BOOKS: Food for the Gods: Vegetarianism & the World’s Religions

April 1, 1999 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

Food for the Gods: Vegetarianism & the World’s Religions
Essays, conversations, recipes by Rynn Berry
Pythagorean Publishers (POB 8174, JAF Station, New York, NY 10116), 1998. 374 pages, paperback; $19.95

Vegetarian religious historian Rynn Berry pops up occasionally in national news media to rebut the oft cited but bogus claim that Adolph Hitler was a vegetarian. Hitler, according to Berry, eschewed meat only occasionally, on medical orders, to relieve constipation. Hitler’s favorite meal, according to his personal cook, was stuffed squab.

On March 13, Berry made headlines again, when Washington Post s t a f f writer Bill Broadway quoted him and cited his new book, Food for the Gods, in an article about the current furor in Amarillo, Texas, over a PETA billboard which says simply, “Jesus was a vegetarian,” and gives a PETA web address: >>www.jesusveg.com<<.

One L. Michael White, identified as professor of classics and director of religious studies at the University of Texas at Austin, reportedly said he knew of no Biblical scholars who believe Jesus was a vegetarian.

Parrots, too

April 1, 1999 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

CARACAS––”Sustainable use”
as preached by the World Wildlife Fund and
endorsed by the Bill Clinton/Albert Gore
White House will hit Venezuelan parrots
from April 15 to July 15, when members of
the Guarao tribe and other eastern Managas
and Delta Amacuro states will be allowed to
capture up to 2,000 guaro parrots, 200 redbellied
macaws, 50 royal parrots, and 50
blue-and-gold macaws.
Venezuelan wildlife authorities
“say they can’t control the thousands of people
who hunt exotic birds and sell them on
the black market,” Bart Jones of Associated
Press reported, “so they’ve decided to let
them hunt some species in the hope that
they’ll leave alone the birds who are most
endangered.”

GUERILLA WARFARE HITS GORILLA TOURS

April 1, 1999 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

KAMPALA––An estimated 117 alleged members of
the displaced Hutu tribal militia Interhamwe on March 1 turned
from fighting the Tutsi-tribe-led coalition that has ruled
Rwanda since 1994 to strike a deadly blow at tourism in the
Bwindi Impenetrable National Park of western Uganda.
Four wildlife guards were killed in the March 1 dawn
assault, including community conservation chief warden Paul
Ross Wagaba, who was burned alive, and 32 park visitors
were abducted from tourist camp sites near Lake Katangira.
Five vehicles and trailers used as residences were
burned, along with the Ugandan headquarters of the
International Gorilla Conservation Project.
Chicago University gorilla researcher Elizabeth
Garland, 29, woke to gunfire but escaped physical harm by
slipping into the bush as other visitors fled their tents into open
view and were captured. She watched as the raiders segregated
the visitors by language and nationality, taking those who spoke
English with them.

ANIMAL WELFARE ABROAD

April 1, 1999 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

An attempt to vasectomize urban
baboons and vervets in the Diani beach district
along the south coast of Kenya started
slowly in January, as after fixing and releasing
just one vervet, the team was unable to catch
any more monkeys of either species,
Columbus Trust official Clement Kiragu told
The Nation, of Nairobi.
Britain will within a year introduce
“pet passports” in lieu of the six month
quarantine of all imported dogs and cats
which has been in effect since 1900, agriculture
minister Nick Brown announced on March
26. The “pet passports” will certify that the
bearer animals have been vaccinated against
rabies, have microchip ID, have had a blood
test, have no exotic infections, and come from
a nation with no endemic rabies. While pets
who have come from most European Union
nations and Australia, New Zealand, Japan,
Taiwan, and Singapore will qualify, pets from
the U.S. and Canada would not, under the
rules as Brown explained them ––but, Brown
added, “We are looking again at the position
for the U.S. and Canada.”

