Zoonotic Diseases: The Next Global Plague?

An in-depth overview of an evolving human health threat

An overwhelming amount of nutritional research implicates the consumption of meat, dairy and eggs as a key cause of cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and other serious illnesses. Industrialized factory farming is also one of the main drivers of environmental degradation, from pollution to global warming, pushing humanity’s very survival toward the brink of extinction. Yet there is another potentially deadly danger linked to the eating and production of animal products: zoonotic diseases that can be transmitted from domesticated farm animals to people.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, food borne illnesses are responsible for about 325,000 hospitalizations and 5,000 deaths every year in the U.S. The CDC estimates that at least one-third of these illnesses and fatalities are directly attributable to the consumption of meat. However, this does not account for cases of food-borne illness caused by eating tainted dairy or eggs, the consumption of plant foods contaminated by bacteria originating from animals, or direct contact with infected animals.

The biological symmetries between humans and other animals enable some viruses to leap the species barrier when humans eat contaminated animal flesh, or by infecting farmers working in close proximity to livestock (who in turn become contagious and pass viruses to people with whom they come into contact). Some of these contagions are the result of complex evolutionary processes which make them so novel that the human immune system has not yet developed defenses against them. In other instances, bacteria growing inside the intestines of animals can afflict whoever ingests contaminated food with symptoms ranging from indigestion to fatal organ failure.

However they are transmitted, zoonotic diseases are clearly a grave threat to public health that some virologists say could potentially kill hundreds of millions of people worldwide should any of them grow into pandemics. Fortunately, there are many preventative measures we can take today to minimize the impact of this medical menace in years to come. With this in mind, below is an overview of the most common and emerging zoonotic diseases.

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA)

• Prevalence: Over 90,000 confirmed cases and 18,000 deaths in the U.S. per year
• Symptoms: Large staph infections (usually on the face, behind the knees, under the arms, and/or on the buttocks) that can turn into abscesses and lethally infect the bloodstream, bones, joints, lungs, and heart
• Transmission: Direct contact between humans and infected pigs; possibly communicable through consumption of contaminated pork products

MRSA (pronounced “mersa”) now claims more human victims in the U.S. than the AIDS virus, and poses the greatest danger to people with compromised immune systems. Scientists have established that MRSA is transmitted to people through direct physical contact with pigs. However, fears that the disease may have entered the human food chain arose in 2008 when three patients in Scotland who had no contact with pigs were diagnosed with a variant strain known as ST398.

A team of independent researchers from the University of Iowa found MRSA present in 70 percent of the 209 hogs tested on 10 different farms in two states. Despite this evidence, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has no plans to test pigs or pork products for infection. Meanwhile, the pork industry categorically opposes testing, claiming that taking such precautions is “unnecessary to protect public health”.

Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD, or Mad Cow Disease)

• Prevalence: 117 confirmed deaths worldwide since 1990
  
• Symptoms: Loss of muscle control, changes in personality, impaired memory, and degenerating vision rapidly leading to severe dementia and death
• Transmission: Consumption of beef products infected with prions (aberrant protein agents) from the brain or spinal cord tissue of cattle

For many years, farmers inexpensively fattened cattle to slaughter weight by feeding them a high-protein diet made from the detritus on the slaughterhouse floor — including the bones, entrails, brains, and spinal cords of other cattle, which is where the virtually indestructible prions that cause bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) reside. BSE was nicknamed “Mad Cow Disease” because the prions damage bovine’s brains, causing them to exhibit symptoms of “madness” such as uncoordinated movement, loss of balance, and radical temperamental alterations. People who contract vCJD (the human equivalent of BSE) display similar behavioral abnormalities as the prions rapidly destroy their brains.

The disease typically gestates for a period of years in the body, but usually kills its victims within weeks or months of the onset of symptoms. The vast majority of cases in both humans and cattle have occurred in the United Kingdom, but in the U.S., three BSE-infected cattle have been found, and three humans are know to have contracted vCJD. Notably, the CDC does not require doctors and hospitals to report when patients are diagnosed with the disease (so the number of affected could be considerably higher), and the USDA scaled back its detection efforts by about 90 percent in 2006 based on its claim that there is only “a very, very low level of BSE in the United States”.

H1N1 (Swine Flu)

• Prevalence: In the 2009-2010 outbreak, over 16,455 confirmed human deaths worldwide, including 2,009 deaths in the U.S.
  
• Symptoms: Fever, cough, sore throat, runny or stuffy nose, muscle stiffness, headache, chills, fatigue, diarrhea, and vomiting
• Transmission: Humans contract H1N1 through direct contact with infected pigs (e.g., in hog barns on farms), then spread the virus to other people; there have been no documented cases of infection through consumption of pork products
  

H1N1 (commonly known as “swine flu”) gets its abbreviated name from the hemagglutinin (type 1 of 16) that binds the recombinant human-pig-bird virus to the host cell (the first of 9 types of neuraminidase). The recent H1N1 outbreak is descended from an influenza pandemic that killed more than 50 million people worldwide in 1918 and 1919, and recurred several times throughout the 20th century in different locations. Indeed, the evolutionary trajectory of the virus has been tracked by research identically matching 80 percent of the newest H1N1 strain’s gene sequences to a superbug that first emerged in 1998 from a Smithfield pig processing plant in North Carolina (the top pork-producing state in the U.S.) and ravaged the North American pig population.

While the virus had originally spread from pigs to farm employees working in close proximity to contaminated animals, the first case of a human infecting a hog herd occurred in Alberta, Canada. Soon after this discovery, the Egyptian government ordered the slaughter of the entire nation’s pig population – about 400,000 animals – ostensibly to stem the spread of H1N1 to humans. As the United Nations criticized the move as “a real mistake” that would do nothing to protect the populace, animal rights groups maintained that factory farms (rather than pigs) were responsible for the virus, and culling herds would be cruel and counterproductive.

H5N1 (Avian Flu)

• Prevalence: 486 confirmed cases and 287 human fatalities worldwide; no reported human cases in the U.S.
  
• Symptoms: Viral pneumonia, respiratory distress, and multiple organ failure
• Transmission: Most cases are the result of direct physical contact with infected birds on farms and in live markets, or surfaces contaminated with their feces; passage of the virus from person-to-person remains relatively rare
  

Like other avian flu viruses, H5N1 is naturally present in the intestines of wild birds and rarely causes them to be sick, but this disease is devastating to domestic chickens, turkeys, ducks, and geese unfortunate enough to contract it. Transmitted via saliva, mucus or feces, H5N1 is highly communicable among avian populations, and can very quickly devastate whole flocks (with an average mortality rate near 90 percent) and expand to others. Notably, while this virus does not spread as easily to humans, it is almost as deadly, killing more than half the people it has infected.

H5N1 was first found in the human population in 1997, and while most of the cases have occurred in Indonesia, the virus has also struck African and European countries. Given the relatively high fatality rate associated with H5N1, scientists are concerned about this strain mutating into a form that can pass more easily from person-to-person and cause a global pandemic that could claim hundreds of millions of lives. Laboratory research suggests that medications currently on the market could be used to effectively treat people for avian influenza, but experts also warn that the virus could quickly develop resistance to these drugs.

