Do Animals Have Emotions?

Here is a fascinating story from CBS New York on animals and emotions. It's a brief story (2 minutes and 43 seconds) about animal behaviour and emotions using some very moving examples of animals forming bonds with other animals and human beings (my favourite story is of Mr. G. and Jellybean - you'll love it, I promise!). The story arrives at the conclusion that animals do, in fact, have emotions. One of the main talking heads in the story is the very eloquent veterinarian Dr. Richard Goldstein, chief medical officer of the Animal Medical Center in New York City. If you get a moment, check it out. It's well worth your time, and it represents another step in the process of connecting the dots in such a way that explodes the notion of animals as commodities and instead treats them as individuals with dignity, a purpose, and - yes - emotions.

In a Just World...

Words to Remember

A sentiment we'd all do well to remind ourselves - over and over again...

More Reasons to Be Hopeful

Every now and then, when the posts on this blog begin to get a little gloomy, I make it a point to spotlight reasons why those who love animals should be hopeful. Despair comes so easily in our day and age. Yet if all we do is despair, if all we do is wring our hands and focus on the bad news, then we miss out on some very wonderful acts of conscience, compassion, and - yes - even heroism.

There are reasons to be optimistic. Unfortunately, in a time when bad news dominates the headlines and television reports, it's easy to miss out on those reasons. That's why I like to steer attention to positive examples of change, and what better place to do so than in this blog?

So with no further delay, here are some developing stories that will hopefully augment our hope in our troubled times.

The Saugatuck Craft Butchery - closed for
Meatless Mondays!

1. CLOSED FOR MEATLESS MONDAYS: Check out this front display window for Saugatuck Craft Butchery in Westport, CT. It now closes on Mondays in honour of "Meatless Mondays." This may not seem like a big deal, especially to the vegan uber-purists. However, it is a big deal! A decade ago, most people didn't even know what Meatless Mondays was. Today, by contrast, Meatless Mondays is so big that a butcher shop like this one refuses to do business on the day. In most locales across America, Monday is a heavy shopping day, which makes this act all the more remarkable. Saugatuck, which prides itself on selling on the finest "pasture-raised and organic meats" doesn't have to close its doors on a day that would likely be incredibly profitable. To close it for this reason shows that even among butchers, there is a growing mindfulness about the move away from meat consumption. I say: Good for Saugatuck! It's an important first step. I hope other butchers follow suit.

Mayim Bialik's new
vegan cookbook.

2. VEGAN HEROINE OF THE YEAR: Mayim Bialik is a busy woman! Star of the hit show The Big Bang Theory, she is also a mother of two and has a doctorate in neuroscience from UCLA. Add to her long list of achievements that she's the author of a vegan cookbook! Mayim's Vegan Table (New York: Da Capo Lifelong Books) spotlights over a hundred of the actress's favourite vegan recipes. (source) Bialik went vegan at age 19 and she has never looked back. As she explained to The Vegetarian Times: "A taste aversion stopped my eating meat, then my deep love and respect for animals started informing more and more of my decisions. I had an innate sense of wanting to be vegan, but I needed more information. The change was gradual, which let me think through every step. I was still eating dairy when my first son was born; he couldn't tolerate my breast milk and I realized I had a dairy allergy. So it kept evolving. I read Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer, and that did it." (source) Good for Mayim! Her cookbook looks fabulous!

Director James Cameron (Titanic, Avatar) went
vegan in 2012 and hasn't looked back.

3. SCHOOL OF VEGANISM: In Calabasas, California (northwest of Los Angeles), an environmentally-conscious private school heavily founded and financed by director James Cameron, the dietary menu has - like the famous director of mega-blockbuster hits Avatar and Titanic - gone 100 percent vegan! MUSE School CA, thanks to Cameron and his wife, Suzy Amis, is now the first school in the country to go entirely vegan. I should note that one public school in Queens, New York, has gone entirely vegetarian, and another school in San Diego has adopted Meatless Mondays, but an all-vegan school is unprecedented. Cameron and Amis - motivated by a love of animals, respect for life in general, and concern for the environment - deserve praise for going out on a limb and showing that a vegan diet is proper and healthy. This was a brave thing to do, and let's hope their decision inspires other schools to do likewise. (source)

Garfunkel the pig, resident of
Happy Trails Farm Animal
Sanctuary in Ravenna, Ohio.

