HOW TO BEGIN YOUR JOURNEY
1. Watch the movies The Witness and Earthlings for free. You’ll see that animals aren’t food and clothing. Animals are individuals who share this world with us.
2. Enjoy the book Mad Cowboy: Plain Truth from the Cattle Rancher Who Won’t Eat Meat
.
3. Replace dairy milk with soy milk, rice milk, almond milk, hazelnut milk, oat milk, multigrain milk, and hemp milk. Unless you’re a baby cow, you don’t need cow’s milk. Consumption of animal protein is linked to heart disease, cancer, diabetes, hypertension, stroke, and even acne. Think of cow’s milk as liquid meat. Treat yourself to nondairy Purely Decadent Ice Cream.
4. For a quick sandwich, try Hickory Smoked Tofurky Deli Slices. Add thin slices of red onion and Vegenaise mayo. Spike your mayo with curry powder or other favorite spices to give your tastebuds an extra kick. Maybe sprinkle on a bit of Daiya cheese. Vegan living isn’t about what you can’t eat—or actually, don’t want to eat. It’s about discovering the thousands of vegan foods you can eat. Add two new very tasty vegan foods for each food you no longer eat.
5. Practice cooking. There are no rules. Experiment with ingredients. To make it easy on yourself, you might begin with a classic cookbook such as Vive le Vegan!
6. Explore fresh fruits and vegetables at your local farmers’ market. Visit food co-ops and international grocery stores. Browse all the aisles. Encourage your natural sense of wonder. Welcome adventure. Choose organic and GMO-free options whenever possible.
7. Free your home of products made from animals. This includes leather, wool, felt, beeswax, silk. To not use these things is to refuse to participate in animal misery and death.
8. There’s no excuse for animal use. Learn about animal liberation issues. Start projects with other activists or on your own to help animals. Keep your group small to stay effective and to avoid getting co-opted. Temporarily join forces with other social justice seekers for larger projects. Be humble, truthful, and fiercely imaginative. Guided by your deepest natural instincts, you will continue asking true questions—the only kind that’s worth asking—and you will travel your way into the answers.
9. Tribe of Heart deconstructs the most dangerous myth that animals can be exploited humanely. Study the humane myth. Share these outstanding resources with your community.
10. It’s necessary to not only not cause harm to animals but to actively protect them from harm.
VEGAN NUTRITION IS SIMPLE
Just eat a variety of goodies from the real Four Food Groups daily. That’s it.
Don’t fret about protein. There’s plenty in all the whole plant foods you eat every day.
NOW AVAILABLE ON DVD
Visit the official site of one of the most powerful movies you can share with your community. After screening this award-winning film that has received standing ovations at packed film festivals across the country, use the resource guide Peaceable Journey to take action and help transform communities.
Donate copies to local public libraries. The handy 10-pack is half price.
See this calendar for upcoming community screenings near you.
RELY ON YOUR OWN VISION
Continue to discover what needs to be done on behalf of the animals and what your own strengths are. See where these two realms overlap. It is at this intersection—where your personal strengths converge with the animals’ struggle for freedom—that the path toward total liberation will emerge. Break the old agreement to accept a broken world, and create a new agreement to take right action to mend it—to even start from scratch whenever necessary. Trust in your own power to participate in making a world that has a place for everyone.
KEEP SIGHT OF THE REAL GOAL: COMPLETE LIBERATION
Freedom fighters seek to free the animals from corporations that use animals as products. Freedom fighters don’t negotiate with tyrants or obey the rules of profiteers who maim and kill the animals. Freedom fighters never work with animal-using industries to “improve” methods of brute confinement and slaughter. When so-called animal advocates or so-called animal protection organizations such as HSUS oppose ag-gag bills but don’t question animal use and endorse “humane meat,” they only help prolong the existence of animal-using industries and delay the evolution of society. That evolution of consciousness and true kindness requires justice. And justice is only possible when we shut down businesses that profit from the misery and death of animals.
Businesses that profit from causing harm to anyone, regardless of species, should be demolished.
Animal liberation is not idealistic, militant, or misanthropic; it is a necessity. For the animals. For the health of this earth. For our own humanity.
And it will not be carried out by animal activists who seek a comfortable place at the oppressors’ table, grateful to be granted permission to take a piss.
Freedom fighters defend the animals and carry the fire of hope for future generations of liberators.
WHY WORDS MATTER
Language is used with precision by animal exploiters. It’s a means to manipulate public perceptions about animals. The fact is, animals are individuals. This is what animal exploiters want you to forget. This is why cows, pigs, chickens, rabbits, buffaloes, turkeys, and goats are called “livestock” or the “food supply” or any variety of terms that degrade their intrinsic value as individuals and reduce them to the non-status of things to be used. So, c’mon, folks, if you’re an animal activist, let’s stop accepting the animal exploiters’ terms for animals. Let’s stop describing animals in the same way as the goddamn meat industry. Because that just reinforces the idea that animals are products. It prevents society from even questioning its use of animals.