Salmonellosis

• Prevalence: Kills several thousand people worldwide (approximately 580 in the U.S.) every year
• Symptoms: Fever, abdominal cramps and diarrhea (which can spread infection to the bloodstream and become fatal)
• Transmission: Salmonella typically infects people who consume foods contaminated with animal feces (usually meat, milk or eggs, but salmonella-tainted manure from farms can also poison fruits and vegetables)

With more than 40,000 cases diagnosed each year in the U.S., salmonellosis is among the most common intestinal infections affecting the human population. Infants, the elderly and persons with compromised immune systems are the most vulnerable to salmonella bacteria, which comes from the digestive tract of birds, reptiles and mammals. Studies have found that about 25 percent of chickens sold in the U.S. are contaminated with salmonella.

Persons infected with salmonella typically exhibit symptoms within 6 to 48 hours of ingesting the bacterium, and recovery usually takes about a week. Antibiotics are often not an effective treatment for salmonellosis because many strains have become antibiotic-resistant, and because these compounds can slow the process of intestinal shedding necessary for recuperation. Cooking food thoroughly and washing all surfaces that come into contact with raw meat can help prevent the spread of infection.

Escherichia coli 0157:H7

• Prevalence: Causes approximately 73,480 illnesses, 2,168 hospitalizations and 61 deaths a year in the U.S.
• Symptoms: Abdominal cramps, diarrhea, fever, and vomiting; approximately 10 percent of subjects (mostly children and the elderly) develop haemolytic uraemic syndrome (HUS), a disease that causes acute renal failure in as many as 5 percent of those who contract it
  
• Transmission: Most infections are the result of physical contact with infected people or animals, or the consumption of contaminated water or food (most commonly milk or cheese that has not been pasteurized); can also be passed from person to person
  

One of the most common bacteria living in the digestive tract of humans and other animals, E. coli is usually harmless to its hosts. However, some strains make people sick, and one particular variety that has developed in the intestines of cattle (E. coli 0157:H7) has the power to kill. Research indicates that as much as 3 percent of the U.S. cattle herd may harbor this deadly contagion.

E. coli spreads very easily, as ingesting only a tiny amount of bacteria (as little as 10 microbes) can cause serious illness and even death. Food contaminated with E. coli looks, smells and tastes the same as nontoxic food, so it is impossible to tell using just one’s senses whether meat, dairy and other products (such as alfalfa sprouts and other vegetables) are safe to eat. Cooking food thoroughly and washing all surfaces that come into contact with raw meat can help prevent the spread of infection.

Campylobacteriosis

• Prevalence: Approximately 2.4 million cases and 124 deaths in the U.S. every year
• Symptoms: Diarrhea, abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting and fever; can become life-threatening to persons with compromised immune systems if it infects the bloodstream
• Transmission: Most cases are caused by eating raw or undercooked poultry, or cross-contamination of other foods by infected flesh; outbreaks are also associated with the consumption of unpasteurized milk or infected water

By far the most common cause of food-borne illness, campylobacter affects almost 1 percent of the U.S. population every year. This bacterium naturally resides in the intestinal tracts of mammals and birds, doing them no harm. However, ingesting it can cause humans to suffer severe sickness and even death.

Studies indicate that more than one-half of raw chicken carcasses sold in the U.S. contain campylobacter. However, it is a relatively fragile bacterium that can be killed by drying, exposure to oxygen, excessive heat (i.e., cooking), and the pasteurization process. Cooking food thoroughly and washing all surfaces that come into contact with raw poultry can help prevent the spread of infection.

Factory Farms: Breeding Grounds for Zoonotic Diseases

Meat-borne diseases have plagued humankind since our pre-historical hunting and gathering days, but a relatively recent (mid-20th century) agricultural innovation – factory farming – has created a “perfect storm” of conditions for the rampant development and rapid dissemination of new pathogens among the human population. Some of the profit-driven techniques steering the world toward impending disaster include:

• Overcrowding – Factory farms typically cram thousands of animals together in a single massive building where they spend most of their lives. Population density is increased through the use of intensive constriction devices, such as battery cages (for egg-laying hens) and gestation crates (for pregnant sows). Keeping animals packed together in regimented rows saves space and makes large farms easier to manage, but also greatly amplifies the spread of contagions through constant close contact.

• Environmental deprivation – The stress caused by intensive confinement, lack of exercise, unnatural diet, absence of sunlight, taking children away from mothers, and other traumatic factors impairs animals’ immune systems to the point where their bodies become dangerously susceptible to disease. The living conditions at Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFO) are so bad that many animals would not survive without the antibiotics farmers constantly feed them. In fact, the Union of Concerned Scientists estimates that about 70 percent of the antibiotics administered in the U.S. are given to farm animals, an abusive practice that is making these drugs less effective in the treatment of human diseases.

• Substandard sanitation – The average CAFO generates millions of gallons of waste a year, and animals therefore typically wind up standing and lying in their own decaying feces. As the waste putrefies on the ground, it also fouls the air with ammonia, methane, hydrogen sulfide, and other toxic gasses that diminish immunity and breed respiratory infections. Not surprisingly, microbes from animal feces are the primary source of most foodborne pathogens, often contaminating meat during the slaughter process.

Downed animals – those too sick or injured to stand or walk – are more likely to carry dangerous viruses or bacteria that can be transmitted to humans who come into contact with them or eat their flesh. In March 2009, the U.S. government announced a new rule banning the slaughter of all downed cattle, a move that will help protect the public from zoonotic diseases and prevent much unnecessary animal suffering. However, it is still legal to cruelly force other species of animals to the kill floor for processing by prodding them with electric shocks, dragging them by chains, or pushing them with forklifts.

As long as producers can make even a small amount of profit from the flesh and blood of downed animals, there will be an incentive to abuse them without regard for their suffering and endanger people’s health by processing potentially diseased animals into food. You can take a stand for human health and farm animals by going vegan and contacting Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack urging him to extend the ban on slaughtering downed cattle to all animals used for food.

Soul Food-For-Thought: The Real Roots of Liberation

Read my review (with photos) of this singular San Francisco Black History Month benefit

In February, I attended the Soul Food-For-Thought event at San Francisco's historic Herbst Theatre, presented by and benefiting the International Fund For Africa (IFA). More than 500 people enjoyed this evening of great vegan food and awesome live entertainment while being exposed to a message of dietary compassion tailored for the Bay Area's African-American community, which made up most of the audience.

I enjoyed Soul Food-For-Thought so much that I wrote a review of it which James McCaffry from the Studios of FotoGrafis then produced as a four-page (11-by-17-inch) booklet under the auspices of ark magazine. This beautifully-rendered brochure includes McCaffry's own photographs of the hosts, sponsors, performers, speakers, and guests. Reading it is the next best thing to being there!

Check out the review

Close Encounter of the Turtle Kind

See my undoctored photo & video proof of intelligent life!

“I know up on the top you are seeing great sights, but down at the bottom we, too, should have rights.”

– From Yertle the Turtle and Other Stories, by Dr. Seuss


Today I went to one of my favorite San Francisco writing places: a semi-private nature-nook in Golden Gate Park partially obscured by trees overlooking South Lake. It’s one of those special spots in the city where I can usually find some small semblance of solitude — only this time, a Red-eared slider, measuring about seven inches from nose to tail, had already claimed it as his* own. He was resting stock-still on the moist earth about 20 feet from the water’s edge, apparently just chilling out by the bench. I’d have expected a turtle to scamper away when I came along, but he just stood his ground even as I sat down.

