From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1997:

Eva Peron
First of all I would like to
thank you for the honorific mention
you made in the January/February
edition of ANIMAL PEOPLE i n
relation to the Asociation para la
Defensa de los Derechos del Animal
and myself.
As regards your reflections
on the case of Eva Peron, I consider
that the dualism you were referring
to when you highlighted the fact that
she loved dogs but wore fur is very
common in Argentina, where people
can give their lives for their dogs but
eat the meat of innocent animals or
wear the furs of species tortured in
leghold traps. However, in the case
of Evita, she lived in a time when
consideration of the rights of animals
was almost unknown.

Read more

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1997:

Native tradition
When we go into the sweatlodge,
during prayers, and upon
leaving the sweatlodge, we are
taught to say, “Hou Mi Takuye
Oyacin,” which means, “All our
relations.” With these words we
honor and bless all living things.
How then can people go
out and murder and eat innocent animals
who are our brothers and sisters?
I view this as cannibalism.
When people wear animal and bird
body parts and feathers, for whatever
reason, that is wrong. If animals
could speak, I am sure they would
ask to live and be free. Yet killing
animals continues, with people trying
to justify it by claiming it is done
“in the proper way,” with “respect,”
and that tradition and culture must be
carried on.

Read more

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 1997:

St. Hubert’s
Since we are Catholic, we
paid close attention to a paragraph in
your January/February “Religion &
Animals” column about a hunting
camp, St. Hubert’s, near Alpena,
Michigan. It seems that priests have
been killing deer at St. Hubert’s for
40 years, on the pretext of using it as
a place to “just get away.” Killing
anything is not the way to spiritual
growth, and it raises the question if
these priests are in the right profession.
They need to re-read the Fifth
Commandment.

Read more

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, Jan/Feb 1997:

Sue ‘em!
In July of this year I was
asked to render an opinion on the
legality of live animal sales. I gave
that opinion: California state law
prohibits a business which sells food
from keeping live animals on its
premises, and merchants in San
Francisco continuously violate that
law. I informed the District Attorney
of the law and the violations. He has
the option of prosecuting these cases,
and has chosen not to do so.
A segment of the Asian
community participates in the sale of
live animals. They have been particularly
astute at organizing opposition
to efforts to stop live animal sales by
making claims of cultural violations
and racism. Unfortunately, politicians
are often less interested in the
absurdity of claims than they are in
the voting power of those who make
them. Because of this, it is not realistic
to expect that San Francisco will
pass anything other than the mildest
and most generalized, unenforceable
“welfare” legislation, if even that.

Read more

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1996:

“I’ll cut you off!”
One of the gents I work with has raced cars for years.
He recently started anew with his racing partner, and began
bemoaning their lack of a sponsor. After hearing him for three
or four weeks, I considered the need to target my advertising to
young males, and asked him, “Jay, how much would it cost
me to put spay/neuter stuff all over your car?”
“Anything!” he said desperately. He mentioned how
much the car had cost thus far, and cautiously asked what I had
in mind.
“How about calling it The Lean, Mean, Neuterin’
Machine?” I asked.
“Wow! I like it!” he responded.
I thought to myself, “Oh dear. This poor guy is
going to have every macho dude on the Texas dirt track circuit
on his case.” He’s not very big, and is a real sweetheart.
I said, “Well, Jay, if anyone gives you any grief
about it, you can always tell them that your car can beat the
balls off anyone on the track.”
When we both stopped laughing long enough to say
something more, I added, “And if you want, you could put a
bumper sticker on the back that says, “If you’re behind me,
cross your legs.”

Read more

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1996:

Bacall
To clarify a few points
mentioned in your October article
“Sugarloaf fight goes on,” I made a
sighting on September 7 of the dolphin
Bacall; she was accompanied
very closely by an obviously young
calf. As luck would have it, I was
not in search mode, nor even on the
water that morning. Under these circumstances
I was very careful to
describe this sighting as a “most
probable” sighting in our release, as
well as making clear that only sightings
with verifiable photographs are
considered confirmed.
You quoted Naomi Rose
of the Humane Society of the U.S. as
stating that the main characteristic I
used to make my identification was a
left lean in Bacall’s dorsal fin. The
primary distinctive characteristic of
Bacall’s dorsal fin is actually a set of
ridges in the lower third of the trailing
edge. The flesh of these ridges
protrudes to her right. We used
these dorsal fin features to distinguish
Bogie from Bacall during their
readaptation period in our sea pen.

Read more

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 1996:

Henry Spira
I wish to express my belated
support for Henry Spira’s ads. I
love both the one with the world and
a fork, and the one with the kitten in
a meatgrinder. They are both very
informative. They address the entire
issue of meat-eating: environmental
effects, cruelty to animals, and
health. They are also very catchy;
you have to read them. I disagree
with Cindy McCoy’s claim in her
August/September letter that “many
will get the wrong idea” about the
kitten ad. The ad screams of sarcasm,
and it is extremely obvious
that it is asking readers to think of
farm animals with the same love and
compassion as companion animals.
––Heidi Silva
Pinole, California

Read more

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, August/September 1996:

Help Agudo
As ANIMAL PEOPLE
readers know, Venezuelan biologist,
researcher, and environmentalist
Ignacio Agudo was cruelly harassed,
persecuted, and charged with treason
due to his campaign (together
with professor Aldemaro Romero)
against the killing of dolphins for
bait. He and his family spent two
years in hiding. In December 1994,
Agudo’s father killed himself rather
than risk betraying their location
under repeated intense interrogation,
and in April 1995 Agudo’s wife
Saida died because she could not get
medication for a chronic heart condition.

Read more

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July 1996:

Reward Juliette
As you reported in your
June cover story, “Wishing for an
end to bear hunting,” a seven-yearold
New Mexico child recently
chose to receive seven painful rabies
shots rather than have a bear cub
who nipped her be killed and tested
for rabies. Juliette Harris was quoted
as saying, “I just didn’t want that
cute baby bear to die.”
Nice, eh? Especially after
the brouhaha about the Make-AWish
Foundation sending 17-yearold
Erik Ness to hunt a bear.

Read more