Author: Sandra Kyle

Hunters in Lockdown show ‘sickening lack of empathy’

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle | 2 Comments on Hunters in Lockdown show ‘sickening lack of empathy’

A new facebook page reveals the real reason hunters love to hunt, writes End Animal Slaughter contributor Lynley Tulloch. 

 

Hunting in New Zealand has been banned since we went into lockdown at 11.59pm Wednesday March 25, 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic. This triggered the start-up of a Facebook page and group called ‘the great NZ lock up mouse hunt’ on the same day. The Facebook group currently has over twenty-five and a half thousand members.  It was started by a New Zealand hunter. In the ‘about section’ on the page it simply says, “we need to hunt something”.

It is in the category of ‘sport’. It calls upon people to hunt mice and rats, taking videos and photos of their catch, measuring their worth by size as you would if you killed a ’trophy stag’. Prizes are awarded in categories of kids (2-10 years) , youth (12-16 years) and adults.

It is all done in the spirit of having a laugh. It’s all very funny, according to the hunter who set up the page.

It’s all very disturbing if you ask me.  This page and associated group is full of hunters eager to boast over killing tiny mice and rats, causing as much misery as possible and then laughing at the victims as they pose their bodies.  It is serial killer type mentality.

It’s all very disturbing if you ask me.  This page and associated group is full of hunters eager to boast over killing tiny mice and rats, causing as much misery as possible and then laughing at the victims as they pose their bodies.  It is serial killer type mentality.

The mice and rats are posed with children’s toys such as lego, barbie cars, ken dolls, and remote-control vehicles. There are videos with tiny dead mice dangling from threads tied to hovering toy helicopters. It is as ridiculous as it is sadistic.

I realize that mice and rats may pose particular health risks to humans, but surely adults and children playing with the dead corpses of these animals is not going to help the situation. What with Covid-19 being of zoonotic origins, I would hate to think of some kind of mutant virus emerging from the dead mouse blood smeared on the toy lego.

It is reminiscent of the many rural possum hunts in schools across the country during the year, where dead possums are dressed up and used for carnival fun by children.

One picture is of a rat tied over a miniature spit roast, his decapitated head lying gruesomely on the ground nearby.  Another shows a cruelly trapped mouse lying dead right next to a row of pizzas.

 

There are numerous instances of animal cruelty on the Mousehunt Facebook page and group. One includes cheese tied onto live electric wires; another an electrified platform.

There is also  a video and pictures of mice who drowned after being lured onto food strapped onto tin cans or bottles over a bucket of water . Drowning animals, including rats and mice, is an illegal and prosecutable offence under New Zealand law.

One harrowing video is of a rat cowering in the corner of a garage. The guy taking the video has a piece of two by four in his hand and bludgeons the rat, not killing it outright, leaving the poor animal writhing and squealing in pain. He is egged on by fellow group members:  “Nice shot bro! Pole axed the bas***d!”.

There are horrific traps, such as this one pictured below, that must cause so much suffering,

This irrational hatred towards these animals, alongside distasteful guffaws at their suffering is disconcerting. You can say they are pests, and that they spread disease, but those rationales go out the door when you see these same people placing their dead bodies alongside food items. One photo has a dead mouse on the kitchen bench with cheese pizzas.

Scroll deep enough into this murky underbelly of grownups and their children amusing themselves abusing animals and playing with their dead corpses and you start to lose faith in humanity.

Scroll deep enough into this murky underbelly of grownups and their children amusing themselves abusing animals and playing with their dead corpses and you start to lose faith in humanity.   The people on this page are also creating a number of torturous looking devices. I quote one member: “I can’t help but feel that rifle cartridge primers, a firing pin, and small sprinkling of gunpowder incorporated into this would be spectacular, Why trap mice when you can set them up to walk into and IED, Allah Akhbar.” This is followed by a bomb emoji.