At first he had his back to me, facing the lake, and retracted his head and limbs into his shell at my slightest movement. But after a few minutes, he suddenly turned himself around and stared straight at me for a good long stretch of time. Though I commonly spy wild turtles while hiking in the park, none had ever explicitly acknowledged my existence before, so I wondered what was up. Was he sick, and seeking my assistance? Or maybe someone had been feeding turtles here so that they’d become tame, and he was expecting a treat from me? Perhaps he was merely curious and wanted to study the bizarre biped in his midst, or aggressively drive me away from his territory?

The turtle’s behavior reminded me of my cats, Zelda and Jasmine, who sometimes perch on tabletops right in front of me about arm’s length away and stare hypnotically into my eyes with an oblique expression as though they’re trying to psychically beam some divine feline secret directly into my mind: but what? I just affectionately stroke their soft pliable ears and scratch under their fuzzy chins — but of course did not try this with the slider, cute as he was, wishing to respect his personal space and knowing that the bite of these particular snapping turtles is powerful enough to sever fingers. Yet I had the distinct impression that he was signaling me, as one conscious being to another. I was unable to comprehend whatever message he might have been trying to convey, however, being woefully ignorant of his obscure reptilian language.

Anyway, given this turtle’s unusually stationary stance (and the Chia-like plants growing on the front half of his shell), I was concerned that he might be ailing, so I eventually called San Francisco Animal Care and Control on my cell phone for advice. A very friendly officer assured me that it’s not uncommon for turtles to sprout foliage, and that he probably just wanted to sun himself (even though we were in the shade). As to why he hadn’t retreated upon my approach, the officer explained that the turtle would probably return to his watery habitat once I departed.

“Red” and I hung out there together for over two hours, until I opted to resume my hike through the park. But first I decided to test the ACC officer’s theory by only pretending to leave, hiding behind some nearby bushes along the footpath in wait. Sure enough, my temporary companion soon sauntered back toward the lake, as you can see in my (obviously) unedited minute-long video documentary chronicling his epic journey:



* Judging from the long fore-claws and thick tail, I believe this particular turtle was a male.

Hitler Farted!

Der Führer’s meat-powered flatulence disorder — and part-time vegetarian curative

Though modern historical scholarship has conclusively proven that Adolph Hitler was not actually a vegetarian*, many people even today still persist in believing that he was. Actually, Nazi Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels first started spreading this strategic misinformation more than 75 years ago to cloak the chancellor in an otherworldly aura simply so he’d be seen as Germany’s saintly savior. But, like most myths, this one does actually contain at least a tiny grain of truth — only in this case it’s a pretty humiliating back-story (or behind-story) that the Third Reich’s arch-villainous architects kept carefully hidden from the outside world.

In reality, Herr Hitler periodically practiced vegetarianism to combat the “excessive flatulence” from which he chronically suffered. The Führer’s ongoing gastric struggles have been corroborated by many reliably authenticated sources, including his own personal physician, Dr. Theo Morell, who wrote in his journal that he once witnessed Hitler endure a bout of “colossal flatulence…on a scale I have seldom encountered before.” In his groundbreaking book Eternal Treblinka: Our Treatment of Animals and the Holocaust, author Charles Patterson wrote that Hitler found “fewer stains in his underwear” when he reduced his meat consumption, and “became convinced that eating vegetables improved the odor of his flatulence.” However, Hitler biographers attest that he certainly didn’t stick with vegetarianism, and in fact was a bona fide glutton for ham, liver, sausage, and (his favorite) stuffed squab.

A friend and creative collaborator of mine from college once explained to me his “cosmic anchor” theory of comedy, which basically propounds that farting is the most primordial form of humor (because the anus is like a second mouth that “speaks” behind our backs and beyond our control, like some mutant strain of rectal Tourette Syndrome). Just think of the hysterical irony, in this particular instance, of a flatulent fascist dictator who can’t seem to stop “talking out of his ass,” as it were. I can just see Hitler at a sprawling public rally delivering a raging rant accusing the Jews of being foul and disgusting animals, banging his fist on the podium and Seig Heiling the rabid crowd — and during a dramatic pause in his spittle-flecked harangue, blasting a massive bugler out the back of his beige jodhpurs that is picked up by the custom Neumann CMV3 condenser microphone and broadcast over loudspeakers to the entire crowd and live radio audiences throughout occupied Europe! Actually, Hitler liked keeping vicious attack dogs around for his amusement (meaning he enjoyed brutally beating them into submission), so in this and other scenarios, he probably would have blamed them for his own embarrassing bumburps!

Despite all these fun-poking antics aimed at smelly old man Hitler for his congenital gas-passing ailment, I do feel it’s worth exploring whether he was onto something…maybe our bodily emissions can be better managed (to smooth social interactions and slow climate change) through improved dietary habits. While there seems to be no real consensus about whether a vegan diet produces less toxic wind than eating meat, dairy and/or eggs, here are a few claims (provided with a general disclaimer about not actually knowing their scientific merits) that I’ve gathered on the subject:

• According to one article published in 1913 (which Hitler himself must have surely read), “The longer the feces are retained in the intestine, the longer the bacteria act upon them, thus causing fermentation and decomposition…A plentiful meat diet also favors the formation of gases (because) the digestive fluids are not able to fully digest it.” Of course, those prone to flatulence are advised to avoid foods that leave “residual matter” in their wake, such as cabbage and beans (the proverbial “musical fruit”).

• A Q&A in the online magazine VegFamily suggests that sticking to a healthy vegan diet of fresh fruits and vegetables, organic whole grains, and lots of water produces relatively little flatulence. Echoing the claims made in the article cited above, respondents assert that (just like meat) processed vegan “junk food” takes longer to digest than natural foods, and therefore results in greater amounts of gas.

• The lifestyle website AskMen.com declares that “Vegetarians might fart as often as meat-eaters, but their ‘serenades’ do not smell as much because vegetables produce less hydrogen sulfide. The more sulfur rich the foods you eat, the more your farts will stink because bacteria will generate sulfides and mercaptans as they break down the nutrients.” Their preventative advice includes steering clear of fumigant foods such as cauliflower, taking Bean-O supplements, and ingesting herbal essences like chamomile, peppermint, sage, and marjoram.

* While Hitler openly praised vegetarianism (mainly because he idolized the classical composer Richard Wagner), the National Socialist Party legally outlawed independent vegetarian societies throughout the Fatherland and their expanding empire, forcing these groups to either join the centralized Nazi Living Reform Movement or disband. So, while vegetarianism itself wasn’t strictly criminalized under fascism, all autonomous organizations were, specifically meaning they could no longer choose their own socio-political positions or espouse non-violent philosophies. Nevertheless, in bold defiance of the totalitarian state, courageous vegetarians continued to hold clandestine meetings that were unaffiliated with official government institutions, routinely risking enslavement and probable extermination in concentration camps.

Witness to Suicide at Powell and Market

Onlookers laugh and cheer as a man jumps to his death – and we wonder why more people aren’t vegan?!

I was there today when a man killed himself before a live audience of bystanding spectators in San Francisco.

