Animals in Entertainment
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Jay Leno and Chris Rock Think Dog Fighting Is Funny
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Are Rodeos More Acceptable Than Bullfighting?
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Circuses: "A Lifetime of Misery"
Elephant Abuse Charges and Freed Circus Animals in Need of Homes
Published October 29, 2009 @ 02:05PM PT
Two pieces of recent good news in the United States and Bolivia, related to animals abused in entertainment venues, deserve some acknowledgment this month -- especially given that despite the good news, animals in both cases are still in danger and in need of help.
First, in the United States, as In Defense of Animals (IDA) reported late last week, the USDA has finally filed charges against Will Davenport. If you're stopping to ask yourself why that names sounds familiar, it's because he's the elephant handler from whom IDA and other advocates have been trying to rescue abused and sick elephants for year (previous related posts viewable here). According to IDA, "the charges state that 'the gravity of the violations alleged…is great' and that Davenport has 'not shown good faith' in his repeated unwillingness to comply with the AWA and its regulations and standards."
Love Is Not Only for Human Animals (and Circuses Aren't Sanctuaries)
Published September 30, 2009 @ 05:31AM PT
A series of videos and stories at National Geographic's Web site, from a special titled Unlikely Animal Friends, came to my attention yesterday via Facebook, courtesy animal-loving, link-providing pals Chad Miller, co-founder of Food Fight! Vegan Grocery in Portland, Oregon, and Dallas Rising, program director of the Minneapolis-based Animal Rights Coalition. The video above, of Tara and Bella at the Elephant Sanctuary, whose heartwarming story many animal advocates and even the general public know by now, is one of these. There is much good to take away from the profiles, and even the videos many of us have seen before are worth watching again, but as tends to be the case with these sorts of mainstream animal programs, there are troubling aspects of what we're shown in a couple cases too (I'll get to that in the last half of this post).
Greyhound Racing Updates: Massachusetts, Iowa, and Beyond
Published September 26, 2009 @ 07:24AM PT
In the last week or so, greyhounds were raced for what should be the last time in Massachusetts. As you may recall, voters in that state supported an end to dog racing last November, and animal advocates -- GREY2K USA in particular -- had been awaiting the final race ever since. Not surprisingly, though, greyhound breeders and others with an economic interest in the continued exploitation and endangerment of the dogs want the decision overturned. So Massachusetts readers, please be sure to keep contacting your state legislators about this issue and to sign up for GREY2K USA's action alerts, so that the group can keep you updated.
The battle over greyhound racing is far from over; dogs are still suffering in several states courtesy of this cruel, unnecessary industry (see a state-by-state map and information here), so advocates outside Massachusetts have as much reason to sign up for the nonprofit's alerts as anyone else. One of the states still racing dogs to death is Iowa, whose Des Moines Register ran an article this past week covering GREY2K USA's recent report on the state's racing industry and the injuries and deaths of dogs there:
Captive Tigers Languishing in Deplorable Conditions in Cancun
Published September 24, 2009 @ 02:33PM PT
For the last year, Mexican and American animal advocacy organizations have been working together in an increasingly critical effort to save seven tigers from horrid captive conditions in Cancun, amid the debris of a former restaurant (where they've been held for several years). And although it looked like the groups and the government had come to agreement on a plan to rescue the animals, officials failed to follow through.
A recent news release explains,
Last Chance for Animals (LCA), The Wild Animal Sanctuary (TWAS) and Gente Por La Defensa Animal (GEPDA) have been negotiating with the Mexican government since August 2008 to rescue and relocate 7 tigers held in abhorrent conditions at Pepe's restaurant, in Cancun, Mexico.
Animals, Nonviolence, and the International Day of Peace
Published September 21, 2009 @ 02:40PM PT
Today is the International Day of Peace, calling for nonviolence and ceasefire, as I learned last night from Kelly of easyVegan.info. And although my plans to post on a related topic this afternoon have been derailed along with the rest of my day, I'm lucky that Kelly (also a periodic contributor to this blog) wrote her thoughtful post on the topic last night, including this:
The day’s “ceasefire” most certainly does not include the millions of cows, pigs, chickens, turkeys, horses, dogs, rats, seals, foxes and other domestic and wild-living nonhuman animals who will be slaughtered for food, clothing, vivisection, entertainment and the like. Quite the contrary: humans’ exploitation of nonhumans will continue, unabated, throughout the day and across the globe.
Updates on Wolves, Whales, and Dolphins: The Hunts Go On
Published September 10, 2009 @ 06:31AM PT
In Japan's village of Taiji, the rounding up of dolphins and shipping them to aquariums, to live the rest of their lives in unnatural, miserable captivity, has begun. The killing of pilot whales has begun. Whether and when the killing of dolphins right there in the cove will resume is yet to be seen. Read more here. (See last related post on this blog here.)
The district judge out in Montana who had the power to stop the wolf hunts underway in Idaho and set to begin next week in Montana passed up the chance: He acknowledged that environmental/wildlife groups may be right that the wolves shouldn't have been delisted, but has ruled that the hunts can go on while the painfully slow process of enviro/wildlife groups suing the government over the delisting continues. Read more here. (See last related posts on this blog here and here.)
Oh--and tens of millions of land animals will be killed for food today, 20,000 every minute, just in U.S. slaughterhouses alone, along with the killing of a mind-boggling number of aquatic animals. There's no failed injunction or grand-scale outrage or media frenzy to report on in relation to those equally tragic deaths because people aren't as horrified by the killing of pigs and cows as they are by the killing of dolphins or as disgusted by the terrorizing of chickens as they are by the hunting of wolves, so this isn't exactly news. But while we're noting the day's bad news for animals, it seems wrong to leave out the ones being killed so casually en masse, who are the same as dolphins and wolves in all the ways that matter.
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Photo of dolphin in Texas aquarium by Flickr user See1,Do1,Teach1
Queenie the Elephant, Left Behind and Alone, Needs Your Help
Published September 08, 2009 @ 04:29PM PT
Photo of Jewel by Barbara Shepler
Shortly after the last time I wrote about elephants Jewel, Tina, and Queenie ("USDA Moves to Rescue Elephant Jewel--Act Today for Jewel and Her Friends") -- three elephants among an unfortunate many being held and neglected in captivity in circuses, zoos, and such -- Jewel and Tina indeed were confiscated by the USDA. The downsides: they were taken to a zoo rather than to sanctuary, and Queenie was left behind.
The statement by In Defense of Animals, which has long been leading the charge to rescue these elephants, on the zoo-related turn of events for Jewel and Tina is pretty well in line with my own conflicted feelings -- that is, the frustration of seeing the elephants end up in a zoo (and seeing Queenie left behind, thus far--more on that as the post continues), when we're simultaneously trying to get elephants out of zoos, coupled with the relief that they're in a better situation than their previous one:
