships with animals from these “farmed” animal species as others might with a traditional household pet.
So, if you have a vegan family member coming over for your non-vegan holiday, I’d like for you to be aware that it’s likely very difficult for them. Not only because they have to witness the mutilation and consumption of an animal who wanted to live, but also because they’re observing those they care most about directly participating in it.
I hope you understand that your vegan loved one cares a great deal about you – so much so that they decided to join your event, despite the fact that they may be profoundly upset by your participation in animal suffering. But to be frank, they’re also probably disappointed, because they know you as a kind person, but your participation in this cruelty runs counter to their high regard for you.
I’m guessing that your vegan loved one feels at least some degree of rejection by you because, if you really sought to understand why they chose to go vegan, you’d go vegan yourself. There’s no logical or ethical justification for killing and eating animals, since it’s biologically unnecessary and unhealthy for us. This can be the hardest thing of all for them; they want so much for you to understand their compassion for animals, because it’s a huge part of who they are as a person.
For many vegans, the holidays are also bittersweet because we remember fondly earlier times when we would get together with family and share how we’ve changed and what we’ve learned while living our separate-but-connected lives. That may not be possible when one goes vegan, since many don’t want to hear about how we’ve developed greater compassion for animals and a desire to promote justice for them.
I understand that your response might be “My house, my rules” which is certainly your prerogative. You’re under no obligation to be accommodating to your vegan loved one by having a vegan holiday. However, by the same token, I urge you to respect their decision to refrain from attending future holidays at your home if that’s their choice, as they may similarly need to decide what’s best for them and what they’re able to witness. For some vegans, it’s simply not healthy for them, or your relationship with them, to be exposed to animal cruelty, and they need to decide that for themselves. Many vegans prefer to simply have vegan holidays at their own homes where they can avoid exposure to unnecessary animal cruelty.
So my final request is to really listen to your vegan loved one during the holidays and try to better understand how they’ve changed and why they’re so passionate about helping animals. Perhaps next holiday season you can show them that you really understand by having a vegan holiday, or better yet, going vegan yourself – it would be the greatest gift you could possibly give your vegan loved one and the animals who will no longer be harmed.
Casey is co-owner of Vegan Publishers, Professor of Psychiatry at Boston University School of Medicine, and staff psychologist at the National Center for PTSD in the VA Boston Healthcare System. He’s an internationally recognized researcher in the area of violence prevention, winning prestigious awards for his work from the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies, the Institute on Violence, Abuse and Trauma, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He has published over 100 journal articles, book chapters, and scientific reports, and has a book forthcoming on trauma-informed violence prevention, published by the American Psychological Association.
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Want to do more than go vegan? Help others to do so! Click on the below for nominal, or no, fees to vegan literature that you can use to convince others that veganism is the only compassionate route to being an animal friend.
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Cowspiracy $1 through 12/26
Cowspiracy
Click HERE to buy Cowspiracy for $1
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Order a FREE vegan kit: http://www.peta.org/living/food/free-vegan-starter-kit/
Take PETA’s Cruelty-Free Shopping Guide along with you next time you head to the store! The handy guide will help you find humane products at a glance. Order a FREE copy HERE
Want to do more than go vegan? Help others to do so! Click on the below for nominal, or no, fees to vegan literature that you can use to convince others that veganism is the only compassionate route to being an animal friend.
PETA: http://www.petacatalog.com/catalog/Literature-39-1.html
Looking for merchandise? Action for Animals has a very good sele : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
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VEGAN 2015 – The Film
Source Plant Based News
“Is The Mainstream Ready To Embrace The Vegan Movement Now?”
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Want to do more than go vegan? Help others to do so! Click on the below for nominal, or no, fees to vegan literature that you can use to convince others that veganism is the only compassionate route to being an animal friend.
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Social scientists call on organizations that promote empathy and compassion to include animals
Wikimedia Commons
Source The Dodo: For the Love of Animals
By Katrina Fox
Dr Melanie Joy, Dr Will Tuttle, Jeffrey Masson, Dr Jonathan Balcombe and Professor Casey Taft are among more than 30 leaders in social sciences who have signed an open letter urging institutions whose work focuses on empathy and compassion to overcome their blind spot when it comes to nonhuman animals.
Stanford’s Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education, the Greater Good Science Center at Berkeley, and the The Dalai Lama Center for Ethics and Transformative Values at MIT are among a group of 12 organizations targeted in an open letter calling for them to include all sentient beings in their work and mission.
The letter, spearheaded by vegan Maryland-based psychotherapist and social worker Beth Levine, and including signatures from several luminaries in the animal advocacy movement, highlights ways in which cultural norms position nonhuman animals either as commodities to be exploited for our pleasure, or as having interests ‘less than’ those of humans. It also points out that these social norms negatively impact not only nonhuman animals, but ourselves and our societies.
“We know that compassionate action leads to happier, more fulfilling lives, as well as an increase in mental, emotional and physical well-being and contributes to a less violent world. Imagine how much happier and emotionally and physically healthy individuals would be and how much more peaceful society would be if we all expanded our moral consideration to include all animals, human and nonhuman,” the letter says.
Sentience is at the heart of our moral code of conduct, according to Levine. “Sentience means that individuals experience various emotions including pleasure, pain, and fear and is aware of what is happening to and around themselves,” she says. “Unfortunately, despite the understanding that animals other than humans are sentient, the reality is that many humans treat nonhumans as things that we can do whatever we want with; use as resources, whether for food, clothing, entertainment, product testing, or vivisection.”
Levine, who has worked in the field of mental health for over 20 years and who has a keen interest in intersectionality in social justice, believes organizations that promote empathy and compassion need to fight against these cultural norms that see animals as commodities to be exploited and include all sentient beings when promoting empathy and compassion.