4. INSPIRATION FOLLOWING TRAGEDY: Kudos to the wonderful folks at Happy Trails Farm Animal Sanctuary in Ravenna, Ohio. Earlier this year, on Valentine's Day - February 14 - tragedy struck the sanctuary when a building burned down, killing two goats, a pot-belly pig and a rooster. Thankfully, two cats and two goats were rescued from the inferno, yet the irreplaceable loss of these four precious lives was devastating. Remarkably, the sanctuary has been busily rebuilding. The goat-sheep barn that burned to the ground in February is now being replaced by an even nicer, safer structure, and the sanctuary will also be seeing the addition of a new horse arena and multi-purpose building. Happy Trails is seeking donations (at the link above), and welcomes visitors to the beautiful 10-acre farm, where - at any given time - about 150 animals are living a good life of love, rehabilitation, and happiness. I've said before, and I'll say it again, that folks at farm sanctuaries are doing the work of saints. Countless happy animals - spared from the factory farm and the butcher's knife - are the reward for their tireless efforts. Way to go, Happy Trails!

5. The decision last week by Mexico City's legislative assembly to prohibit animals from appearing in circuses was a great move, although it has sparked some controversy. (source) According to an Associated Press news report from June 9: "More than 1,000 acrobats, clowns and other circus employees marched through downtown Mexico City on Tuesday to protest a new ban on animals in circuses." (source) Despite complaints from Mexican circus workers that the move is going to have devastating economic effects, the ban actually represents a principled move by Mexican politicians to end one of the worst forms of animal exploitation in existence. Mexico City isn't the first city in the country to enact such a ban. Actually, the nation's largest city is a relative latecomer in a nationwide movement to outlaw the participation of animals in circuses. The aforementioned AP report went on to note: "Armando Cendeno, president of the national circus association, said the measure will affect about 50,000 circus employees and 3,000 to 3,500 animals, mainly elephants, tigers, camels and hippos. 'It is impossible to take these animals back to their natural habitat, because they would die,' he said." As the demonstration in Mexico City shows, changing society so that animals are no longer exploited can potentially be painful, especially when jobs and livelihoods are at stake. Change is seldom unambiguous and straightforward, and it is never easy. But the Mexico City legislature has the right idea. Animals ought not to be exploited for entertainment. Or for any other reason, for that matter. Let's hope other places where animals are integral to circuses follow Mexico City's example.

Words of Wisdom

Random Thoughts on the Ultimate Invasive Species

Nutria hunting in Louisiana. What do you call it when an "invasive species" is hunted by the ultimate invasive species - humankind? 

Here's a factoid I bet you didn't know: The United States government kills millions of animals per year.

In 2013, the federal government "shot, poisoned, snared, or trapped" some 4 million animals. Animals on the government's "hit list" include bobcats, coyotes, river otters, foxes, black bears, as well as (according to The Washington Post) "greedy feral hogs, giant swamp rats called nutria, big aggressive Argentine lizards called tegus and swarms of hungry starlings...."

Most of the killings are carried out by the United States Department of Agriculture's Wildlife Services. According to a recently released statistics, the killings in 2013 included:

• 75,326 coyotes
• 866 bobcats
• 528 river otters
• 3,700 foxes
• 12,186 prairie dogs
• 978 red-tailed hawks
• 419 black bears
• three eagles (that we know of), both the golden and bald variety

As noted above, all of these are said to be "invasive species." But what is the real "invasive species"?

Let's review the evidence:

• What animal has destroyed the earth's rainforest at an alarming rate, with no end in sight?
• What animal has drained the earth of its oil, mined every potential deposit of every resource imaginable, polluted until holes formed int the ozone, and wiped out entire ecosystems in the name of progress?
• What animal is responsible for more mass extinctions than any other animal on earth?
• What is the only animal in this world that intentionally inflicts sadism and mass murder on other animals, including its own species?
• What animal has spilled oil on nearly every stretch of beach from Alaska to South America, throughout the Gulf of Mexico, up and down the Atlantic Coast, and in nearly every other part of the world?
• What animal...