I was biking down Market Street when I saw a massive crowd gathered near the Powell Street cable car turnaround. They were frantically yelling, a combination of anxious cries and excited cheers, as though watching the climax of an intense sports match. I figured it must be a fistfight, but I was wrong…because the shouting then rose to a sudden cacophony punctuated by a dense fleshy thump.

I had never heard a sound like that in my life, and wondered what the hell it could be. Traffic had stopped, people were rushing across Market, and police & ambulances were screeching in, so I crossed the street to find out, and saw, right on the north side of the Powell BART station fence, a handful of cops standing over a shirtless man lying face-down in a bloody pool on the sidewalk. People were pointing up at the window ledge of the third-floor apartment above the “Forever 21” store he’d just jumped from, and holding cameras in the air snapping pictures of the corpse.

This nightmarish scenario was disturbing enough, but far worse was overhearing numerous young people actually laughing and saying things like “Oh shit! Did you see that?!” and “That was so cool!” One twenty-something woman nearby even loudly bragged to her friend on a cell phone that “I was yelling ‘Jump! Jump!’ And then he jumped!”

We may well wonder what caused 32-year-old Dylan Yount to take his own life. I don’t know his reasons, but maybe it had something to do with being sick and tired of living in a world where shit like this happens?

Call me naïve or out of touch, but I was actually shocked that some people’s response to seeing a fellow human violently end his tortured existence was about the same as if they’d just watched a YouTube video of a guy getting repeatedly kicked in the balls.

It’s existentially insane that, in this day and age, supposedly civilized folks consume actual, real-life atrocity as a form of entertainment while it's actually happening. The fact that these grotesque inhuman deformities actually felt comfortable broadcasting their repugnant monstrosity to everyone within earshot makes my heart ache. But what makes it so much worse is that they actually felt compelled to publicly proclaim the deadness of their souls.

Significantly, all of those I personally observed deriding Dylan's death were young adults ranging from their late-teens to mid-twenties. It's not really a generational thing though: callous, casual cruelty rears its ugly head in every century, whether it's the Roman Coliseum, Jack the Ripper or Kitty Genovese. I just expect better in 21st century San Francisco. Regardless of place or time, those who laughed as Dylan died clearly have no manners, no shame, no decency, and perhaps no capacity for compassion.

And I really can’t help but wonder, what in the world made them that way? Did they suffer horrific, unspeakable physical abuse and psychological torture as children? Or are they just unbelievable assholes? Either way, what's their excuse? And does their vile brutality and lack of empathy indicate that, ultimately, humankind has no future?

The Killing Joke

Years ago, when I was newly vegan, I spent many a Friday night with other activists on the sidewalk outside of the Metreon multiplex in downtown San Francisco handing out “Why Vegan?” booklets while showing “Meet Your Meat” and other factory farming videos on a battery-powered TV/VCR. Most people would walk by without acknowledging my offer of a booklet and deliberately avoid looking at the TV images. Some would stop and watch for awhile, and maybe take a leaflet, or even cry and thank us for being there, putting a little money in our donation jar.

And a few – always young men – would make a big show of laughing out loud as animals were slaughtered onscreen. Similarly, when I co-hosted “Vegan TV” on the SF community access station, we’d sometimes get calls from Beavis and Butthead types calling us faggots, pussies or whatever because we refused to eat meat.

In those days, such things rarely phased me, because I had an explanation. I figured these young guys joked about animal cruelty and those who repudiated it because admitting to anyone (especially their male peers) that they had feelings about anything (or anyone) left them vulnerable to ridicule, rejection and being branded “gay” – so laughing at others’ pain was their way of acting tough.

Hey, I was involuntarily subjected to junior high school too, and remember what a powerful force peer pressure was at that age, and how often I conformed to others’ rigid and distorted definitions of manhood simply because I lacked a strong self-identity and the courage to be myself. So, armed with this analysis, I deduced that the boys’ humorous reaction to slaughter footage was both a result of nervous laughter and a way for them to impress their friends. It seemed rather pathetic, but understandable: because in a way I’d been in their shoes before.

But now, after years of practicing animal rights advocacy and discovering denial firmly entrenched in every stratum of society, I no longer find such simplistic explanations of casual cruelty satisfactory. Mainly because even most so-called “mature adults” never really grow up when it comes to fundamentally respecting non-human species. Many don't even respect fellow human beings.

Even as I write, and even as you read, somewhere in the world animals are being tortured for people’s amusement in circuses, rodeos, horse races, game reserves, dog fighting rings, and other “entertainments” that by all rights should have been abolished along with human slavery long ago. But there's also still human slavery, war, starvation, terrorism, and torture going on this minute as well. There are millions of poor, homeless children right here in prosperous America. In one way at least, my experience today only served to reinforce my grave doubts about the true nature of our species — that humankind, as a whole, is stubbornly numb to the sufferings of others, whether or not we are directly responsible for their misery.

Then again, in my despair, there’s a whole other side to this story that I’ve neglected to tell. That is, of the hundreds of people who today saw a man fall to his doom, most did not laugh or cheer: they cried openly in the arms of loved ones, or sought emotional solace from a stranger, or stood silently awestruck alone contemplating the inconceivable. If not so distressed by the relative minority whose heartless behavior I found so nauseating, I might have stuck around awhile longer to grieve with those whose humanity seemingly remained intact, and perhaps found my faith in people restored. Instead, numbed to the core of my being, I rode on, and decided hours later to share my thoughts here in this public journal.

I guess it just goes to show that every life experience presents both challenges to and opportunities for growth, and what we choose to make of them is often largely up to us. Meaning, in the course of our Earthly journey, we always need to beware of mistaking one small aspect of reality for the whole truth.

If you are feeling suicidal, please call a suicide hotline and get the help you need!

Act Now to Protect Great Apes

Tell Congress: Pass bill to ban invasive primate experimentation

"It's about the money. There's big bucks in this research, especially chimp research. We're talking millions. Millions of dollars."

– Narriman Fakier, former employee of New Iberia Research Center turned whistleblower


In March of last year, ABC's Nightline, World News Tonight, and Good Morning America shows aired disturbing video footage captured by an undercover investigator from the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) which depicts the severe abuse of primates at New Iberia Research Center (NIRC) in Louisiana, where new medical and pharmaceutical treatments designed for humans are tested on more than 6,000 monkeys and chimpanzees. The exposé documents what the HSUS investigator saw during his nine-month stint posing as a lab tech, using hidden cameras to bring Big Science's dirty little secret to light: that researchers routinely violate basic animal welfare laws, and only suffer consequences when the public demands justice.

The United States is one among only four nations in the world where research on chimpanzees is still legal. Meanwhile, countries like Austria, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden, and the UK have banned invasive experiments on all great apes (i.e., chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, bonobos — and homo sapiens) because the immorality inherent in such studies cannot be ethically justified on the basis of saving human lives. Seriously, torturing and killing our closest biological cousins is not the only (or even best) way to understand our own medical maladies, and yet it continues, funded by our taxes: why?

