Advocacy For Animals

Action Alerts from the National Anti-Vivisection Society

Each week the National Anti-Vivisection Society (NAVS) sends out an e-mail alert called “Take Action Thursday,” which tells subscribers about current actions they can take to help animals. NAVS is a national, not-for-profit educational organization incorporated in the State of Illinois. NAVS promotes greater compassion, respect, and justice for animals through educational programs based on respected ethical and scientific theory and supported by extensive documentation of the cruelty and waste of vivisection. You can register to receive these action alerts and more at the NAVS Web site.

This week’s Take Action Thursday reviews bills concerning animals and the military, as well as a novel Rhode Island law allowing animals to have their own advocates in court. continue reading…

Phony Front Groups the Only Chickens in Hen Debate

by Michael Markarian, president of the Humane Society Legislative Fund

Our thanks to the HSLF Animals & Politics blog for permission to republish this post, which first appeared on their site on July 13, 2012.

It’s not uncommon for Washington lobbying groups to set up phony organizations that sound like they are advocating in the public interest, rather than for corporate special interests. Now there’s a new group inside the beltway with the altruistic sounding name “Keep Food Affordable,” set up by the pork industry to attack members of Congress who are backing legislation to improve the treatment of egg-laying hens and provide a stable and secure future for U.S. egg farmers.

So who is this shadowy front group? In this interview, videotaped this summer at the World Pork Expo in Des Moines, a board member of the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC) said “it’s funded mainly by NPPC.” And why would the pork producers care about legislation that only deals with laying hens, when they have no involvement in egg production, processing, or sales? Because they have among the worst records on animal welfare—with many large, industrialized operations confining sows in small cages, and producing enormous volumes of waste that pollute the environment. In fact, just this week, The Humane Society of the United States served notices to 51 pig confinement operations in the top pork-producing states for unreported releases of the hazardous pollutant ammonia.

The actual stakeholders involved in egg industry issues agree that Congress should pass S. 3239 and H.R. 3798, the Egg Products Inspection Act Amendments of 2012. This legislation has the backing of animal welfare groups, the egg industry, veterinary groups, and consumer groups. continue reading…

Animals in the News

by Gregory McNamee

-Rothschild giraffes (Giraffa camelopardalis rothschildi) in Murchison Falls National Park, northern Uganda--© Hector Conesa/Shutterstock.com

That’s no small matter, that face thing. Writes Catherine Clabby in the last number of American Scientist, “Those expressive eyes, so often like our own, demand attention. But so do the striking differences, whether it is tomato-red skin, a snout-like nose or thick, long fur.” Faces are a marker of the astonishing diversity of primate types, and, as Clabby’s interviewees, primatologists Michael Alfaro and Sharlene Santana note that “What is peculiar about primates is their high reliance on facial cues to act socially.” In other words, you may be remembering the primate faces you’ve seen—but so, too, they may be remembering yours. The Q&A is a fascinating glimpse inside the minds of the primates, and the people who study them.

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Animals in the Olympics

by Lorraine Murray

In just over a week, the 2012 Summer Olympic Games will begin in London, England, with the opening ceremony taking place on July 27.

A Hanoverian cantering during a dressage test--© Karl Leck/USESA

The pastoral part of his theme also involves real grass and soil, plows, and a cricket team, as well as, he claimed, clouds hanging above the stadium that could provide rain. Beyond that will be the flashing, noisy, bright high-tech displays that Olympic audiences have come to expect, including fireworks. The ceremony would begin with ringing of an enormous clanging bell.

People involved in animal rights and animal welfare were immediately concerned about the animals. Ingrid Newkirk, the president of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, wrote Boyle a letter describing the risks of stressing, injuring, and traumatizing the animals:

“There are inevitably serious problems involved when it comes to using live animals in productions, and I don’t mean just aesthetically, with animals falling ill, defecating, urinating and so on.

“Animals become stressed and anxious when they are forced into unfamiliar or frightening situations, and stage sets—with their bright lights, heavy equipment and noisy crowds—are obviously traumatic environments for them.

“Then there is the transport to and from the venue, which also proves stressful as animals do not understand what is happening.

“And as for fireworks, clearly they frighten the bejesus out of animals. By contrast, the use of stunningly clever animatronics would create a show of Olympic proportions—without harming any living beings.”

She went on, “Should you opt to use real animals—and we hope you do not—please do as the producer of Babe did and ‘pay them their wages’ by making sure that they are retired to an animal sanctuary after the performance, rather than being sent back to farms and ultimately slaughtered. Your intent is to recreate our ‘green and pleasant land’ but real animals are not necessary to achieve this aspiration and, in fact, detract from it.” continue reading…

Age of Reason?

by Will Travers, Chief Executive Officer, Born Free USA

Our thanks to Will Travers and Born Free USA for permission to reprint this post, which first appeared on the Born Free USA Blog on July 10, 2012.

“Ice Age: Continental Drift” opens in theaters this week, and I can’t help but wonder if our sense of reason has gone adrift lately at the way we look at the icy regions of our planet and the wildlife that calls the Arctic home.

Polar bear adult and cub on sea ice, Arctic Ocean--Jenny E. Ross/Corbis

Wildlife belongs in the wild. Polar bears belong in the wild. Yet we’ve recently been inundated with stories about how zoos can “save the polar bear” by establishing a captive population. It is appallingly naïve and frankly irresponsible to think that the seriously complex situation facing polar bears can be solved by simply collecting and preserving bears like some sort of museum piece. continue reading…

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