Another post about traps “Had a crack at making a mascalls trap, you ripper, 0.9 mig wire for the nosse, head was hanging by a thread” (laughing face emojis).

I began to reflect on philosopher Hannah Arendt’s thoughts about the ‘banality of evil’, and how hideous acts of cruelty become normalized and accepted. Smashing a piece of wood down onto the head of a living sentient creature, videoing it and enjoying the suffering is reminiscent of how the mob acts during totality terror regimes.

Surely, the mass murder of animals by hunters reflects this. Despite the claim by hunters that  they are just feeding the family, or getting out to enjoy the great outdoors, there is more going on.

Surely, the mass murder of animals by hunters reflects this. Despite the claim by hunters that  they are just feeding the family, or getting out to enjoy the great outdoors, there is more going on. This page illustrates that extra element so well. The hunters are not simply killing animals out of necessity – they enjoy it. They display a release of sorts, the pent-up anger and an outpouring of hatred and complete lack of empathy for the animals concerned is sickening.

The animals are the objects of a human totalitarian terror regime. They have no rights, no identity, no name. They are nothing but a body with which the hunters can pose alongside, dismember and turn into trophies.

Arendt reflected on the nature of totalitarian human societies. Extending that thought to human treatment of animals can reveal some alarming parallels. The animals are the objects of a human totalitarian terror regime. They have no rights, no identity, no name. They are nothing but a body with which the hunters can pose alongside, dismember and turn into trophies. They are objects of blood lust and anger, of people who feel so dispossessed and alienated in life that they take out their frustration on defenseless animals.

We live in a pathological global society based on a depraved sense of human superiority over animal subjects. We need to change our relationship with animals if we are going to survive not only this pandemic but mitigate against future ones.

Messing with the bodies of dead animals is how we got ourselves into this Covid-19 mess. It is not only cruel, but socially irresponsible to foster and sanction this kind of behavior through Facebook.

I acknowledge that in the New Zealand context mice and rats are considered ‘pests’ as they are not part of the natural ecosystem but were introduced.  As mentioned, they may also spread disease – not that this seems to be bothering the members of this group.

But that does not mean we should glorify and gamify their deaths. And it does not mean we should turn a blind eye to deliberate animal cruelty.

 

Dr Lynley Tulloch is an animal rights advocate and lectures in Education.

Facing Our Global Crisis: A Time For Reflection And Awakening

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

This article by End Animal Slaughter contributor Dr Joanne Kong provides a profound and timely message:  Covid-19 is an opportunity for reflection and change, to “move beyond self-interest, material gain, division and conflict, to an elevated awareness that we are all connected as equals…”   We are called on to create a new world, where our food is not borne of exploitation of, and violence to, other beings, and where we protect and nurture the living planet.   

Joanne is a vegan and animal advocate, speaker, writer, classical concert pianist, and professor at the University of Richmond.  Be sure to check out her links at the bottom of the article.

 

Like so many others, I’ve realized that a new reality has set in, where we’re facing threats to our survivability, unprecedented in our lifetimes.  Yes, these are frightening times, not only because of the dire threats of the COVID-19 virus to our health, but because we’re undergoing, out of necessity, drastic changes in our daily habits and the ways in which we interact with others.

More than ever before, this global pandemic has become a driving force for us to re-examine our place in the world.

This is not to minimize mankind’s extraordinary achievements, the progress we’ve made in so many areas of human endeavor, and the immense advances we’ve made in science and technology.  It’s those very advances that have allowed us to remain, albeit remotely, connected to each other, and maintain awareness of the rapidly-shifting landscape of the crisis we’re in.

Somewhere, along the way, our society has lost a sense of connection to the natural world that surrounds us.

But somewhere along the way, our society has lost a sense of connection to the natural world that surrounds us.  I’m certainly not an expert on global health, life sciences, or the complexities of the earth’s ecosystems.  But it’s just become more and more apparent to me how the collective actions, attitudes, and energies that we put out into the world do indeed reflect back to us, and become manifest.  In these times, we’re seeing the truth of that saying, “All things connect.”

So I share here some of the thoughts, observations and reflections I’ve had over the past couple weeks.  I’m sure that some of you have had these thoughts as well, and others of your own that reflect your own unique lens on the world.  I think that sharing our perceptions with each other can be valuable ways to communicate meaningfully, as we grow and transform our lives through this difficult time.

  • A Clear Warning Shot

If nothing else, the current global pandemic is a direct sign that humans must move away from exploitation of animals.  In not doing so, we will continue to put our own lives in peril.  It’s not as if we haven’t received warnings before – the Spanish flu, SARS, MERS, avian flu, swine flu, salmonella, Ebola – all stem from animal exploitation.

  • Exploitation of Animals and Nature

I hope that the coronavirus pandemic leads us to conscious global awakening and awareness of how our actions are wreaking destruction on the planet.  Industrialized animal agriculture, fossil fuel use, deforestation, pollution, urbanization, mining, decimation of sea life – all have led to a staggering loss of habitat and biodiversity.

I hope that the coronavirus pandemic leads us to conscious global awakening and awareness of how our actions are wreaking destruction on the planet.  Industrialized animal agriculture, fossil fuel use, deforestation, pollution, urbanization, mining, decimation of sea life – all have led to a staggering loss of habitat and biodiversity.  As David Quammen, author of Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Pandemic, wrote:  “We invade tropical forests and other wild landscapes, which harbor so many species of animals and plants – and within those creatures, so many unknown viruses.  We cut the trees; we kill the animals or cage them and send them to markets.  We disrupt ecosystems, and we shake viruses loose from their natural hosts. When that happens, they need a new host.  Often, we are it.”  Over 70% of emerging infectious diseases can be traced to animals.  Our species cannot expect to survive if we continue to perpetuate our egocentric view of the world, that the earth’s resources are inexhaustible and its inhabitants expendable.

  • Our Response to Crises

How successfully we deal with this challenge and the many more that are sure to come, will depend upon our ability to aggressively pursue preventive courses of action.  This is inherently difficult, as one could argue that it’s a part of human nature to be more reactive than proactive; we can feel powerless and distant from being part of the solution, waiting until circumstances become so dire that we are then forced to address the problem.  Once the challenge of the moment passes, will we only fall back to our usual habits and complacency, until the next crisis arrives?

  • The Greatest Cognitive Dissonance of Our Time

The damage of animal agriculture is a symptom of something much deeper than its physical effects.  For it is a denial, a contradiction and a betrayal in the most violent way, of our most precious and powerful instinct – compassion.

The damage of animal agriculture is a symptom of something much deeper than its physical effects.  For it is a denial, a contradiction and a betrayal in the most violent way, of our most precious and powerful instinct – compassion.  Our ability to feel for others is at the center of our hearts.  Certainly many of us, especially those of us with companion animals, would say, “I love animals!”  Yet in what is the greatest cognitive dissonance of our time, society turns a blind eye to the billions of animals who suffer a brutal death.  It’s an invisible thread in our lives, so deeply embedded that most of society never questions, let alone gives thought to it.  More than ever, it is time to open our eyes, our minds and above all our hearts.

  • Going Vegan is the Most Powerful Action You Can Take!

By refusing to exploit the innocent and the vulnerable,  we can truly live the Golden Rule and spread veganism’s positive message that the world needs now, more than ever.

As an ethical vegan and animal advocate, I can say that becoming vegan was the most positive, powerful and transformative decision I ever made.  As many of you can attest, the plant-based lifestyle is so much more than making nutritious food choices; every time we eat whole plant foods, we’re choosing not only good health, but compassion, non-violence, empathy for other beings, a deeper sense of peace, and respect for all life and the planet.  By refusing to exploit the innocent and the vulnerable,  we can truly live the Golden Rule and spread veganism’s positive message that the world needs now, more than ever. Every individual makes a difference!  As Margaret Mead said:  “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

  • A Time of Opportunity

I believe that this crisis is a turning point for us, and that in meeting the challenges we face, it will be the best of our human qualities that move us forward:  our intellect, ingenuity, inventiveness, creativity, compassion and determination.

