September 11 brings sounds of silence to animal & habitat activism

September 1, 2001 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2001:

WASHINGTON D.C.–Activism for animals and habitat is abruptly
quieter after the September 11 hijackings of four airliners that left
an estimated 6,333 people dead at crash sites in New York City,
Washington D.C., and Somerset County, Pennsylvania.
Both the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense
Council immediately hushed criticism of the policies of U.S.
President George W. Bush–even on Endangered Species Act enforcement
and oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, where their
views and those of the Bush administration are polar opposites.
“In response to the attacks on America,” said a Sierra
Club internal memo disclosed by Counterpunch columnists Alexander
Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair, “we have taken our ads off the air;
halted our phone banks; and removed any material from the web that
people could perceive as anti-Bush. We are taking other steps to
keep the Sierra Club from being seen as controversial.”

Why animal advocates must organize politically now!

September 1, 2001 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2001:

Why animal advocates must organize politically now!
by Julie E. Lewin, President & Lobbyist, Animal Advocacy Connecticut

Political axioms:
* An organized minority can drive public policy, because
every legislator knows that an organized minority can swing elections
in his or her district.
* To achieve in the legislative arena, an issue group must
have either corporate power or an organized grassroots which uses the
power of the vote.
* Grassroots power comes from enduring accountability,
facilitated by at least one full-time lobbyist in the statehouse who
reports back to constituents in each district how their legislators
vote. Many legislators openly champion the causes of animal
exploiters, confident that humane voters in their home district will
never know.

The Witness

September 1, 2001 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2001:
The Witness
Tribe of Heart video (P.O. Box 149, Ithaca, NY 14851), 2000.
43 minutes. $20.00 + $4.00 postage & handling.

In the year-plus since The Witness debuted at the Animal
Rights 2000 conference in Washington D.C., it has become the screen
production most raved about by activists since The Animals’ Film,
narrated by Julie Christie in 1981. Mainstream critics praise it;
activist publications gush.
Unlike The Animals’ Film, which played at off-peak hours in
some major theatres, The Witness is not as demonstrably reaching the
general public–and probably no documentary could in today’s much
more competive screen marketplace.

Reviews

BOOKS: Best Friends

September 1, 2001 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2001:

Best Friends by Samantha Glen
The True Story of the World’s Most Beloved Animal Sanctuary
Kensington Books (850 3rd Ave., New York, NY 10022), 2001.
284 pages, paperback. $15.00.

Like every successful institution, the Best Friends Animal
Sanctuary has a few critics–but most have never been there. They
just have difficulty believing, based on their own experience, that
any no-kill sanctuary can accomplish what Best Friends does.
Somehow, they insist, there is trickery involved. Best Friends,
in their view, must be some kind of weird desert cult, fooling
everyone and getting away with it because the site is so remote.
If you cannot visit, as thousands actually have, to see for
yourself why Samantha Glen calls Best Friends “the world’s most
beloved animal sanctuary,” her book Best Friends is the next best
thing.

Human obituaries

September 1, 2001 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2001:

Dorothy Checci-O’Brien, 70, died on August 27 at home in
Plymouth, Massachusetts. A longtime valuable news source for ANIMAL
PEOPLE, Checci-O’Brien stood under five feet tall and weighed less
than 100 pounds, but was fined $405 in October 1985 for allegedly
beating up two hunters she caught trying to shoot waterfowl near her
house despite her “No Hunting” signs. Considered the most effective
pro-animal lobbyist in Massachusetts, working strictly as a
volunteer, Checci-O’Brien earlier led a long and eventually
successful effort to wrest the Ellen Gifford Sheltering Home for Cats
in Brighton from the allegedly self-aggrandizing control of corporate
attorney John G. Kilpatrick Jr., and closely monitored the financial
affairs of the Massachusetts SPCA and the Animal Rescue League of
Boston. New England Anti-Vivisection Society president Theo Capaldo
called Checci-O’Brien “the mother of animal activism in
Massachusetts.” Friends of the Plymouth Pound held a memorial
celebration of her life on September 29.

Obituaries

Aid afoot for Jaipur elephants

September 1, 2001 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2001:

JAIPUR–To call the 90-odd tourist elephants of Jaipur
“neglected” presents a paradox. Among the most photographed animals
in India, they attract constant attention as they amble up to 10
times a day through the 18th century Pink City and climb the mountain
to the 16th century Amber Fort of Akbar the Great and his son
Jahangir.
Sacrifices of goats and other animals carried out almost
continuously at the Amber Fort temple to Kali, the blood goddess,
recall the harsher side of Akbar, the conqueror/ prophet who united
much of India by proclaiming religious tolerance and trying to
synthesize Islam and Hinduism.

LETTERS: Stop Smoking Camels

September 1, 2001 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2001:

We are British veterinarians, volunteering for Help in
Suffering in Jaipur, India. We are trying to set up a mobile camel
clinic. Our goals are to place reflectors on camel carts to reduce
night road accidents; worm the camels; give treatment and advice to
camel owners concerning saddlery; and to discourage the traditional
use of burning as a “cure” for various ailments.
A pilot effort has been very successful, attending to more
than 700 camels, and was well received by the camel owners–but we
need funding to continue. We have prepared a detailed proposal and a
detailed budget which we would be happy to send to interested people
and organizations.
–Emma and Richard Morris, DVMs.

Animal obituaries

September 1, 2001 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2001:

Ralf, 17, resident porcupine at the Science North center at
the University of Guelph, Ontario, since 1984, except for a stint
at the 1990 World’s Fair in Osaka, Japan, died on August 6. As
many as three million visitors had petted Ralf, including the Prince
and Princess of Wales in 1991.

Haida, 21, the oldest of the five orcas at Sea World San
Antonio, captured from the wild in 1980, died suddenly of an
unknown cause on August 2.

Obituaries

BOOKS: Blood Relations

September 1, 2001 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2001:
Blood Relations: Animals, Humans, and Politics by Charlotte Montgomery
Between The Lines (720 Bathurst St., Suite #404, Toronto, Ontario,
Canada M58 2R4), 2001. 337 pages, paperback. $26.95.
Charlotte Montgomery admits that Blood Relations is not a
complete portrait of the animal rights movement in Canada.
“What I could do,” she writes, “was offer a representative
sample, a selection of people and issues that would give the gist of
the animal movement. Think of it as somewhere to start. The
activists who once rescued living turkey chicks from a garbage bag
full of dead bodies are not here. Nor is Floyd the lonely monkey,
who doesn’t know humans are trying to help him, nor a special green
parrot, both of whom I met during my research and will remember.
Nor are the people who defend whales or give donkeys and greyhounds a
home–or a lot of issues and people who arguably should be.

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