Oh hell, you get the picture! I realize these rhetorical questions get tiresome, and I'm sorry to inundate you with them. However, the purpose here is to raise an important point about which species is truly the "invasive" one. I think we all know the answer.

Unfortunately, there are some cases when the mass extermination of certain wild animals is done to offset terrible damage. For example, it is widely known that nutria can - and, indeed, have - severely damage wetlands across North America. To allow them to continue to multiply and spread unchecked means the continued destruction of these delicate ecosystems.

Still, there is "context" - there is a "big picture" - behind this wanton destruction of animal life by the U.S. government. Human beings, with their malevolent collective notions of progress, development, globalization, commodification, unfettered markets, and growth for the sake of growth (which the late, great Christopher Hitchens called "the ideology of cancer") are inflicting far greater destruction on the earth than any invasive species.

These same destructive tendencies are what lead us as a species to collectively believe that animals are things - commodities, products, items to be bought and sold - things with a price tag on their heads, sometimes literally. Factory farming is far more destructive to the environment than all the nutria in the world combined.

If we do not stop to reexamine the core values that got us to the global environmental crisis where we are now - greed, violence, denial, an absence of empathy - then we will continue to witness this insane paradox of human beings destroying "invasive species," even as the ultimate invasive species continues to carry out the slow (alas, sometimes not so slow) murder of Earth.

One of the Most Powerful Videos I've Ever Seen - And It's Just Someone Talking!!!

There is NOT one ounce of gore, not one drop of blood, not one scene of animal abuse in this video, but it is one of the most extraordinarily powerful videos I've ever seen. It's actually a video of a woman talking (!!). How can that be powerful, you ask? Well, watch it! 

The "talking head," in this case, is Kate Cooper, Marketing Consultant to the Food Industry. Watch how she reveals the "secrets behind food marketing," and - equally important - watch the reaction of the audience as they grow increasingly disturbed by what she says. 

What makes this video so incredibly effective is that the end is stunningly powerful, yet you do NOT see it coming. I promise you: It will leave you speechless.

The video has only been on YouTube for a few weeks and it already has 2 million views. I can see why.

Watch it! Please! No blood, no guts, no violence! Just the sheer power of words.

Words of Wisdom

"I had never seen a slaughterhouse before. My blood ran cold. This didn't just turn me into a vegetarian. It turned me into a genuinely compassionate human being. I ultimately became vegan when I aw what happens to millions of chickens - their beak burned off, millions of tiny male chicks being hurled to their death into grinders, premature calves being deliberately induced and being killed by crushing to death. It is a so tiresome to hear the hideous lies and self delusion from those who profit from this ghastly trade. I am a vegan because I love life in all its forms."

- Philip Wollen

Must-See Video: Father Frank Mann's Conversion to Veganism

Do yourself a favour: Check out Father Frank Mann reflecting on why he converted to veganism. It's one of the most eloquent and moving testimonies I've ever heard. And it shows what many of us have believed all along: That veganism and animal rights are an essential part of our spirituality and ability to feel empathy with all living beings.

Please check it out, and share it with others you know. You'll be glad you did!

Words of Wisdom from Gary Francione

Words of wisdom from Gary Francione, who has been a source of so much wisdom over the years. He is absolutely right. The key is to link Animal Rights and Human Rights. One without the other is meaningless. The violence used against animals comes from the same place as violence used against humans. It is rooted in an objectification of both, the dangerous tendency to see them as means to ends, or commodities, or the "other."

A Great Image...

... with words worth remembering. Have a look:

Two Gore-Free Videos That Say It All

The first is called "I am scared and don't want to die."
The second is called "A kiss before dying."
Zero gore.
Just pathos and tragedy.
Remember: Animals savor life as much as you or I. They want to live, too. They deserve to live. No animal wants to be our food.
Please watch. Please share.
Let these videos strengthen our commitment to a violence-free world, where animals can live in peace.