  • A Time of Courage

I like to imagine that a future society looks back upon our time and sees that we were the ones who courageously envisioned a new world.  One in which we’ve moved beyond self-interest, material gain, division and conflict, to an elevated awareness that we are all connected as equals.  One in which we’ve realized a new (even exciting!) future of food that is healing and not borne of violence to other beings.  And a world where we’ve ended the ravages upon our planet, instead, regenerating and preserving its beauty and many gifts.

Follow the work of Dr Joanne Kong

 

www.vegansmakeadifference.com

www.joannekongmusic.com

TEDx talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZWzNfOpbCQ

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1MPyy3PoIISF_2JEsIRWwg/playlists

‘The Root of the Problem is Eating Animals’

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle | 2 Comments on ‘The Root of the Problem is Eating Animals’

Like much of the rest of the world, New Zealand is in lockdown because of Covid-19.  Only the ‘essential’ services continue.  The New Zealand government has stated that slaughterhouses are an essential service.

In this article End Animal Slaughter contributor Dr Lynley Tulloch, and Editor Sandra Kyle, write that not only are slaughterhouses not essential, it is time to close them down permanently.   If breeding, slaughtering, and eating animals is not called to a halt, the appearance of deadly zoonotic diseases and other pathogens will increase at an unprecedented rate.

 

Read the article here

 

Scalded to death because they cannot lay eggs

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

A worker in a Chinese hatchery uses a net to kill newly born male chicks in hot water.  As their little heads bob up, he pushes them down with a wooden spoon while thousands of other fluffy babies await their turn. After dying in agony, these babies’ feathers are removed in a spinning machine before being sold to snake breeders as snake food, or to street vendors to be barbecued.

Not only in China, but across the entire world, billions of day-old male chicks are killed in hatcheries because they cannot lay eggs.  In the West they kill them by grounding them up alive in whirling blades, or gassing them.  

This abomination has gone on for decades only because few people knew about it.  As the truth about abuse and cruelty in the animal agriculture industry becomes more widespread, we move closer to a vegan world. 

Read the article here (WARNING CONTAINS GRAPHIC VIDEO)

 

The Madness of Eating Animals (Video)

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

In this video featuring  well known activist Gary Yourofsky we are invited to consider the madness of using live, terrified, innocent sentient beings for our food.   We see how the animals arrive in trucks at the slaughterhouse, terrified, knowing what’s going to happen next.   We hear their screams.  We see the heartless workers jabbing at them with electric rods, and shooting them with a stun gun.  We witness how quick the slaughterers have to be, because this is a production chain – often thousands, sometimes tens of thousands,  of animals are killed in one facility every single day. The line speed is one of the chief reasons mistakes are made.  Animals are not stunned properly, and are conscious when they have their throats slit or are dunked in scalding water to clean their skins (pigs and chickens). Their last moments on earth, after a lifetime of suffering in a factory farm, are spent in indescribable agony.

 

Food producers, caterers, even some farmers, are beginning to see the public moving more towards veganism, and are producing, manufacturing and promoting more plant-based foods, including alternative protein ‘meats’.   This is paving the way for a more humane and compassionate world, as well as helping to stem climate change and improving people’s health.  Have you made the change yet?

 

Watch the Video on the Kinder World website here:   (WARNING GRAPHIC IMAGES)

Damned if they do, and damned if they don’t

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

Do we really think that cows (or other animals) in line for slaughter don’t suspect what’s about to happen to them? Don’t they have the senses of hearing, smell and vision, and a brain to process the information it receives, just as we do?

