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.
Dangerous Intersections at Sochi — An Olympian Speaks Out
Source Vine Sanctuary News
Guest post by Seba Johnson
I sit to write this commentary on the eve of Valentine’s Day. Each year, this day of LOVE comes around on February 14th, and this year it happens to fall during the Winter Olympics. How very appropriate. As a youngster I had a love, and that love was ski racing. By the time I was fourteen, I made Olympic history as the youngest alpine ski racer to ever compete and the first Black female alpine ski racer. My heart was filled with the love of my sport.Before the sport of ski racing entered my heart I had a first love, and that was the pure admiration and respect I felt for animals. Since birth, I was raised as an ethical vegan. I have never worn nor eaten an animal nor used his or her so-called “by products.” As soon as I was able to comprehend, I was taught that animals have the desire and the right to live happy, healthy lives just as we humans would like to do. There was never a time in my young life that I didn’t look at animals as thinking, feeling, and loving beings. A little later, in my early teenage years, I would find that oftentimes animals were much more loving than many of the humans I encountered.
Without going into great detail about my own experiences, I’d rather like to speak about those who suffer great deprivation when it comes to the matters of respect and compassion. Just today I was asked if I was watching the Olympics currently taking place in Sochi. My immediate response to anything Olympic-related is all about the controversies surrounding this year’s Games. Those controversies include both abuses of animals and discrimination against LGBT people.
How on earth is it OK to shoot poisonous darts at homeless dogs and cats, otherwise known as “Sochi strays”? This Olympic host country was awarded the Winter Games back in 2007; certainly, a spay-and-neuter program could have been put in place well in advance. This would have prevented the cull of strays and the cruel slow deaths of many adorable canines with hearts as loving as the Olympians who have vowed to rescue and save a life or two. May the international attention to the dogs of Sochi force the International Olympic Committee to implement humane treatment of all future host country’s non-human population. While they’re at it, may the IOC challenge Japan to cease their annual dolphin hunt in Taiji for good, well before the 2020 Olympic Games are to be held in that host country.
Read the rest of Seba’s blog HERE
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2 Clicks to Save Squirrels and Deer
Source IDA
End Animal Killing Contests in New York
Protest Squirrel Killing by Holley’s Fire Department!
The firefighters’ oath of protecting lives still doesn’t mean anything in Holley, New York. The Holley Fire Department is once again gearing up for another “squirrel shoot ’em up” event on February 22.
The appalling “Squirrel Slam,” a fundraiser for the Holley Fire Department, is moving forward for the eighth consecutive year despite pleas from the public to cancel it. The “Squirrel Slam” wantonly promotes the mass killing of squirrels. Last year prizes were given to the individuals who killed the largest and heaviest squirrels, often pregnant females and those who may well have recently given birth, leaving their young left alone to starve to death. Children as young as 14 years old will be encouraged to gun down as many of these harmless and unsuspecting animals as possible.
Blasting away defenseless squirrels for fun is sickening, and needs to stop now!
Bay Ridge Civic Association Supports Deer Massacre
Despite offers to manage local deer populations with a non-lethal method, the Bay Ridge Civic Association (BRCA) near Annapolis, MD, went ahead and ordered the killing of their community’s beloved deer.
The BRCA contracts with the despicable USDA Wildlife Services (WS), whose agents have come to Bay Ridge twice so far to shoot at least eighteen deer in what used to be the sanctuary of these sweet animals and many residents alike; a 90-acre wooded area in the neighborhood.
Shocked and angry residents, and their frightened and scared children who asked their parents to do something to help the deer, were devastated. Here we have a community torn apart over the battle for and against saving the deer.
Tell the Bay Ridge Civic Association to Stop Killing Deer
The Bay Ridge Civic Association not only disregards the wishes of its own residents who want to see their community deer alive and protected, and who prefer nonlethal methods if the deer population needs to be reduced, but they even ignored a generous offer by Wildlife Rescue, Inc., of Maryland to assist with deer sterilization. Instead the BRCA went ahead and ordered the deer to be killed.
Click here to let the BRCA know what you think.
