In December 2011, the National Academies’ Institute of Medicine issued a landmark report confirming that the current use of chimpanzees for invasive biomedical research is “largely unnecessary.” Nearly 1,000 chimpanzees remain in six U.S. laboratories, with about 500 of them owned by the federal government. The cost to federal taxpayers is $30 million a year to maintain these animals and use them in research, and the United States is the only industrialized nation to continue this practice.
The Institute of Medicine (IOM) report was commissioned by the National Institutes of Health following an outcry over the agency’s 2010 proposal to move 186 federally-owned chimpanzees from Alamogordo, N.M., to the Southwest National Primate Research Center in San Antonio. These chimpanzees, including 53 year-old Flo, had already been subjected to decades of harmful research, yet were slated to be available again for invasive experiments.
At the urging of thousands of animal advocates—including more than 25,000 HSUS supporters, several U.S. senators, and former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson—the NIH announced in January 2011 that it would postpone the transfer of the remaining Alamogordo chimpanzees until the IOM committee issued a report on the necessity of using of chimpanzees in research. NIH director Francis Collins indicated at a December press briefing that the Alamogordo chimps would not be used in research for the foreseeable future. He also announced that a Council of Councils would be formed to make an assessment of what uses of chimps conform to the NIH guidelines. Those uses that fall outside the recommendations of the IOM report will be terminated in time.
The IOM’s findings support the overwhelming evidence that the use of chimpanzees in harmful research should end, except in very narrow circumstances. The report makes plain that the limited usefulness of chimps will diminish further over time, especially as alternative methods are developed.
NIH instructed the committee to disregard ethical and financial considerations when making its decision, but these factors cannot be logically excluded from any judgment about future uses of chimps. The cost to taxpayers would be significantly reduced if invasive research ended and the same chimpanzees were retired to nonprofit sanctuaries, where they live in far superior environments at a lower cost than the confined housing in laboratories—which do not have highly professional staff that know how to provide an enriched and humane environment. It is financially irresponsible to continue throwing research dollars away supporting chimpanzee research instead of pursuing innovative and cost-effective approaches that are also more humane.?Now that we have affirmation by a panel of experts that the scientific rationale for using chimps is very highly questionable, it’s up to Congress to pass the Great Ape Protection and Cost Savings Act. Chimpanzees suffer immense, lasting physical and psychological harm from being used in invasive experiments in laboratories. Our 2009 undercover investigation demonstrated that the complex needs of chimpanzees simply cannot be met in a laboratory setting.
These bills (S. 810 and H.R. 1513), which combined have nearly 150 cosponsors in the House and Senate, would phase out harmful research on chimpanzees in laboratories and retire the approximately 500 federally owned chimpanzees—including those at the Alamogordo Primate Facility—to permanent sanctuary. Meanwhile, The HSUS has petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to upgrade all chimpanzee populations as endangered—an outcome that would also end the use of chimps in invasive experiments.
In the wake of this important report, please act today to urge your legislators to end the use of chimpanzees in harmful research once and for all.
What would a notable New Jersey Senator want with little ol’ me? I asked myself this very question at the start of 2010 when I received a call from Senator Joseph Kyrillos’ office asking me to come in and share my story, which is explained in detail here. Shortly after, I gained my composure and reminded myself that I am special, unique, and worthy of the Senator’s time because my passion brings me joy and provides me with endless opportunities to serve others. Before I reveal the outcome of our electrifying meeting, allow me to provide you with some basic pointers pertaining to advocacy work and the “how to’s” of meeting with your legislator.
1. E-mail, call, or write a letter to your legislator about the topic of interest you have a desire to advocate for. Make it short and sweet, while adding the most important details and leaving out extraneous information. Remember, these are busy folks, so be memorable and BE KIND!
2. Before your meeting, make Google your friend. Read up on your legislator’s biography, the issues he/she is a champion for, committees he/she serves on, and awards he/she has received. Knowledge is power no matter what the circumstance.
3. Prepare the documents that you will be presenting to your legislator, and if you are like me, carry them in a bright colored folder! I chose bright orange (pink and purple were runners up). For example, I left a brochure explaining RSD/CRPS, my resume, and my first CSL blog post with information on crazysexylife.com. What is a meeting with a senator without mentioning Kris Carr and Crazy Sexy Life?