“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you does not depend on race, gender, sexual orientation or species,” she says. “If these organizations were true to their mission, they would be advocating that we treat all animals, human and nonhuman, as individuals whose lives matter to them.”
The letter includes signatories from 33 leading social scientists in the US, UK and Australia, including:
- Dr Melanie Joy, Professor, University of Massachusetts
- Professor Casey Taft, Professor, Boston University School of Medicine, Boston, Massachusetts
- Dr Richard Ryder, psychologist, author, coined the term ‘speciesism’ in 1970
- Dr Will Tuttle, author of The World Peace Diet
- Dr Jonathan Balcombe, author of Second Nature: The Inner Lives of Animals
- Nik Taylor, Associate Professor, School of Social and Policy Studies, Flinders University, Australia
- Jeffrey Masson, author of When Elephants Weep
- Dr Richard Twine, Senior Lecturer in Social Sciences, Edge Hill University, UK
- Dr David Nibert, Professor of Sociology, Wittenberg University, Ohio
- Dr Carol L. Glasser, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Minnesota State University
Open Letter to Organizations that Research and Promote Empathy and Compassion
· Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (http://ccare.stanford.edu/tag/ccare/)
· Center for Investigating Healthy Minds at the Waisman Center (http://www.investigatinghealthyminds.org/)
· Charter for Compassion (http://charterforcompassion.org/global-compassion-movement)
· The Compassionate Mind Foundation (http://www.compassionatemind.co.uk/index.htm)
· World Suffering & Compassionate Relief of Suffering [Compassionate Societies] (http://www.compassionatesocieties.org/)
· The Dalai Lama Center for Ethics and Transformative Values (http://thecenter.mit.edu/)
· Facing History and Ourselves (https://www.facinghistory.org/)
· Greater Good Science Center (http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/)
· Interdisciplinary Program on Empathy and Altruism Research (http://www.ipearlab.org/)
· Program on Empathy Awareness and Compassion in Education (http://www.prevention.psu.edu/projects/PEACE_Area2.html)
· Roots of Empathy (http://www.rootsofempathy.org/)
· Start Empathy (http://startempathy.org/
Full text of letter and signatories courtesy of Beth Levine’s Blog:
We are writing to ask for your help to make the world even kinder and more just.
You are an important change-maker. You and your organization are working to strengthen empathy and compassion towards people. These qualities are our most valuable resources because they are at the heart of a peaceful, caring, and just society and they connect us to others regardless of potential divisive differences. As such, we are requesting that you honor the essence of compassion by including nonhuman animals in your missions.
In the following few paragraphs, we will make the case for promoting compassion for all and following that we present a suggestion as to how your organization can help.
Sentience
Sentience is the ability to experience various emotions including pleasure, pain, and fear to have an innerlife, to be aware of what is happening to and around one’s self.
Importantly, humans are not the only living beings who are sentient. Marc Bekoff, cognitive ethologist, writes in LiveScience: “Yes. Scientists do have ample, detailed, empirical facts to declare that nonhuman animals are sentient beings.” Those of us who spend time with nonhuman animals, whether we share our lives with dogs or cats, volunteer with wildlife rescue organizations, work at farm sanctuaries caring for rescued cows, pigs, and chickens, or conduct field research know animals are have feelings common to us humans.
Empathy and Compassion
Research, such as that reported in Kate Stewart and Matthew Cole’s book, Our Children and Other Animals: The Cultural Construction of Human-Animal Relations in Childhood, shows how children have a great capacity for empathy for and desire to protect nonhuman animals and how we, as a society teach our children a separate morality for animals used for food. This is evidenced by children’s affinity for many nonhuman animals. Our social norms often pressure children and adults to disconnect from their empathy and compassion for other animals. And that is shown by our media and food traditions. An example is the 4-H club which result in children disconnecting from their feelings of attachment to animals they raised in order to bring these helpless creatures to the auction house before they are slaughtered.
Unfortunately, the reality is that many humans treat other animals as widgets; resources for our use, whether for food, clothing, entertainment, product testing, or vivisection, as opposed to treating other animals as individuals whose lives matter to them, just as our lives matter to us. Our cultural norms position nonhuman animals either as commodities to be exploited for our pleasure, or certainly as having interests “less than” those of humans.
Thanks to the work of social scientists we know that compassionate action leads to happier, more fulfilling lives, as well as an increase in mental, emotional and physical well-being and contributes to a less violent world. Imagine how much happier and emotionally and physically healthy individuals would be and how much more peaceful society would be if we all expanded our moral consideration to include all animals, human and nonhuman.
Our Suggestion for Action
Institutions such as yours are integral to helping our world be a safe and just place for all. Some organizations, such as Institute for Humane Education, YEA Camp, and The Kerulos Center already promote moral consideration for all sentient beings, both human and nonhuman. We are asking you to expand your horizons to include all sentient beings in your missions. This means, for example, researching how our social norms of treating nonhuman animals as commodities affect our well-being on an individual and societal level and how these norms affect the other living creatures on our planet and the planet itself. Providing empathy and compassion toward all sentient beings, especially those who are vulnerable and without social privilege, is precisely the practise required to make the world a better place.
We welcome your response. For further information, contact Beth Levine at BethLCounseling@aol.com.
Beth Levine, LCSW-C
Psychotherapist
Rockville, Maryland
Jonathan Balcombe, PhD
Director for Animal Sentience, Humane Society Institute for Science and Policy
Washington, DC
Matthew Cole, PhD
Sociologist
Honorary Associate and Associate Lecturer
Open University, UK
David Coles
Counsellor and Depression and Anxiety Specialist
Australia
William Crain, PhD
Professor
Department of Psychology
The City College of New York
New York, New York
Theonyl A. Cuevas, LCSW
Quality Assurance Consultant
New York, New York
Margo DeMello, PhD
Program Director, Human Animal Studies
Animals and Society Institute
Albuquerque, New Mexico area
Beatrice M. Friedlander, J.D., B.A. (Sociology)
Board of Directors, Animals and Society Institute, Inc.