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Please ensure abuser is sentenced to the fullest extent of the law
BACKGROUND
On February 6, 2014, Carlos Efrain Duarte, 41, was arrested for “allegedly” strapping fireworks to a dog and leaving him to die on a street in North Hollywood in July 2013. According to a press release from the Los Angeles Police Department, Duarte has been charged with one count of felony animal cruelty in connection with the incident.
Indy, a 3-year-old pit bull, was found, abandoned and left for dead, on July 5, 2013. Someone had strapped fireworks to his body and lit them on fire, a deliberate and brutal act of incredible cruelty. He had third-degree burns on his rear legs, his paws and part of his thorax – some of the burns were so severe that his bones were exposed. The doctor who treated Indy, Daniel Slaton, DVM, advised news outlets that he has treated many animal with Fourth of July-related injuries, but none were as extreme as those Indy suffered. Fortunately, after several surgeries and skin grafts, Indy fully recovered from his injuries, and he was adopted by a worker at the animal hospital where he received treatment.
Equally fortunate, the police continued to investigate the incident in an attempt to find Indy’s abuser.
Back in July, a witness reported seeing a man pulling a severely injured dog from the bed of his truck and leaving him in an alley. Police were able to track down the truck using surveillance video, and the witness was also able to positively identify Duarte as the man who dumped Indy.
Duarte is due in court on Feb. 20, 2014 on one count of felony animal cruelty. He is also being held on an immigration hold.
Please reach out to the Los Angeles District Attorney’s office and encourage them to prosecute Duarte to the fullest extent of the law. Duarte planned and carried out an act so egregious that no plea bargain should be offered to him.
For Indy, and for all the victims of heartless “humans” who find amusement in the suffering of animals, we must take a stand against those who purposely torture and cause immense pain to innocent animals in order to deter these things from happening in the future.
Please help ensure that justice prevails, and Indy’s abuser is prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Ask the L.A. County District Attorney to send a loud and clear message that animal cruelty and abuse will not and cannot be tolerated in a civil society.
WHOM TO CONTACT
District Attorney’s Office
County of Los Angeles
Telephone 213-974-3512
Fax 213-974-1484
webmail@da.lacounty.gov
Click HERE for free faxing from your computer. No fax machine, credit card, or registering required. Please be certain to confirm you message by clicking on the link sent to your email address or else your fax will not be sent
SAMPLE LETTER
Dear District Attorney,
I have learned of an extremely disturbing and malicious case of animal cruelty in which a Mr. Carlos Efrain Duarte deliberately caused the suffering of a dog named Indy by strapping and setting firecrackers off on Indy’s body. Indy suffered third degree burns on his rear legs, his paws, and part of his thorax – some of the burns were so severe that his bones were exposed. This alleged incident occurred in North Hollywood in July 2013.
I am requesting that you help maintain that justice prevails, by charging Indy’s abuser, and ensuring he is prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
When I try to imagine what possible motive animal abusers entertain for subjecting their animal victims to such malicious, heinous acts of brutality, I fail, but I am thankful for a lack of cognitive understanding and rationalization. To engage in such malevolent behaviour absolutely suggests sociopathic and sadistic tendencies and demonstrates an incontrovertible lack of morality regarding other living beings and a gross disrespect for the law. In fact, a person who shows such a remarkable lack of compassion towards animals has, disturbingly enough, the ability to show such indifference towards humans. This link between animal and human abuse has been established, and if we excuse or ignore Indy’s violent suffering, we would be serving an injustice to both animals and society.
Please respect the victims by penalizing the guilty and demonstrate your commitment to justice, responsibility, and integrity, attributes unquestionably necessary in an law enforcement setting: rejecting cruelty by maintaining an unyielding position towards it would be a model for all community members and would serve to characterize this type of behaviour as both impermissible and punishable.
Thank you for your attention to this urgent appeal.
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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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Nosey the Elephant Needs Your Help in Florida Today!
Please note that petition is now closed; either the rides were cancelled (yay) or it is past the time of the event. Thank you.
Please click HERE to take action
PETA has just learned that a strawberry farm in Florida is teaming up with infamous exhibitor Hugo “Tommy” Liebel to host rides featuring the suffering elephant Nosey (aka “Tiny”) this weekend, despite abundant evidence of Liebel’s decades-long neglect of her. Please join PETA in urging Oak Haven Farms & Winery in Sorrento, Florida, to cancel the rides immediately.