Make no mistake, cows waiting at a slaughterhouse feel fear.   They know something is terribly wrong.  They can ‘smell the blood in the air’; can hear the desperate mooing of other cows and the rough yelling of the workers.   They see their family and friends disappearing, and wait in vain for them to return.   In some places they see them being slaughtered right in front of them. 

In 2019 four bulls made a desperate bid for freedom from an Auckland abattoir. 

They didn’t make it.

End Animal Slaughter contributor ANNALESE WEBBER wrote a poem for them: 

 

“Tragedy! Let the bulls live!” It was said that they earned their new freedom
Freedom however is just something that cannot be earned.

“Blame them not, I would run too!” came the words through a mouthful of beef steak
Never considering that they were escaping from you.

Trying their damnedest to get far away from the imminent slaughter
Sensed with their eyes, with their ears, and with their noses, they knew.

Cops had said “They were aggressive and dang’rous,” while others cried “How brave!”
Here’s a descriptor much more accurate: frightened to death.

Fence of the abattoir couldn’t contain the quartet of scared cattle
galloping over the road into the park at the end.

Demonised workers who chased them were trying to make their own living
Cattle who ran for their lives ended up paying with death.

Took ‘till the twentieth gunshot for quiet and still in the suburb
Seems that you’re damned if you don’t, and you are damned if you do.

A ‘Most Despicable Form of Schooling’

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

In New Zealand, school children are encouraged by teachers and parents to kill wild animals as part of a government-led initiative to eradicate so-called ‘pests’.     

In this article Professor Emeritus Marc Bekoff calls out NZ communities who practice this, pointing out the link between cruelty to animals and violent behaviour in later life:

‘Imprinting kids to kill animals is bad news, can have horrific long-term effects, and should be stopped immediately’.

Read the article here.  

“Readers can find other essays on animal cognition and animal emotions here –

–  http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/animal-emotions 

 

 

Conservation – or the Thrill of the Kill?

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

In this article End Animal Slaughter editor Sandra Kyle looks at trophy hunting and suggests that it’s time to lay down the gun and pick up the camera.

 

The National Geographic photo shows a middle-aged man sitting in his trophy room in Delaware, surrounded by taxidermied animals.   Above the large brick fireplace the head of a bull elephant is mounted, its trunk curled out in front, flanked by his enormous tusks.   Below him is a standing giraffe, and another giraffe rests off to the side, his or her long legs curled under their body.  When the trophy hunter shot the animals they would have fallen in a crumpled, bloody heap, but now thanks to a mould mounted under their beautifully preserved skin they have an eerily lifelike appearance.  In the photo we also see a rhino, hyenas, deer, cervals and other animals.  The hunter says hunting is in his blood, and he thinks of himself more as a conservationist and a collector rather than someone who goes out and shoots sentient beings for the thrill of the kill.

Judging by the 100 or more specimens on display, this hunter is undeniably a collector.   But what is the real reason trophy hunters pay tens of thousands of dollars to kill an animal and bring them home to put on their wall?  They may tell you it is for conservation, or to help impoverished local communities, but I suspect that is not the primary motivation.   Trophy hunting may well be about adventure, tradition, camaraderie, but it is also more than that.  Seeing the way hunters of both sexes pose grinning for photos above the corpses of the large – often dangerous – animals whose lives they have just extinguished, I suspect it is much more to do with power, status – and possibly sexual stimulation – than the desire to help human or wild animal populations.

Trophy hunters who pay tens of thousands of dollars for their licence to shoot African animals like to say that picking off certain individuals is an effective conservation tool that can benefit both animals and local communities.  It sounds good in theory, but there is a problem with it in practice.  In many of the countries where trophy hunting is carried out, there is a high level of corruption, and funds can end up lining the pockets of dishonest operators and officials rather than helping to alleviate the poverty of the local people.

