BOOKS: Life Song: In Harmony With All Creation

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1995:

Life Song: In Harmony With All Creation, by Bill Schul, Ph.D.
Stillpoint Publishing (Box 640, Walpole, NH 03608), 1994.
204 pages, with bibliography. $12.95.
Bill Schul endorses the idea of a
universal life spirit, not the private domain
of homo sapiens, but shared by every organ-
ic entity on the globe. It is a spirit of com-
munication and intelligence, having its
essence at the very cellular core of each liv-
ing thing. This is an idea of mythic and con-
tentious proportions, yet Schul glides easily
across this semi-mystic plane where many
others before him have been blown to bits by
the land mines of the Scientific Method.

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BOOKS: Ocean Warrior

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1995:

Ocean Warrior, by Captain Paul Watson.
Key Porter Books Ltd. (70 The Esplanade, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5E 1R2), 1994. 264 pages, cloth, $26.95.
[In U.S., order from Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, 3107-A Washington Blvd., Marina Del Ray, CA 90292.]
If Ocean Warrior was a work of fiction and Paul
Watson had never been a sailor, it would still make Watson a
worthy heir to the tradition of Stephen Crane, Herman
Melville, and Robert Louis Stevenson––a tradition he honors
with allusions to The Open Boat, Moby Dick and Treasure
Island. It’s a can’t-put-it-down page-turner: a rousing collec-
tion of classic sea stories, weaving all five of the eternal
themes into a single narrative. For those who weren’t litera-
ture majors, that’s man-against-man, man-against-woman,
mankind-against-nature, self-against-self, and coming-of-
age. It’s the story of a young man who matures through der-
ring-do in naval battle, growing into the command of a fleet
and leadership of a crusade while more awkwardly grappling
with politics and personal relationships.

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OBITUARIES

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1995:

Choi Hui-bok, 23, of Pusan,
South Korea, allegedly killed herself on April
12 when her husband Chung Hae-soo came
home drunk after eating dog meat, which
many Koreans believe to be a sexual tonic.
She had tried repeatedly to get him to give it
up. “We fought over the matter and I went to
another room to sleep,” Chung told police.
“When I woke up she was dead, dangling
from a window frame by a necktie.”

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The Monkey Wars

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1995:

The Monkey Wars
by Deborah Blum
Oxford University Press (200 Madison Ave., New York, NY 10016),
1994. 306 pages, cloth, $25.00.
Based on a Pultizer Prize-winning
investigative series published in 1991 by the
Sacramento Bee, The Monkey Wars is the
fairest, most comprehensive look yet at pri-
mate research and related protest. Author
Deborah Blum gained access to many of the
most controversial researchers and laborato-
ries in the United States. She describes from
first-hand observation the exploratory brain
surgery of Stuart Zola-Morgan, for instance,
combining appreciation of his findings with
discussion of the moral issues that have led
the activist community to brand him “Dr.
Zola-Morbid.”

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REVIEWS: The Wellman Procedure: A Surgical Technique for the Complete Gonadectomy in the Dog and Cat

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1995:

The Wellman Procedure: A Surgical Technique for the Complete
Gonadectomy in the Dog and Cat, promoted by William K. Wellman,
DVM, c/o All Creatures Veterinary Surgery (70234 Phoenix, South Haven, MI
49090; 616-637-3929).
According to William K. Wellman,
who advances “The Wellman Procedure” with
mailers, a videotape, and online postings,
“This revolutionary approach to spaying and
neutering cats and dogs promotes less inva-
sive surgery, far less time in surgery, much
shorter recovery time, outpatient surgery for
the pet, increased safety as result of the
above, lowered costs for pet owners, and
higher productivity for veterinarians.” Thus,
Wellman argues, widespread adoption of his
procedure could mean, “The possibility of
millions less unwanted animals, the possibili-
ty of greater affordability, and greater reduc-
tion in the mounting costs of animal control.”

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COURT CALENDAR

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1995:

Humane Enforcement
American SPCA humane enforcement chief Robert
O’Neill led the biggest cockfighting raid in U.S. history on March
25, arresting 289 alleged spectators and seven alleged organizers in a
Bronx theatre building modified so that the cockpit could be disguised
as a boxing ring at a moment’s notice. Ninety cocks were seized for
euthanasia, along with 20 dead cocks. The ASPCA had already made
240 arrests and seized 1,550 cocks in a series of previous raids that
began in June 1994. The raids caused The New York Times to editorial-
ly demand that judges begin imposing the fines for cockfighting of up
to $25,000 and prison terms of up to four years that New York law
allows, instead of the token fines of about $200 that are usually given.
Scotland Yard on March 19 arrested six men and an
eight-year-old boy in the first cockfighting raid in Britain since 1985.
Another dozen suspects escaped.

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High Court undoes transport victories

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1995:

LONDON––The British High Court on April 12
reignited the five-month controversy over the export of live-
stock to European veal finishers and slaughterhouses with a
ruling that Dover, Plymouth, and Coventry had no jurisdic-
tion to ban live animal transport through their docks and air-
ports. The High Court rapped the civic authorities for acting
out of “narrow self-interest” in a “surrender to mob rule.”
The ruling undoes at a stroke the major gain from a
struggle backed by up to 92% of the public, according to
independent polls.
Anti-live export demonstrations commenced in
December 1994 after the European Union failed to adopt
rules of humane transport, and erupted into rioting at several
sites when, blockaded at ports, cattle exporters turned to fly-
ing animals to market. The conflict claimed six human lives:
two British livestock handlers and three Algerian crew mem-
bers aboard a chartered Air Algerie Boeing 737 that crashed
December 21 while returning from a night run to the
Netherlands, plus demonstrator Jill Phipps, 31, who was
crushed beneath a cattle truck on February 1, leaving behind
a nine-year-old son and a private animal sanctuary. Violence
continued into April on both sides, as the Animal Liberation
Front and pro-live export goons hit back and forth at each
other with vandalism and beatings.

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An anti-wise use Weiss guy

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1995:

SANTA ROSA, California– In
a former life,” says Larry Weiss, “I prac-
ticed criminal law for 18 years. Eventually I
grew tired of making the streets safe for drug
dealers. Then, in 1985, I providentially
encountered a book, Peter Singer’s Animal
Liberation, which convinced me that I could
remain a lawyer and be proud of my work.”
Ten years later, Weiss grins, “I
mostly defend dog criminals. Or dogs who
are accused of criminal behavior,” he cor-
rects himself. “Especially those of whom it
is suspected they might eventually commit a
crime because someone thinks they resemble
a dog that might have a criminal disposition
under some other circumstance.”

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Religion

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1995:

The Miami county courthouse
maintenance staff has created a “Voodoo
Squad” to pick up the dead chickens, goats,
and other relics of Santeria sacrifice found
there each morning, remnants of Caribbean
immigrants’ attempts to influence justice.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in June 1993
that municipalities may not ban Santeria, but
they may enforce nondiscriminatory restric-
tions on it for reasons of health, sanitation,
and prevention of cruelty to animals.
The Rabbi Mayer Krucfeld,
assistant director of supervision for Star K
Kosher Certification, of Baltimore, recently
spent two days in La Jara, Colorado,
explaining how to start a kosher slaughter-
house to about 50 potential investors.
Currently the westernmost kosher slaughter-
house in the U.S. is Empire Meats, of Iowa.
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