France: the power of the hunters

“Hunters, if you want to save lives stay at home” we can read on the posters. At the bottom of this slogan, figures revealed by the French Biodiversity Office.

During the 2019-2020 season, 114 hunting accidents occurred,11 were fatal and 30 million animals were slaughtered.

“In 20 years the hunters have killed more than 400 people”!

This hobby is the only one to cause the death of non-participants (mountain bikers, walkers, some victims were killed at home)

71% of French people do not feel safe walking in nature during hunting season.

50% of hunting accidents occur on Sunday, a day of rest and leisure for a majority of French people

78% of French people are in favor of Sunday becoming a day without hunting.

In France, according to the National Union of Hunting Game Producers, 14 million pheasants and 5 million partridges are reared each year to be released a few hours before the hunt begins.

Thus, 9 out of 10 pheasants killed in hunting come from farms.

For the Foundation Brigitte Bardot… “these grain-raised animals serve as targets for hunters who engage in a real clay trap in a henhouse!”

The situation of these farms is so absurd that the deputies Guillaume Pelletier (LR) and Pascal Brindeau (UDI) intervened with the Minister of Agriculture to request the extension of the hunting period in order to be able to organize the slaughter, by hunters, game not released during the confinement period.

For more…at https://worldanimalsvoice.com/2021/03/31/france-the-power-of-the-hunters/

And I mean … 1.3 million hunters are registered in France. Just for comparison: The German Hunting Association currently has 397,414 hunting licenses.

If you add a wife to every hunter, because hunting remains a men’s hobby, you get two and a half million French voters who need to be courted.
Emmanuel Macron understood that.

Macron’s bows to the hunters are sometimes tangible, sometimes symbolic.
He has halved the price of the hunting license from 400 to 200 euros.
And he celebrated his 40th birthday in 2017 at Chambord Castle, the former royal, now legendary hunting ground.

On the night of his birthday party, Macron joined the hunters and their freshly shot boars.
Despite asking for discretion, the hunters proudly tweeted a photo of the Halali president around the world.

In Germany every year 5 million wild animals are shot, or killed in traps.

5 million animals every year – that’s 13,700 every day, 570 an hour, almost 10 animals a minute. Every 6 seconds an animal dies at the hands of a hunter.
The most hunted animal in Germany is the fox.

The justification for the 500,000 bloodbaths with foxes, which are actually only supposed to hide one’s own desire to kill, is rabies, which has been practically eradicated in Germany since 2008.

Theodor Heuss, the 1st President of the Federal Republic of Germany, put it in a nutshell about 50 years ago:
“Hunting is a subsidiary form of human mental illness“.

Whole job done: the result of a fox hunt. There should be people who get intoxicated at such a sight. And they are even allowed to run around freely …

Heuss was right! If you see these pictures, you agree with him.

My best regards to all, Venus

 

EU, Togo, Spain – How nearly 3,000 cattle came to be stranded at sea for three months.

 

How nearly 3,000 cattle came to be stranded at sea for three months | Live exports | The Guardian

How nearly 3,000 cattle came to be stranded at sea for three months

After being refused entry to several countries on health grounds, the surviving animals were ordered back to Spain for slaughter

Read more: Stranded cattle ship ordered to dock in Spain after ‘hellish’ three months at sea

After more than three months stranded in the Mediterranean, the surviving bulls onboard a livestock ship were humanely slaughtered by the Spanish authorities in Cartagena on Sunday. An official Spanish veterinary report described dire conditions onboard the Elbeik, on which 179 bulls had already died.

The Elbeik and a second livestock ship, the Karim Allah, had been refused entry to multiple countries on health grounds. We look back on the events that shaped this “hellish ride”.

18 December 2020
Two livestock ships, the Karim Allah and the Elbeik, leave Spain bound for Turkey loaded with young Spanish bulls. The Karim Allah departs from the port of Cartagena carrying almost 900 animals and the Elbeik leaves from Tarragona with nearly 1,800.

27-29 December
The Karim Allah arrives in Turkey on 27 December and the Elbeik on 29 December. Both ships are refused entry due to fears the bulls may be infected with a bovine disease called bluetongue. The shippers blame a mistake on health certificates issued by Spain’s agriculture ministry; the ministry denies this. On 1 January, the Karim Allah leaves the Turkish port of İskenderun and the Elbeik leaves from another Turkish port, Derince.

6 January
The Karim Allah arrives in the Libyan port of Tripoli on 6 January and departs again on 9 January with all the bulls on board, after being refused permission to unload.



9 January
The Elbeik arrives in Tripoli on 9 January and leaves again on 25 January, after also being refused permission to unload. The ship’s next port of call is Alexandria, Egypt, arriving on 1 February and leaving on 4 February.

27 January
The Karim Allah reaches the Italian port of Augusta, Sicily, and leaves again on 29 January.

19 February
The Karim Allah arrives in Sardinian waters near the port of Cagliari. On the same day, the Elbeik anchors off the coast of northern Cyprus, near the port of Famagusta. Animal welfare organisations call for vets to visit the ships. Cypriot vets are placed on standby to check the animals but neither ship approaches or requests veterinary assistance.

22 February
The Karim Allah returns to waters near Cartagena, Spain, but does not enter. The shippers plan to have the cattle’s blood tested and, if the animals are cleared of any disease risk, to re-export them. The shipper says the Spanish agriculture ministry has said the animals “face immediate slaughter” if the ship docks.

25 February
The Spanish agriculture ministry’s deadline for the Karim Allah to slaughter its cattle expires. A legal tussle ensues as the shippers try to block an official Spanish slaughter order.

26 February
An official Spanish vet report dated 26 February finds 22 of the Karim Allah bulls died at sea, with two corpses still on board. The report notes that other corpses were chopped up and thrown overboard during the journey. It concludes that the animals suffered from the lengthy journey, were generally unwell and not fit for transport outside the EU, nor should they be allowed into the EU for disease-control reasons. Euthanasia would be the best solution, it says. The report does not say if the cattle have bluetongue, but it notes a range of other skin, eye and leg conditions including alopecia, flaking, scabs and joint inflammation compatible with septic arthritis.



6 March
The legal tussle ends and the slaughter of the Karim Allah bulls by Spanish officials begins on 6 March. By 9 March, all the Karim Allah bulls are dead.

18 March
Under orders from Spanish officials, the Elbeik finally returns to port in Cartagena three months after it left Spain, following stops near Cyprus, in Greece, to stock up on supplies, and off the coast of Menorca.

19 March
Spanish veterinary officials complete and sign a report describing dire welfare conditions onboard the Elbeik. The report cites the Elbeik’s captain as saying that, of the 1,789 bulls originally loaded, 179 died during the journey. The bodies were chopped up and thrown overboard. Ten other carcasses were also found on board, the report says, and of the remaining animals, some are dying, while others are starving and extremely dehydrated. In some pens, it notes, “the crew had placed fodder in the corral in a way that the starving animals were forced to eat on the corpses of their companions”. The urine and manure buildup covers the animals’ hooves, it says, leaving them without dry areas to lie down.

22 March
A separate veterinary inspection, conducted on behalf of the Elbeik cattle owners, found that only 136 of the bulls required immediate euthanasia. The rest, it said, could recover after a period of rest and adequate feeding if cleared of the risk of bluetongue or other diseases.

28 March
The last of 1,610 surviving bulls from the Elbeik are slaughtered in the port of Cartagena. Spain’s agriculture ministry says it has forwarded the veterinary report to the public prosecutor on the basis that “the facts described therein could constitute indications of a possible offence in relation to the current legislation on animal welfare”. The cattle owner, who does not wish to be named, has disputed the findings of the report.

Arrival and departure times for the Elbeik and the Karim Allah were supplied by Marine Traffic.

 

EU revealed to be world’s biggest live animal exporter

Read more

England: Poet, Life Long Vegan, Animal Rights Activist – Introducing Benjamin Zephaniah.

 

I have loved (in a ‘blokey’ sort of way) ! Benjamin since I saw him at a London animal rights demo decades ago.  So seeing him again the BBC this morning; I thought it was time to introduce him to you.  Here are a few shorts of his life and actions; a passionate animal rights advocate, he wrote the foreword to Keith Mann‘s book From Dusk ’til Dawn: An insider’s view of the growth of the Animal Liberation Movement

Dedicated – Yes; do we want him – for sure.

Regards Mark

Benjamin Obadiah Iqbal Zephaniah (born 15 April 1958)[1] is a British writer and dub poet. He was included in The Times list of Britain’s top 50 post-war writers in 2008

Turning vegan at 13 Benjamin is pretty much a lifelong vegan. He is now 58 and as a busy performer, writer and with a passion for martial arts, he just naturally shows people what it is like being vegan and doesn’t “ram veganism down peoples throats”.

Zephaniah is an honorary patron of The Vegan Society,[12] Viva! (Vegetarians’ International Voice for Animals),[13] EVOLVE! Campaigns,[14] the anti-racism organisation Newham Monitoring Project with whom he made a video[15] in 2012 about the impact of Olympic policing on black communities, Tower Hamlets Summer University and is an animal rights advocate.

In 2004, he wrote the foreword to Keith Mann‘s book From Dusk ’til Dawn: An insider’s view of the growth of the Animal Liberation Movement, a book about the Animal Liberation Front.

In August 2007, he announced that he would be launching the Animal Liberation Project, alongside People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.]

He became a vegan when he read poems about “shimmering fish floating in an underwater paradise, and birds flying free in the clear blue sky”.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Zephaniah

https://benjaminzephaniah.com/poetic-thoughts/

https://animaladvocacy.fandom.com/wiki/Benjamin_Zephaniah

 

 

EU: Petition – STOP PLANT-BASED DAIRY CENSORSHIP.

WAV Comment – we feel this a very important petition to support as it has huge implications throughout the EU regarding plant based dairy censorship.  Please give your support, thank you – petition link below.

STOP PLANT-BASED DAIRY CENSORSHIP

Dear European Commission and EU Member States, 

We want you to put a halt to plant-based dairy censorship

Please reject amendment 171. If adopted, it would totally counteract the consumer shift to more sustainable eating habits that’s urgently needed to fight climate change.

Dairy terms are already protected by law. Amendment 171 would go further and censor all use of dairy-related language, packaging, or imagery for plant-based foods. 

Words and phrases like “contains no dairy” or “creamy texture” might be banned. The same goes for a tweet or an advert mentioning scientific data showing that a product causes, for example, “half the carbon emissions of dairy butter”. Bizarrely, the amendment could even prohibit plant-based foods from using photos of their own products on packaging.

In this way, amendment 171 would not only hide information from consumers, but also hinder innovation and the emerging sustainable food sector. Altogether, it would be a huge reversal of the work done so far to meet the EU’s own goals on public health and sustainability, as agreed under the terms of the Paris Agreement. Given the urgency of the climate crisis, it’s a highly irresponsible move.

Please add your name and tell the European Union to stop plant-based censorship. 

Petition link:

Stop plant-based dairy censorship | Stop AM171 | ProVeg International

Jo-Anne McArthur: the most important animal photographer of our time

When it comes to animal activism, I’ve always believed the most powerful tools we have as activists are undercover investigations.

The truth is that the majority of animal cruelty at the hands of humans is done for major industries behind closed doors.

Joe-Anne MacArthur

From animal farming for food and textiles to zoos and circuses to laboratories, etc. – all of these industries know that if the public saw how they regularly mistreat animals, people would be outraged.

It’s why you can’t just walk up to a factory farm or an animal testing facility, knock on the door, and ask for a tour. It’s why states across the US have passed ag-gag laws that attempt to criminalize undercover investigations.

It’s also why Ringling Bros. is out of business.

While undercover operations carried out by brave animal activists have been going on for decades, there is one activist I’d specifically like to spotlight: Jo-Anne McArthur.

Even if you’ve never heard her name, you’ve likely seen her photographs. McArthur’s award-winning, powerful and haunting work has been featured in National Geographic, HuffPost, and Photolife – among many other media outlets.

These hens are forced to share a cage with a dead friend.