WHAT NATHAN RUNKLE IS REALLY SAYING
“We applaud Illinois and Indiana legislators for listening to the will of the people and abandoning these dangerous and ill-conceived [ag-gag] bills, rather than caving to the corrupt motives of the factory farming lobby,” said MFA’s [Mercy for Animals] Executive Director Nathan Runkle. “Truth and transparency in food production are vital to the integrity of our nation’s food supply.”
Translation: Factory farming is bad, very bad…but MFA gives a big thumbs up to the myth of humane slaughter. MFA is not out to end animal agriculture. Killing is okay as long as Big Ag “kills with proper methods.” MFA acknowledges that animals are the “food supply” and does not challenge but accepts their unjust enslavement as the norm. MFA’s idea of “truth and transparency” does not include not poking cows with a cattle prod or not killing them; just poke ‘em in a gentler, nicer way. And MFA will happily let Big Ag decide whatever the hell that actually is.
A TRUE ANIMAL FREEDOM MOVEMENT IS EMERGING
Individual no-compromise grassroots activists consistently make headway with justice for animals in their communities every day. But as a movement, as a surging collective force, we linger at the threshold of change. Believe it or not, this is the most difficult part of any journey. But if we, as a movement, do not want more sorrow and the extinction of the natural world, we must make the crossing together.
Let our hearts make new laws, according to the wisdom of nature. Wait for no huge gathering of allies; they’re never gonna show. When we can accept this, we’re finally free from self-destructive rage, frustration, debilitating fear, and wishful thinking. Make the most of the allies you already have. Rely on yourself. This is what works. There is no one-size-fits-all guide. Each of us must dig deeper than before, come to know our unexplored strengths, and carry out ever-evolving actions toward liberation based on that extraordinary power.
These words are not for the domesticated and hopelessly civilized—who will read, rant to the choir until spent, then slouch back to the vegan buffet at Whole Foods, the Xbox, booze, the mega mall, or whichever dope of the day numbs them quickest. These words are for the wild women and men who love the great trees, the rivers, the mountains, the wide open sky, the fox, the raven, the turtle, and all our animal kin. For the warriors who break to become new and wake to grow true. You’re not alone. Seek counsel in the woods, on the shoreline, atop the mountains. Right vision will come. Right action will naturally follow.
PAUL WATSON: THE FIERCE HEART OF A PROTECTOR
“A deep ecologist would clean up a pond because plants and animals deserve to be free of
pollution; a shallow ecologist would preserve the pond so that his grandchildren would have
a nice place to swim.”
The Three Basic Laws of Ecology (4 minutes)
February 2013: Watson Interviewed on ABC 24 (5 minutes)
THE POETRY OF THE LIVES OF ANIMALS
Consider the endless debates over animals: what they feel, what they think, what their behaviors mean. Often myths and mere speculation serve as facts about animals until proven otherwise—decades or centuries later. All we know for certain is that their lives, like ours, remain a great mystery. And the more we experience, the more the wonder of that mystery grows.
Every life is fascinating. Every life travels a river of unrepeatable moments.
Every animal has a right to live out his or her own remarkable odyssey.
VIEW THE PORTFOLIOS OF NICK BRANDT
Maasai Mara in Southwestern Kenya, 2008
“For me, every creature on this planet has an equal right to live. Whether human being, Serengeti elephant, or factory farm cow,” says Nick. “This is why I take these photographs. I hope that maybe you will see these animals, these non-humans, in the way that I do—as not so very different from us.”
His close-up wildlife portraits were taken without a telephoto lens.
OPPOSE HORIZONTAL HYDRAULIC FRACTURING
Fracking 101
HOW MANY PLANETS ARE NEEDED TO SUPPORT YOUR LIFESTYLE?
Animated Global Footprint Calculator
Ecological Footprint Quiz
ANSWER TO YOUR OWN CONSCIENCE
Research your own experiences for the truth….Absorb what is useful….Add what is specifically your own….The creating individual is more than any style or system.
—Bruce Lee
One does not sell the earth upon which the people walk.
—Crazy Horse, 1875
REMEMBER HOW PROGRESS HAPPENS
“However, history shows clearly that humanity is moved forward not by people who stop every little while to try to gauge the ultimate success or failure of their ventures, but by those who think deeply about what is right and then put all their energy into doing it,” writes Murray Gell-Mann, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics.
WHAT TO LOOK FOR WHEN CHECKING PRODUCT LABELS
Animal Ingredients List
Believe it or not, you’ll soon learn to recognize these suckers and know them like the back of your paw.
Just getting started? Bring this handy helper to the grocery store.
WHO ARE THE ECO-TERRORISTS?
The U.S. federal government churns out eco-terrorist rhetoric to favor corporate interests and to stifle activists. Such rhetoric is used to cause fear of imprisonment—to prevent public dissent and direct action. It’s also used to fabricate a bogeyman in the collective mind of the people. This enables profiteers to hijack public opinion and gain support for laws that destroy civil liberties. Americans are misled to believe that the erosion of personal freedom is an acceptable trade-off for safety and peace.