ANIMAL CONTROL & RESCUE

April 1, 1999 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

“While it is argued by the Estate
that Howard Brand intended to prevent
future cruelty to his horses by ordering their
death,” Vermont probate judge S u s a n
Fowler ruled on March 16, “it would seem
to this court that a death sentence imposed
upon healthy, if aging, animals might be
considered cruel in its own right.” Fowler
thus overturned Brand’s will, allowing the
two horses to go to sanctuary. Brand, of
Essex Junction, Vermont, died on January 2
at age 88, soon after amending his will to
provide that the horses should be killed.
Fowler’s reasoning followed that of the
California state legislature when in 1979, at
request of the San Francisco SPCA, it overturned
a will which required the death of a
dog named Sido. The SF/SPCA placed Sido
in a new home, where he lived five more
years. Richard Avanzino, then president of
the SF/SPCA and now heading Maddie’s
Fund (see pages 12-13), credits response to
the Sido case with awakening his awareness
that the public would far more generously
support efforts to save animals’ lives than it
supports traditional animal control service.

Organizations

April 1, 1999 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

WISE-USE THREATS
The Smithsonian Institution, operators of the
National Zoo in Washington D.C., “backed out of a signing
reception [at the zoo] for my book Science Under Siege: The
Politicians’ War on Nature and Truth,” naturalist and author
Todd Wilkinson reported on March 19, “because the organizers
said my book was ‘too hot politically.’ The shorthand of this,”
Wilkinson continued, “is that it might anger certain lawmakers
who might affect funding for the institution. The book signing
was to have been held in conjunction with a speech by grizzly
bear biologist Dave Mattson, who is featured in one chapter.”
Forest Guardians chief canvasser Mike Cherin
found a pipe bomb in the Santa Fe-based group’s mailbox on
March 19, three months after an unknown party pumped shotgun
fire into the Santa Fe offices of Animal Protection of New
Mexico. The Santa Fe police bomb squad removed the explosive
and safely detonated it. After each incident, the organization
attacked reportedly received a drawing with an Albuquerque
postmark, showing the crosshairs of a gun sight over its name,
signed “MM,” which the New Mexico Department of Public
Safety tentatively believes may indicate the involvement of the
loosely organized Minute Man militia faction.

Activists & Organizations

People & deeds

April 1, 1999 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

American Humane Association board member
Shirley Jones presented an award at the March 27 Ark Trust
Genesis Awards gala in Los Angeles––reminding A N I M A L
PEOPLE that she still hasn’t answered our June 1998 question
as to whether her loyalties are with AHA or the National Dairy
Council, for which she is most prominent national spokesperson.
The Dairy Council and state affiliates have worked to
exempt agricultural practices from coverage by the humane laws
of 28 states––17 in the past 12 years. The Dairy Council and
AHA also have directly opposing positions on the use of bovine
growth hormone to boost milk production, the use and development
of genetic technology, crate-rearing veal calves, and
humane standards for livestock transport.

The Easter Beaver

April 1, 1999 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

The beaver in this photo by
Sharon Brown of Beavers, Wetlands
& Wildlife actually has an apple, not
an egg. (The egg-laying aquatic
mammal is the platypus.)
“New York City decisionmakers
will soon decide whether to
ban trapping in city-owned watershed,”
Brown wrote in an accompanying note.
Approximately 2,000 square miles of upstate New York
will be affected.

Texas Tech researcher could have sat on ant hill

April 1, 1999 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

PETA in mid-February disclosed a
$120,000 Texas Tech project in which deer were
compelled to give birth in pens full of fire ants, to
see whether fawns exposed to the ants survive, and
anesthetized day-old bobwhite quail chicks were covered
with fire ants. In each experiment the object was
to see whether the ants did the animals more harm
than exposure to the pesticides most often used to kill
fire ants; other fawns and quail were exposed to the
pesticides but not the ants.
As it turned out, the fire ants did not kill
any fawns––but eight of the 25 pregnant deer who
were net-gunned from a helicopter in May 1998 by
researcher Mark Wallace died from capture stress,
and another doe died of injuries suffered in capture.
Eight of the 26 fawns born during the
experiments were either stillborn or were euthanized
because they were judged unlikely to live.

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