One Atrocity Leads to Others

Luka Rocco Magnotta, the 29-year-old Canadian
who allegedly sent human body parts in the mail
recently, got his start as an animal abuser.

There's a piece of conventional wisdom that I've always agreed with that goes something like this: People who begin as animal abusers often graduate to heinous crimes involving human beings.

Take 29-year-old Luka Rocco Magnotta, a Canadian who has appeared in Internet porno videos and is now being sought by authorities for allegedly murdering a man, dismembering the torso and mailing various body parts to the offices of the federal Liberal and Conservative parties. 

The story is almost too gruesome and twisted to be true. 

And guess what?

In today's Vancouver Sun, columnist Stephen Maher reports that animal rights activists had been hunting Mangotta down for videos he posted online showing him murdering kittens. Maher writes:

They were motivated by four horrible videos in which a young man gleefully kills kittens. In the first one, in 2010, a young man alleged to be Magnotta suffocates two kittens in a plastic bag. A few weeks later, he posted a related video.

By January of 2011, after frantic online searching, animal lovers tentatively had identified Magnotta as the suspect. They meticulously compared photos that Magnotta posted of himself, identifying jewelry and furnishings that appeared in both, until they were certain they had found the right guy.

They then focused on finding him, something which was made more difficult by the many apparently fake photos Magnotta seems to have posted — using a host of false online identities — showing him in cities around the world.

This news, horrifying as it is, should come as no surprise. 

By the time police raided a Montreal apartment on Tuesday where Magnotta lived, they discovered scenes of human depravity and violence too horrifying to describe. The National Post, a Canadian newspaper I read religiously, actually describes a website called Best Gore that has posted a sickening video purported to be Mangotta cutting up his bound victim, having sex with the body and feeding parts to his dog.

Hard to imagine anything more vile than that.

Magnotta's story is a cautionary tale. There is a banner going around the Internet (especially Facebook) that says, "FAMOUS ANIMAL ABUSERS," and shows pictures of Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, David Berkowitz and Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Michael Vick. Below their faces, it says, "THE LINK BETWEEN ANIMAL CRUELTY AND HUMAN VIOLENCE IS INDISPUTABLE." 

I refuse to post that banner here because Vick, unlike Bundy, Dahmer and Berkowitz, is not a serial killer and does not belong with those monsters, despite his involvement in horrific dog fighting matches. Vick's dogfighting ring was broken up by authorities in 2007 and he endured a trial and punishment. Since then, Vick has served a prison term, publicly apologized and lobbied for legislation to create much stricter penalties for those who take part in animal fighting. 

As Vick said last year: "I deeply regret my previous involvement in dogfighting, I'm sorry for what I did to the animals. During my time in prison, I told myself I wanted to be part of the solution, not the problem." (Source) 

I believe Vick's face shouldn't have been added alongside Bundy, Dahmer and Berkowitz. We should forgive those who express genuine, heartfelt remorse about their crimes against animals. And Vick's example shows that not every single animal abuser goes on to become a murderer of human beings.

But take away Michael Vick's face, and the banner is absolutely correct. The link between animal cruelty and human violence is indisputable. My suggestion is to remove Vick from that banner and add the face of Luka Rocco Magnotta, who - if the ghastly stories about him are true (and they appear to be) - has earned a prominent spot among the very worst of the worst of the animal abusers who turned into savage killers of human beings. 

A Physician Makes the Case for a Plant-Based Diet

This is a brilliant talk by Dr. Milton R. Mills, M.D., who makes one of the most convincing series of arguments I've ever heard that human beings are naturally herbivores, not omnivores. It is almost impossible to walk away from this incredibly informative speech without agreeing 100% that human beings were meant to consume a plant-based diet. Mills, a doctor from Virginia, Stanford University-trained and a member of the advisory board to the wonderful Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (which promotes alternatives to animal testing and advocates a vegan diet).

Dr. Milton R. Mills

One of the many omnivore arguments that Mills destroys is the notion that other animals feed on animals, therefore human beings ought to be able to do the same. He does this by showing that human beings simply aren't built like carnivores. We don't run through the forests chasing down wildebeests and wild boars, ripping our prey open with our mouths and tearing at their flesh as they buck madly. Well, maybe some of us do. But it isn't natural.

Mills very capably demonstrates the many ways in which human beings are really physically plant eaters. If you're interested in reading about his ideas online, the website Vegsource.com has published an excellent essay by Mills that covers much of the same ground as his speech. Mills makes extremely persuasive arguments that I do not hear often coming from defenders of the plant-based diet. We need more advocates like him to help us understand where human beings, as a species, went wrong, and how we might get back to doing things the right way.

Be Kind to Animals - Always

This week is Be Kind to Animals Week. I just read a lovely - and very inspirational - story about Yvonne Wall (right), who runs a horse sanctuary in California called Forever Free Horse Rescue (check out their wonderful website if you get a chance). The story (click here to read it) talks about Yvonne's tireless efforts to help abused, abandoned and neglected horses. She gives them a loving home where they feel both safe and wanted, and where they form bonds with each other and with compassionate people.

These stories are so important because we're inundated, day in and day out, with tragic stories about the harsh and violent treatment of animals in factory farms, slaughterhouses, laboratories, fur manufacturing facilities, hunting grounds and countless other places where harm and death run rampant. It is so important for us to remind ourselves that there are also good people in this world trying to make a difference. People like Yvonne Wall, who gives and gives and gives of herself. Her reward, as she tells it in the wonderful video that goes with the story, is to make a difference in the lives of these beautiful beings. 

People like Yvonne deserve our thanks and inspire us to do more. Those of us who are passionate about animal rights hold out hope that one day, this is what all interaction between human and animals will look like. 

An undeniably gruesome image...

...but at least it captures your attention. And it makes you think. People need to think more. They need to connect the dots. They need to understand the impact of their decisions. Images such as this one help us tear down the wall of denial.

Helping the Humans and Animals of Japan

Such a monumental tragedy, what happened in Japan. Words cannot express. To be hit by the deadly double blow of a colossal earthquake and a tsunami on March 11 is bad enough. Throw in a nuclear crisis and you have a thoroughly traumatized nation.

There are plenty of opportunities to donate to humans and animals in Japan. Red Cross, UNICEF and the Mennonite Central Committee are all wonderful ways of helping people. And believe me, they need our help. Whatever you can spare - $5, $10, $20, $50, $100 or more - every little bit helps.

Lots of agencies are also working around the clock to help animals in Japan. A Facebook group for Japan Earthquake Animal Rescue and Support is collecting donations. The Japanese organization known as the Animal Refuge Kansai is also doing a lot to help offer shelter and care for Japan's devastated and homeless animals. The Animal Miracle Foundation & Network has also been providing critical assistance in hard-hit areas. Finally, the groups World Vets and the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA) are two other very worthwhile organizations that need our support.

It is amazing how far a little bit of money goes with these groups. Whether the recipients are human beings or animals - ideally both - a small donation makes a big difference.

One more...

Here is another Mercy for Animals video, one that focuses on human beings who are among those that I spoke of in my previous Blog post who are making a difference. The video is beautifully made and is a much-need reinforcement, especially for anyone who feels lonely in pursuing their vegan ways. The lifestyle can be very lonely when you are not surrounded by kindred spirits. This video is a reminder that those kindred spirits are, indeed, out there, and they're not giving up. They realize the fight is worth it.

The unfortunate toll that violence takes on good people

I received an invitation to join a new Facebook group called "Animal Revenge Movement." The poorly worded description on the group's page reads: "With 156 billion animals being killed world wide [sic] every year just for what animal eating humans call food? Animal Revenge Movement is for people that believe it's okay to kill humans to help and save animals."

The group's Facebook page is a gathering place to celebrate the maiming, mutilation and death of human beings by animals (and, presumably, by animal rights advocates who have the proper credentials to tell us who deserves to live and who deserves to die). The page includes unsettling pictures of animals harming human beings. The group's profile picture is of a person whose face is concealed by a bandana, wearing a black T-shirt with white lettering that says, "IT'S OK TO KILL HUMANS TO SAVE ANIMALS." And on their Facebook wall, malcontents post messages praising animals that inflict pain and death on human beings.

It's a grim, sad spectacle. It's depressing as hell to see. This group's page is brimming with nastiness. What do you expect from a place on Facebook where people assemble to fantasize about inflicting violence on "corpse munchers" (as one caustic poster calls omnivores)?

Needless to say, I'm not about to hit this hateful group's "Like" button.

The most unfortunate thing about this grim page - and all of the other spots on the Internet where infantile misanthropes gather to wish ill upon the human race - is that it shows the violence of the system rubbing off on people of good conscience. You can find this ugliness in other places on the Internet. The website of the North American Animal Liberation Press Office includes a page called Payback that tragically celebrates acts of animal violence carried out against human beings. The following is fairly typical of the tragedies listed on the NAALPO's Payback page:

28 June 2009
Longmont, CO

A 12-year-old boy was killed Sunday when stomped on by a bull that threw him while he was competing in a rodeo in Colorado, authorities said. Boulder County Sheriff's Deputy Cathy Bryarly said the youth was tossed from the bull's back before he completed the 6-second ride and the animal's rear legs came down on his lower abdomen, missing a protective vest he was wearing, the Longmont Times-Call reported. The accident occurred about 11:20 a.m. during the Little Britches Rodeo at the Boulder County Fairgrounds. The boy, whose name wasn't released, was conscious when rushed to Longmont United Hospital, where he died, Bryarly said. "Although youth rodeo events use animals that are age-appropriate in size and demeanor, there is always an inherent risk to rodeo participants when dealing with these animals," Sgt. Mike Dimond of the sheriff's office said in a statement. Dimond later told the newspaper such accidents tend to be rare. "It could happen any time," he said. "I'm just surprised it doesn't."

It is unsettling to see this type of story celebrated, even though I completely understand the frustration that drives animal rights activists to cheer on such acts of violence. I often share that frustration, that sense of despair, that feeling that everything is hopeless. How many entries have there been on this blog where I've lamented the collective callousness, ignorance and violence of the human race? How many times have I felt a deep sense of despair about the billions of animals murdered each year by human beings? More than I care to count.

And yet there is something profoundly tragic about embracing the violence that forms the very foundation of the global animal killing machine. The factory farm system, the fur coat industry, the foie gras racket - these are all things that should have been done away with long ago. These institutions are eating away at the human race like cancer. Do not be surprised when those who resist these ultra-violent systems become tainted by the violence, eventually embrace it and take great satisfaction from acts of brutality, degradation and, yes, even death.

The alternative to such destruction is Mahatma Gandhi's concept of ahimsa or nonviolent action. Ahima predates Gandhi by centuries, but he successfully wove the concept into his teachings. Gandhi, more than most people, understood the toll that violence takes, both on the recipient and the aggressor. If there is hope for humanity, it rests in our ability to completely jettison the cultures, customs and traditions of violence that we have consciously and subconsciously embraced over the years. Each one of us has it within us to become living, breathing examples of ahimsa, if only we rise above the brutality that engulfs us and promote a new and different way of living, one free of exploitation and bloodshed.