Eco-terrorist rhetoric is about power, control, and maintaining the predominant deathwish perspective of capitalist culture: that everything and everyone is an expendable resource to be used. The animal liberation movement and environmental movement challenge this entire way of thinking and living. People begin to recognize that how humans exist on this earth in relation to the natural world is not sustainable, just, or peaceful. That awareness ignites a true desire for a shift in consciousness and action. That awareness demands a metamorphosis from society.
Of course, eco-terrorists are real. They do exist: BP, Exxon, Monsanto, Union Carbide, Life Sciences Research International (aka Huntingdon Life Sciences), and any other subjugator of the natural world.
Defy rhetoric. Defend the truth. Align your actions with your deepest values.
THEY SING FOR JOY LIKE WE DO
See how else they are similar to us. Send this beautiful slideshow or
an animal e-card by Peaceful Prairie Sanctuary to a friend.
VEG RESTAURANT FINDERS
Worldwide Guide to Veg Eating
HappyCow’s Compassionate Eating Guide
Most vegetarian places offer vegan options or will gladly whip up a vegan dish upon request.
A PEACEFUL WORLD IS POSSIBLE
ONLY WHEN THE LAST CAGE IS EMPTY
VEGAN BEER, WINE, & LIQUOR
Barnivore
Vegans are from Mars Wine Guide
VIDEO CLIP OF A 72-YEAR-OLD VEGAN BODYBUILDER FROM CALIFORNIA
Jim Morris
ADD: MURDER IS COMPASSION
From George Orwell’s classic novel 1984
WOULD YOU FEED THIS STUFF TO YOUR DOG BUDDY?
Non-vegan dog food contains harmful preservatives, spoiled oil and grains unfit for human consumption, fake coloring additives, toxic chemicals such as pesticides and sodium pentobarbital, roadkill, diseased slaughterhouse entrails, shelter dogs and cats (forcing your best friend to eat like a cannibal), sick zoo animals, and other waste.
VegeDog and VegeCat easily transform people food into vegan dog food and vegan cat food.
THE FORMER VP OF CITIBANK
Australian philanthropist Philip Wollen has been living vegan since 2001. Wollen is a hardcore supporter of the work of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society and Tribe of Heart. He says, “Imagine another world: a clean, peaceful environment, healthy people, no cruelty, no killing, no screams. What type of person would come up and say, ‘Let’s capture, cage, impregnate, torture, and kill all the animals. Let’s eat their rotting corpses and make our bodies a graveyard for murder victims.’ What would you say to someone who came up with that brilliant idea? Well, if no one here would invent such an industry, what kind of person would defend it? I guess I know the answer. Upton Sinclair said, ‘It’s difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on him not understanding it.’ While we’ve been having this debate, 13 million animals have been murdered. I was a meat eater until I saw the atrocities committed against these powerless animals. Cruelty, if inflicted upon a puppy or a kitten, would have landed the offender in prison for a long time. But if it’s on a farm, it’s okay. As I traveled around the world many years ago, I realized there were hundreds of animals I didn’t eat: dogs or cats, bears or bats, horses or hamsters, rosellas (parrots) or rats. So I simply added five animals to the list: cows, sheep, pigs, chicken, and fish. I’ve never felt better. Feeding a child meat is tantamount to tossing him a pack of Marlboros…. Are we to live forever in a sick, cruel, and smug past? The brutes, the bullies have been Goliath, but David is coming. Maybe in this room, maybe he is one of you. And if not you, who? And if not now, when?”
When asked if there were no factory farming in the whole world, would it change his attitude toward the eating of meat, Wollen replied passionately, “It would not change my attitude in the slightest.”
FIND A HEALTH FOOD STORE, FOOD CO-OP, OR FARMERS’ MARKET IN YOUR NECK OF THE WOODS
GreenPeople
Food Co-op Directory
Farmers’ Market Directory
National Directory of Fruit Stands & Farmers’ Markets
WHEN A MONKEY ESCAPED IN A LAB,
THE FIRST THING THAT MONKEY DID
WAS FREE OTHER CAGED MONKEYS
Photo from the Animal Liberation Front
When society is orderly, you protect yourself with justice;
when society is confused, you protect justice by yourself.
—Taoist sages
from the book Huainanzi
second century B.C.E.
FREE THE ANIMALS, FREE YOURSELF
WHY SUPPORT ANIMAL LIBERATION
Animal welfare and animal rights have been co-opted by the meat industry and other exploiters. As long as nonhuman animals are seen as commodities to be legitimately used by humans, the issue will erroneously be about how animals are treated. Many activists are “deactivated” by animal-using industries when they accept a complicit role in the regulation of animal use and murder. Needless to say, an animal activist is an animal activist when he or she works on behalf of only the animals.
A mountain gorilla’s freedom is precious to herself. This is true for both wild and domesticated animals.
WHAT IS AN OPEN RESCUE?