Ann Arbor, Michigan area
Lori B. Girshick, PhD
Sociologist, Writer
Chandler-Gilbert Community College, Chandler, Arizona
Carol L. Glasser, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Sociology
Minnesota State University, Mankat
Sandra Higgins BSc (Hons) Psych, MSc Couns Psych, MBPsS
Counselling Psychologist
The Compassion Foundation of Ireland
Ireland
Melanie Joy, PhD
Professor, University of Massachusetts, Author, President, Beyond Carnism
Boston, Massachusetts
April Lang, LCSW-C
Writer, Psychotherapist
New York, New York
Amie Laporte, Masters, Development Psychology
Maryland
Heidi Leabman, LCSW, SEP
Somatic Psychotherapist
New York, New York
Dr Frank Malone
Psychoanalyst
Greater Philadelphia Area
Clare Mann, Psychologist
Australia
Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson, PhD
Author
Australia
Kelly Struthers Montford, MA
PhD Candidate
SSHRC Canada Graduate Scholar
Department of Sociology
PhD Trainee | Faculty of Nursing
University of Alberta, Canada
David A. Nibert, PhD
Professor of Sociology
Wittenberg University
Springfield, Ohio
Dr Tracie O’Keefe DCH, BHSc, ND
Psychotherapist, Australia
Kay Peggs, PhD
Reader in Sociology
University of Portsmouth, UK
Richard D. Ryder, PhD
University of Edinburgh, Diploma in Clinical Psychology
University of Cambridge, PhD in Social and Political Sciences
UK
John Sanbonmatsu, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Philosophy
Department of Humanities and Arts
Worcester Polytechnic Institute
Worcester, Massachusetts
Jack Sawyer, M.Div, Ph.D.
Parker Street Foundation
San Francisco, California
Casey Taft, Ph.D.
Professor, Boston University School of Medicine
Boston, Massachusetts
Chloe Taylor
Assistant Professor
Department of Women’s and Gender Studies
Department of Philosophy
University of Alberta
Alberta, Canada
Nik Taylor
Associate ProfessorSchool of Social and Policy Studies
Flinders University, Australia
Lee Ann Thill, MA, ATR-BC, LPC
Art Therapist, Professional Counselor, Educator
Greater Philadelphia Area
Lisa Tolhurst (Lily), LPC MA MS NCC
Psychotherapist, Educator
Tucson, Arizona
Will Tuttle, PhD
Graduate School of Education
University of California, Berkeley
California
Richard Twine, Ph.D.
Senior Lecturer in Social Sciences
Department of Social Sciences & Co-Director of the Centre for Human Animal Studies
Edge Hill University
Ormskirk, UK
Order a FREE vegan kit: http://www.peta.org/living/food/free-vegan-starter-kit/
Take PETA’s Cruelty-Free Shopping Guide along with you next time you head to the store! The handy guide will help you find humane products at a glance. Order a FREE copy HERE
Want to do more than go vegan? Help others to do so! Click on the below for nominal, or no, fees to vegan literature that you can use to convince others that veganism is the only compassionate route to being an animal friend.
PETA: http://www.petacatalog.com/catalog/Literature-39-1.html
Looking for merchandise? Action for Animals has a very good sele : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
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Source Free From Harm
By Ruby Roth
I’d never have guessed my first children’s book would provoke such backlash. That’s Why We Don’t Eat Animals, though well received, has also caused some controversy, garnering attacks from the likes of animal agriculture trade magazines and even Farm Bureau CEOs. Though veganism is swiftly gaining momentum, it still provokes knee-jerk reactions— for me, each case of opposition is a study of the invisible forces that shape our thinking about food, health, and animals.
When my subsequent children’s book, Vegan Is Love, was reviewed by Nicole German, a registered dietician on Diet Blog, her critique perfectly illustrated the real reasons why “experts” often dismiss or malign veganism: fear, ignorance, and industry collusion.
FEAR
“The main problem I have with this book,” German writes, “is that children are impressionable, and this is too sensitive of a topic to have a child read this book.”
We tend to shelter children from the “adult” world because we fear shattering the fragility we imagine they inherently possess. We follow this concept of childhood because we inherited it from the Victorian age—not because it is universally accepted. Throughout history and the world, various cultures consider their children to have capabilities beyond what we acknowledge here in the West. In some cultures kids are contributing members of the community by the time they’re four—watching siblings, pounding grain, helping collect firewood. Kids are more competent and sturdy than we think. Surprised parents have repeatedly told me that their child reacted with curiosity—not fear—when they learned about factory farming in my books. During readings, I’ve never once seen a child overwhelmed—only adults. Kids learn when we teach them.
An illustrated page from That’s Why We Don’t Eat Animals.
I do, though, agree that kids are impressionable, which is exactly why they need information at an early age that will help them make educated choices. In my experience, when kids understand options, they choose wisely.
With constant media and technological stimulation, kids are being “impressed” upon by biased messaging up to hundreds of times a day—by whom? Follow the money. Seventy-five percent of government subsidies go to meat and dairy while less than half a percent goes to fruits and vegetables. The Milk Mustache campaign, driven by the National Milk Processor Board (administered by the USDA) spent $190 million in 1998. Colluding industry-led campaigns like these cause massive increases in demand, in this case, billions of pounds of fluid milk.