When an animal is shot, it can also cause many problems within the population the animal came from.  For example, old bull elephants are favoured by some hunters because they say they are no longer adding to the gene pool and their absence will not overly affect the herd.    However, older bulls exert an important impact on the herd.   They have a wealth of experience; for example they can guide the herd to safety, or to sources of life-preserving water. They also impose order.   It has been shown that young bulls in musth, when their testosterone levels are particularly high, are  more likely to fight each other when an older bull is absent.

For trophy hunters, size evidently matters.   They go after male lions with large heads and impressive manes, and these are often the dominant male in a pride.   However, picking off one dominant male lion could lead to the pride being fractured, and also to the loss of many younger lions.   Lions are a species with a tendency to infanticide, and when a new male takes over a pride he may kill all the cubs of the deceased lion, so he can populate the pride exclusively with his own offspring.

In discussing hunting, and trophy hunting in particular, we need to consider ethics.    In 2015, Cecil the Lion was wounded by American dentist Walter J Palmer who shot him with a bow and arrow.   Cecil must have suffered greatly before he was tracked down by the dentist the next day and killed. How is it ethical to shoot a sentient animal with a bow and arrow, causing them to physically and emotionally suffer, sometimes for days, from their wound?  The phenomenon of ‘canned hunting’ is another case to be considered here.  According to Ian Michler, a South African safari operator and photographer who investigated the canned lion industry for the 2015 documentary Blood Lions, cubs are taken from their mothers and brought to petting zoos. When male lions grow into adulthood, they are lured within the sights of the ‘hunter’ for fees that are much lower than other trophy hunts,  and therefore more affordable to the non-wealthy.  The animals are pretty much sitting ducks.    And there is another deleterious spinoff from hunting lions.  Hunters have no need for the bones of the animal, so these are shipped to Asia where the wealthy can eat them crushed into a powder and consumed as a health tonic and aphrodisiac.   Thus trophy hunting is spurring on more demand for lion bones, and this is encouraging cruel and illegal poaching of lions in the wild.

A newspaper report recently revealed that some hunters are willing to pay to have leopards ‘kneecapped’ so they can shoot them more easily.

The questions must be asked:  Even if convincing evidence did exist that trophy hunting can produce conservation benefits, is it ethical to cause the death and suffering of individual animals to save a species?   Even if a killing has the potential to produce a social benefit, does that in itself mean it’s ethical?

Do humans owe anything to other species at all?  Are our own rights all that matter?

As the dominant species on the planet we have considerable potential to exploit and destroy nonhuman animals, and we have always done so.  Animals, particularly wild animals and farmed animals, are scarcely viewed as living, feeling, intelligent beings at all, but given value in relation to their economic or property value to us.   Is it not time that other animals were legally protected from our destructive activities?  At present protection for farmed animals is so weak that cruel factory farms are legal everywhere in the world, and where wildlife laws exist, they almost always correspond to species and not to individuals.

Clearly, trophy hunting brings pain, fear, suffering and death to both the individual killed and to members of their family left more vulnerable because of the killing, and possibly left them in mourning.  Many studies have shown that elephants and primates mourn, and if it is true for them, it could also be true for other species.

There is no need for us to be killing wild animals at all.  Alternative conservation approaches like photo tourism where the shooting is done with a camera and not a rifle could take the place of trophy hunting.  Substantial conservation income to benefit animal populations and local people can therefore be gained without having to take the life of a sentient being.

There is an easy solution to trophy hunting in places like Africa.   Governments around the world simply need to place a ban on trophy imports, and host countries begin to support alternative, ethical methods of conservation and income generation.  This would be a win-win for all.

Except, perhaps, for those who just enjoy the thrill of the kill.

Calves necks ‘sawed’ in French slaughterhouse

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

In this recent undercover video taken in a large French slaughterhouse we see terrified calves forced into a stun box and their neck severed in a sawing motion, a drawn out and agonisingly painful process for the baby animal.   

