Campaigns & Organizations

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2000:

The Sea Shepherd Conservation
Society, often pursued by law enforcement,
announced on August 21 that on August 19
its Brazilian affiliate, Instituto Sea
S h e p h e r d, had joined with “members of
Brazil’s environmental law enforcement
agency IBAMA and military police” to conduct
“a high-seas raid against four illegal
driftnetting vessels.” The Sea Shepherds
said they spotted the outlaw fishers from an
airplane, kept them under observation from a
helicopter, and used a speedboat to approach
and mark the vessels for identification and
possible confiscation by the Brazilian Navy.

The Hornocker Wildlife Institute,
noted for predator-related field research, is
reportedly leaving the offices it has occupied
since 1986 at the University of Idaho i n
Moscow, and relocating to Bozeman,
Montana, where it will become part of the
Global Carnivore Project.
According to the National AntiVivisection
Society 1999 Financial Report &
Program Summary, sent to donors as part of
NAVS’ summer 2000 newsletter, “the educational
component” of a direct mail campaign
about vivisection” brought returns
amounting to 180% of investment––but the
“educational component” of direct mailings
sent to benefit the NAVS Sanctuary Fund
brought returns of 420%. The operative psychology
may be partly that animal protection
donors tend to regard involvement in handsonl
rescue as a test of the sincerity of advocacy
groups, and partly that the plight of specific
living animals has about three times
more emotional pull than the plight of animals
who are already dead, even if it might
be possible to save countless other animals
from a similar fate.
John Passacantando, w h o
c o f o u n d e d Ozone Action in 1993 with former
G r e e n p e a c e activist Karen Lohr, in
August became executive drector of
Greenpeace USA, replacing K r i s t i n
Engberg, who resigned with the entire board
in late July. Greenpeace International
executive director Thilo Bode resigned earlier,
leaving the 30-chapter global organization
temporarily adrift. Passacantando reportedly
hopes to merge Greenpeace USA with
Ozone Action. This would move Greenpeace
still farther from the early emphasis on animal
issues which helped it build a global
membership of about five million people by
1990, including one million Americans,
with total revenue of about $150 million.
Animal-focused campaigns were largely
abandoned after 1986. Since the 1990 peak
of support, Greenpeace revenue has fallen to
circa $83 million. U.S. membership is down
to 300,000. The British affiliate, with
200,000 members, is next largest.
The British firm Digital
C e l l p h o n e s has reportedly abandoned an ad
campaign which featured a photo of a fox and
the words “Stop hunting,” due to complaints
from the pro-hunting Countryside Alliance.
The American SPCA e n l i s t e d
actress Mary Tyler Moore as celebrity
spokesperson at an August 23 press conference
called to promote a proposed ordinance
which would confine New York City carriage
horses to Central Park. A similar ordinance
was adopted in 1989, when the city council
overrode a veto by then-mayor Ed Koch, but
was repealed in 1992, over a threatened veto
by Koch’s successor, David Dinkins.
Responded Pets Alive executive director
Sara Whelan, whose no-kill sanctuary in
Middletown, New York, keeps 12 retired
New York City carriage horses, “I’d be the
first to protest if the horses were abused. But
while there is always the exception, these
horses are very well treated. Carriage horses
bring out big donors,” Whalen continued to
Andrea Peyser of The New York Post. “In
return, you don’t see what the money is buying.
You won’t see any direct improvements
in the horses’ lives.” The ASPCA bill as yet
lacks a city council sponsor.
BirdLife Malta, founded in 1962
as the Malta Ornithological Society, in
June agreed to join with the M a l t a
Federation of Hunters, Trappers, and
Conservationists to breed quail for hunters’
guns, on the theory that if the 17,000 to
19,000 bird-shooters in Malta aim at quail,
they won’t kill so many migratory birds and
songbirds. BirdLife Malta, historically the
leading voice against bird-shooting on the
Mediterranean flyway, “has just signed their
own death warrant,” commented W o r l d
Animal Conscience chair Michael Pearson,
whose much younger organization is the most
prominent Maltese voice for animal rights.
The Phoenix-based Make-AWish
Foundation of America, target of
international protest in 1996 when it sent 17-
year-old Erik Ness of White Bear Township,
Minnesota, to Alaska to kill a bear,
announced on August 8 that state chapters
may no longer grant wishes that involve hunting
or shooting. “Make-A-Wish is obviously
caving in to pressure from the animal rights
organizations,” complained Safari Club
I n t e r n a t i o n a l representative Dan Treb, of
Delano, Michigan. The new Make-A-Wish
policy was issued despite a boycott called in
May by the International Bowhunting
O r g a n i z a t i o n . Ness, who killed a bear in
his second attempt, died in 1999 at age 21.