These profit-seeking systems are the ones we should be concerned about influencing our kids—not a picture book about choices. If we don’t intercept the all-pervasive, concerted efforts between Big Ag, Big Pharma, and federal nutrition programs, today’s youth will inevitably join in the animal cruelty and the dysfunctional cycle of disease and medication we are experiencing in this country at an all-time high. The most important message to teach kids is that we don’t have to fear anything we have the power to change.
Read More HERE
Order a FREE vegan kit: http://www.peta.org/living/food/free-vegan-starter-kit/
Take PETA’s Cruelty-Free Shopping Guide along with you next time you head to the store! The handy guide will help you find humane products at a glance. Order a FREE copy HERE
Want to do more than go vegan? Help others to do so! Click on the below for nominal, or no, fees to vegan literature that you can use to convince others that veganism is the only compassionate route to being an animal friend.
PETA: http://www.petacatalog.com/catalog/Literature-39-1.html
Looking for merchandise? Action for Animals has a very good sele : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
Have questions? Click HERE
Read more…
Mainstream Animal Advocacy Messages Framed By Those Doing The Harm
Wikimedia Commons
Source Vegan Publishers
By Dr. Casey Taft
I recently spoke with a highly respected activist connected to those who lead the largest animal advocacy organizations, discussing how these groups are now only asking others to “go vegetarian” and “cut down on” consuming animals (reducetarianism), rather than promoting veganism. He told me something that I intuitively knew but never fully digested: these organizations inform their advocacy decisions based on market research. In other words, when determining how best to encourage people to stop exploiting animals, they ask those doing the exploiting how we should craft our message to them.
Let that sink in for a moment and ask yourself how that would look with any other social justice movement. Do you think the Black Lives Matter folks conduct surveys with white racists in an effort to determine how we can end racial injustice? Do feminists conduct focus groups with sexist men about how we can best end patriarchy and violence against women? Of course not! It is absurd to ask those doing the oppressing how we should talk to them to encourage them to stop the oppression.
Of course, when we ask a non-vegan how we should engage in advocacy, they will tell us that we should only ask them to cut down on eating animal “products.” They would prefer that we never mentioned the word “vegan” at all because it makes them uncomfortable. This is why mainstream animal advocacy organizations are now calling for reducetarianism and vegetarianism rather than veganism. They can engage in their advocacy while not upsetting a very large potential donor base that funds their organizations and salaries.
We should not stop short of asking others to go vegan by suggesting that they go vegetarian or reducetarian instead because it makes them more comfortable. Being comfortable does not bring about the radical shift that we need for animals. We need to help the broader society step out of its comfort zone and ultimately reject the injustice we expose animals to in our use and abuse of them. Nonhuman animals deserve justice and an end to their use, not market researchers who are asking those engaging in the injustice how we can best talk to them.
Let’s do a thought experiment, just for the vegans. Think back to before you were vegan, when the plight of nonhuman animals wasn’t even on your radar. Maybe you willfully ignored what was happening to them or maybe you were just uninformed and unaware. Now imagine that a large animal advocacy group randomly contacts you, asking that you help lead a heavily funded campaign to end nonhuman animal exploitation. Do you think you are qualified to lead such an effort? Or do you think that your present self, as a vegan with a different perspective, might be more up to the task? Of course one is better positioned to know how to frame an animal rights message when we have some concept of the injustice that animals experience.
We have our greatest success in helping others go vegan if we discuss the implications of what we do to animals; the ethical argument is by far our strongest one. Large advocacy groups with access to considerable resources and large followings tell others that we should be asking people to reduce – rather than end – their exploitation, diluting our collective vegan message of social justice and undermining the ethical argument. Too many people are being taught that animal exploitation is okay in moderation, and that the best approach to having a vegan world is to not talk about veganism at all. Be aware of the source of this wrong-headed advocacy approach: pandering by large animal advocacy groups to those engaging in the exploitation.
Our movement should not be guided by the preferences of those who never want to see the end to exploitation of animals. It may help bring in donations to the large groups by those who are thankful that we don’t ask them to go vegan, but it is certainly not good for nonhuman animals. It’s time we as a movement collectively treat animal use as an issue of social justice.
Casey is co-owner of Vegan Publishers, Professor of Psychiatry at Boston University School of Medicine, and staff psychologist at the National Center for PTSD in the VA Boston Healthcare System. He’s an internationally recognized researcher in the area of violence prevention, winning prestigious awards for his work from the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies, the Institute on Violence, Abuse and Trauma, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He has published over 100 journal articles, book chapters, and scientific reports, and has a book forthcoming on trauma-informed violence prevention, published by the American Psychological Association.
Order a FREE vegan kit: http://www.peta.org/living/food/free-vegan-starter-kit/
Take PETA’s Cruelty-Free Shopping Guide along with you next time you head to the store! The handy guide will help you find humane products at a glance. Order a FREE copy HERE
Want to do more than go vegan? Help others to do so! Click on the below for nominal, or no, fees to vegan literature that you can use to convince others that veganism is the only compassionate route to being an animal friend.
PETA: http://www.petacatalog.com/catalog/Literature-39-1.html
Looking for merchandise? Action for Animals has a very good sele : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
Have questions? Click HERE
Read more…
Europe’s First Abolitionist Vegan Advertising Campaign
Source Linkedin
By Sandra Higgins
Eden Farmed Animal Sanctuary & Matilda’s Promise, Animal Rights & Vegan Education Centre, have launched a Public Advertising Campaignon transport and street signage throughout Ireland.
The ads, which focus on abolition of animal use, and on the harm caused bydairy and egg consumption, will appear:
- on Buses throughout Ireland
- on Bus Shelters throughout Ireland
- in Dublin DART trains
- on Billboards throughout Ireland
- in newspapers/magazines
- in Third Level Colleges and Universities throughout Ireland
The campaign will run throughout November in celebration of World Vegan Month.