4. If you know your nerves often get the best of you, practice speaking beforehand. Keep in mind, you will have thirty minutes or less to meet with your legislator, so use your time wisely. Kill him/her with kindness, passion, and a snazzy outfit. A little sparkle never hurt anyone!
5. Meet with your legislator! Make eye contact, remember your manners, and use body language that expresses confidence. Convey to him/her that your message is unique and your cause is worth his/her time, effort, and backing.
6. Follow up with your legislator and his/her staff within a few business days expressing your gratitude for the opportunity. Let him/her know that you are excited and will be in touch to follow through with what you discussed together.
7. Pat yourself on the back for a job well done! You just met with a legislator!
Meeting with Senator Kyrillos was like meeting with a very accomplished friend. His presence and charm are undeniable, but his ability to make you feel comfortable on the spot is pure magic. A few minutes into our conversation, I stopped shaking and started doing what I do best, which is advocate for holistic, compassionate, affordable, integrative, and individualized care for persons with chronic pain and illness. I want the patients to be viewed as the expert, minimizing the large power differential that exists between doctor and patient, and the health professional to be the facilitator of holistic and integrative care. “First, do no harm,” is a principle that has been overlooked in recent years, creating a system where diseases progress and individuals are left to solve their problems alone.
The Senator’s main question was, “How can I help you accomplish your goals?” We came to the following action plan:
1. Create a personalized website for persons with chronic pain.
2. Write a proposal to Congress (where I will testify) and a press release.
3. Increase my own advocacy work. My long-term goal is to lecture to health professionals in hospitals across the country about chronic pain, illness, and disability and the above mentioned topics of interest.
For now, I am thrilled with the outcome of our meeting and excited for what the future holds. As a budding social worker, advocacy runs through my veins, and my life is dedicated to the service of others, especially the vulnerable and the oppressed. Remember, YOU can make a difference! Now, go forth and serve others!
Jenny has put together a list of triumphs for our animal friends in 2009. Hope it motivates you to make your first Monday in 2009 a meatless one!
This Thanksgiving I was asked to speak at the Berkshire Vegetarian Network’s holiday dinner, and in the true spirit of the day (and a bad bout of writer’s block) I came up with a list of ten things for which I’m thankful. The food was great and with my veins coursing with a tremendous amount of carbs, I delivered the speech — which was a big hit with the Berkshire set. Being a very generous person, I thought to myself, who am I to deny the lovely readers of CSL this collection of precious little nuggets, suitable for livening up any holiday gathering? Here they are and, in advance, you’re welcome!
10. I’m thankful that the number of vegans in the U.S. now out-numbers the membership of the NRA! Whoot! Whoot!
9. I’m thankful for the legislative victories in a number of states across the US that ban the most egregious practices in factory farming. Even though the new regulations only make it marginally better for animals living in intense confinement operations, these are steps in the right direction and they set a precedent for more improvements.
8. My husband Doug and I are very thankful for the hood in NYC’s East Village that we like to call “Vegantown” – First Ave below 12th St – where you can’t swing blob of tofu without hitting a vegan-friendly restaurant!
7. I’m thankful for all the healthy, humane plant-based alternatives for holiday meals that are popping up everywhere online, in books, magazines, and newspapers—and even for Holiday Diva Martha Stewart, who devoted an entire show to the horrors of the meat industry without feeling the need to offer the industry a rebuttal. She took the opportunity to educate her audience on factory farming, with help from author Jonathan Safran Foer (of “Eating Animals”) and filmmaker Robert Kenner (Food, Inc.).
6. Oh – and that makes me thankful for Jonathan Safran Foer whose book “Eating Animals” has received a tremendous amount of media coverage and who has become a wonderful spokesperson for farmed animals. Even when confronted with an unbelievably asinine or hostile question, he is able to articulately answer with a sharp wit and calm nobility.
5. I’m full of thanks that I’m not in a room where the focal point of the day’s celebration is the carcass of an animal who suffered his/her entire short life for the trivial pleasure of unimaginative palettes and holiday tradition. (OK, so shoot me, this one only works on Thanksgiving Day BUT – you gotta read this awesome article by Ari Solomon about us vegans (can you say RIGHT TF on!).