Last year, the U.S. Department of Agriculture ordered Liebel to pay a penalty to settle nearly three dozen charges of violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act, most of them related to his mistreatment of Nosey, including repeatedly chaining her so tightly that she could barely move and denying her necessary veterinary care. Click here to learn more about Liebel’s unrelenting neglect of Nosey’s health and well-being.
Please urge Oak Haven Farms & Winery to make the prudent and compassionate decision to cancel the rides on Nosey immediately.
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.
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Have questions? Click HERE
Read more…
PETA Rescues 17 Bears From Concrete Pits
Seventeen bears have been rescued from what would have been a life sentence in miserable concrete pits in Helen, Georgia. They’re now roaming acres of natural habitat at The Wild Animal Sanctuary in Keenesburg, Colorado, where they are already rolling in the grass, racing around their fields, and enjoying relative freedom and fresh mountain air in a stunning 60-acre habitat.
The move was the result of a collaborative effort between PETA, PETA patron and The Simpsons co-creator Sam Simon, The Wild Animal Sanctuary, the Atlanta Humane Society, and PETA patron and Atlanta Humane Society Executive Committee Vice Chairperson anna j ware. PETA worked quickly to relocate the first six bears—two pregnant brown bears, Ursula and O.B.; cubs Howell and Mansell; and juvenile siblings Drew and Rose. Ursula and O.B. were moved to the sanctuary in time to give birth to their new cubs in comfortable dens, and for the first time ever, they will have the chance to raise their cubs themselves, instead of having them taken away shortly after birth. Hunter, Nikki, Mikie, Dakota, Chance, Goldie, Ringo, Marley, Burton, Nanoochie, and Spunky were moved at a later date.
Each transport was a carefully planned event that included at least one veterinarian. During the long journey, the bears rested in climate-controlled trailers, and the only stops were for gas and veterinary checks and to re-provision the bears. Before heading out on the first 22-hour transport, PETA’s legal team reviewed the laws related to the possession and transport of captive animals in each state that had to be traveled through. PETA also arranged for “Emergency Contingency Locations” along the transport route—typically, reputable zoos, sanctuaries, or veterinary teaching hospitals—that were on-call should any health-related emergency arise with any of the bears. Luckily, no such stops were needed, and the bears seemed to enjoy the ride as well as the new foods they were offered.
When the bears first arrived at the sanctuary, the team opened the trailer doors and let them slowly look around at their new surroundings before moving them into their new habitat. Dakota immediately stepped out of the cage, put his nose to the ground, and started smelling and exploring the environment and then grazing. It didn’t take long before he was running joyously and incredulously around his new, vast home!
All the bears were given time to become acclimated to their new surroundings and to experience sights, sounds, and smells that they never could have imagined in the bear pits from which they saw virtually nothing but concrete walls and gawking tourists. One-year-old cubs Howell and Mansell were so thrilled with their new home that they immediately started climbing on everything in their surroundings, even the entrance to their den!
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
Action for Animals has a very low price : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
Have questions? Click HERE
Read more…
The Cost of Shark Bait Soup: Dolphins Chopped Up And Skinned Alive
WatchDog.net
Please click HERE to sign petition
Background Source WatchDog.net
Shark fin soup comes with a price. And we’re not talking the thousands people pay to eat it — we’re talking the mass killing of sharks, the disruption of our oceans’ ecosystem, and the brutal slaughter of hundreds of thousands of dolphins used by fishermen as shark bait.
Every day, hundreds of dolphins in Peru are harpooned, chopped up, and skinned alive to be used to lure sharks to boats. And despite Peru’s legislature outlawing dolphin killings in 1996, enforcement is so lax that up to 10,000 dolphins are still slaughtered every year.
Fishermen eager to cash in on shark fin soup’s popularity don’t care about these amazing creatures or the havoc they’re wreaking on the ecosystem. But if we pressure the Peruvian government to crack down and enforce its dolphin hunting ban, we can save our oceans before it’s too late! PETITION TO PERUVIAN PRESIDENT AND LEGISLATURE: Stop the senseless slaughter of these intelligent animals. Enforce the ban on dolphin meat and prosecute fisherman who kill them illegally.