E-mail Noah for your how-to guide.
Share this slideshow.
In the U.S., hundreds of millions of newly hatched male chicks are suffocated and discarded each year, or ground up alive to produce fertilizer or feed. Can any of this be fairly considered “respectful,” “compassionate” or “humane”?
Share this slideshow.
At slaughter, most cows and veal calves are stunned by having a metal bolt shot into their skulls. Next, they are raised up by shackles attached to a rear leg, and then their throats are slit while their hearts are still beating in order to push out the blood. Because the stunning process is designed to make sure that the animal’s heart remains beating, it is not uncommon for cows and calves to still be conscious while their throats are cut open.
“HUMANE SLAUGHTER” ACCORDING TO TEMPLE GRANDIN
How do you make sure an animal is really dead? Poke ’em in the eye. “You can use your finger in a big animal’s eyes,” Dr. Grandin says. “But not little animals. You poke those eyes with a pencil.”
EXAMPLE OF COMMUNITY SUPPORTED AGRICULTURE (CSA):
AN ANIMAL-FREE PRODUCE FARM IN SOUTHEAST MINNESOTA
Featherstone
CREATE YOUR OWN COMMUNITY GARDEN
Free Start-Up Guide
FORGET THE 2006 UNITED NATIONS F.A.O. REPORT LIVESTOCK’S LONG SHADOW
That report stated animal agriculture causes 18% of greenhouse gases. By the way, that’s more than the combined total emissions from transportation vehicles around the entire world. Check out this more accurate 2009 report. Animal agriculture actually causes at least 51% of greenhouse gases.
Worldwatch Institute
HUMAN POPULATION WILL SURGE TO OVER 9 BILLION BY 2050
Meat, dairy, and egg consumption isn’t sustainable. By 2050 global food production must be increased by 70% to feed the growing population. The United Nations Environment Programme’s 2010 report urges adopting a vegan way of eating.
ANIMALS TELL US WHAT THEY WANT BUT WE DON’T LISTEN
A cow’s brain has nearly the same number of convolutions as a human brain. And like us, cows dream.
Farmers shoot sheep who learn how to open the latch on the gate of the corral so they can’t teach other sheep to do the same and escape.
Chimpanzees learn American Sign Language, only to have their signed requests to their captors ignored or denied.
More than 60 billion land animals and countless fish worldwide are killed to be eaten every year. That they have to be confined, controlled, or captured against their will is proof of their lack of consent.
WHERE THE HECK ARE THE SLAUGHTERHOUSES AND FUR FARMS AND LABORATORY ANIMAL SUPPLIERS IN THE U.S.?
The Final Nail
GO INSIDE A LAB
Antivivisectionist veterinary surgeon Dr. André Menache provides the commentary to this 3-minute video clip of monkey experiments in Israel. He has also said: “A significant proportion of the funds distributed for basic research is wasted on animal experiments. I use the word wasted because animal studies are not predictive of human outcome. This fact is supported by systematic reviews, complexity theory and evolutionary biology. In the era of the human genome, let us fund studies that rely on our DNA, human cell culture, microfluidics, non invasive imaging and the like. That is what good science is all about.”
Weizmann Institute
WHY DEBATES ABOUT VIVISECTION END UP NOWHERE DECADE AFTER DECADE
Noam Chomsky said it best: “The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum.”
Vivisectors deploy eco-terrorism rhetoric to distract attention away from the very origins of violence—their own labs. Chomsky also said, “Everyone’s worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there’s really an easy way: Stop participating in it.”
THE KINDNESS OF RATS
When given the option of getting a food reward or taking altruistic action, many lab rats choose to push the lever that stops the torment of their fellow rat, especially when they know the other rat. Wish the same could be reported for human subjects in similar experiments.
ANIMAL AGRICULTURE CAUSES WORLD HUNGER AND UNNECESSARY MISERY
10 acres of healthy high-protein beans can easily feed 60 people. But use the same 10 acres for growing animal feed to make meat products, then the unhealthy yield feeds only 2 people.
More than 900 million people have little or nothing to eat. Every day over 38,000 children die terrible deaths from starvation. Imagine the despair of the mother or the father of such a child.
Not eating animals is the most sacred healing we have absolute power to successfully accomplish daily. What we choose gives us our power. When we choose against life and ourselves, we betray both. When we choose in favor of our tribe—the whole earth—we live right with ourselves and gather more strength to take another natural step toward creating the brilliant world we see in our collective vision.
FEED HUNGRY FOLKS AND END FAMINE WITHOUT EXPLOITING ANIMALS
Vegfam
Live wild. Love nature. Protect the earth and all her children.
Wanna reach MJ? vegangrub@gmail.com
Vegan Grub encourages ending all exploitation and murder of animals.
Needless to say, a little bit of exploitation or murder ain’t okay.
Every species born on this earth has an intrinsic right to live free. Rules and arguments designed by humans to justify exploitation, captivity, brute force, and killing are irrelevant.