The campaign is designed to counteract speciesism at the levels of individual prejudice and the socio-cultural norm. The ads allow individual non-humans to use their voice to ask for empathic engagement, to awaken conscious awareness of the harm we cause by using them, and to ask for the justice to which they are entitled.
This is an effective way of reaching a large population of non-vegans. The ads provide a direct link, through Free Text and a QR Scan Code to a Free Vegan Kit and to an educational website www.govegan.ie, both of which offer practical information to begin living vegan, as well as comprehensive information on the issues concerning our use of other animals. There is also a Facebook Page Go Vegan Ireland.
Joanna Lucas, Peaceful Prairie, our Campaign Designer, has created ads that allow the featured animals to crack open the darkness of their world that has been hidden for too long. The ads shine light on something that is rotten and wrong to its core, and direct people into the brighter path of veganism.
The campaign is inspired by the residents I work with at Eden Farmed Animal Sanctuary who have taught me everything I know about the personhood of the animals we harm. I have seen the light go out of too many eyes. Every one of them fights to the last breath to hold onto the only life they have. The least we owe them is a vegan world.
The Last Pig
Source The Last Pig
THE LAST PIG is a documentary feature currently in production. Principal photography has been underway since summer of 2014. We are presently seeking funds to complete the last phase of shooting and post production. Target completion is June 2016.
STORY
THE LAST PIG journeys into the life of a pig farmer as he grapples with death, searches for compassion, and finally finds the courage to change.
For over a decade, Bob Comis has provided a humane—even idyllic—life for the pigs he farms. But as he tends to his charges, he develops a closeness that begins to haunt him, and his weekly trips to the slaughterhouse become agonizing . With 250 pigs on the farm, Comis suddenly finds himself trapped by his past.
Through this personal journey, THE LAST PIG raises crucial questions about equality, the value of compassion and the sanctity of life. Comis’ soul-bearing narrative carries us through his final year of farming pigs, the struggle to reinvent his life, and the ghosts that will haunt him forever.
It is our hope that THE LAST PIG will help propel a shift in our society’s relationship to non-human beings and our capacity for compassion.
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The Vegan Way of Living – Free Telesummit
Find out how you can live a Compassionate, Healthy, Joyful, and a Sustainable Life! Enter your name and email address HERE to join this FREE event!
21 empowering speakers come together to teach a compassionate, sustainable, healthy, and happy way of living. Discover how to live a life free of animal products and suffering.
Hosted by Rupa Vadodaria, Certified Integrative Nutrition Health Coach
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Want to do more than go vegan? Help others to do so! Click on the below for nominal, or no, fees to vegan literature that you can use to convince others that veganism is the only compassionate route to being an animal friend.
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Compassion, Inc.
Source Compassion Incorporated
Compassion, Inc., is a nonprofit creating connections through our online vegan community with our Business Directory, Job Board, & Events Calendar. We’re your one-stop source for all things vegan! And, we’re expanding every day!
Members also receive discounts at participating businesses.
Compassion Incorporated
Order a FREE vegan kit: http://www.peta.org/living/food/free-vegan-starter-kit/
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Want to do more than go vegan? Help others to do so! Click on the below for nominal, or no, fees to vegan literature that you can use to convince others that veganism is the only compassionate route to being an animal friend.
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Why Plant Crops Don’t Kill More Wildlife than Pasture Raised Animals
FFH, Public domain
Source Free From Harm
By Anupam Katkar
Picture this: You’re a harvest mouse who lives in a wheat field. Being a mouse, you have excellent hearing and can easily pick up sounds that a human cannot hear. Thanks to your sensitive whiskers and small size, you’re acutely attuned to vibrations caused by large machines. Although your eyesight isn’t the best in the world, your eyes are situated high on your head and offer an excellent all-round view. And to top that off, you have lightning reflexes and dash about at a top speed of 8 miles an hour.
Now imagine that you’re perched idly on a stalk of wheat, your tail curled around it like a fifth limb. You’re smelling the crisp morning air and feeling the sun shining on your face. But then, the ground starts to shudder as a 3 ton, 4-cylinder diesel-engined combine harvester ominously starts heading your way – which, by the way, you can see without even turning your head. What will you do?
Run like hell
Humbly await your fate on a Kentish plum
Mike Archer, a paleontologist, goes with Option 2, which makes me wonder if he should be spending more time with living animals instead of extinct ones.
But this article is not the rebuttal of any one person or article, but an exploration of a notion perpetuated repeatedly without a shred of scientific evidence: that more animals are killed cultivating food for vegans and vegetarians, and therefore eating meat is kinder because it kills fewer animals. I think that this is not a scientific debate, but a social power struggle, perhaps with the support of the meat industry. But before we debunk the “armchair experts”, let’s have a look at some actual studies conducted in the field.
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The Term “Factory Farming” is Not Vegan
Wikimedia Commons; cage-free
Source Free From Harm
By Hope Bohanec
Advocates fighting for farmed animals should be proud as we have come a long way in educating the public about the horrors of animal agriculture. Just a couple of decades ago, the only soy milk was in powder form; if you wanted a vegan cookie, you had to bake it yourself; and vegans often ventured into restaurants with trepidation for fear of their sanity– and leave hungry. Now, there are vegan chain restaurants and vegan doughnuts alongside national media stories about caged hens, immobilized sows, and overcrowded cows. The number of animals killed in the U.S. is going down by the hundreds of thousands and the fact that animals suffer to produce meat, dairy and eggs is quickly becoming common knowledge. Vegan is now a household word.