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
Action for Animals has a very low price : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
Have questions? Click HERE
Read more…
Bird Trapped in Indoor Water Park — Please Help!
PETA
BACKGROUND
Parrots are beautiful and highly intelligent birds. In the wild, they are never alone and will fly up to 30 miles a day through forests, foraging and exploring with their flockmates. But in captivity, they are denied the opportunity to engage in natural behavior and often become neurotic, sometimes fatally mutilating themselves.
Splash Lagoon, an indoor water park in Erie, Pennsylvania, has reportedly confined this parrot to a barren enclosure in a noisy, busy, chlorine-rich facility for years.
WHOM TO CONTACT
Please politely urge parent company Scott Enterprises to improve this parrot’s quality of life by providing him with enrichment like toys for playing, chewing, and intellectual stimulation.
Individual
Carrie Wakinekona
Manager, Splash Lagoon
carriew@visitscott.com
Paul Pisano
Executive Director, Scott Enterprises
paulp@visitscott.com
Group
carriew@visitscott.com ; paulp@visitscott.com
SAMPLE COMMENT
Dear Manager Wakinekona and Executive Director Pisano,
I was shocked to learn that a parrot at Splash Lagoon is reportedly forced to languish inside a barren enclosure with little to no enrichment. In the wild, parrots — known for their intelligence, curiosity, and desire to keep busy — form strong bonds in larger groups, roost in different trees, frolic, explore, forage, and fly for miles, reaching speeds of up to 40 miles per hour.
I hope you’ll take this information into account and provide this deserving animal with the intellectual enrichment and stimulation that he requires.
Thank you for your time and consideration of this important issue.
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
Action for Animals has a very low price : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
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Stop the Crossbow Insanity in New York
Wikimedia Commons
Please click HERE to take action
Background, Source IDA
Oppose Legalizing Crossbows
What’s next… throwing spears out of car windows to kill wildlife for fun?
We need your help to stop a proposal in New York that would legalize the use of crossbows. For bow hunting, it would also lower the current 500 foot minimum shooting distance from a home or occupied structure down to the outrageously dangerous distance of only 150 feet in order to further accommodate bow hunters.
There is a notable trend in relaxing crossbow hunting regulations across the nation, mainly in an effort to stem declining hunter numbers, by increasing hunting opportunities.
A current example is New York’s Governor Andrew Cuomo, who wants to legalize hunting with crossbows to kill deer and bears, and allow the use of crossbows just 150 feet from homes and other buildings.
Crossbows are short-range, lethal weapons from which the projectile is released by squeezing a trigger, rather than by manually releasing the string as with a longbow. They are essentially guns that shoot powerful arrows and weapons which appeal to inexperienced hunters.
Send the letter to the leaders of the New York Assembly and the Senate and Governor Cuomo and request that they amend Governor Cuomo’s proposed budget bill by deleting section I.
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
Action for Animals has a very low price : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
Have questions? Click HERE
Take action now to stop the Australian shark cull
Wikimedia Commons
Please click HERE to take action
Background, Source GreenPeace
A brutal and misguided mass cull of sharks has begun in Western Australia.
All human deaths at sea are tragic — but this knee-jerk response is scientifically unproven and pushes already vulnerable species to the brink.
Let’s pile the pressure on WA Premier Colin Barnett to halt this senseless shark attack.
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
Action for Animals has a very low price : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
Have questions? Click HERE
Read more…
URGENT: Save Marius and the senseless killing of “surplus” animals
Karen Lyons Kalmenson
Update, Marius has been killed: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/09/danish-zoo-outrage-giraffe-marius
1. Please sign petition HERE
2. Please sign petition HERE
Background Source Ryot News + Action
A giraffe called Marius is in serious danger of being executed at the Copenhagen Zoo on Sunday, February 9.
His last meal is less than twenty-four hours away. Marius is healthy and 18 months old.
According to the zoo’s scientific director, Bengt Holst, Marius’ impending death will protect the rest of their giraffe population from inbreeding. Thanks to European laws, he says, Marius must be euthanized before he comes of age and attempts to mate.