For optimal viewing, use the free Web browser Firefox.
This site was established September 2006.
Back to Top of Page.
1. Watch the movies The Witness and Earthlings for free. You’ll see that animals aren’t food and clothing. Animals are individuals who share this world with us.
2. Enjoy the book Mad Cowboy: Plain Truth from the Cattle Rancher Who Won’t Eat Meat
.3. Replace dairy milk with soy milk, rice milk, almond milk, hazelnut milk, oat milk, multigrain milk, and hemp milk. Unless you’re a baby cow, you don’t need cow’s milk. Consumption of animal protein is linked to heart disease, cancer, diabetes, hypertension, stroke, and even acne. Think of cow’s milk as liquid meat. Treat yourself to nondairy Purely Decadent Ice Cream.
4. For a quick sandwich, try Hickory Smoked Tofurky Deli Slices. Add thin slices of red onion and Vegenaise mayo. Spike your mayo with curry powder or other favorite spices to give your tastebuds an extra kick. Maybe sprinkle on a bit of Daiya cheese. Vegan living isn’t about what you can’t eat—or actually, don’t want to eat. It’s about discovering the thousands of vegan foods you can eat. Add two new very tasty vegan foods for each food you no longer eat.
5. Practice cooking. There are no rules. Experiment with ingredients. To make it easy on yourself, you might begin with a classic cookbook such as Vive le Vegan!
6. Explore fresh fruits and vegetables at your local farmers’ market. Visit food co-ops and international grocery stores. Browse all the aisles. Encourage your natural sense of wonder. Welcome adventure. Choose organic and GMO-free options whenever possible.
7. Free your home of products made from animals. This includes leather, wool, felt, beeswax, silk. To not use these things is to refuse to participate in animal misery and death.
8. There’s no excuse for animal use. Learn about animal liberation issues. Start projects with other activists or on your own to help animals. Keep your group small to stay effective and to avoid getting co-opted. Temporarily join forces with other social justice seekers for larger projects. Be humble, truthful, and fiercely imaginative. Guided by your deepest natural instincts, you will continue asking true questions—the only kind that’s worth asking—and you will travel your way into the answers.
9. Tribe of Heart deconstructs the most dangerous myth that animals can be exploited humanely. Study the humane myth. Share these outstanding resources with your community.
10. It’s necessary to not only not cause harm to animals but to actively protect them from harm.
VEGAN NUTRITION IS SIMPLE
Just eat a variety of goodies from the real Four Food Groups daily. That’s it.
Don’t fret about protein. There’s plenty in all the whole plant foods you eat every day.
NOW AVAILABLE ON DVD
Visit the official site of one of the most powerful movies you can share with your community. After screening this award-winning film that has received standing ovations at packed film festivals across the country, use the resource guide Peaceable Journey to take action and help transform communities.
Donate copies to local public libraries. The handy 10-pack is half price.
See this calendar for upcoming community screenings near you.
RELY ON YOUR OWN VISION
Continue to discover what needs to be done on behalf of the animals and what your own strengths are. See where these two realms overlap. It is at this intersection—where your personal strengths converge with the animals’ struggle for freedom—that the path toward total liberation will emerge. Break the old agreement to accept a broken world, and create a new agreement to take right action to mend it—to even start from scratch whenever necessary. Trust in your own power to participate in making a world that has a place for everyone.
KEEP SIGHT OF THE REAL GOAL: COMPLETE LIBERATION
Freedom fighters seek to free the animals from corporations that use animals as products. Freedom fighters don’t negotiate with tyrants or obey the rules of profiteers who maim and kill the animals. Freedom fighters never work with animal-using industries to “improve” methods of brute confinement and slaughter. When so-called animal advocates or so-called animal protection organizations such as HSUS oppose ag-gag bills but don’t question animal use and endorse “humane meat,” they only help prolong the existence of animal-using industries and delay the evolution of society. That evolution of consciousness and true kindness requires justice. And justice is only possible when we shut down businesses that profit from the misery and death of animals.
Businesses that profit from causing harm to anyone, regardless of species, should be demolished.
Animal liberation is not idealistic, militant, or misanthropic; it is a necessity. For the animals. For the health of this earth. For our own humanity.
And it will not be carried out by animal activists who seek a comfortable place at the oppressors’ table, grateful to be granted permission to take a piss.
Freedom fighters defend the animals and carry the fire of hope for future generations of liberators.
WHY WORDS MATTER
Language is used with precision by animal exploiters. It’s a means to manipulate public perceptions about animals. The fact is, animals are individuals. This is what animal exploiters want you to forget. This is why cows, pigs, chickens, rabbits, buffaloes, turkeys, and goats are called “livestock” or the “food supply” or any variety of terms that degrade their intrinsic value as individuals and reduce them to the non-status of things to be used. So, c’mon, folks, if you’re an animal activist, let’s stop accepting the animal exploiters’ terms for animals. Let’s stop describing animals in the same way as the goddamn meat industry. Because that just reinforces the idea that animals are products. It prevents society from even questioning its use of animals.
WHAT NATHAN RUNKLE IS REALLY SAYING
“We applaud Illinois and Indiana legislators for listening to the will of the people and abandoning these dangerous and ill-conceived [ag-gag] bills, rather than caving to the corrupt motives of the factory farming lobby,” said MFA’s [Mercy for Animals] Executive Director Nathan Runkle. “Truth and transparency in food production are vital to the integrity of our nation’s food supply.”
Translation: Factory farming is bad, very bad…but MFA gives a big thumbs up to the myth of humane slaughter. MFA is not out to end animal agriculture. Killing is okay as long as Big Ag “kills with proper methods.” MFA acknowledges that animals are the “food supply” and does not challenge but accepts their unjust enslavement as the norm. MFA’s idea of “truth and transparency” does not include not poking cows with a cattle prod or not killing them; just poke ‘em in a gentler, nicer way. And MFA will happily let Big Ag decide whatever the hell that actually is.
A TRUE ANIMAL FREEDOM MOVEMENT IS EMERGING
Individual no-compromise grassroots activists consistently make headway with justice for animals in their communities every day. But as a movement, as a surging collective force, we linger at the threshold of change. Believe it or not, this is the most difficult part of any journey. But if we, as a movement, do not want more sorrow and the extinction of the natural world, we must make the crossing together.
Let our hearts make new laws, according to the wisdom of nature. Wait for no huge gathering of allies; they’re never gonna show. When we can accept this, we’re finally free from self-destructive rage, frustration, debilitating fear, and wishful thinking. Make the most of the allies you already have. Rely on yourself. This is what works. There is no one-size-fits-all guide. Each of us must dig deeper than before, come to know our unexplored strengths, and carry out ever-evolving actions toward liberation based on that extraordinary power.
These words are not for the domesticated and hopelessly civilized—who will read, rant to the choir until spent, then slouch back to the vegan buffet at Whole Foods, the Xbox, booze, the mega mall, or whichever dope of the day numbs them quickest. These words are for the wild women and men who love the great trees, the rivers, the mountains, the wide open sky, the fox, the raven, the turtle, and all our animal kin. For the warriors who break to become new and wake to grow true. You’re not alone. Seek counsel in the woods, on the shoreline, atop the mountains. Right vision will come. Right action will naturally follow.
PAUL WATSON: THE FIERCE HEART OF A PROTECTOR
“A deep ecologist would clean up a pond because plants and animals deserve to be free of
pollution; a shallow ecologist would preserve the pond so that his grandchildren would have
a nice place to swim.”
The Three Basic Laws of Ecology (4 minutes)
February 2013: Watson Interviewed on ABC 24 (5 minutes)
THE POETRY OF THE LIVES OF ANIMALS
Consider the endless debates over animals: what they feel, what they think, what their behaviors mean. Often myths and mere speculation serve as facts about animals until proven otherwise—decades or centuries later. All we know for certain is that their lives, like ours, remain a great mystery. And the more we experience, the more the wonder of that mystery grows.
Every life is fascinating. Every life travels a river of unrepeatable moments.
Every animal has a right to live out his or her own remarkable odyssey.
VIEW THE PORTFOLIOS OF NICK BRANDT
Maasai Mara in Southwestern Kenya, 2008
“For me, every creature on this planet has an equal right to live. Whether human being, Serengeti elephant, or factory farm cow,” says Nick. “This is why I take these photographs. I hope that maybe you will see these animals, these non-humans, in the way that I do—as not so very different from us.”
His close-up wildlife portraits were taken without a telephoto lens.
OPPOSE HORIZONTAL HYDRAULIC FRACTURING
Fracking 101
HOW MANY PLANETS ARE NEEDED TO SUPPORT YOUR LIFESTYLE?
Animated Global Footprint Calculator
Ecological Footprint Quiz
ANSWER TO YOUR OWN CONSCIENCE
Research your own experiences for the truth….Absorb what is useful….Add what is specifically your own….The creating individual is more than any style or system.
—Bruce Lee
One does not sell the earth upon which the people walk.
—Crazy Horse, 1875
REMEMBER HOW PROGRESS HAPPENS
“However, history shows clearly that humanity is moved forward not by people who stop every little while to try to gauge the ultimate success or failure of their ventures, but by those who think deeply about what is right and then put all their energy into doing it,” writes Murray Gell-Mann, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics.
WHAT TO LOOK FOR WHEN CHECKING PRODUCT LABELS
Animal Ingredients List
Believe it or not, you’ll soon learn to recognize these suckers and know them like the back of your paw.
Just getting started? Bring this handy helper to the grocery store.
WHO ARE THE ECO-TERRORISTS?
The U.S. federal government churns out eco-terrorist rhetoric to favor corporate interests and to stifle activists. Such rhetoric is used to cause fear of imprisonment—to prevent public dissent and direct action. It’s also used to fabricate a bogeyman in the collective mind of the people. This enables profiteers to hijack public opinion and gain support for laws that destroy civil liberties. Americans are misled to believe that the erosion of personal freedom is an acceptable trade-off for safety and peace.
Eco-terrorist rhetoric is about power, control, and maintaining the predominant deathwish perspective of capitalist culture: that everything and everyone is an expendable resource to be used. The animal liberation movement and environmental movement challenge this entire way of thinking and living. People begin to recognize that how humans exist on this earth in relation to the natural world is not sustainable, just, or peaceful. That awareness ignites a true desire for a shift in consciousness and action. That awareness demands a metamorphosis from society.
Of course, eco-terrorists are real. They do exist: BP, Exxon, Monsanto, Union Carbide, Life Sciences Research International (aka Huntingdon Life Sciences), and any other subjugator of the natural world.
Defy rhetoric. Defend the truth. Align your actions with your deepest values.
THEY SING FOR JOY LIKE WE DO
See how else they are similar to us. Send this beautiful slideshow or
an animal e-card by Peaceful Prairie Sanctuary to a friend.
VEG RESTAURANT FINDERS
Worldwide Guide to Veg Eating
HappyCow’s Compassionate Eating Guide
Most vegetarian places offer vegan options or will gladly whip up a vegan dish upon request.
A PEACEFUL WORLD IS POSSIBLE
ONLY WHEN THE LAST CAGE IS EMPTY
VEGAN BEER, WINE, & LIQUOR
Barnivore
Vegans are from Mars Wine Guide
VIDEO CLIP OF A 72-YEAR-OLD VEGAN BODYBUILDER FROM CALIFORNIA
Jim Morris
ADD: MURDER IS COMPASSION
From George Orwell’s classic novel 1984
WOULD YOU FEED THIS STUFF TO YOUR DOG BUDDY?
Non-vegan dog food contains harmful preservatives, spoiled oil and grains unfit for human consumption, fake coloring additives, toxic chemicals such as pesticides and sodium pentobarbital, roadkill, diseased slaughterhouse entrails, shelter dogs and cats (forcing your best friend to eat like a cannibal), sick zoo animals, and other waste.
VegeDog and VegeCat easily transform people food into vegan dog food and vegan cat food.
THE FORMER VP OF CITIBANK
Australian philanthropist Philip Wollen has been living vegan since 2001. Wollen is a hardcore supporter of the work of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society and Tribe of Heart. He says, “Imagine another world: a clean, peaceful environment, healthy people, no cruelty, no killing, no screams. What type of person would come up and say, ‘Let’s capture, cage, impregnate, torture, and kill all the animals. Let’s eat their rotting corpses and make our bodies a graveyard for murder victims.’ What would you say to someone who came up with that brilliant idea? Well, if no one here would invent such an industry, what kind of person would defend it? I guess I know the answer. Upton Sinclair said, ‘It’s difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on him not understanding it.’ While we’ve been having this debate, 13 million animals have been murdered. I was a meat eater until I saw the atrocities committed against these powerless animals. Cruelty, if inflicted upon a puppy or a kitten, would have landed the offender in prison for a long time. But if it’s on a farm, it’s okay. As I traveled around the world many years ago, I realized there were hundreds of animals I didn’t eat: dogs or cats, bears or bats, horses or hamsters, rosellas (parrots) or rats. So I simply added five animals to the list: cows, sheep, pigs, chicken, and fish. I’ve never felt better. Feeding a child meat is tantamount to tossing him a pack of Marlboros…. Are we to live forever in a sick, cruel, and smug past? The brutes, the bullies have been Goliath, but David is coming. Maybe in this room, maybe he is one of you. And if not you, who? And if not now, when?”
When asked if there were no factory farming in the whole world, would it change his attitude toward the eating of meat, Wollen replied passionately, “It would not change my attitude in the slightest.”
FIND A HEALTH FOOD STORE, FOOD CO-OP, OR FARMERS’ MARKET IN YOUR NECK OF THE WOODS
GreenPeople
Food Co-op Directory
Farmers’ Market Directory
National Directory of Fruit Stands & Farmers’ Markets
WHEN A MONKEY ESCAPED IN A LAB,
THE FIRST THING THAT MONKEY DID
WAS FREE OTHER CAGED MONKEYS
Photo from the Animal Liberation Front
When society is orderly, you protect yourself with justice;
when society is confused, you protect justice by yourself.
—Taoist sages
from the book Huainanzi
second century B.C.E.
FREE THE ANIMALS, FREE YOURSELF
WHY SUPPORT ANIMAL LIBERATION
Animal welfare and animal rights have been co-opted by the meat industry and other exploiters. As long as nonhuman animals are seen as commodities to be legitimately used by humans, the issue will erroneously be about how animals are treated. Many activists are “deactivated” by animal-using industries when they accept a complicit role in the regulation of animal use and murder. Needless to say, an animal activist is an animal activist when he or she works on behalf of only the animals.
A mountain gorilla’s freedom is precious to herself. This is true for both wild and domesticated animals.