This particular slaughterhouses kills a staggering 90 calves per hour, and exports their flesh to Israel, Egypt, Japan and the United States.  The calves’ hides are sold to tanneries that supply leather to luxury brands.

That this could be happening to innocent babies in this day and age is beyond belief.

The only way we can stop the brutal killing of animals for food is by not eating them. 

The only solution is to go vegan.  Take the Challenge. 

 

READ THE MERCY FOR ANIMALS ARTICLE :  (WARNING:  VIDEO CONTAINS GRAPHIC CONTENT)

Why Vivisection is ethically wrong, cruel and unnecessary

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

Testing to find a cure to the coronavirus Covid 19 is currently underway, using laboratory monkeys.   However, vivisection is a cruel, ineffective and out-dated way to find cures for human ailments.

 

Millions of animals suffer and die every day in laboratories all over the world, with little or no protection from cruelty.  Species experimented on include non-human primates, rats and mice, dogs, pigs, cats, sheep, rabbits and pigeons.  Most animals are killed when they are no longer useful to the experiment.

 

It’s cruel and unethical to sentence more than 100 million animals yearly to a barren life in a laboratory cage and intentionally cause them pain, disfiguration, loneliness, fear and despair before taking their lives.

 

What’s more, testing on animals is bad science.  In 2004, the FDA estimated that 92 percent of drugs that pass preclinical tests, and use animals, fail to proceed to the market. All that time, money, energy – and animal suffering – for such a poor result.

 

Animal experiments also prolong the suffering of humans waiting for effective cures.  Misled experimenters squander precious money, time and other resources to keep their place on the gravy train.  It is estimated that up to half of experiments using animals are never even published. 

 

Humane alternatives to animal testing exist.  Non-animal research methods include computer modelling, in vitro technology, human-patient simulators among others, and these are cheaper, faster and more accurate than animal tests. 

 

It is time to stop torturing and killing innocent animals in the name of science.  It should be against the Law to do so.

 

Visit this website to learn more about vivisection. 

 

 

 

Slaughterhouse workers also deserve our compassion

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

Animal activist Amy Jones and her partner witnessed brutal pig slaughter in a Cambodian abattoir – but felt no hate for the slaughterers.  

 

Quotes:

‘Eventually, the workers rose from their hammocks, picked up their knives, and approached the animals in pairs. One worker used a metal rod to pummel the pig’s head, before sitting on the struggling animal. Then, while the dazed pig writhed and trembled, the other worker knelt and slit the pig’s throat. As the animals died, they were dragged across the bloody concrete floor, to be thrown into a boiling vat of water. The other pigs huddled together, their bodies shaking. The night quickly filled with the sound of screaming animals. In an apartment room close by, a baby began to shriek. The wailing sounded eerily similar to the animals’ screams coming from the killing floor below’.

 

‘Due to the inherent nature of the job, slaughterhouse workers are frequently exposed to trauma, violence, and extreme stress, and so it’s perhaps not surprising that slaughterhouse employees suffer from a host of physical and psychological problems including PTSD. These problems often spill over into families and communities through an increase in crime rate, particularly drug and alcohol abuse, and higher incidents of domestic abuse’.

 

Read the Tenderly article here:

 

 

Joachin Phoenix is right. We are guilty of a moral atrocity.

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

Key Points

  • Joaquin Phoenix has gotten his share of mockery for talking about factory farming and animal rights in his Oscars acceptance speech but he is absolutely right.

 

  • As countless undercover investigations have shown, the more than 100 billion animals farmed for food animals (90% in factory farmed) are confined in tiny cages, mutilated without anesthetic, and killed “piece by piece” in slaughterhouses. We have ample neurophysiological and behavioral evidence that these animals can feel happiness and suffering in much the same way humans do.

 

  • We need to question the common and unquestioned practices today that will be seen as clear moral atrocities by our descendants. 

 

Read the New York Daily News article here: