In case you missed it last night, here’s PETA President Ingrid Newkirk on Colbert talking about everything from her plans for her will to her recent book Making Kind Choices. Best Colbert Report ever, if you ask me.

Alicia Silverstone’s wonderful ad is in some very impressive company in TV Guide’s “Best of 2007” viral video list, including two of the very greatest videos of all time (IMHO): Will Ferrell’s “The Landlord,” and Justin Timberlake’s utterly glorious “Dick in a Box.” For anyone who works in marketing, you’ll know that companies tend to use the term “viral video” for pretty much any visual media they can come up with (it tends to be more of a wistful hope than an actual description of the video in question), but some videos really are “viral”—i.e., millions of people watch them, post them on their blogs, and pass them onto their friends—and it’s a truly incredible experience to be involved with one.

You can see TV Guide’s full list here, and here’s a reprise of the stunning pro-vegetarianism PSA that took 2007 by storm.

In England, they do Mother’s Day differently (i.e., they actually celebrate it on the right date). And with Mothering Sunday coming up across the pond, PETA Europe have put together an incredibly striking demonstration to draw attention to the horrible suffering of mother pigs in gestation crates. My friend Alexia has the full story over on her blog Fish & Chimps, but here’s a quick look at the amazing demonstration that’s been getting tons of coverage for pigs abused on factory farms.

It’s pretty well established that Stephen Colbert is the top name in hard-hitting, up-to-the-minute news nowadays—not only does he make or break presidential campaigns, but the dude even has a bridge named after him. And in yet one more coup for the king of late-night news, Colbert is fortunate enough to be hosting PETA President Ingrid Newkirk herself tonight, so that they can discuss the recent HBO documentary about PETA.

To mark this occasion, we’ve mocked up a brand-new Stephen Colbert doghouse for our program to help “backyard” dogs. As Ingrid puts it, “If you were stuck outside on a chain for your whole life in all weather and no love, this might at least make the people in the house over there come by once in a while, just to look, and you could bark at them to pass the time.” Who needs a bridge when they can have a PETA doghouse with their face on it? You’re very welcome, Mr. Colbert.

Here’s hoping the “Colbert bump” we’ll get from this appearance brings us animal liberation by the end of the week. If you have Comedy Central, be sure to check out Ingrid on The Colbert Report tonight at 11:30 p.m. And if you don’t have Comedy Central … well you’re really missing out on a whole lot of stuff—I’ll post the video of the interview on the blog tomorrow morning.

So they’re selling that piece of land next to the big white Hollywood sign. And sadly, it’s just a little bit too expensive for PETA to purchase (like, 20 million dollars too expensive), but we did write to the real estate company today to negotiate a deal for renting the space until they’re able to sell it. Here’s hoping they say yes—I think it would be totally worth it:

Deflocked. ♥

Click for a larger version

To check out the archives of past strips, click here.

The votes have been flowing in (seriously, it’s been a banner year for the Sexy Vegetarian Next Door contest), and we’re down to the top two chicks and the top two dudes. There are still two more days to cast your vote for the winner, so click one of the finalists below to hit up the voting page and crown one of these attractive herbivores North America’s Sexiest Vegetarian Next Door.

In related news, I’d like to take this opportunity to express my heartfelt appreciation to all the people who have been writing me in to win this contest.* Sadly, PETA’s employees are ineligible, so those votes will not be counted, but I’m truly humbled by this outpouring of support.

*Technically, nobody has actually done this yet.

It looks like something out of the latest Saw movie, but then that's what vivisection is all about. This stuff goes on behind closed doors all the time, and only occasionally do some of these hideous stories see daylight. This is the latest, from the folks at the University of Washington, who’ve already been slapped with a 12-month probation due to the sorry state of their labs. The shocking violations detailed in PETA's formal complaints to the federal government are now the subject of an in-depth report by Seattle's Komo TV:

"In a hidden part of the University of Washington campus, hundreds of monkeys live and die for research. They undergo experimental surgeries and tests until their usefulness is over. . But over the past year and a half, one group of researchers at the university has been at the center of a series of investigations for performing dozens of unauthorized surgeries on monkeys."

This morning, PETA called for an immediate investigation into the use of state funds for experiments at UW that may have violated federal animal protection regulations. Among the barbaric experiments being carried out at UW, monkeys are having their skulls cut open, electrodes inserted into their brains, and wire coils implanted in their eyes. They're restrained in experimentation chairs, with their heads bolted in place so that they can't move while experimenters track their eye movements, and they're deprived of food so that they'll comply during tests. Komo TV's exposé shows that this is just the tip of the iceberg:

Here's what PETA Primate Specialist Dr. Debra Durham says about the case:

"UW is using millions of dollars of taxpayers' money to torment monkeys and has broken nearly every rule in the book along the way. We're calling on state auditors to reclaim any and all state funds that UW used in the commission of this laundry list of violations."

The National Eye Institute is funding these experiments at the UW, and we're asking them to stop. You can write to them about this issue here.

Before singling her out on PETA’s Worst Dressed List last week, we contacted Kylie Minogue a number of times to let her know about the cruelty she was supporting with her weird proclivity for wearing reptile skins out in public, but so far she hasn’t even bothered to reply. Well, as Kylie is doubtless figuring out at the moment, we don’t exactly give up around here. The hope is that this latest letter—along with the accompanying video of exactly how reptiles suffer in the exotic-skins industry that she’s been promoting—will appeal to her conscience, while the press she’s getting over her Worst Dressed List appearance continues to do its work on her vanity.

I love this:

“Police arrested a 28-year-old man Sunday on a cruelty to animals charge after he yelled an obscenity at a police dog in a patrol vehicle, according to an arrest affidavit. … Police say Rogers yelled an obscene statement in the window as he walked past a patrol vehicle that contained a patrol dog “causing (the dog’s) behavior to become overloaded, tormenting the dog,” the affidavit states.”

Full story here.

citizen.co.za/Creative Commons

The Daily Mail just reported that Prince Charles has banned foie gras from royal menus and “instructed chefs at all of his royal residences to stop serving the dish.” The announcement came after an activist in Bristol wrote to the prince about the cruelty involved in producing the stuff when she noticed that it was being sold in the royally appointed shop House of Cheese. Here’s how Prince Charles’ Deputy Master of the Household (i.e., the guy who writes back to you when you send a letter to the Royal Palace) responded:

"The Prince of Wales has asked me to write and thank you for your letter about animal welfare issues surrounding the production of foie gras and your experience in Tetbury. I just wanted to reassure you that The Prince of Wales has a policy that his chefs should not buy foie gras. His Royal Highness was not aware that the House of Cheese sells foie gras and this will be addressed when their warrant is reviewed."

That’s about as big a boost to Britain’s growing movement to permanently ban the sale of foie gras as you could hope for: If the few remaining establishments that are still selling the stuff won’t take it from outraged consumers, they might want to think twice about ignoring a frickin’ royal mandate. PETA’s president sent a letter to the Prince today, thanking him for taking this compassionate stand, and we’re hoping that this positive example from overseas will influence cities like Chicago to stand by their decisions to ban this cruel delicacy forever. Thank you, Prince Charles.

PETA's Spay Day Pack

That’s right—today is Spay Day, people. It’s like Christmas for kittens. Passover for puppies. Um, Bastille Day for bunnies? Apparently, we don’t get a day off for Spay Day here at PETA (I asked), but we are encouraged to take a few moments to reflect on the staggering number of unwanted animals that can result when someone won’t spay or neuter their pets. Check it:

One unaltered female cat and her offspring can produce an estimated 420,000 cats in only seven years, and a female dog and her offspring can produce 67,000 puppies in six years.

With that in mind, here are my personal favorites among the many videos we’ve produced over the past couple of years to raise awareness about this issue. Let me know which one you think is the most effective. And have a glorious Spay Day.

John McEnroe Raises a Racket

Kitties Get Frisky

Did You Know?

Ron Jeremy Comes Out Against Sex

And just in case you need even more Spay Day inspiration, check out this great story about a Michigan group who are doing their part to end animal overpopulation.

Janez Drnovsek, the Slovenian president who led his country to independence in 1991, died this weekend at the age of 57. Mr. Drnovsek’s prodigious accomplishments included building a stable democracy in Slovenia and preparing the way for his country to join the European Union in 2004. He was also passionate about animal rights: An ethical vegan, Drnovsek urged Slovenians to be kind to animals with the same keen awareness of the suffering of others that gained him a reputation as a champion for oppressed people and a progressive leader who refused to stay silent in the face of injustice. Drnovsek became vegetarian after he was diagnosed with cancer in 1999, and he credited his diet with prolonging his life as he battled the disease over the next nine years. In a 2005 interview, he discussed the philosophy behind his decision to adopt a vegan diet:

“If we think for a moment how man manages animals and what impact he has on animal world, we could say he was not human at all. Just think of all slaughterhouses and production of beef or poultry where conditions for animals are impossible. … It is not that people are bad—they just don't think about it. When the final product is in front of them on the plate, they don't think what was has been before and how it got to this stage.”

Drnovsek was a man of principle, courage, and most of all, compassion, and his example inspired countless people to look with fresh eyes on the world around them and live their lives in a way that showed kindness to all beings. He will be greatly missed.

I’ve written about these Colonel Sanders effigy-burnings before, but this video really shows just how striking these demonstrations can be. This one’s from a protest in Pittsburgh earlier this month.

If you want to organize your own demonstration against KFC, (no need to get quite so fancy as this—a few friends and some simple signs is all it takes), we can walk you through the process.

Topshop is one of Britain’s largest clothing retailers, and for a long time now, they’ve been busy doing for animal-free fashion what the Body Shop has done for cruelty-free cosmetics. Not only do they refuse to sell fur or exotic skins, but they advertise their ethical choices with pride. In 2006, they filled the window of their flagship store in London with this beautiful anti-fur display, and this week, they’ve outdone themselves. Check out their latest display, which draws attention to the cruelty inherent in the exotic-skins trade. It’s a piece of art.

Twenty-one-year-old Flagstaff resident Rachel Feather knows about making sacrifices—not only does she (apparently voluntarily) live in Flagstaff, but she’s recently given up her own name to help PETA make a point. Heretofore, Ms. Feather will be known as FishingHurts to friends and family, having legally changed her name as a way of starting conversations about how fish experience stress and pain just like chickens, cows, pigs, cats, and dogs, and—conveniently for us—directing people to PETA’s pro-fish website FishingHurts.com.

FishingHurts, who has been vegetarian since she was 13, calls fish the "forgotten animal" and was adamant that her name-change be used to help her finned friends, who tend to get overlooked even by people who are good enough to recognize that land animals deserve our compassion. As FH puts it, "Fish should be respected, not mutilated on hooks or dragged up from the sea. I'll remind people of that every time they say or read my name."

A big thanks to FishingHurts for making what’s honestly a really big change in her life to help draw attention to the horrific practices inherent in the industrialized slaughter of fish. Amazing stuff.

Also, to make up for my gratuitous slander of Flagstaff, Arizona, for the sake of a cheap laugh, here are three fun facts about that fine city—which is already that much more beautiful for numbering compassionate souls like FishingHurts (née Rachel Feather) amongst its citizens:

1.) Flagstaff is the birthplace of singer Michelle Branch, actor Ted Danson, and astronomer Clyde Tombaugh—who discovered the (now ex-) planet Pluto in 1930.

2.) Flagstaff has an annual rainfall of 23 inches and an annual snowfall of 110 inches.

3.) Getting back to the animal-friendly theme here, Flagstaff is home to the confusingly named New Jersey Pizza Company, which serves a delicious assortment of soy cheese pizzas to Arizona’s vegans and soy-cheese enthusiasts.

So yay, Flagstaff. And yay, Rachel FishingHurts. Keep up the great work.

I’m back! I hope reading Amy’s posts wasn’t too much of a trial in my absence. If, for some reason, you find yourself missing her unique stylistic flair now that I’m back, you can still get a daily dose of Ms. Cook on PETA’s Veg Cooking blog. Fair warning, though: All of the posts are about cooking stuff, from what I can tell. The woman has an obsession with food.

Speaking of food, here’s a great little spoof on the cooking show format that was made for us by PETA member Eric Steinman. It’s called Cooking With Liz:

-Jack

Fashion-forward blogger Perez Hilton is being named the queen of my "Best-Dressed" list because he has been spotted in a Fabulous Furs faux-fur coat. His look sure beats that of another well-known queen, Aretha Franklin, who just yesterday was announced as the "winner" of PETA's " Worst-Dressed" title for sporting the fur of dead animals.

PETA had this to say about Aretha: "How 'bout some R-E-S-P-E-C-T for animals? Aretha, when you waddled into the Grammys in yet another vulgar fur, you looked as if you were going to perform 'I Am the Walrus' by The Beatles. You may be a queen, but you don't know jack about compassion." Ouch.

Sure, Perez is only on a list of one, but I'd be happy to make it longer—that way, we can have a full-blown, knock-out, throw-down fight for the "Best-Dressed" title next year.

See Perez in his cruelty-free faux fur here, and check out all the hags who made our "Worst-Dressed" list here.

-Amy

After lengthy discussions with PETA, PETCO has announced that it will reduce the number of animals for sale in its stores nationwide by 30% and revamp its live-animal vendor certification standards to improve conditions at all of its pet suppliers, starting with Rainbow World Exotics (RWE) in Hamilton, Texas.

At RWE—a hellish facility that breeds and brokers tens of thousands of animals who will be sold at pet stores, including PETCO and PetSmart—PETA found abuse and neglect of small animals and birds, including the following:

•Rabbits were neutered by an employee using a dull razor and Clorox wipes on the animals' open incisions. One improperly anesthetized rabbit kicked and struggled during the surgery.

•Live hamsters, rats, and mice were dumped into trash cans, and animals were thrown against the floor in an attempt to kill them.

•Many animals were denied veterinary care, including a baby Goffin's cockatoo named Angel, who Jack told you about in January; ferrets with rectal prolapses; and a guinea pig with a broken hip.

Watch the video posted below for more details on the horrors uncovered in the investigation, and check out the piece from the Today show, where the story broke nationally.

Change is good, but we wish that PETCO would have done even better and kissed its relationship with RWE goodbye. Says PETA Vice President Daphna Nachminovitch, "It is astounding that an abusive mill like RWE can still call the nation's two largest pet supply companies its customers." She continues, "The decisions by PETCO and PetSmart not to cut ties with RWE make it clear that to them, the bottom line is far more important than ensuring that tens of thousands of animals avoid pain and suffering. PETA wants consumers to know that animals do not generally fare well in the pet trade. Animal shelters and pounds are the place to go when you are ready to offer a loving, responsible home to an animal."

I couldn't agree more. If you care about animals, don't buy from stores that sell animals.

For what you can do to help, click here.

-Amy

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To check out the archives of past strips, click here.

During my time in Norfolk, Virginia, where I worked at PETA's headquarters, I got to know my local Harris Teeter very well. I'm the kind of person who likes to visit the grocery store on an almost daily basis so that I can load up on the freshest produce or just stroll the aisles. This led to quite a close bond with the store, and I even affectionately called it The Teet.

As you can imagine, when the news of Harris Teeter's new animal welfare policies flew into my in-box minutes ago, I was thrilled to learn that their plan is going to surpass national rivals. Under the new plan, they will do the following:

•Increase its purchases of chickens killed by controlled-atmosphere systems—the least-cruel method of bird slaughter—from 11% to 26% over the next three years. The Teet will also start purchasing turkeys killed by controlled-atmosphere systems, starting with 2% this fall, and giving purchasing preference to controlled-atmosphere systems suppliers.

•Increase its purchases of pig meat from suppliers phasing out gestation crates—restrictive metal enclosures that confine pregnant pigs—by 10, 15, and 20% over each of the next three years. Harris Teeter is also giving purchasing preference to suppliers that don't use cruel gestation crates.

•Increase the total percentage of its egg sales that represent cage-free eggs from 6% to 9% by 2009, and will work to increase that number to 12% by 2010 (the national average is only 5%). The company's new line of Harris Teeter brand eggs will also be cage-free, and Harris Teeter is giving purchasing preference to cage-free egg producers.

I am in no way saying that these changes make eating animals, eggs, or dairy products OK in my book—they don't. I still believe the best thing anyone can do to end cruelty to animals is to go vegan, but this is a small step in the right direction. And now I don't have to feel as guilty about my little love affair with a grocery store anymore.

-Amy

Many of you have asked what PETA's response is to the recent recall of 143 million pounds of beef. Well, we're doing a mass mailing of our "Vegetarian Starter Kit," of course!

We've sent copies of our "Vegetarian Starter Kit" to school boards across the country and urged them to add more vegetarian options to school cafeteria menus. But we're not simply saying that vegetarian options should replace the tainted beef. Oh, no. Vegetarian options should replace all beef because of beef's dangerous levels of saturated fat and cholesterol, which can be an even bigger threat to human health than E. coli and salmonella.

Beef and other animal products have been conclusively linked to America's top killers: heart attacks, strokes, diabetes, and cancer. Meat-eaters are 10 times more likely than vegetarians to suffer from heart disease, and a low-fat vegetarian diet has been proved to reverse heart disease.

PETA's Lindsay Rajt summed it up nicely by saying, "The diseases we may catch from downed cows are far less likely to kill us than the fat and cholesterol we get from their flesh. The best way to protect the health of the nation's school kids is to encourage them to eat more vegetarian foods."

For more details on the connection between your health and eating meat, please check out the health section of GoVeg.com.

-Amy

Since being named the sexiest vegetarian of 2007, Kevin Eubanks has clearly embraced the prestigious title. So much so that the Tonight Show bandleader decided to write, direct, and star in a new ad for us that boasts about the benefits of a meat-free diet.

Kevin's ad is just one in a series of vegetarian testimonials—others feature Casey Affleck, Forest Whitaker, and Kevin Nealon—but Eubanks' hilarious video has a certain something not seen in the others.

Maybe it's the giant strawberry costume he's dressed in. Maybe it's his reference to wanting all his organs to work just fine (because of the connection between eating meat and impotence). Or maybe it's the date he has planned with pineapples, melons, and other fruits. OK, I think it's all of the above.

—Amy

Greetings from peta2!

Being the wild youth that we are over at peta2, since Jack is away we thought we'd take this opportunity to, well, bum rush the blog and tell you what's going on in our neck of the woods. And there's a lot.

Right now we're in the midst of a SuicideGirls blitz. More than 40 nearly nude SuicideGirls—45 to be exact—stripped down to their tats and piercings to star in a series of provocative new "Ink, Not Mink" and "I'd Rather Go Naked Than Wear Fur" anti-fur ads for peta2. The SuicideGirls for those of you not in the know, are members of a 1,500-strong all-female online pin-up community.

The ads, which are a bit risqué for some of peta2's younger visitors, are being released throughout the month on peta2's MySpace page where you'll be able to read blogs from some of the SuicideGirls who took part in the campaign.

We launched the super sexy ads at a big bash at The Roxy in LA on Valentine's Night, where there was standing room only. Nicole, who has been tirelessly working on this campaign since October, had this to say about the party, "We were thrilled to see that so many people came out to party with peta2 and the SuicideGirls to support such a great cause! And the ads turned out beautifully!"

Check out some of the pix of the event.

xox

Patricia

While Jack is away in Cali, I pledged that I wouldn't make The PETA Files too girly. Not that I'm really known to be the type of girl who focuses on clothes or make-up more than, say, how the Saints are a better football team than the Redskins. But in the absence of the second-best PETA blogger, I vowed to keep girl talk to a bare minimum—that is, until I found a reason to write about H&M.;

In addition to turning out trendy clothing that is both affordable and stylish enough for all of us hipster wannabes (Jack included), H&M is now on my list of top places to shop for an even better reason. The international retail giant has pledged to stop buying cruelly produced Australian wool!

That's right! In addition to already carrying a wide variety of synthetic leather purses and an abundance of cruelty-free clothing, H&M is going a step further by pledging to buy more wool from countries that don't use mulesing—the crudest, cruelest, and cheapest method used for flystrike "prevention." H&M also vows to ensure that the Australian merino wool used in its designs comes only from farmers that don't practice mulesing.

To learn more about mulesing—in which Australian farmers use shears to cut chunks of skin and flesh from lambs' backsides, without any painkillers—please visit SaveTheSheep.com.

- Amy

I’ll leave the historians to argue about how accurate that Lincoln quote is, but it’s a hell of a nice sentiment. While we’re waiting for them to figure that out, here are some other historical animal lovers for your viewing pleasure.

I almost forgot! I’m going to be away next week in sunny Berkeley, California, but my arch-rival Amy Cook, whom you may know from the Veg Cooking Files (or whatever it is she calls her blog) will be running the show in my absence. What Amy lacks in worldliness and savoir faire, she makes up for with a certain plodding intellect (she’s also a keen typist), so you’ll be in good hands until I return. Amy is also a lot prettier than I am, so please don’t get too attached before I come back next Friday. Have a great week!

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that selectively breeding dogs for certain “aesthetic” traits like a shiny nose, or perky ears—or whatever the hell it is that breeders are looking for in the animals they use for self-gratification and profit—isn’t good for the animals, and in fact can cause extreme health problems. All of the animals who won awards at the AKC-sponsored Westminster Dog Show this week have something in common beyond having been deliberately bred into a world where millions of animals are dying on the streets for lack of a good home: They’re all genetically predisposed to be highly susceptible to a laundry list of debilitating diseases.

In first place, we have Uno, the first beagle ever to take home the “Best in Show” honors at Westminster. As a beagle, Uno has a significantly higher risk of hypothyroidism, demodectic mange (a condition that occurs when a dog’s immune system can’t regulate the number of mites living in the skin), umbilical hernia, epilepsy, eye and eyelid problems, cryptorchidism, hip dysplasia, intervertebral disk disease, and luxating patella. But I’m sure his Westminster crown will console him when one or more of these ailments set in.

The two poodle contestants, Vikki and Remy, who were just edged out by Uno in the competition, probably won’t live as long as he does either: Poodles are prone to cataracts, progressive retinal atrophy, allergies, severe skin disease, hip dysplasia, runny eyes, ear infections, Von Willebrand disease, bloat, and Addison's disease—an adrenal gland deficiency which requires lifelong medication and monitoring.

Uno also defeated a Weimaraner named Marge (elbow dysplasia, bloat) a Sealyham terrier named Charmin (bronchitis, early tooth decay, poor digestion, severe spine problems), and an Australian shepherd named Deuce (hip dysplasia, blood disorders, digestive problems, epilepsy, chronic eczema, gastric disorders, spinal paralysis).

So everyone’s a loser. Thanks, breeders, for contributing to the problem. Can’t wait to see you guys next year.

PETA’s Investigator Inside the Slaughterhouse

Last week, PETA revealed shocking footage taken inside a South American slaughterhouse which exports kosher meat to the U.S. The abuse our investigator found was especially horrific due to the use of a method called "shackling and hoisting," which is extremely painful and frightening for the animals. I spoke with the investigator yesterday to discuss his experiences working on this case:

What was the most difficult thing about this investigation for you?

Being Jewish, I grew up believing that kosher food was better supervised and therefore cleaner, healthier and produced more humanely. Like the famous kosher slogan, I thought the kosher food industry always “answered to a higher authority.” It was disillusioning to see, yet again, such callous violations of the most fundamental Jewish principles, such as tsa’ar ba’alei chayim (kindness to animals) and to witness this horror face-to-face with the tortured animals.

Why did you agree to do this investigation?

As someone who keeps kosher, I feel ashamed and embarrassed that the kosher food industry has been complicit in some of the worst farmed animal abuses. PETA has been instrumental in bringing about humane improvements to kosher slaughter within the United States and much of that has been due to our undercover investigations. We have also tried for years behind the scenes to get the important companies to end this hideous “shackle and hoist” kosher slaughter method in South America but unfortunately these companies were more concerned with hiding what goes in their slaughterhouses. Undercover footage is the best way to expose the truth and ultimately hold people accountable to make conditions less cruel for the animals. I desperately want kosher food to live up to the highest standards and I know other kosher consumers demand the same.

You can watch the results of the investigation below, and if you’d like to take action, please click here to write to Jewish leaders asking them to enforce tougher standards on kosher slaughterhouses like this one to ensure that these horrors never happen again.

We sent this letter to the St. Kitts Attorney General yesterday urging him to immediately investigate the “teaching” procedures being performed on dogs, donkeys, and sheep at Ross University School of Veterinary Medicine, which is owned by Chicago-based DeVry, Inc. (of late-night TV commercial fame). We’re also calling for prosecution of any school officials who are found to have been violating the island’s cruelty-to-animals statutes.

All this got set into motion when we received numerous photographs documenting the mutilation of animals who are forced to undergo multiple surgeries before they are killed and cut apart. The key points to remember here are that a) there are numerous humane alternatives to the tests conducted at Ross, and b) it is illegal to cause "unnecessary suffering" to animals under St. Kitts law. As it should be. Here’s what PETA’s research director told the media today:

"Ross University is forcing its students—men and women who will devote their lives to healing animals—to maim and kill dogs and other animals in unnecessary, painful procedures. We're asking the attorney general to help students and animals by enforcing St. Kitts' anti-cruelty laws."

If you’d like write to the veterinary school about this issue, you can do so through the handy webform here.

PETA Demonstration Against Cruel Toxicity Testing in the ‘90s

You may have heard the news that the Environmental Protection Agency, the National Toxicology Program, and the National Institutes of Health have signed a "Memorandum of Understanding" to coordinate efforts on alternative methods to animal experimentation. This stuff is always more complicated than it sounds, so it’s not quite time to pop the champagne corks just yet (as some groups have been doing)—but feel free to put the bubbly on ice, because it’s a good sign that our hard work is paying off.

Courtesy of the good folks in PETA’s Regulatory Testing Division—who have been working behind the scenes with these agencies for years to get them to admit that their bloated animal testing programs (which are responsible for the suffering and death of hundreds of millions of animals) are outdated, ineffective, and, frankly, absurd—here’s a little rundown on what this all means, and how it came about:

First of all, this is a significant about-face for the NTP and the EPA—both of whom have been shockingly resistant to incorporating modern science into their toxicity testing programs. It looks like the United States is finally beginning to realize (as Europe has known for some time and as the animal protection community has been advocating for years) that the public and the environment can be better protected through non-animal in vitro tests based on well-understood biological principles than by throwing wads of cash and millions upon millions of lives into the bottomless pit of animal testing.

Fighting this entrenched, bureaucratic mentality over the past couple of decades hasn’t been easy—and, as usual, we’ve had to use a two-pronged attack to get it done: While our Regulatory Testing Division comments on each animal testing plan that the EPA and the NTP puts forward, works directly with top corporations doing the testing and finding alternatives, testifies at government workshops and before Congress, and, occasionally, sues the government to disclose their deliberations about promoting animal tests, our Campaigns Department gets out the billboards, the bullhorns, and the bunny suits and shouts about these ludicrous, wasteful experiments to anyone who will listen. During this time, PETA has convinced the Department of Transportation to stop testing corrosive substances on rabbits, followed Al Gore around on his campaign stops with a 10-foot rabbit to convince him to stop pushing EPA animal tests, and worked (ever-so-patiently) to persuade regulatory agencies which still believe that it’s important, for example, to keep testing asbestos on animals (the NTP) and which have failed to ban a single toxic industrial chemical in more than a decade (the EPA) that maybe it’s time to stop testing on animals and start using modern science instead. We’ve also funded the development and incorporation of non-animal test methods to the tune of more than ¾ million dollars in recent years.

This new collaboration is certainly something different, and it’s a promising step in the right direction—but it has to be backed up with Congressional will and funding if it’s going to get anywhere. A new entity must be created with the resources to get the job done—it can not be left to the EPA and the NTP. The fact that the head of the human genome project is involved with this is a good sign—it’s going to take an intense, focused effort on the scale of the human genome project to get the job done.

So we’re hoping that the prevailing wind surrounding the National Research Council’s vision and the newly announced collaboration between the NTP and the EPA will provide the momentum necessary to overcome the inertia that has characterized the American government’s attitude to toxicity testing for decades, and which causes the suffering and death of more than 15 million animals every year.

For more information on what you can do to help animals used for experimentation, check out StopAnimalTests.com.

askmen/Creative Commons

I got the following e-mail yesterday from PETA Director Michael McGraw, who was in Paris to accompany Pamela Anderson after she was asked to fill in at Brigitte Bardot’s annual press conference to protest the Canadian seal slaughter. Brigitte Bardot has been an advocate for animal rights since before most people had even heard of the concept, and she has some mighty big shoes to fill—but if there’s anyone in the world who can do it, it’s Pam. Here’s how it all went down, according to Michael:

"Brigitte Bardot asked Pamela to fill in for her today at her annual news conference to protest the Canadian seal slaughter (Brigitte is ill and couldn't make it). Pam of course did an amazing job. We arrived at Bardot's offices to a swarm of press. Pam read a 1-page statement about how, as a Canadian, she is appalled that the seal hunt continues...she described in graphic detail how the seals are beaten to death, and encouraged consumers to boycott designers who work with any fur. She then screened a graphic 2-minute video of the seal slaughter. The press were stunned. After a few words from the Bardot Foundation's campaigns director, Bardot herself called and was put on speakerphone...in front of all of the press, she thanked Pamela for continuing on the campaign in her place, and in broken English called Pam her daughter and her Valentine. Pam was so moved; it was very sweet. Pam was then presented with a heart-shaped bouquet of roses and a personal letter from BB. Then off we went to the Canadian embassy (with AP reporter and photographer and about 15 paparazzi in tow) where Pamela asked to see the Canadian ambassador so she could personally deliver a letter from BB to him in protest of the seal slaughter. Photographers went wild. We were turned away at security, but it made a great photo and a shocked guard promised to hand over the letter for her."

If you want to know what all the fuss is about, you can watch the footage Pam screened for press (and sign a petition asking the Canadian government to stop the seal hunt) here, and there are a few pics from the event here. Thank you Pam and Brigitte!

And in other important news ... Deflocked!

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To check out the archives of past strips, click here.

One of our most popular anti-fur slogans here at PETA is “Fur is worn by beautiful animals and ugly people”. And we’ve got some great ads to back it up. But the pictures that have been circulating of Aretha Franklin at the Grammy awards last week don’t even really need the tagline to drive that point home. She looks like a walrus in a cat costume. Except, like, nowhere near as cute as that sounds.

Here’s the note that PETA VP Dan Mathews sent to Aretha, who got all in a tizzy yesterday about the fact that Beyonce called Tina Turner “the Queen” and not her.

Dear Aretha-

Music lovers may think of you as a "queen," but to animal lovers, you are a court jester. I'm sorry, Aretha, but your furs make you look like a clown. Why not shed the old-fashioned look that adds pounds to your frame and detracts from your beautiful voice? Won't you donate your furs to the poor as "queen of compassion," Mariah Carey, did? You'll get a tax credit for the donation, and we at PETA will all sing your praises.

Dan Mathews
VP, PETA

Seriously, our letter pretty much wrote itself after that.

If you’ve been following the Clemens hearings, you may have caught a surreal moment yesterday when a Congressman asked Roger whether he was vegan or not. Honestly, I’d be happy if this were a mandatory question at all congressional hearings, but I have to admit that it was a little odd in context. Nonetheless, Roger’s response (essentially “Dude, WTF is a vegan?”) more or less mandated another letter from our corner, and this time we’re sending him a gift basket full of steroid-free vegan goodies to sweeten the deal. It’s an established fact that a letter from PETA goes down a lot easier with a couple of vegan cookies and some faux-beef jerky. Check it out.

P.S. Thanks to PETA Files reader Tamara for sending in a transcript of this exchange!

And remember: Pels Ud, Kaerlighed Ind!

Some more pics and video at these sites, which are presumably more informative if you speak German Danish.

http://politiken.tv/nyheder/indland/article470983.ece
http://galleri.tv2.dk/index.php/category-Nyhederne/id-10407233/page-1.html

The title says it all really. The country sensation took her rightful place alongside country’s biggest stars this week in the Country Music Hall of Fame. Congratulations, Emmylou, for this well-deserved honor, and thanks again for everything that you do for animals.

latimes/Creative Commons

When the Royal College of Psychiatrists in the U.K. studied the relationship between mental disorders and eating meat and dairy products, they found that "a higher national dietary intake of … dairy products predicted a worse two-year outcome of schizophrenia." It’s a testament to the wildly varied interests of the folks in our Vegan Department that this was the very first thought that popped into their minds while they were skimming through the latest tabloid gossip about Britney’s exploits in the psych ward (she’s apparently been asking for ice cream). But that’s what happened, and that’s how this friendly letter to Brit’s parents was born. The letter suggests putting the suffering star on a vegan diet to help her get her emotional and physical health back to a place where it won’t be daily fodder for Perez and The Superficial. TMZ covered the story yesterday, and I’ll let you know if we hear back from James and Lynne Spears.

Shortly after the North Carolina Department of Agriculture announced that it was launching an operation to transfer the animals out of All Creatures Great and Small this month following the release of a seven-month long PETA undercover investigation which revealed nightmarish conditions at the no-kill shelter, our Cruelty Investigations Department received the following e-mail from the investigator who had last spent time on the inside at ACGS, confirming that it was all worth it:

Sent: Saturday, February 02, 2008 6:14 PM
Subject: Heroes

Hello all-

I want each of you to know how wonderful things are turning out at the property formerly known as acgs. Every second that we spent every long night at the office or miserable day in the rain was so worth our effort. The animals that we helped there are exponentially happy and so much more at peace now. The Dept. of Ag…and other volunteers have turned the situation around almost a full one eighty in the last 32 hours. The animals on the hill and in the kennel have been relocated to pens where they no longer fight with their neighbors. The dogs outside with no shelter have been brought in out of the elements. The food, water, hay, sawdust, peanut butter treats, meds, and love have been flowing like these animals have never known before. There is very little barking and so much less commotion. This is truly a different place now. I wish you all could be here with me to see it. Things are not perfect yet but all is being addressed quickly and concisely. I can hardly hold back the tears for the joy at knowing how valuable our time was to dogs like Hammer who has finally been given vet care. I have gotten to know a young female pit named Lilly over my time here. She was always very excited to see me come into her unprotected outside pen, but today I took her out for her first walk in what seemed to be years. She was so scared at first that she cowered and crawled but after I had her out for a while she jumped into my chest and wrapped her arms around my waist and hugged me for the longest time, kissing my chin. She is now in her own ten by ten on the hill full of saw dust, hay, and new food and water bowls, and will be moved in very soon as she is sure to be deemed adoptable very soon. I am overwhelmed with all that has happened here and I know many of you have worked much longer on this than I have. If no one else says this, THANK YOU, to each of you, from the the bottom of my heart and on behalf of the animals who can not say it the same way as you are all heroes for them! Thank you for the work you have done here. I am proud to have worked with each of you on this. If there is anyone who you would like to share this with please do so, as all who have been there in thought and concern deserve to know how important it truly was.

Sincerely,

I talked a bit yesterday about the ad we have running during the Westminster Dog Show, which is like a great big frat party for dog breeders, but what I didn’t mention was that we also had a team on the ground waiting to greet attendees, and inform passersby exactly what the breeding industry means for animals. The demonstration—which involved body bags to symbolize the millions of homeless animals who won’t be getting a mention at the dog show and signs reading “Breeders kill shelter dogs' chances”—was a big success, and the pics are really striking. Here’s what PETA VP Daphna Nachminovitch had to say about the protest:

"Breeders churn out puppies for a buck and go so far as to oppose spay/neuter laws that can save animals' lives. All dogs are created equal, but millions of wonderful mixed-breed dogs across the country are paying with their lives because of purebred mania."

It’s a new dawn, people. A fresh, vibrant world full of hope. The storm clouds have dispersed and the sun is shining on a happier future, where anything is possible…

On a trial basis, in the fine city of Philadelphia, 7-Eleven is offering vegan sandwiches.

To celebrate this glorious news, and to help make sure this trial is a big success, PETA dispatched our lovely lettuce ladies to the city last week to offer samples of the tasty meatless sandwiches (varieties include "chicken," "steak," and mock egg salad) to passersby. ‘Cuz that’s just how we roll. Check out the pics, and if you live in Philadelphia, be sure to give the sandwiches a try. Word on the street is that they’re pretty damn good.

Oh, brave new world that hath such people in it.

If you haven’t seen this ad yet, you should check it out. It’s all part of our new campaign to let the world know that the breeders bear a direct responsibility for this country’s massive animal-overpopulation crisis. It shouldn’t take a rocket scientist to make the connection that people who are deliberately breeding animals for profit when millions are dying for lack of a good home are making a bad situation worse—but the breeders have a powerful lobby. So we’re hitting them where it hurts: This simple but effective ad will be running on the USA network tomorrow during the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, which is like prom night for breeders. More on this after the show.

There was a great piece about this in The Washington Post today, and you can watch the ad below.

sfspca/Creative Commons

Congressman Tom Lantos of California died today of cancer at the age of 80. The only Holocaust survivor to serve in Congress, Lantos was a staunch advocate for human rights and a powerful defender of animals, beginning with his offer to help with the Silver Spring monkeys case (PETA’s first major investigation), and continuing throughout his career, as he went on to found the Congressional Friends of Animals Caucus, push through the Pets Evacuation and Transportation Act following Hurricane Katrina, and sponsor or support dozens of pieces of legislation aimed at ending the suffering of animals.

Lantos has said that his traumatizing experience in the Holocaust, during which his family was killed and he spent time in a forced labor camp, gave him and his wife Annette an understanding of what it means to be victimized for no other reason than being different from others, and inspired them both to devote their lives to working on behalf of the oppressed and the downtrodden. At PETA, we are profoundly indebted to Tom Lantos for his insistence that oppression should be fought wherever it exists, not just where it’s convenient, and we will always remember the important work that he did to help animals with gratitude and admiration.

Tom Lantos will be deeply missed here at PETA, both by those of us who knew him personally, and by those of us, like me, who have been inspired by his example. Even as we mourn his loss, we celebrate his amazing work for all beings.

You may have heard of Safeway. They are the second-largest grocery chain in North America. Which makes our latest breakthrough with the company (which has been six years in the making) a huge victory for animals. Safeway executives have just confirmed to us that they are initiating a new animal welfare plan that will make them, along with Whole Foods, one of the grocery industry leaders with regard to animal welfare. The company has agreed to encourage all of their egg suppliers to ban battery cages, implement a purchasing preference for pork that was produced without cruel gestation crates, and favor poultry suppliers that use controlled-atmosphere killing (the least cruel method of slaughter) instead of electric stun baths and throat-slitting.

As usual with these announcements, this is wonderful news because it means that one of the biggest, most influential corporations in the world is listening to the public’s concerns about animal suffering and making significant changes that will directly affect millions of animals—as well as fundamentally changing the way an entire industry does business. It does not mean that we’re all going to pat ourselves on the backs, pack up our desks, and go home. We still have a long way to go before animals stop being tortured and killed because (for instance) people have a preference for a certain kind of breakfast food, but this is a big step in the right direction, and we’re extremely grateful to everyone who helped us during the years of negotiations, the multiple shareholder resolutions, and the action alerts encouraging Safeway to take animal issues seriously.

Thanks to Safeway for making this compassionate decision, and to everyone who worked so hard to make it happen. Now back to work.

You could look at it as a half-assed blog entry with no real topic, but I prefer to think of it as 10 blogs for the price of one! Either way, it’s all I’m offering this Friday afternoon, which means it’s time to brace yourselves for another edition of Internet soup! So, um, here are a bunch of links. Some of them are pretty funny.

1. Portland, Oregon, is now the proud home of … the world’s first vegan strip bar. Congratulations, Portland.
2. Some kinds of taxidermy are OK in my book.
3. These awkward new anti-KFC shirts are guaranteed to make you popular in a hurry.
4. Some meat advertising just does our job for us.
5. We’ve got plenty of resources to help people humanely address conflicts with wildlife in their home, but what the hell are you supposed to do about that hipster infestation?
6. Fish: Smarter than your kids. And cunning, too.
7. What’s so unnatural about grown men drinking milk?
8. French and Saunders like their fur coats “fresh.”
9. Shouldn’t animals be doing more for the animal rights movement?

OK, that’s all I’ve got. If you’re still aching for more Internet hilarity, you can check out my groovy music videos here. But be warned, you will never get those 10 minutes of your life back.

There was yet another carriage-horse fatality in New York today. How many more horses have to die before New York realizes that this industry has no place in a civilized city? The following is PETA’s official statement on the incident.

PETA has just learned that a horse used to pull carriages in New York City died this afternoon at the Clinton Park Stables. Unconfirmed reports indicate that the horse died of colic, which causes severe abdominal pain. PETA is investigating the circumstances of the horse’s death and reminds New Yorkers as well as tourists that these horses should be in pastures, not locked in dark, damp stalls in warehouse buildings. We renew our call to New Yorkers to help put an end to this inhumane and unsafe industry and to support City Council Member Tony Avella’s proposal to ban horse-drawn carriages in the city.

Literally. Mississippi state representative W.T. Mayhall Jr. has been all over the news recently after introducing a provocative bill that would bar Mississippi restaurants from serving obese people. I’ll refrain from commenting on whether such a bill would be a good idea, but if they are going to consider such things, we have a suggestion for an amendment: instead of royally pissing everybody off by refusing to serve overweight people altogether, PETA is proposing that restaurants be required to serve only healthy vegan meals to consumers who are struggling with their weight. As PETA Vice President Bruce Friedrich says, "Vegan meals like hearty vegetable casseroles, bean burritos, and pasta with mushrooms, tomatoes, and green peppers not only are satisfying but will slim you right down too." You can read our letter to the state rep here.

Update 12/22/2008: Donna Karan has announced that her fall 2009 lines will be fur-free and that she has "no plans" to use fur in the future! Read more.

We’ve been trying to get designer Donna Karan to watch some footage of exactly what happens to the animals killed for her fur coats for a long time now—and yesterday, a brave PETA member who was up in New York for fashion week made sure that happened, with a little help from some soy lattes: Dressed to the nines and carrying a tray of coffees, she marched up to Donna Karan’s apartment and was welcomed inside without any questions, and offered a seat in the living room. When Donna Karan returned home, my friend pulled out the mini DVD player she had in her bag and cued up the fur farm footage, prompting the following exchange:

DK: I can't watch this now. I have somewhere to be . . . I just really don't have the time.
PETA: Yes, but you’ve promised twice that you would stop using fur and you keep bringing it back. Everyone’s so disappointed. You have to know that this isn’t right.
DK: I've seen all these videos, but for me it's just purses and accessories.
PETA: But for me and millions of other people, these are animals. They suffer terribly as they are electrocuted, gassed and skinned alive for their pelts.

…and so on, until Donna decided enough was enough and escorted my friend out of the house. Pissed off as she was, hopefully this has at least planted the seed in her head that it’s time to stop supporting the horrific abuses of the fur industry. But if that doesn’t work, we’ve got a few more tricks up our sleeve:

The New York Post featured this story on their front page today. You can read their coverage here.

Call me a hopeless dreamer, but I really thought we were going to get a bit of a break from hearing news about professional athletes taking part in vicious blood sports. The latest is that New York Mets all-star Pedro Martinez was videotaped taking part in a cockfighting event in the Dominican Republic. Cockfighting is still legal in the Dominican Republic, so Pedro wasn’t actually breaking any laws, but there’s a reason that it’s illegal in this country: It’s a hideously cruel, barbaric practice that’s nothing short of torture for the animals involved. I know the guy has a reputation for being a headhunter, but this is taking it a bit far, don’t you think? The damage is done now, sadly, but we’re asking Pedro Martinez and Hall of Famer Juan Marichal (who was also present at the event) to take part in our ”Developing Empathy For Animals” training seminar, which Michael Vick voluntarily attended after being charged, so hopefully some good will come of it. We’re also calling on the league to offer animal-sensitivity training for MLB players.

You can read our letter to Pedro Martinez here, and there’s a great post on the story by Deadspin’s Rick Chandler here.

Earlier today, we launched the latest and (IMHO) greatest installment of the new video series for our Animal Birth Control Campaign. Just in time for the American Kennel Club-sponsored Westminster Dog Show, this one makes a few telling points about the folks who run the AKC—a group which discourages spay/neuter legislation and bills aimed at protecting pets from abuse as part of its agenda to cash in on the animal-breeding business, while millions of homeless animals die in shelters and on the streets. I love this video.

Watch the rest of the series

That’s right. It’s officially the Year of the Rat today, and in honor of the new year’s murine mascots, PETA is asking people to, um, be a bit nicer to them. For regular folk, doing that could be as simple as looking into humane options for dealing with rats who may end up in their home. And for people like the executives at Mars Candy, it would probably mean discontinuing those experiments where they torture and kill the little guys. This recent demonstration outside a Mars factory in Chicago helped to drive that point home (at the expense of some completely frozen protesters):

Meanwhile, the folks in PETA Asia Pacific have been busy as hell bringing in the New Year with demonstrations aimed at encouraging people to stop buying glue traps. You can see some pics from those demos here.

So, a very happy Year of the Rat to everyone! Hopefully it’ll be a good year for rats, too. It’s about time they caught a break.

PETA's 'Year of the Rat' Pack

Deflocked!

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To check out the archives of past strips, click here.

Update: Please click here to take action on this issue.

I wish I could say that the title of this entry were anything other than a simple statement of fact. But according to shocking allegations made by a former animal technician at Shin Nippon Biomedical Laboratories (SNBL), the recent boiling of a live female macaque monkey—who was evidently placed inside a giant rack washer inside her wire cage and killed during the 180 degree, 20-minute cycle—was just one in a long list of egregious animal welfare violations at the animal-testing facility.

The whistleblower, whose employment was terminated shortly after she complained about these apparent violations, told reporters that SNBL’s reaction to her inquiry about the incident with the macaque was to complain about the additional paperwork that it was generating.

"When I inquired about it,” she told a Kiro TV reporter who investigated her allegations, “the reply I got back was 'Oh, dear.' Think of the paperwork. That just upset me to my soul because no animal in there should die because of somebody’s mistake or negligence or lack of compassion. "

Last week, PETA sent the whistleblower a $1,000 check and a basket of groceries to thank her for standing up for the animals abused in this lab despite the fact that her decision to do so likely led to her firing. As PETA President Ingrid Newkirk puts it, “Her ‘reward’ for revealing SNBL’s callous and vicious treatment of monkeys was unemployment. But in our book and that of all primates, she’s a hero.”

The USDA is currently investigating this incident, so there’s a chance that the lab will be held accountable for this horrific negligence, but there isn’t much hope that those responsible will be charged with cruelty to animals. As the Seattle television station which has been covering this story pointed out, although causing unnecessary suffering or death to an animal is illegal in the state, there’s an exemption for this on the books in cases where the cruelty is connected with “any properly conducted scientific experiments.”

As horrific as this story is, it would never even have come to light in the first place had it not been for the whistleblower’s willingness to speak out, and we are extremely grateful to her for her bravery. You can watch investigative footage of this lab here, and for more information about what you can do to help animals suffering in laboratories, click here.

Well, Rudy Giuliani’s office hung up on us when we offered the once presidential hopeful an ambassadorship last week, but Omar Osama Bin Laden (the estranged son of the more notorious OBL) and his wife are talking to us. We sent a letter yesterday urging the bin Ladens to cancel plans to organize a “grueling” endurance horse race across the Sahara Desert as “a way to promote peace.” That’s a 3,000-mile horse race across North Africa, scheduled to begin in March. We didn’t think that sounded like a barrel of laughs for the horses. As PETA’s president puts it, "If this were a rally in which cars were in danger of overheating and breaking down, I'd be all for it. But horses are flesh and blood. Such a grueling race will mean fatalities, not peace. Animals have not declared war on us - they should be truly left in peace."

The bin Ladens got back right away and some important assurances have already been given. More on this later. You can read our letter to bin Laden here.

If you were following the Super Bowl ads closely this year, you would have noticed an advocacy ad for the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, which depicted a drug dealer lamenting his recent lack of customers, because “kids are just getting high out of their medicine cabinets nowadays.” Which, well, no problem with that specifically—it’s a perfectly sound message reminding parents to be careful about their prescription drugs. Some big question marks do arise, however, when you consider the email that PETA received from FOX Television last month when we submitted our own series of ads to run during the Super Bowl:

“Time will not be sold on FBC network facilities for viewpoint or issue advocacy, and advertisers may not use their commercial time for addressing viewpoints or issues.”

So what’s going on here? Was FOX outright lying to us to get us off their case, or is there something I’m missing here? To make FOX’s double standard even more obvious, one of the three ads that we submitted (the series was designed to raise awareness about KFC’s cruel treatment of chickens) specifically addressed the issue of drug abuse. I’ve posted that ad below.

Here’s the letter we sent to FOX Broadcasting Company's VP of Advertising Sales today, asking him, essentially, WTF?, and you can watch the entire series of ads that were banned from Super Bowl consideration here.

Watch the entire series of banned ads

Happy Super Tuesday, everybody! While the frontrunning presidential candidates square off for this big 24-state battle, let’s take a moment to remember how we got here: Ladies and gentlemen, back by popular demand, it’s Broccoli Obama, Celery Clinton, Mitt Ramen-y, Mike Huckleberry, and Dijon McCain! This version’s nice and short, but you can check out the whole feature at http://www.peta.org/feat/greenhouse/index.asp.

The 2008 Sexiest Vegetarian Next Door contest is underway, and this year we’re doing things a bit differently. To spice things up a bit, we’ve pitted the nominees against each other in a bracket-style tournament, where the winner takes all. (“All,” in this case, being a free trip to Hawaii.) You can check out the smoking hot lineup of sexy vegetarian guys and gals here. Happy voting!

This photo, which appeared in Us Weekly and People magazines last week, is interesting not just because it shows that even the fabulous Katherine Heigl must, sometimes, take a Saturday afternoon to move her belongings from one house to another, but because—if you look very closely—you can see that she’s sporting a PETA T-shirt just for the occasion. You can compare the tee she’s wearing in the pic with our brand-new “Have a PETA Day” shirt below. Thanks are due to my eagle-eyed colleague Johnny Machuzak for pointing that out. Now get back to work and stop reading gossip magazines, Johnny.

Other blogs that covered this story:
PopSugar
Celebrity-Gossip
The Candid Photos
Jezebel
X17

There’s just so much to say about last night, and so little that has anything to do with the subject matter generally covered by this here blog. But Michael Strahan did get himself a key sack and another well-deserved ring … and we love Michael Strahan here at PETA. So, even though my blood runs burgundy and gold, I’m going to go right ahead and say congratulations, the New York Giants. That was amazing. Now here’s Michael:

Ingrid Newkirk in India, symbolically averting Gandhi’s eyes from the cruel “Jallikatu” festival earlier this month

A couple of weeks ago, I posted a blog asking if people had a specific question for Ingrid, and it turns out that a lot of people do! She’s just back from her trip to India (for more on how that went, click here), and she took some time today to respond to the questions. You can read the resulting “interview with Ingrid” below. Not all the comments and emails I received are addressed in this interview (otherwise this entry would be, like, 12 pages long), but if you asked a question that’s not featured here, I’ll hit you up with a response by email. Enjoy!

When did you become a vegetarian/vegan and what exactly prompted you to make that decision?

In my book, Making Kind Choices, I talk about what a slow learner I was. How I first stopped eating escargot after watching some snails looking for an escape route out of a paper bag, shellfish after ordering a lobster on my birthday and realizing he was broiled alive for my fleeting taste, and finally, going vegetarian after rescuing a little pig abandoned on a farm to starve to death. It was hard 45 or more years ago, now it's easy as (tofu cream) pie.

I am only a kid but I saw your show and know all I want to do is help. But how?

Every one of us, no matter if under eight or over eighty, is powerful. We all influence the marketplace. You may send PETA $50 (and we are grateful) but you spend thousands a year on food, household products, shampoo, clothes, entertainment, gardening supplies, candles, I don't know what all. If those goods are tested on animals or made from the parts of animals who have suffered greatly in slaughterhouses, or come at the expense of animals being carted around in small cages (the circus, for instance), then we have a problem. But if you choose compassionately, then you are a powerful consumer. And your voice, the leaflets you leave everywhere, will educate others and get them to understand. Your advocacy makes a whole world of difference.

There are quite a few chain clothing stores that sell fur and fur trim. How does PETA choose which ones to target for a campaign?

At the launch of the Indian version of 50 Awesome Ways Kids Can Help Animals

Ah, that would give away our secret formula. We look at many factors, but among them are how many animals suffer and in what ways, how popular they are, how out of synch this is with their line/brand/image. The important thing is to never cut any retailer any slack, but complain, complain, complain and do not help them sustain (by buying in that store) if they carry fur. The same goes for people you see in the ugly stuff. Polite is fine, but saying something, anything, is vital. Don't let them go home thinking no one did anything but admire their cruel choice.

I would love to know your stand on giving drugs to animals. Both my husband and I are vegans and have made the decision not to use drugs tested on animals but find it really hard when one of my animals need medication.

You are lovely people. If there is a non-tested (natural) remedy, great. If not, well, please do all you can to join us in pushing the FDA to change its outdated animal testing methods for 21st century tests. After all, we have whole human DNA on the web and super-computers we can program with the right data for the right species.

When people ask me, 'why do you care about animals?' I am starting to feel stuck with answers and was wondered if you have any really good comebacks when you are asked question's like that?

Ingrid feeding one of the overworked bulls that PETA India is trying to save from becoming leather shoes and belts

I'd ask "why don't YOU?" What an odd question, really. It's like asking "Why do you care about the planet?" You just do. Or should. Especially, if you have the power every day to help or hurt. When people ask me "Why are you vegan?" I want to ask "Why aren't you vegan", but I do tell them exactly why. After all, eating meat is all about not having the discipline to overcome a desire for a taste habit, whereas being vegan is all about being kind, being healthy, being a responsible environmentalist, leaving enough resources for others to share.

Would it be effective for all of us to gather in one place to flex our strength and end one or more of the horrible things happening to animals?

That might indeed be the case, but I'm afraid we human beings will never agree which ONE horror to unite about, so I think we must all do as much as we can to combat as many horrors as possible. The more activism we expend, the quicker we will have total animal liberation. And sometimes it takes only one person, not the whole lot of us, to bring about a change. One letter can sway a whole corporation to drop a product like sticky glue traps for mice, one phone call can get a mall to stop sponsoring one of those cheap traveling zoo shows.

Can you ever, in reality see an end to factory farming and animal experimentation?

I think I was born an activist. Injustice makes me see red. And I always cared about animals. I was living in India when I was eight and actually stopped a man from beating a bull who had collapsed with exhaustion from pulling a heavy cart in the sun. Whether or not we will ever have an end to all cruelty, even to factory farming (although I think the water shortages of the future will put paid to that), we can make a difference for so many animals by helping open people's hearts and minds and eyes to the alternatives to the suffering around them.

Where’s Alex Pacheco?

Alex and I, like any human beings, had our agreements and disagreements, but he worked hard at PETA for many years. He did some great undercover investigations, including the one that got Exxon and other gas companies to cap their stacks, down which went flying (and then frying) birds and small mammals who got caught and couldn't get out. It is hard for someone to do those investigations and Alex moved on about nine years ago now. He deserved a rest.

How do you maintain your strength, your energy, your being, after being present in slaughter houses and watching hours and hours and HOURS of undercover footage of animal abuse? How do you not get too depressed to function?

If you close your eyes, it does not go away. I feel pressure to work hard and try to change lots. I imagine myself in their place. BUT, I try not to watch more footage than I have to. I try to show it to those who need to see it in order to understand why bad habits must change! Please use our videos everywhere you can, at the bottom of your signature on your email, to show to visitors and schools and clubs and relatives. A video is worth a million words. When I am in danger of being overwhelmed by human supremacism's vicious consequences, I watch a funny movie, read something amusing, or go for a walk in the fresh air.

How do you respond to those that are unaware of what's really happening and refuse to believe it?

I'm more interested in the fence-sitters, although if you bang your head against a brick wall hard enough, the brick wall will eventually fall.

How do you convince them otherwise?

Dare them to watch those films—but don't be there in the end, so they don't have to be resistant and defensive. Just dare them to watch and then ignore them.

The mandatory spay/neuter ordinance, which I was talking up this week on the blog, passed today at the Van Nuys City Council meeting with a 10-1 vote! There is still one more vote to take place next week which will finalize it, but the decision will be made based on simple majority. According to my colleagues in LA who were at the meeting, there were hundreds of people in attendance, including Bob Barker who spoke on the importance of spaying and neutering. Boo-ya!

A huge thank you to everyone who has helped push this historic bill into law.

Vegan beauty Annalise Braakensiek was recently asked by Cleo magazine to offer a signed photo up for auction to raise money for her favorite charity … which just happens to be our friends over at PETA Asia Pacific. The stunning image that Annalise is donating on PETA AP’s behalf was published in Cleo magazine with a blurb about why animal rights issues are so important to her. If you’re a fan (and who the hell wouldn’t be, after seeing this pic?), you can bid for the photo on e-bay until February 8. Happy auctioning!

As of this Wednesday, it looks like Rudy Giuliani isn’t going to be getting that other job he was applying for, but that doesn’t mean he’s run out of options for serious public service, and his first exciting new employment opportunity arrived by fax today, in the form of an offer from PETA President Ingrid Newkirk to be our new Animal Emergency Response Division Ambassador. If he were to accept the offer, Rudy’s duties would include helping to get PETA’s public service announcements about animal emergencies shown on television and heard on the radio, and meeting with officials who make contingency plans for natural disasters to remind them of the importance of keeping animal-integrated families united. You can read Ingrid’s letter here, and I’ll let you know how Rudy responds.

This case has been a decade in the making, with a steady stream of complaints about substandard conditions and terrible suffering at the no-kill shelter in North Carolina, but this week, shortly after the release of a seven-months long PETA undercover investigation into All Creatures Great and Small, the animals languishing in the shelter are finally getting the help that they have desperately needed. The North Carolina Department of Agriculture has announced that it will be launching an operation to transfer the remaining animals—almost 300 of them—out of this hellhole and into pre-approved animal sheltering organizations, and closing ACGS for good due to ongoing, persistent violations of the animal welfare act.

This is a big victory for the animals who have suffered from overcrowding, disease, and untreated injuries at the shelter, and a testament to the hard work and perseverance of the undercover investigator, whose harrowing footage of conditions inside the operation broke this case wide open after seven years’ worth of red tape prevented All Creatures Great and Small from being shut down following a series of failed state inspections as far back as 2001.

We were thrilled to learn that these animals have finally gotten a reprieve, but there’s still work to be done on this case, specifically the filing of criminal charges against the operators of the facility, who have thus far not been held accountable for the shocking neglect and mistreatment of the animals in their care. You can find info to contact the Henderson County District Attorney and urge him to get on with that on this page.

And if you haven’t seen it yet, this is the video from PETA’s seven-month investigation into the shelter. Sadly, these sorts of conditions are an extremely common sight in no-kill shelters like ACGS, which take in more animals than they can manage and refuse to give suffering animals in their care a humane release.