One reason is that animal research is extremely profitable. Between 2000 and 2009, the National Institutes of Health, a Federal agency, granted NIRC more than $17 million in public funds to conduct research on chimpanzees — money they used to viciously persecute primates, both within and beyond the law and often for decades on end. In this case, the government took appropriate action against NIRC, with Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack ordering an investigation of their operations and pledging to punish anyone found guilty of violating the Animal Welfare Act. But while NIRC is one of the nation's larger primate research centers, it's trespasses still only represent the relatively small tip of vivisection's animal cruelty iceberg — what remains buried beneath the depths of deception is perhaps even worse, and even during the best of economic times, the U.S. government clearly wouldn't have the means to police every facility all the time.

Emptying the Cages

Thankfully, inspired by HSUS's repulsive revelations, Congress is now considering a pragmatic and compassionate solution: the Great Ape Protection Act (H.R. 1326). This bipartisan bill would phase out invasive research on great apes, ban the breeding of these primates for experimentation, and permanently retire hundreds of chimpanzees to sanctuaries where they would be lovingly cared for instead of callously exploited for profit. Passage of this bill would greatly accelerate our country's ethical evolution towards respect for other life forms and advance our moral standing among nations, but there is still one extremely powerful force standing in the way of our potential progress: the numerous medical research institutions that would lose hundreds of millions in revenue if H.R. 1326 becomes law.

The highly-influential Society for Neuroscience (SfN) is just one of the many scientific associations that cunningly cultivates an oh-so-purely-altruistic image, but is terrified of having their inalienable American "right" to torment animals for a living restricted in any way. Recently, this illustrious organization bombarded its members with a "Call to Action" urging them to tell their Federal Representatives to oppose the Great Ape Protection Act because "(it) would inhibit medical advances and researchers' pursuit of new vaccines and treatments to prevent disease" (hepatitis C in particular). In their sample letter to members of Congress, SfN even pretends to give a crap about non-human species by emphasizing the "number of protections in place to ensure the welfare and well-being of these animals" — conspicuously ignoring the fact that existing laws are not being obeyed or enforced, as the video evidence from inside New Iberia and other primate research labs makes so painfully clear.

While SfN boasts a membership of more than 40,000 scientists and physicians, only a miniscule minority of these are actively engaged in primate research. So why, then, did they disseminate this action alert to their entire constituency? Certainly, they fear no longer having great apes to sacrifice on the altar of empirical knowledge, but they're even more afraid of being drawn inexorably down the slippery slope. That is, if the government outlaws invasive primate experimentation today, what horrors will tomorrow bring — rights of personhood for genetically-engineered lab rats?!

Sadly, SfN officials and other dogmatists of domination are mentally enslaved by the antediluvian ideology that all of Earth's millions of species exist merely to serve human needs — an historically corrupt doctrine in which animals' interests are dismissed as utterly irrelevant. Fortunately, their outmoded attitude is not shared by the majority of society: an online survey being conducted by WashingtonWatch.com, for instance, currently indicates that nearly two-thirds of respondents support the Great Ape Protection Act. Nevertheless, it’s not We the People who will ultimately decide whether to pass this bill, but our democratically-elected Representatives in Washington, D.C.—and animal research institutions' pockets are obviously deep enough to peddle political influence. So please, make sure your Representative knows where you stand on this issue.





Use HSUS's "Humane Alert" to call and email your Federal Representative urging him or her to co-sponsor and vote YES on the Great Ape Protection Act (H.R. 1326). Then check out the other ways you can help primates, and forward the alert to your family and friends around the country.

Living On Burrowed Time

Help stop the impending eviction of Antioch's owls

When I worked at the University of California, Davis (circa 1998-99), burrowing owls occupied underground nests around my workplace, the Carlson Health Sciences Library, which lies on the relatively remote outskirts of the UC system's largest campus. I loved watching them peek their little heads up through holes in the earth, and would stand awed as they unselfconsciously stared back at me with an intensely palpable awareness and fierce dignity. So, because burrowing owls are such an integral part of my personal natural history (not to mention the Dead Milkmen's timeless post-punk epic "Stuart"), I feel a strong emotional connection with these downy-feathered cutie-pies — and a commensurate outrage that government agents paid with our tax dollars to protect wildlife are continually bending over for business interests that don't give a flying hoot about owls.

This time, an established community of these unique birds is slated for expulsion from their habitat in the East Bay town of Antioch, California because the state's Dept. of Fish & Game is allowing real estate prospector Kiper Homes to proceed with construction of the Blue Ridge housing development. Workers have already started placing one-way eviction doors (that allow residents to leave but not return) over many of the burrows' tunnel openings, a job that by law must be completed by next month (before the owls' breeding season begins). Then Kiper will complete the foreclosure by caving the den in so the birds can't come back, and exterminators will proceed with gassing the remaining ground squirrels to death as a mere formality.

It is estimated that there are probably fewer than 10,000 burrowing owl breeding pairs left in the U.S., and yet 11 members of this native species are being forced out of their habitat in the middle of winter just before they are about to reproduce. Perhaps, being unable to quickly find safe, secure and suitable shelter, some or all will die from exposure to the winter elements or predation. The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service has officially identified burrowing owls as a "candidate species" for either “threatened” or “endangered” status, and California considers them a "Species of Special Concern" under the state's Endangered Species Act because their population has declined by about 50 percent in the last 10-15 years. The number one jeopardizer of their existence: real estate development.

People vs. Owls

Surely the anthropocentric will protest, “Hey, they're just owls — and people need places to live more than they do!” But why do we have to build on land already occupied by members of a species whose numbers are rapidly dwindling? There are over 300 million humans in the U.S., and only a few thousand burrowing owls: is spreading suburban sprawl really such a boon to our society that it justifies risking the irreversible eradication of a species?

And yes, all kinds of creatures are summarily displaced and killed whenever houses and neighborhoods are built, and even we animal activists take this so much for granted that it usually passes without mention — until the animal under the bulldozer is both adorable and potentially threatened or endangered. In this case, for instance, we may feel bad for the owls, but (if we really think about it) even worse for the squirrels. So, in the long view, we need to radically reinvent construction practices to minimize our destructive impact on the environment and those already living in it.

Realistically, anyplace we build will be home to some form of fauna or flora, and animal and environmental advocates can't save them all. So we have to start somewhere, and it makes pragmatic sense to focus first on the most ecologically vulnerable. Then again, these are not actually separate issues, because by stopping the development of this particular housing complex (and others like it in the future), we can save both the owls and the squirrels.

• Local grassroots group Friends of East Bay Owls encourages concerned citizens to write letters (based on provided samples) to California Attorney General Jerry Brown, Fish & Game Director John McCammon, and state senators asking them to revise current owl eviction policies. They are also looking for volunteers to help install artificial burrows at Antioch's Prewett Ranch Family Park on Saturday, January 23rd.

• Urban wildlife rehabilitation center Wild Care Bay Area, meanwhile, is urging people to contact the Antioch City Council — as well as Ed Hobaugh, Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Kiper Development, Inc., at (925) 648-8888 ext. 13 or ehobaugh@kiperinc.com. Their alert includes a sample letter tailored for City Council members, but only talking points for Mr. Hobaugh emphasizing the fact that Kiper never performed an Environmental Impact Report for the proposed housing site. If you do speak with Mr. Hobaugh, I suggest that you kindly ask him to explain why he thinks his company's profits are more important than the fate of the burrowing owl community. I'd do it myself, but I just moved cross-country last week back to the Bay Area, and the stress of displacement would leave me more susceptible to losing my cool when he says, in so many words, that it's just business.