Her subject? Animals in the human environment.

For more than a decade, McArthur has traveled to over 40 countries documenting how animals are exploited by humans for food, clothing, entertainment, research, and more.

For more…at https://worldanimalsvoice.com/2021/03/31/jo-anne-mcarthur-the-most-important-animal-photographer-of-our-time/

And I mean…«Good information is hard to come by.
It’s even harder to do anything with them, ” said Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

With the excellent work of Jo-Anne McArthur and other undercover investigators, we can know what animals suffer in concentration camps around the world.

Although the media have sold their souls to the devil and are information carriers for the meat and milk mafia around the world, we can still find out what happens when we want.
If we want! but the majority do not want to.

This is the world’s worst human character trait: indifference!
And that’s why we still come up with enough excuses not to look facts in the eye, in order not to decide and act …

1. My conscience is clear because I buy my meat from the farmer next door. All of this only happens in Thailand
2. You can actually slaughter animals in small farms, painlessly, and my neighbor will do it.
3. I am actually animal-friendly, I also have dogs myself.
4. Actually, animals are always slaughtered, which is quite natural.
5. If there was something useful in this stupid vegan diet, it would have prevailed.
6. I don’t have a great idea about animal rights and animal ethics, but all of these are arguments that are totally weak.
7. It’s just like that, we can’t change anything

Note: Each of these excuses legalizes your “private choice”. But if your private decision means torture and death for others, then it is not a private decision, it is a collaboration to crime.

My best regards to all, Venus

 

Rats are sentient too

Rat Meat: In just about every country around the globe there are people eating Rat corpses for pleasure or survival necessity.
West Virginia, USA & Mexico have “Rat Stew”, “Caldo de Rata” there is also Rat Jerky.

The USA citizen in the cooking photo especially enjoys eating Rat testicles.

In Thailand, Vietnam, Taiwan, Laos, China, Cambodia, etc, etc, Rats can sometimes be seen on restaurant menus.

Some people in Australia, New Zealand, Polynesia, Africa, South, Central & North America, and Europe enjoy eating Rats.

Rats from the forested wild, near wineries or grain farms, are preferred to sewer Rats, graveyard Rats & garbage dump Rats.
Buying live Rats or Rat corpses in open markets is risky because one never knows where the Rats lived and what they actually fed on.
Rats like people can survive on eating just about anything & everything.

There is a better way, a kinder way, a healthier way.

Source: Scott Young

And I mean…Yes, the whole thing is absolutely weird and disturbing, and no, it doesn’t just apply to the rats.
This affects all sentient animals.

Is severing a pig’s leg more painful than severing a rat?

If I see the infliction of pain as negative and accordingly try to avoid it, then it is consistent to do this to all living beings with pain perception.
It then makes no difference whether these creatures are humans, rats, dogs, or cattle.

In view of the masses of animal products consumed in Germany, we do not need any sharp criticism of “THE other” food cultures, the so-called exotic ones.

My best regards to all, Venus

 

Germany: Hell of fire in Europe’s largest pig fattening

BREAKING NEWS: The facility known as the largest pig breeding facility in Europe is located in Germany and was part of the Straathof group of companies.

Now the plant in Alt Tellin is burning down and with it thousands of innocent creatures! They cannot escape the flames, the heat, and the smoke and die excruciatingly in these minutes!

30.03.2021, Alt Tellin: Foto: Stefan Sauer/dpa-Zentralbild/dpa +++ dpa-Bildfunk +++

The former owner Straathof had received a nationwide professional ban due to numerous criminal violations of the Animal Welfare Act.
He had therefore initially sold the system to a bank holding company and this last year to a Swiss mailbox company.

Again and again, there were massive scandals in Alt Tellin: one time highly toxic sulfuric acid escaped and another time over a thousand piglets died due to defective ventilation.

The lawsuits against the approval of the facility have been delayed since 2017! A massive judicial scandal could be hiding here.
Because fire protection was presumably not guaranteed right from the start and the system should therefore never have been approved.

Now the horror that was, unfortunately, to be expected has occurred – the farm is on fire.
Like so many animal husbandry facilities before!

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