Attempts to find the young giraffe a new home have been unsuccessful.
Marius faces death by bolt gun. The zoo plans to use his meat to feed carnivorous zoo animals, and a lethal injection would contaminate the potential feed.
But before the majestic animal’s body is fed to the (literal) tigers, it will be dissected and studied.
This practice of “keeping the population genetically sound” sure doesn’t seem like a kindness to us – either for Marius or for the other giraffes.
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
Action for Animals has a very low price : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
Have questions? Click HERE
Read more…
Free Lolita from Seaquarium
Care2
Please click HERE to sign petition
Background Source Care2
Her name is Lolita, and she is 48 years old. August 8th, 2012, marked the 42th anniversary of Lolita’s capture from her family, the South Resident orcas in Penn Cove off Whidby Island in Washington. She was kidnapped at the age of 6 from her home in northwestern Washington State, and she has been a prisoner for the last 42 years.
The entire community of about 85 resident orcas was driven into Penn Cove, Whidbey Island. Four baby whales and a young mother drowned in the capture, and seven very young whales were sold into the entertainment industry. Of at least 45 whales removed or killed during the capture era, only one survives … alone … in a Miami marine park, The Miami Seaquarium. Since the brutal capture Lolita in 1970, she has been kept in a tank that is illegal by current APHIS standards for space requirements as provided in Regulation 9 CFR section 3.104.
The Miami Seaquarium is considered to be one of the most dilapidated aquatic parks in the world. It is in need of major repairs, and per the Marine Mammal Inventory Report, has a substantial death rate for their animals.
We ask Arthur and Andrew Hertz, owners of the Moami Seaquarium, to retire their ‘captive’ and return her to her family pod in Washington State. Some of the worlds top orca researchers and past releases of cetaceans show that captive animals can almost always be successfully reintroduced to their habitats.
They never should have been in possession of Lolita, and other sea mammals to begin with – according to the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA) prohibits the “taking” of marine mammals. The maximum fine for violating the MMPA is $20,000 and one year in jail. “Taking” as defined under the MMPA as “harass, hunt, capture, kill or collect, or attempt to harass, hunt, capture, kill or collect.”
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
Action for Animals has a very low price : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
Have questions? Click HERE
Read more…
Indonesian human rights
BACKGROUND | SOURCE FACEBOOK
ATTENTION ACTIVISTS: MENTALLY ILL PEOPLE IN INDONESIA CHAINED AND CONFINED IN CAGES AND CELLS NOT RECEIVING PROPER CARE! please click the “see more” option to see all I have shared here.. very important…
As we Fight for Animal Rights, I wish to bring your attention to the plight of the mentally ill in Indonesia… this link gives insight to the lack of care for the institutionalized individuals with mental disorders… As activists we fight not just for animals, we fight for the rights of all living beings, including these people…
This country needs intervention of some kind.. Humanitarian folks from perhaps the states and or another country that have the ability to help facilitate a new way of caring for their mentally ill… I truly don’t think this is to be cruel so much as they are uneducated on how to deal with them and we have to try and help them some way…mgf
I have written an email to the email addy’s below:
WHOM TO CONTACT
1. http://www.embassyofindonesia.org/
Click Contact US at top of page
2. http://peluk.komnaspa.or.id/
Click Kontak at top of page: Nama anda (name); Alamat email anda (email); Subyek (subject); Isi pesan (message); kirim pesan (enter)
3. http://www.apcdfoundation.org/
Scroll down to near bottom of page
4. http://g3ict.org/resource_center/country_profiles/indonesia
Click Contact at top right of page
SAMPLE LETTER | COURTESY McKENNA GRACE FISHER
Dear Government Officials:
I am writing you in regards to the story that has come to my attention regarding several facilities in your country that house the mentally ill. It is my concern that they are not receiving proper health care and/or treatment for their illnesses. It would be helpful to know that your government officials are looking into new ways of facilitating change to insure better care and treatment for these individuals.
Chaining people to wood posts and not feeding them enough is not compassionate care. They are not able to speak for themselves so I write you with my concerns. I would like to know if you are collectively working to garner assistance in training and building hospital-style accommodations for people being held in these facilities and the ones who are left in the care of their families with little or no attention to the mental illnesses they suffer from.