“The Simpsons” – Top 10 Animal-Friendly Episodes

A best-of list spanning two-plus decades of humane humor

Encompassing 21 seasons and 450 episodes, “The Simpsons” is the longest-running sitcom in television history, and this January 10th, Fox will culminate its year-long celebration of the classic cartoon's 20th anniversary with a documentary special by Super Size Me director and star Morgan Spurlock. Diehard fans already know that “The Simpsons” pioneered a subversive style of animal rights comedy never before seen on the small screen. So, at the dawn of a new decade deluged with Top 10 lists, I decided to pay this prime-time program homage by showcasing the 10 best animal-centric “Simpsons” episodes (so far, in chronological order).

1. Episode 1: “Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire” – In the series premiere, Homer loses the family's Christmas money betting at the dog track, but then brings home the best present ever — a rescued racing greyhound named Santa's Little Helper. Laugh Line (Homer to Bart, who wants to adopt the abandoned dog his father bet on): “But he's a loser. He's pathetic! He's...a Simpson.”

2. Episode 29: “Bart's Dog Gets an F” – The family's misbehaving canine attends obedience school, where Bart refuses to implement the draconian instructor's pain-based training methods. Laugh Line (Bart): “Now...Sit! I said, Sit! Um, take a walk. Sniff that other dog's butt. See? He does exactly what I tell him.”

3. Episode 43: “Lisa's Pony” – Homer finally grants his 8-year-old daughter's wish for a pony, but she relinquishes her beloved horse after learning that dad must work nights to pay for expensive stabling. Laugh Line (Homer): “Marge, with today's gasoline prices, we can't afford not to buy a pony!”

4. Episode 54: “Dog of Death” – After Santa's Little Helper runs away from home, infamously villainous billionaire tyrant Mr. Burns plucks him from the pound and turns him into a vicious attack hound — but his love for Bart ultimately overcomes his killer conditioning. Laugh Line (Ben Caseyesque veterinarian): “I love animals. I spend my life saving them, and they can't thank me. Well, the parrots can.”

5. Episode 79: “Whacking Day” – Each May, the town of Springfield observes a traditional holiday that entails beating snakes to a pulp with clubs, but Bart and Lisa are able to save the serpents' lives with the help of soul crooner Barry White's earth-shaking basso profundo. Laugh Line (“Whacking Day” song sung by children's choir): “Oh Whacking Day, oh Whacking Day! Our hallowed snake-skull cracking day! We'll break their backs, gouge out their eyes; their evil hearts we'll pulverize! Oh Whacking Day, oh Whacking Day! May God bestow His grace on thee!”

6. Episode 98: “Bart Gets an Elephant” – Bart wins a real live pachyderm from a radio call-in show, but “Stampy” proves a neighborhood hazard, so Bart and Lisa must persuade Homer to send his colossal pal to a sanctuary instead of selling him to an ivory dealer. Laugh Line (Homer): “Lisa, a guy who's got lots of ivory is less likely to hurt Stampy than a guy whose ivory supplies are low.”

7. Episode 133: “Lisa the Vegetarian” – Lisa gives up eating meat, but almost cracks under constant ridicule at home and school — until a pep talk by Paul and Linda McCartney puts her back on the righteous path. Laugh Line (“Actor” Troy McClure, in an “educational” filmstrip): “Don't kid yourself, Jimmy. If that cow ever got the chance, he'd eat you and everyone you care about!”

8. Episode 249: “Treehouse of Horror XI” – In a Free Willy parody, Lisa emancipates a captive bottlenose dolphin named Snorky from an exploitive marine park — but the deposed “King of the Dolphins” then enslaves humanity for banishing his kind to the sea eons ago. Laugh Line (Snorky): “They made me do tricks like a common seal!”

9. Episode 252: “Lisa the Tree Hugger” – Trying to win the affections of über-activist Jessie Grass, Lisa (channelling Julia Butterfly) refuses to disembark from an ancient redwood until it is spared from logging. Laugh Line (Jessie): “I'm a level-five vegan — I won't eat anything that casts a shadow.”

10. Episode 417: “Apocalypse Cow” – Bart joins 4H to drive cool combine harvesters, but winds up having to save the calf he raised from butchery — with a cow-costumed Homer nearly being killed in a fully-automated slaughterhouse. Laugh Line (Bart): “Sorry, Lis, I can't be a vegetarian — I love the taste of death!”

Hope you enjoy these amazingly amusing episodes — and learn more about “The Simpsons” at thesimpsons.com!

Minestrone Is Murder?

Maybe so — but carnivores still kill many more plants than vegans do

Day after day, meat eaters try to discredit ethical veganism with an astonishing array of pseudo-philosophical protests, but the recurring assertion that “Plants have feelings, too” is particularly vexing — mainly because it’s so transparently insincere. Think about it: Why are meat eaters so remarkably resistant to recognizing the horrific suffering of “food” animals, yet simultaneously eager to anthropomorphize faceless fruits and vegetables that utterly lack the brains, central nervous systems, and sense organs (like eyes and ears) generally associated with sentience? When carnivores insist that plants’ feelings matter, it seems to me that they disingenuously want to appear genuinely concerned about hurting innocent herbs, when in fact the sneaky subtext peeking out from underneath the edge of this compassionate facade is a self-serving accusation that we vegans are as guilty of murder as the most unrepentant flesh-obsessed gourmand.

The latest example of this perennially weed-like phenomenon sprouted up yesterday in Natalie Angier’s New York Times article “Sorry, Vegans: Brussels Sprouts Like to Live, Too” — a title which insinuates, baselessly, that plants’ faculty for feeling somehow negates the moral authenticity at the core of animal rights. Now, please understand, I am by no means criticizing Angier for promoting the hypothesis that all living organisms are imbued with some form of consciousness: actually, I find the eminent behavioral botanist’s quotation touting plants’ capacity for “sensory modalities and abilities we normally think of as only being in animals” quite compelling. What I do object to, strenuously, is that any carnivore (much less a mainstream science journalist) would have the unmitigated chutzpah to charge that it’s hypocritical for us vegans to shout “meat is murder” while allegedly committing mass herbicide — especially because meat eaters kill so many more plants than we do in the course of daily dining!

Need proof? Then check out these stunning statistics:

• To yield a single pound of edible meat, a chicken must consume about 2 pounds of grain*, a pig must consume about 4 pounds, and a cow must consume 10 to 16 pounds. So, every time someone eats meat, they kill 2 to 16 times as many plants than they would by eating vegan.

• Slaughtering approximately 65 billion animals worldwide for meat each year requires that one-third of humanity’s grain harvest be fed to livestock. This calculation accounts for 80% of U.S. corn crops and about 99% of U.S.-produced soy meal, but not the vast fields of grass and other naturally-growing plants upon which free-range cows, sheep and goats graze.

• According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, livestock production occupies 70% of all the land used for agricultural purposes, and nearly one-third of the Earth’s entire landmass. This boundless terrain was once unspoiled habitat for billions of native plants and animals who were either displaced or eradicated — some to the point of extinction. The beef industry, for instance, is the driving force behind the destruction of Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, one of the planet’s most diversity-dense regions, with nearly 80% of deforested land being used for ranching.