Much of this progress is the result of the strategic denouncement expressed by the powerful term, “Factory Farming.” For decades, animal activists have inscribed the motto “End Factory Farming” into brochures and splattered “Stop Factory Farming” on protest signs with red letters dripping like blood. This incriminating term conjures images of endless rows of animals in barren cages; filthy, windowless warehouses; and animals suffering and dying on manure covered concrete floors —images that are increasingly familiar and available to us via social media.
The ubiquity of these images and conditions associated with “factory farming” has spawned a pervasive condemnation. Everyone, it seems, can rally together and agree that we must stop “factory farming.” But this rallying cry has created an unforeseen consequence, one that animal exploiters are taking full advantage of. Producers who sell the flesh and fluids of animals can simply state that their product is not factory farmed; it’s organic . . . local . . . humane . . . cage-free . . . (insert any number of misleading labels here). Likewise, when consumers hear these offensive two words, they are now thinking, “Oh, but my meat (or dairy or eggs) isn’t factory farmed, I buy it at Whole Foods” (or “it’s organic,” or “it’s free-range,” etc.).
Read more HERE
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Are Vegans Vegetarians? Part 1
Wikimedia Commons
Source This is Hope, the Book
By Will Anderson
Part1:
The content of this multi-part blog is based on one of my presentations at the 2015 NAVS Summerfest last week.
The debate over the meaning of vegetarianism is not new. People have deliberated whether dietary vegetarianism was entirely plant-based or included animal products like milk, eggs, and honey since the founding of the first Vegetarian Society in 1847. What I am proposing is not new, though the reasons (environmental, social justice) have grown. Here we are continuing a conversation about what the meaning of vegetarianism should be. We are part of a debate that has been going on most recently since the 1830s.
In a break with tradition, I offer that veganism is not vegetarianism except in our minds by what we inherited as artifacts from vegetarianism’s history. The word vegetarian was first used in print in 1842. Practitioners of “the vegetable diet” of that era ate a largely raw vegan diet that often was associated with self-improvement, church congregations seeking to enhance their spiritual beliefs, and improving the higher self and that of humankind. However, the first Vegetarian Society at its 1847 founding allowed egg and dairy consumption as part of the vegetarian movement to accommodate its members.
The definition and our understanding of what the term “vegetarian(-ism)” means is inconsistently applied by organizations, food manufacturers, the media, vegetarians and the public. As we will see, this causes constant confusion and makes attaining a vegan planet unnecessarily difficult. How often should we be forced by this confusion to explain the “types” of vegetarianism and tag veganism into the mix? The violence and injustice waged against other animals, ecosystems and people will be reduced when we restore clarity to our language regarding vegetarianism and veganism.
Today, interpretations of vegetarianism range from veganism as an expression of justice, nonviolence and nonexploitation of others that we apply to everything we do in our lives—all the way to it being a practice that concerns itself solely with a dietary choice that can include all foods except “meat”. I will demonstrate the misunderstandings this creates and the harm it causes to our progress as a movement. Pointedly, the confusion in our messaging about veganism and its association with vegetarianism is our responsibility. We can take cues from the Vegan Society, founded by the creators of “vegan,” but must also respond to a world that has changed since the term was first used.
Perhaps what most of us can agree on is that the term vegetarian has meant many different things to different people, eras, and cultures. The core definition of vegan has not changed. Unlike vegetarianism, there is no confusion about veganism being the clearer, more effective and comprehensive approach to end the harms in our relationships with other beings. In fact, veganism reflects the original “vegetable dietarians” as they were called before the term vegetarian took hold. I will provide you with links to the history of our movement with the last installment of the blog series.
We must own the language if we are to communicate the vegan message effectively. The more clear and concise we can make it, the more powerful it will be for our advocacy. Veganism states itself exactly; vegetarianism is all over the place as to what it means.
NEXT: History – A review of the historical circumstances when vegetarianism lost its vegan meaning, and the events that led Donald Watson and others to create the term, “vegan.”
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the schisms of isms
what we are or
are not.
if we live by kindness,
that is the
best that
we got!!!!
Karen Lyons Kalmenson
My position on Veganism in a Nutshell
Wikimedia Commons
Source Veganism: A Truth Whose Time Has Come
By Butterflies Katz
I would be vegan even if animals were exploited on green pastures rather than factory farms. My position is not about horrific treatment in factory farms or on the way to being slaughtered, (of course that’s despicable), but about any animal’s birthright under any conditions not to be objectified for human use. Animals should not be made slaves to humans any more than humans should be made slaves to other humans. I am pro-rights; fundamental rights of anyone who can feel and has consciousness, not to be harmed in my name. My educational efforts and campaigns are based in RIGHTS of anyone sentient not to be enslaved, exploited, sexually-violated, and/or violently assaulted by humans; who can live vegan.
I am anti-violence to any being; human or other animal. It is my life’s stance. I have been successful for nearly 4 decades through vegan living.
I use my advocacy time to educate people about the vegan ethic. Veganism is comprehensive and inclusive of all species of animals and all ways they are harmed by humans.
I tend to focus my energies towards those who are already interested. I hold FREE public vegan educational events, admin groups where people who are interested can join, etc. I have found that there are plenty interested already, so I focus on them; with the ultimate goal of reaching a “tipping point” in human consciousness. I believe the Golden Rule and treating anyone sentient (human or other animal) with basic respect. Therefore, I like to offer welcoming, FREE public-service events with a FREE vegan meal and education. I also like the written word; because I became vegan from someone’s writing.
I don’t have to use graphic shocking imagery which is unnecessary when you are talking from an animal rights-based position; as it is not about “treatment” or poor welfare standards in certain situations, but about any being’s birthright not to be violently assaulted and used at all, by humans. I prefer to use imagery that depicts “the way it should be”; beautiful images of humans being friendly to other animals.