Words of Wisdom

It's All How You Look At It...

Source: Lolcats

Marc Bekoff in Forbes? The Times Are a-Changin'!

When I think of Forbes Magazine, I think of a business magazine that has been around a long time and has rightfully earned a reputation as a staid and venerable bulwark of free enterprise.

But Forbes surprised me with a long and detailed profile/interview with Dr. Marc Bekoff, Professor Emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado, Boulder. Bekoff is the author of the powerful The Emotional Lives of Animals and The Animal Manifesto: Six Reasons for Expanding our Compassion Footprint.

Bekoff is one of the most eloquent spokespeople for animal rights. He has written numerous books about the ethical treatment of animals and he travels around the world lecturing on the subject. He is also a past Guggenheim Fellow and a fellow of the Animal Behavior Society. In short, this guy is a heavy hitter. Yet he's not necessarily the kind of guy you see profiled in a magazine like Forbes.

However, there he is, speaking his mind in Forbes and saying very eloquent things. He speaks about a wide range of topics, from animal ethics to climate change to what he calls "proactive compassionate activism." There are moments when he sounds pessimistic. For example: "The stakes are huge if we fail to take care of other animals and Earth because we are on the brink of numerous irreversible losses to magnificent webs of nature. Our wholeness and that of the world at large is in peril.

But Bekoff ultimately sounds an optimistic note:

Rest assured that we are indeed making positive differences even if we don’t see them now. I also travel a lot, like you, and meet incredibly passionate and committed people all over the world who are dedicated to making the lives of other animals much better than they are. So, there is light, it sometimes seems very dark, but there is that ever-present glow that keeps me and many others going. I like to say we must get rid of all negativity, focus on what works, keep the faith, be nice to everyone including our opponents, and never say never – ever. We also need to “pick our battles” and accept that some people will never change, and that’s the way it is.

Marc Bekoff appearing in Forbes - a magazine that definitely does not have a history of publishing articles about animals and their well being - is itself a great victory. It is a sign that times are changing. Hopefully for the better.

Remembering the Dead

The wonderful folks with Canadians for the Ethical Treatment of Food Animals (CETFA) are calling for a roadside memorial in Manitoba at a spot where a semi truck crashed and killed 71 cows in January.

CETFA is asking for a sign to be placed at the crash site that reads: "Careless driving costs lives: In memory of 71 cows." The sign would be similar to the memorials created by Mothers Against Drunk Drivers (MADD) that are placed near places where people died as a result of impaired drivers.

It occurred to me as I read this article that we don't always take time to stop and remember the animals that have died. I'm not talking about our pets, mind you. Most of us have lost a pet that was very near and dear to our hearts, and we take comfort in the idea of a Rainbow Bridge, where our pets play and frolic with other animals.

No, I mean animals like the 71 cows killed in the semi collision. Or the countless animals who've perished in factory farm fires in Canada and the United States during the past decade. Or the millions - ultimately - billions slaughtered by the Animal Murdering Industries (meet, dairy, leather, fur, etc.).

We vegans and animal rights activists stare down into the abyss confront death every single day. Day in, day out. We're surrounded by it. We stare at those animal death counters where the numbers are climbing at an astonishing rate (you know what I mean - "Animals Killed Since You Visited This Website" - those counters). We watch some of the most horrible videos imaginable. We feel sick inside when we see meat wrapped neatly in shrink wrap and styrofoam.

And those of us who love animals, who pray for animals, who want to see the bloodletting and the violence stop, die a little each time when we see these things.

So it's probably asking a lot to think about remembering and memorializing the animals who've died as a result of human violence, especially factory farm animals, fish and other aquatic lives, and fur-bearing beings. How do you mourn thousands? Millions? Billions?

When I grapple with this issue, I think of all the people who toss around numbers of human beings killed when talking about the past. More than 6 million Jews murdered under Hitler. Twenty million Russians killed in World War II. Millions who perished in gulags, famines and purges under Stalin. It all becomes miles to Pluto.

How do we put a human face on the millions? How do we put an animal face on the billions?

I look at the bottom of my blog page: 59 billion land and sea animals, murdered for Americans alone in 2009 (Source).

How do you mourn each one of those animals? Billions. Do you find one animal that is representative of all of them and mourn him or her? Or maybe a few symbolic animals who met such a grim fate?

Should we be mourning the dead? The dead cows? The dead pigs? The dead sheep? There are moments when I'm walking by the meat section in the store and I want to break down and sob. Death is everywhere. It swallows you whole in the meat and fish section of the supermarket.

Is there not a Rainbow Bridge for these animals, where they can frolic and play and have fun in the sun? A place where there are no factory farms, no fishing boats, no canneries and butcher shops? No one to rip away your baby when he or she is only a day old?

I realize I'm only asking questions, and they aren't questions with easy answers. I do know that those of us who have experienced our epiphanies about animals, who have awakened to the horrors, and who have consciously chosen to no longer participate in the mass murder any longer, are haunted far more deeply than those who haven't opened their eyes, who can't feel the suffering and who have no empathy for animals.

We're surrounded by death on all sides of us. Mourning is part of the process of loss. How do you mourn the violent end of so many precious beings?

Maybe Canadians for the Ethical Treatment of Food Animals has the right idea. It begins with memorializing those 71 cows who met their tragic fate on that highway in the middle of Manitoba.

On the surface, it may not seem like much. But it's a start.

How Many Words Are Pictures Worth Again?

These ones (below) must be worth millions. The crying calf says it all - no words necessary.

Saving Animals, the Vegetarian/Vegan Way

There is a fascinating article from the Website Counting Animals.com about the number of animal lives saved by going vegetarian. After crunching a lot of figures about animal deaths and the number of animals consumed per person, the author of the article concludes that vegetarians save about 404 animal lives per year. In other words, at least one animal a day is saved by switching to the vegetarian lifestyle.

The author, Harrish, concludes:

My numbers are larger than the ones previously quoted in animal advocacy circles (usually 50, 95 or 100), but I have not seen these quotes accompanied by a detailed explanation of methodology or pointers to their sources. Given how conservative my methodology is and how much larger my numbers are, vegetarians have been undercounting the number of animals they actually save and short-selling their impact on animal lives. Yet, this estimate is a work in progress. With more data becoming available and more meticulous tabulation of some things ignored in this post (such as bycatch), the estimated number is actually bound to increase.

The article includes a lot of stark statistics, such as the following:

When you're dealing with numbers in the billions, it becomes miles to Pluto. It's hard for me to wrap my brain around so many animals being slaughtered. And for what? Because we human beings think they taste good? What an appalling reason to commit murder. Cannibals used to use the same reasoning to eat human beings. When will carnivorism go the way of cannibalism?

When you start to consider that each one of the above animals is a sentient being, with feelings and emotions, and they form bonds with each other and savor life as much as you or I, then it's easy to become overwhelmed with the brutality of human beings.

Yet it is also encouraging that a growing number of people are removing meat from their diets. By doing so, they're saving lives. And if a vegetarian is saving more than 400 lives per year, imagine how many lives a vegan is saving. Remember, dairy is extremely destructive. Dairy cows are kept pregnant to continue giving milk, and their newborns are ripped away from them and turned into veal, and the mothers are murdered when they can no longer give milk.

The chicken egg racket is equally violent. Huge numbers of male chicks that can't lay eggs are routinely thrown alive into huge garbage cans or grinders. Egg-laying chickens live absolutely miserable lives, eventually cut short by death.

Alas, vegetarians who consume milk and egg products are perpetuating this destruction, even as they are saving lives.

A wise person (whose name I can't remember) once said, "The only true vegetarian is a vegan." But even vegetarians are to be commended for saving so many lives.

Vegans deserve even higher praise, for saving lives and being 100 percent consistent in their practices.

And the above study shows that just one person changing his or her lifestyle can save a lot of lives. Which just goes to show what we vegans have been saying all along: Veganism is not just a diet. It truly is, in the last analysis, a way of life. The way of life.

What More Needs To Be Said?

If an image is worth a thousand words, this one is surely worth millions!

'Nuff Said

What more needs to be said?