Strictly speaking, it’s impossible for us to physically survive without consuming other living entities — just as billions of microbial creatures subsist on the proteins in our bodies. But contrary to the misleading myths of popular belief, veganism isn’t about achieving perfection, purity or sainthood (or, for that matter, smugly proving our superiority or political correctness). Rather, the point is to consciously make pragmatic lifestyle choices that significantly reduce the amount of pain, agony and death suffered by others as a result of our privileged existence, and persuade people to do the same in the name of non-violence.

So, the next time some smart-ass carnivore tries to excuse their lethal fauna-filled diet by feigning sympathy for faultless flora, just look them right in the eye and tell them straight out: If you really, truly care about the plight of exploited plant beings, then go vegan now!


* I originally cited a website claiming (inaccurately, it seems) that the grain-to-meat conversion ratio for chickens is 6:1. Tip of the hat to Erik Marcus for pointing out the error.

Nightmare of the Nurse Mare Foals

Thoroughbred horseracing's invisible victims

For decades, the thoroughbred racehorse industry has practiced a shockingly cruel breeding method that activists have only recently brought to light. The result of this compulsory procreative procedure are nurse mare foals — the unwanted offspring of female horses used as nursing surrogates for thoroughbred ponies. Every year, tens of thousands of these horses are killed or orphaned simply because they are useless to a multi-million dollar enterprise that thrives on equine exploitation.

Here's how it works: in order to get thoroughbred mares to produce as many potential racehorse champions as possible, breeders push their biological limits to extremes by forcing them to reproduce once a year. Maximizing productivity requires breeders to have the mares reimpregnated right after giving birth, which precludes them from nursing their own babies. The newborns are therefore taken away from their mothers within days of delivery, and nursed by surrogate mares (of “inferior” breeds) who have just given birth to their own offspring — the “by-products” of this process known as nurse mare foals.

Permanently separating thoroughbred babies from their mothers is tragic enough, but most nurse mare foals face a far worse fate than either racehorses or surrogates. While some are killed soon after being born or starved to death, others are sold (as young as one day old) to the tanning industry, which slaughters them and turns their skin into handbags, belts, and other high-grade leather products. The lucky ones are rescued by horse advocacy groups, which, just like the tanners, must pay the going rate of $200 to $400 apiece — and then spend several hundred more dollars feeding and raising each horse for months before they are ready for adoption.

Rescuers nourish nurse mare foals by bottle-feeding them milk replacer, which could theoretically be used to feed thoroughbred foals as well, thus eliminating this exceedingly inhumane breeding practice altogether. There are two main reasons that they don't do this: formula is expensive, and horse breeders maintain that thoroughbreds need to drink real (albeit surrogate) mother's milk from the source to achieve peak athletic performance. Plus, the larger nurse mare farms (concentrated in New York, Kentucky and Tennessee) produce 50 to 100 foals a year, and it is more operationally efficient to make the surrogate mothers do all the work rather than paying human caretakers to feed the foals by hand.

Another possible solution to the problem of unwanted foals is a new domperidone-based drug protocol that induces non-pregnant mares who have given birth before to lactate. Though chemically manipulating horses' hormones poses ethical dilemmas in the context of animal rights philosophy, in practical terms it would prevent tens of thousands of unwanted foals from being born into a life of suffering and untimely death. It could also dramatically reduce the number of surrogate nurse mares by enabling thoroughbreds who are too old for breeding to nurse foals.

There are many ways to help relieve the suffering of nurse mares and their orphaned foals, from urging elected legislators to pass humane laws to financially supporting horse advocacy organizations or adopting a rescued foal. Learn more about how to take action at lastchancecorral.org.

Preposterous: The Presidential Turkey Pardon

The perverse absurdity of a reverse animal sacrifice

Every Thanksgiving, at a White House ceremony punctuated by much media fanfare, the President of the United States symbolically “pardons” a single turkey — just one day before he joins the rest of America in devouring 45 million others. Legend has it that Abraham Lincoln started the custom one Thanksgiving day in the 1860s by sparing his son Tad’s “pet” turkey from the axe, but the pardon only became an official American tradition in the late 1980s when George H.W. Bush* occupied the Oval Office. Lincoln’s gesture of historical kindness has since evolved into a bizarre ritual in which the country lightheartedly hails saving the life of one turkey in order to displace the unconscious collective guilt for killing millions more.

This year, the farce of this reverse animal sacrifice reached new heights of ridiculousness with White House videographer Arun Chaudhary’s YouTube video parody preview. In this short spoof (of what exactly, I’m not sure), 2009’s chosen turkey (named Courage) “does the slow walk right through the gates outside 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, past ‘Pebble Beach’ where reporters do stand-up television shots, through the West Wing and Oval Office into the Rose Garden.” So rather than solemnly acknowledging all the millions of birds who are summarily slaughtered for this bloated holiday buffet, we treat their deaths like a big joke — ha ha, industrialized mass murder is just so inherently hilarious, right?!

In an attempt to further salve society’s buried remorse for all the many tons of bird blood spilled throughout November at friendly neighborhood abattoirs, Courage gets to live out the rest of his natural days at Disneyland. But animal advocacy organization Farm Sanctuary** says the “Frontierland” exhibit of this Southern California theme park is not the “The Happiest Place on Earth” for turkeys, and that courage and his alternate*** should be moved to one of their shelters for safekeeping. In a press release, the group charged that “The Walt Disney Company…has shown that it lacks the ability to provide (adequate) care” because they feed the birds “a high-calorie, high-fat diet formulated for rapid weight gain, a likely cause of (their) premature deaths.” The way we treat our “rescued” Thanksgiving turkeys is a representation of what this holiday means to us, and begs a necessary question: Is dying young from obesity-related causes at the world’s most corporatized amusement park really the kind of freedom our pilgrim forebears had in mind when they shared their first harvest meal with the local natives?

A Real “Indian” Pre-Thanksgiving

Just yesterday, the Obamas held their first official state dinner at the White House honoring Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, a vegetarian world leader. While (contrary to media reports) not all the food served was strictly vegetarian****, the menu showed some small awareness on the President’s part that meat doesn’t have to be the centerpiece of a fulfilling meal — or our diets. And yet, come tomorrow, he and the rest of the First Family will be digesting a customary turkey flesh feast, so I guess Obama really didn’t learn all that much from Mr. Singh’s ethical example.

Now, I’m just an average guy, nothing particularly special or extraordinary about me (for instance, I haven’t won a Nobel Peace Prize). Even so, I’ll be non-violently “pardoning” a turkey for real this Thanksgiving***** by not eating one — just the same way I’ve been pardoning turkeys every day of my life for the last 14½ years. Meanwhile, President Obama (like other U.S. Commander in Chiefs before him) is making a public show of offering amnesty to one turkey while simultaneously ordering another to be killed for his table — a behavioral contradiction that seems rather shallow and hypocritical. I mean, it’s not like either of these turkeys deserved to die, and yet one is given the full celebrity treatment while the other is condemned like a convicted criminal on Death Row, forever nameless, along with millions of his kind.

The penitentiary metaphor is perfectly apt here, for turkeys are indeed incarcerated for their entire lives on factory farms, helplessly awaiting execution in their dark, dirty prisons — despite the fact that they have committed no crimes (unless being born a member of their particular avian species can be considered a punishable offense). Ironically, humankind has complicitly committed unspeakably unnatural atrocities against turkeys for generations in government-certified factory farms and slaughterhouses. But we wouldn’t want to bring any of that up, because it might ruin someone’s appetite for slow-roasted wings, breasts and “drumsticks”!

Turkeys are affectionate, intelligent animals who deserve compassion, not torture. They are innocent victims who love life and deserve to live as much as anyone else. In that sense, a supposed “pardon” granted by our nation’s leader to a single turkey appears not as an act of mercy, but rather a disingenuous attempt to officially sanctify senseless slaughter in the name of commercialized gluttony.


* I originally wrote that John F. Kennedy was the first President to pardon a turkey for Thanksgiving, but later found out that Bush Sr. was the first to officially perform the pardoning ceremony, a custom which all subsequent Presidents have followed.
** In the interest of full disclosure, Farm Sanctuary was my employer from 2008-2009.
*** A Vice Turkey has also been appointed to take command should Courage for some reason be rendered unable to perform the duties associated with his post.
**** Along with a wide selection of both vegetarian and vegan options, the executive chefs prepared Green Curry Prawns for guests.
***** For the first time in many a year, I’ll be the sole vegetarian dining with an extended family of committed carnivores.

Go Figure! The Mathematics of Dietary Death

Computing the cost of plant vs. flesh food production in animals’ lives

Anyone who’s been vegan for any length of time has heard the dizzying array of specious arguments for why people are supposedly meant to eat meat, dairy and eggs. These reasons range from the nutritional (“we need animal protein to live”) to the Biblical (“God gave humanity dominion over all the Earth’s creatures”) to the ethical. Yep, that’s right: some omnivores have the cajones to claim that vegans are responsible for killing more animals than flesh eaters!

Oregon State University professor of animal science Steven Davis, for one, contends that people who eat beef from cattle fed on grazing pasture spare more animals’ lives than vegans because of all the death supposedly caused by harvesting crops. While Davis’ research has appeared in such prestigious periodicals as TIME magazine and the Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics, apparently no one bothered to peer-review or fact-check his methodology before publication. That is, a new analysis of the professor’s claim reveals that (surprise, surprise!) his numbers don’t quite add up.

Artist and graphic designer Mark Middleton recently calculated the true impact of food production on two categories of animals: domestic species specifically slaughtered for human consumption, and wild species killed as a consequence of agricultural harvesting. What’s more, he translated his findings into an easy-to-read graph* that enables comparison of how different diets (i.e., plant vs. flesh foods) impact animals’ lives — both by the numbers and as an interactive (filterable) visual representation of these otherwise abstract values:



Extrapolating from this diagram, we find that:

• Eating chicken flesh takes about 100 times the number of animals’ lives as eating the equivalent caloric content of vegetables.

• Subsisting on only grains for an entire year would likely cost fewer than two animals (e.g., field mice) their lives.

• Contrary to Davis’ central assertion, the number of wild animals who die as a result of beef production is much greater than occurs in the harvesting of all plant food varieties combined.

Middleton arrived at his revised conclusion by incorporating into his formula some criticisms of Davis’ work by researchers Gaverick Matheny and Andy Larney which, upon even cursory consideration, seem so basic that it’s amazing they even had to bring them up. I mean, it doesn’t take a mathematician to know that we can feed more people per acre by using land to raise crops rather than cattle, as Matheny opined, or to understand Larner’s contention that counting animals killed by predators (in addition to, say, chemical pesticides and mechanical threshers) skews the end results. So Middleton’s new presentation begs an obvious question: why did Davis’ claims go so completely unchallenged by the mainstream media and the scientific establishment when he made them?

Opinion makers’ unquestioning acceptance and promotion of Professor Davis’ flawed theory says more about meat eaters’ desperate psychological need to justify their violent destructiveness than anything else: apparently, people want to continue eating animal flesh so badly that they will even unconsciously create and cite conspicuously inaccurate data to make the case that omnivores are ethically superior to vegans. Once again, we vegans have the truth on our side, but there remain some lingering doubts about its persuasive value, because people basically believe what they want to believe. If history is any guide, many omnivores will continue to invent and propagate ways of salving their guilt by convincing themselves that meat is not murder but mercy — no matter how much incontrovertible evidence we vegans present to the contrary.

Related AnimalRightings:

- My 8-page VegNews magazine feature article “The Road to Vegetopia: (Re)Imagining the Future of Food” (illustrated by Mark Middleton)

- My blog post about Middleton’s “Virtual Battery Cage”

* For interested techies, Middleton built this interactive graphic in Adobe Flash using a data visualization library called Flare. Click here for a full explanation of the analysis and mathematical proofs.

Mystery Corpse: Extraterrestrial Visitor or Balding Sloth?

Four teens insist they killed unidentified creature in self-defense

OK, this is weird…


…but rest assured that scientists will (probably) soon have a logical explanation for the bizarre pinkish carcass recently recovered in Cerro Azul, Panama. British hoax debunker Dr. Darren Naish makes a convincing case that the so-called “Blue Hill Monster” is nothing more exotic than a native three-toed sloth of the Bradypus species that had somehow lost most of its fur coat. However, if DNA tests do by chance fail to conclusively ID the victim as a known denizen of this planet, the FBI should send any top-secret real-life equivalent of Fringe Division they may have south of the border pronto in search of a crashed spaceship.

Whatever biologists eventually determine this creature to be, the pertinent part of the story from an animal rights perspective is that the teens (four males, aged 14 to 16) claim it was living when they saw it come out of a cave, and they killed it simply because it was crawling in their direction. Of course, the adolescents assumed that being approached meant they were about to be attacked, so they threw rocks at their alleged assailant until it was stone cold dead. Then they dumped the body in a nearby creek, returning only days later to photograph the remains and alert the authorities.

Now, I don’t feel it’s my place to pass judgment against these kids: if their account of events is true (which some doubt), it’s easy to imagine them being freaked out by the shocking reality of something they had never seen before, so their violent reaction may well have been borne from a visceral terror of the utterly unknown. Which would mean that the encounter triggered their autonomic “fight or flight” response, causing them to reflexively weaponize whatever objects lay most conveniently close at hand. Yet this only serves to illuminate an unsettlingly dark aspect of human nature: faced with a unique lifeform they did not understand, the boys savagely destroyed it in the most primitive possible manner instead of pausing to assess the actual threat level — an alarming outcome that intimates implications for everything from race relations and war to our wanton destruction of the environment, and ultimately our species’ prospects for avoiding self-imposed extinction.

That the creature bears a disturbing resemblance to many of the humanoid aliens commonly depicted in our movies and mythology invests the murder with an even more universal theme. I mean, the iconic blockbuster E.T: The Extraterrestrial wouldn’t have been nearly so endearing (or popular) if young Elliot had just repeatedly pummeled the nighttime stowaway in his family’s shed to death with that baseball, right? With the thought-provoking District 9 currently straining the veracity of Steven Spielberg’s more hopeful fairy tales in multiplexes worldwide, let this unfortunate incident be a lesson to any intelligent beings out there cruising the cosmos who may be thinking about a visit to Earth: “We come in peace” is probably not going to cut it down here!