I don’t ask others to follow my personal form of advocacy. I realize we all come from unique perceptions and people want to campaign from what they feel is true to their beliefs. I only mind if they misappropriate the very definition of veganism – a non-hypocritical way of life that seeks to exclude all forms of cruelty and exploitation of animals for food, clothing, entertainment, experimentation, labor, breeding, etc.
I look up to veganism. I don’t put other activists on a pedestal. I put the vegan ideal on a pedestal. I consider the vegan ethic and the Light from the Sun to be my leaders and what I follow.
I realize that many humans are conditioned by society where it is socially accepted to abuse animals; eat and wear them, buy products that were tested on them, etc. I try to alter the perceptions of humanity and lift them up to seeing the vegan ideal, rather than lowering the literal meaning of veganism to meet “where people are at”. I would not feel right diluting the vegan message; it’s a Great Truth and we should be cultivating the vegan in everyone. I don’t see vegan living as the “end-all-point” or that we should “take baby steps to get there” -but- “the first step” or “the least we can do”.
I never confuse the meaning of veganism with a plant-based diet or a plant-powered diet. Eating a plant-powered diet is a big part of being vegan, but only a part. One can eat a plant-based diet for many reasons other than non participation in animal exploitation. There is one reason to be vegan. It is clearly in the definition. Veganism is always about not exploiting animals for food, clothing, products, and practices, to the furthest we are capable.
Since veganism is not really about YOU – but about THEM, I don’t tend to try to get someone to go vegan for their own personal benefit. I do mention that there are personal benefits. It is freeing to our spirit that we are living our life with the knowing that we don’t harm animals. It is uplifting to our soul and enhances our life to live according to what we know is right. And if someone does not know that it’s right not to hurt animals; my role is to help them to empathize, to care, and not to infringe on animal’s inherent rights.
Since we can live vegan, I believe veganism is for everybody – a Universal Truth. It’s something everyone needs to evolve to seeing and doing. If humanity embraced vegan living; we could save the world from environmental devastation caused by farming animals, and the violence that plagues this planet. We could attain Peace on Earth quite literally, if humans evolve to the vegan way of life. Many long term vegans have proven that vegan living is a viable and preferable alternative to what is now considered the norm. I believe becoming vegan evolves us and helps us become who we are meant to be. If I try to get you to go vegan, I am not asking you something that will harm you or anyone.
Vegans are the pioneers ushering humanity into a more civilized way of living on Earth that has far reaching benefits to the planet and all its inhabitants. Helping others to become vegan and making it easier for everybody to become vegan – is the perhaps the most important work we can do.
I have made certain “vegan stands” through my nearly 37 years of vegan living. I am vegan-sexual and have been for 3.5 decades. I don’t desire to be intimate with someone who has no issue with animal abuse. I won’t eat in a non-vegan restaurant. I try to support and promote vegan-owned businesses, as they will make it easier for others to be vegan. At age 25 (3 years after I became vegan) I saw that I was still participating by being employed by restaurants, and so I made a stand to stop working for animal exploiters.
When I do live with nonvegans, at times, they are fed vegan and educated about veganism. If I rescue animals that do not want to eat vegan, I find them a more suitable home. No one is going to get me to participate in nonveganism.
I don’t believe in buying animals ever, as I don’t see animals as objects that can be bought and sold like slaves. I don’t believe in breeding other animals or anyone but yourself (and I don’t believe in that either). I see it as sexual violation to breed animals, and unethical. I only rescue animals. I feed them a balanced and supplemented vegan diet and instill in them not to kill other animals. I don’t recommend to “adopt/foster” without saying feed these rescues a vegan diet, simply because I don’t believe in rescuing animals to feed them other tortured and murdered animals. I don’t participate in feedings carnivorous animals.
I prefer certain species of animals – and humans are not the top of the list. I often prefer living with dogs (fed a plant-powered diet), deer, bunnies, ducks, birds – over humans. However, I would not ever harm or kill any species of animal (including humans) intentionally or pay someone else to do it for me (by being nonvegan). I show basic decency to anyone.
I try to rid myself of all indoctrinated speciesism, sexism, racism, ageism, nationalism or any discrimination based on irrelevant criterion. That is a part of my vegan advocacy and personal growth.
I have a strong stand against “wrongful conviction” in humans and the same for imprisoning victims of other species….capturing animals from the wild and forcing them to entertain humans and live in prison, purposely breeding animals to bring harm to them, etc. I have a strong stand against “breeding” or sexually violating individuals, of any species. I have a strong stand on using a someone like they are a something; turning the bodies of animals into a reproductive machine for human use. I have a strong anti-slavery stand; whether humans or other animals. I only would purchase fair-trade chocolate, coffee, etc. Anyone against slavery must be vegan.
When it comes to animals in the environment that are introduced or so called “pest animals” – I don’t kill or harm them. I believe in sterilization bates, not poison bates. I’m an environmentalist, but I’m vegan first. So I won’t kill or harm animals that may be bad for an environment. If I did, humans would surely be targets, as there is no species of animal that is more a pest to the planet. I am not humancentric. I see the big picture that includes humans, all other animals, and the planet we all share.
I believe in helping animals living in the wild. Even if they are not exploited, some of the most horrific torture I’ve seen on film is predator animals horrifically killing a baby animal; eating them alive. Animals in the wild need help too. And we should help anyone who needs help, if we can. Also, my dog friend Kisses was rescued from living a free life in the surrounding woods where she had been abandoned. I believe she lived a longer and better life with me than free-living in the woods without human intervention. She obviously agreed, since she was able to run away into the surrounding forest at any point, but she never did. So living free of human intervention is not always better.
I do believe in hunt-sabotage. I do believe in peaceful protests and standing outside animal exploiting businesses to voice objection to their marketing lies and violence. I do believe in nonviolent civil disobedience and protest. I do believe in public activism and educational stalls and events. I don’t believe in any violence to anyone; so no arson to animal exploiting buildings. Someones can be in that building; birds, rodents, and other small animals. Plus you are adding to air pollution for those in the neighborhood. (And they will just set up business somewhere else.) I do believe in rescuing and saving animals from animal harmers; if you can and if you have a good home for these rescues. They can’t generally be freed into the environment. It’s not stealing. Animals should not be property of humans so they can torture them. The law does not have right on its side, at all times. I follow the laws of my conscience above the laws of government. If I somehow can rescue someone from a life of misery, I will and I think that is right – even if the law considers them someone’s property. I don’t. If I could have “stolen” an African-American slave during the time of legal slavery, I would have. If I could have stolen “a Jew” from a Nazi concentration camp, I would have. Hitler was an elected official. A hunter walked through my campsite and killed a deer that I befriended; he was perfectly within his legal rights. Sometimes the legal laws are not what is REALLY RIGHT.
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Want to do more than go vegan? Help others to do so! Click on the below for nominal, or no, fees to vegan literature that you can use to convince others that veganism is the only compassionate route to being an animal friend.
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‘Cowspiracy’: Inspiration for a Fallen Vegan
Karen Lyons Kalmenson
Source Huffington Post
By Michelle Weiss
Admittedly, over the last year I have slowly but surely become less of a vegan and more of a vegetarian. What used to be a bite of a blueberry muffin once in a while somehow turned into cheese quesadillas every weekend, and rather than try to reestablish my desire to be and identity as a vegan, I continued to let myself travel down a path of dairy consumption.
Then one day on my way to work I got a call from my older brother, a person who has never been vegan or vegetarian, and in fact was one of the staunchest carnivores I have ever met. The first words out of his mouth on our phone call were: “Dude. I think I’m going vegan.” There have been plenty of people over the last 6 years that have told me this or something similar, like that they wanted to cut back on their meat consumption, but never would I have ever imagined I would hear these words come out of my brother’s mouth. He told me he had watched the documentary Cowspiracythe night before and it completely changed his perspective on food, specifically on meat and dairy products. Without having to even watch the film, I was inspired by my brother’s words and actions. If someone who refused to give up meat for any reason could suddenly alter their entire diet in a drastic way, why couldn’t I make a simple change and cease eating dairy again? Something deep inside of me felt strange, perhaps even a little guilty every time I ate dairy but I suppressed it, telling myself I was being too hard on myself and that I couldn’t expect to be a hero or to be perfect. However, after talking to my brother I was encouraged and energized to return to a completely animal free diet. But I still needed a little bit of a push, so I watched the film.
Cowspiracy is a documentary that follows the adventures of a man named Kip as he searches for the leading cause of climate change and the overall decrease in our environment’s health. What he found was that meat consumption was the number one factor related to global warming, deforestation, and starvation across the world. With facts on top of data on top of UN reports that all definitively show that animal agriculture is detrimental to our atmosphere, Kip shows the viewer that you cannot eat meat and think you aren’t harming the earth. A few facts from the film’s website:
- Animal agriculture is responsible for 18 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, more than the combined exhaust from all transportation.
- Animal agriculture water consumption ranges from 34-76 trillion gallons annually.
- Animal agriculture is the leading cause of species extinction, ocean dead zones, water pollution, and habitat destruction.
The documentary is filled with statistics similar to the above three. It’s almost overwhelming to watch and you feel like you need to be taking notes. That said, the thing I liked most about this film was that it showed a side of veganism that I think everyone can relate to. I appreciated that this documentary was really geared towards people who care about the environment and who are concerned about climate change — and that’s just about everyone I know. Touching on the drought in my home state California to wild life and rain forests disappearing across the world, this documentary presents information that will speak to viewers from every culture, country, and continent.
Another part I liked about the film (that I understand some people may not like) is that there was a small portion dedicated to slaughter and animal cruelty. At one point, Kip explores whether or not raising meat at home is more sustainable than factory farming. He visits a man who raises and slaughters ducks in his own backyard and becomes very disturbed by watching the man chop off the ducks heads and then feather and skin them. Kip even says in an interview afterwards: “When it gets to this point it’s not even about sustainability. I don’t feel real good inside.” I went vegan because of animal cruelty and was excited to learn along the way that being vegan was also good for my health and the environment as well. For my brother, the environmental side was the sticking point for him. Though I have never pushed my views on others or ever considered myself an “evangelist vegan” I do think the population needs to be much more educated so everyone can find their sticking point.
In conjunction with my brother’s epiphany, this film has helped me to revisit the reason I went vegan, to remember why I maintained a vegan diet for so long, and to reset my eating habits to return to a 100% animal free diet. I’ve seen several videos, have read endless books, and have watched countless documentaries, but this was the first one that made me want to spread the word that going vegan is vital because not only will it stop harming animals, not only will it improve our health, but it will save the planet – and that would be a feat for all of human kind.
You can download “Cowspiracy,” order the DVD, and also watch it on Netflix.
Follow Michelle Weiss on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/michellebweiss
Order a FREE vegan kit: http://www.peta.org/living/vegetarian-living/free-vegetarian-starter-kit.aspx
Take PETA’s Cruelty-Free Shopping Guide along with you next time you head to the store! The handy guide will help you find humane products at a glance. Order a FREE copy HERE
Want to do more than go vegan? Help others to do so! Click on the below for nominal, or no, fees to vegan literature that you can use to convince others that veganism is the only compassionate route to being an animal friend.
PETA: http://www.petacatalog.com/catalog/Literature-39-1.html
Looking for merchandise? Action for Animals has a very good sele : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
Have questions? Click HERE
Read more…
Our Compass 