WHAT IS AN OPEN RESCUE?
E-mail Noah for your how-to guide.
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In the U.S., hundreds of millions of newly hatched male chicks are suffocated and discarded each year, or ground up alive to produce fertilizer or feed. Can any of this be fairly considered “respectful,” “compassionate” or “humane”?
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At slaughter, most cows and veal calves are stunned by having a metal bolt shot into their skulls. Next, they are raised up by shackles attached to a rear leg, and then their throats are slit while their hearts are still beating in order to push out the blood. Because the stunning process is designed to make sure that the animal’s heart remains beating, it is not uncommon for cows and calves to still be conscious while their throats are cut open.
“HUMANE SLAUGHTER” ACCORDING TO TEMPLE GRANDIN
How do you make sure an animal is really dead? Poke ’em in the eye. “You can use your finger in a big animal’s eyes,” Dr. Grandin says. “But not little animals. You poke those eyes with a pencil.”
EXAMPLE OF COMMUNITY SUPPORTED AGRICULTURE (CSA):
AN ANIMAL-FREE PRODUCE FARM IN SOUTHEAST MINNESOTA
Featherstone
CREATE YOUR OWN COMMUNITY GARDEN
Free Start-Up Guide
FORGET THE 2006 UNITED NATIONS F.A.O. REPORT LIVESTOCK’S LONG SHADOW
That report stated animal agriculture causes 18% of greenhouse gases. By the way, that’s more than the combined total emissions from transportation vehicles around the entire world. Check out this more accurate 2009 report. Animal agriculture actually causes at least 51% of greenhouse gases.
Worldwatch Institute
HUMAN POPULATION WILL SURGE TO OVER 9 BILLION BY 2050
Meat, dairy, and egg consumption isn’t sustainable. By 2050 global food production must be increased by 70% to feed the growing population. The United Nations Environment Programme’s 2010 report urges adopting a vegan way of eating.
ANIMALS TELL US WHAT THEY WANT BUT WE DON’T LISTEN
A cow’s brain has nearly the same number of convolutions as a human brain. And like us, cows dream.
Farmers shoot sheep who learn how to open the latch on the gate of the corral so they can’t teach other sheep to do the same and escape.
Chimpanzees learn American Sign Language, only to have their signed requests to their captors ignored or denied.
More than 60 billion land animals and countless fish worldwide are killed to be eaten every year. That they have to be confined, controlled, or captured against their will is proof of their lack of consent.
WHERE THE HECK ARE THE SLAUGHTERHOUSES AND FUR FARMS AND LABORATORY ANIMAL SUPPLIERS IN THE U.S.?
The Final Nail
GO INSIDE A LAB
Antivivisectionist veterinary surgeon Dr. André Menache provides the commentary to this 3-minute video clip of monkey experiments in Israel. He has also said: “A significant proportion of the funds distributed for basic research is wasted on animal experiments. I use the word wasted because animal studies are not predictive of human outcome. This fact is supported by systematic reviews, complexity theory and evolutionary biology. In the era of the human genome, let us fund studies that rely on our DNA, human cell culture, microfluidics, non invasive imaging and the like. That is what good science is all about.”
Weizmann Institute
WHY DEBATES ABOUT VIVISECTION END UP NOWHERE DECADE AFTER DECADE
Noam Chomsky said it best: “The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum.”
Vivisectors deploy eco-terrorism rhetoric to distract attention away from the very origins of violence—their own labs. Chomsky also said, “Everyone’s worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there’s really an easy way: Stop participating in it.”
THE KINDNESS OF RATS
When given the option of getting a food reward or taking altruistic action, many lab rats choose to push the lever that stops the torment of their fellow rat, especially when they know the other rat. Wish the same could be reported for human subjects in similar experiments.
ANIMAL AGRICULTURE CAUSES WORLD HUNGER AND UNNECESSARY MISERY
10 acres of healthy high-protein beans can easily feed 60 people. But use the same 10 acres for growing animal feed to make meat products, then the unhealthy yield feeds only 2 people.
More than 900 million people have little or nothing to eat. Every day over 38,000 children die terrible deaths from starvation. Imagine the despair of the mother or the father of such a child.
Not eating animals is the most sacred healing we have absolute power to successfully accomplish daily. What we choose gives us our power. When we choose against life and ourselves, we betray both. When we choose in favor of our tribe—the whole earth—we live right with ourselves and gather more strength to take another natural step toward creating the brilliant world we see in our collective vision.
FEED HUNGRY FOLKS AND END FAMINE WITHOUT EXPLOITING ANIMALS
Vegfam
Live wild. Love nature. Protect the earth and all her children.
Wanna reach MJ? vegangrub@gmail.com
Vegan Grub encourages ending all exploitation and murder of animals.
Needless to say, a little bit of exploitation or murder ain’t okay.
Every species born on this earth has an intrinsic right to live free. Rules and arguments designed by humans to justify exploitation, captivity, brute force, and killing are irrelevant.
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This site was established September 2006.
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