Mind you I am not standing in judgement; I simply wish that somehow your government will see fit to establish an organization that will garner educational information and assistance in the implementation of how mentally disabled people need to be treated.
We are all human, some with the inability to live like the rest of us and need our special efforts to help them survive. I appreciate you taking time to read this email, and I ask that you let me know what else I might do in the US to garner assistance for your leadership to move this situation to a place of change that will bring about better and more healthy conditions for these innocent victims of mental illness.
Thank you for your prompt attention to this urgent appeal.
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
Action for Animals has a very low price : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
Have questions? Click HERE
The Dark and Disturbing World of Silk
Please note the initial Care2-specific links have been disabled by Care2, perhaps due to the age of the article, but the links that direct to other sources are intact; I included the above recent video for additional reference. Please also see Animals As Fabric by Be Fair Be Vegan.
Please also note that the original article contained a section about “peace silk” or “ahimsa silk” as a “humane alternative”, which is false considering exploitatively using any animal requires unwilling victims. I have therefore corrected that error by removing that statement. SL
Source Care2
By Abigail Geer
Care2 Editor’s note: This post is a Care2 favorite, brought back by popular demand. It was originally published on June 21, 2013.
It’s pretty obvious why some people choose not to eat meat or wear fur, but why someone wouldn’t use silk is just plain baffling to most. So here’s the deal.
When we think of silk we imagine beautiful gowns, delicate underwear and lavish furnishings, what we definitely don’t picture is live silk worms being plunged into vats of boiling water. And why would we? This certainly isn’t going to make us want to reach for our wallets, instead it is likely to make us reel with disgust.
The Plight of the Silk Worm
Just like cows, chickens and pigs, silk worms are domesticated, raised and bred on factory farms and are also killed by the hundreds of millions every year. To make one single pound of silk 2000-3000 worms have to be slaughtered.
Just prior to the metamorphosis stage where Bombyx Mori silk worms transform into moths, they spin fibers to create their cocoons. Naturally, the moth would chew its way out of this cocoon once the transformation is complete, but the problem this poses to the silk manufacturing industry is this natural development would result in chewed silk strands that are much shorter and less valuable than the intact cocoon. Which is why when the silk worms are in their pupa stage after being fed a strict diet of mulberry leaves, they are placed while still alive into boiling hot water, killing them and starting the process of unraveling the cocoon to produce silk.
Ahisma is another method of silk production that don’t include death for the silk worms. Although not resulting in death, there are still ethical issues surrounding the domestication and farming, such as adult moths being unable to fly because their bodies are too large and males unable to eat due to undeveloped mouth parts.
Some among us will try to claim that silk worms don’t matter and that they are just insects. While it’s true that we have a limited depth of understanding about insects, what we do know is that they have the capacity to feel and the right to live free from pain and suffering.
Other Alternatives
If you prefer to avoid animal products altogether (because why wouldn’t you? Please see Animals Are Not Ours To Wear for facts and alternative options. SL), there are other alternatives available. Lyocell, silk cotton, ceiba tree filaments and milkweed seed pod fibers are all eco friendly options worth exploring.
The dark and disturbing world of silk worms isn’t one that gets much media coverage, because the industry believes that we simply don’t care enough to care, but that doesn’t have to be the case. You can reject these inhumane practices and opt to buy cruelty free alternatives instead. We do not need to exploit insects, or any other animal for that matter, and no amount of whitewashing will justify using these tiny beings as resources for our own ends.
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Fish alternatives can be found HERE
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Find bacon alternatives HERE and HERE
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Want to do more than go vegan? Help others to do so! Click 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 HERE
Vegan Outreach HERE
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Read more…New investigation reveals the reality of ‘enriched’ cages
OC Comment: This is what happens when welfare supersedes abolition – the replacement of “very cruel” with “less-cruel-but-still-highly-cruel”. People believe the animals are well-cared for and, rather than adopting a vegan diet to save animals, they inaccurately believe that well-cared-for animals are okay to be consumed. Welfarism is not the solution: it perpetrates cruelty and saves no animals. Even cage-free claims are grossly overstated. Animals in these environments are impossibly crammed together and have no room to move; it is just as cruel, but the welfarists, again, rather than embracing a vegan lifestyle to save animals, instead believe that the “cage-free” animals have a cared-for existence and choose to continue committing a cruel diet. Simply, however, despite the cruel conditions animals endure prior to death, they are still SLAUGHTERED. Killing can never be humane regardless of definition, spin, or label.
Source Animal Aid
On 1st January 2012 battery cages were banned throughout the European Union. But what should have been a huge step forward in improving the lives of farmed chickens was hijacked and watered down by the farming industry. Battery cages were replaced with ‘enriched’ cages, also called ‘colony’ cages.
Two years after the battery cage ban, Animal Aid has released new undercover footage showing the reality of life for hens in so-called enriched cages in the UK, as well as a new factfile called The Battle for the Battery Cage. It charts the farming industry’s successful campaign to prevent an outright ban on the use of cages for hens.
Despite the claims of improved conditions, enriched cages provide only an additional 50cm2 of space per hen compared with traditional battery cages. This is smaller than the area of beer mat. As you will see in our film, the only enrichment provided in these cages is a scratching area, which often consists of a small piece of Astroturf that soon becomes covered in excrement. There is also a ‘nest-box’, which may simply be a screened-off area of the cage. There is no requirement to provide any form of bedding or comfort in the misleadingly named nest-box, or in any part of the cage.
Many people now believe that cramped, barren cages are a thing of the past, but they are still very much a part of modern chicken farming, with half of all eggs laid in the UK coming from hens in enriched cages*. Many of these eggs are used in everyday processed foods such as cakes, quiches and fresh pasta.
*United Kingdom Egg Statistics – Quarter 3, 2013, Defra, 7 November 2013
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
Action for Animals has a very low price : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
Have questions? Click HERE
Urge School District to Ditch Massive Plastic Dump
Wikimedia Commons
BACKGROUND | SOURCE PETA
An estimated 20 million tons of plastic litter enter the world’s oceans annually, killing more than 1 million seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals and turtles. Yet on February 8, Alvin Independent School District in Southeast Texas plans to release 10,000 plastic turtles into Mustang Bayou—a waterway that flows into the Gulf of Mexico. Foraging birds and other wildlife find small brightly colored pieces of degraded plastic irresistible, and many ingest the plastic or feed it to their babies. Their digestive systems become blocked, ultimately resulting in starvation (see more here). Alvin school officials claim to make dedicated efforts to retrieve all 10,000 plastic turtles at the end of its “turtle race” fundraisers, but a single one missed could have devastating consequences. Your voice is needed!
Please urge Alvin Independent School District officials to replace this event with one that won’t pose a threat to animals or the environment. And please forward this alert far and wide!
WHOM TO CONTACT
Fred Brent, Superintendent, Alvin Independent School District:
fbrent@alvinisd.net
Alvin Independent School District Board of Trustees:
twennerstrom@alvinisd.net ; rmetoyer@alvinisd.net ; charris@alvinisd.net ; sstringer@alvinisd.net ; mike@insurancetexas.net ; cmccauley@alvinisd.net ; ntonini@alvinisd.net
SAMPLE COMMENT
Dear Superintendent Brent and Alvin Independent School District Board of Trustees:
An estimated 20 million tons of plastic litter enter the world’s oceans annually, killing more than 1 million seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals and turtles.
Yet on February 8, Alvin Independent School District in Southeast Texas plans to release 10,000 plastic turtles into Mustang Bayou — a waterway that flows into the Gulf of Mexico. Foraging birds and other wildlife find small brightly colored pieces of degraded plastic irresistible, and many ingest the plastic or feed it to their babies. Their digestive systems become blocked, ultimately resulting in starvation.
School officials claim to make dedicated efforts to retrieve all 10,000 plastic turtles at the end of its “turtle race” fundraisers, but a single one missed could have devastating consequences.
Please act with responsibility and compassion and cancel this event and replace it with an environment- and animal-friendly occasion.
Thank you for taking the time to consider this urgent appeal.
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
Action for Animals has a very low price : http://store.afa-online.org/home.php?cat=284
Have questions? Click HERE
Read more…
Our Compass 