4. I’m thankful that the days of embarrassingly rubbery or chalky soy cheeses are almost over – such as with the invention of Daiya cheese, which melts so well and tastes delicious on pizza, in casseroles or quesadillas. And for Dr. Cow Nut Cheese, which (despite the giggle-worth name) is made from raw, healthy nuts and not from the hormone- and antibiotic-laced mammary secretions of a bovine.
3. I’m thankful for the Thanksgiving ham that collided with Celebrity Chef Paula Deen while she was “helping to deliver more than 25,000 lbs. of ham & turkey” to the less fortunate. I wonder Paula ever stop to think about ill fortune of the dead frozen animals she was tossing…or of the irony of the incident since she is a spokesperson for the nation’s top pork producer — Smithfield Foods.
2. I’m thankful for all the attention over this past year that the media has given to the myriad of issues surrounding consuming animal products—the environment, the lack of sustainability considering population growth, the impact on our health and finally, more than ever, about the ways in which farmed animals are treated. It’s finally happening friends! People are starting to care!
1. I’m thankful for all the animals at the Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary that we have been able to help and care for. Each of them is an individual whose life matters very much to them—and to us–and we love each of them dearly. They make our fight easier by showing visitors how unique, friendly, sentient and forgiving animals can be when shown kindness and are allowed to live a normal life with others of their kind.
Once again, it’s a glorious Meatless Monday! Today, Andy Glick is here to share the first part of his experiences in the animal rights movement in Woodstock, NY…
Ingrid Newkirk, PETA
I feel very fortunate to have been involved in the Animal Rights (AR) movement since the early days. In 1989, I formed a group in Woodstock, NY, called WARM (Woodstock Animal Rights Movement). For a few years prior to starting WARM, I had been an avid follower and contributor to PETA and other national groups that were gaining popularity at that time. Some of the many inspirational leaders and organizations at the time included: Ingrid Newkirk and Alex Pacheco (PETA), the Fund for Animals with Cleveland Amory, Friends of Animals, Neal Barnard (PCRM), Gary Francione (professor of AR Law at Rutgers and director of the first AR legal clinic at his school), and Dr Michael Klaper (medical doctor, author of “Vegan Nutrition” and “Pregnancy, Children and the Vegan Diet”, lecturer, and one of the very few ethical Vegan doctors at the time).
To add some perspective to all this, “Animal Liberation” (by Peter Singer) was published in 1975. PETA was formed in 1980 and a year later, PETA conducted an undercover investigation inside a primate research lab at the Institute of Behavioral Research in Silver Spring Maryland. Alex Pacheco took photos of the chimps and monkeys that were at the lab and turned them over to the police. The researcher, Dr. Edward Taub, was arrested and the lab was shut down. Eventually, this became the first animal-testing case to be heard by the United States Supreme Court. PETA gained national attention (and notoriety) and the AR movement took off in earnest from that point on.
The decade of the 60’s and all that it stood for was still very much alive when the Animal Rights movement was formed. Many people of the 60’s generation were involved in AR…it became their next big cause to fight for. It was a time of discovery in a sense. The curtains were being pulled aside for the first time on nightmares that had long existed for animals. We started to see what was going on behind the scenes in animal laboratories. We learned of the horrors of the fur trade, animals used in entertainment, hunting (and canned hunts), puppy mills and kill shelters, animals used for food, the dairy industry, the effects of eating animals on our health, animals and the legal system, animals used for clothing, dissection…and on and on.
We felt that since we had documentation, videos and testimonies to “prove” it, that all we had to do was go public and present all this newly uncovered information and everyone would be appalled and irate. Finally, great changes would start to occur right away. We had the drive and the passion and the intellect to affect the sorely needed change. It was even said that after Civil Rights and Women’s Rights, it was now time for Animal Rights, and this could quite possibly be the greatest upheaval of all, since so much of society was built upon the backs of animals. But, things didn’t go quite so smoothly, or quite as fast as we would have liked.
On a personal level, I felt I needed to be more involved in Animal Rights on a daily basis and so, in 1989, I decided to start WARM (Woodstock Animal Rights Movement). I placed my first graphic photo ad in the Woodstock Times (a picture of two terrified monkeys in a tight embrace, huddling in the back of a small cage with terror and fear in their eyes) and announced the first meeting of WARM. To my surprise, about thirty people showed up, and we were off to a good start!
I began to hold monthly meetings at the Woodstock Town Hall. Attendance varied from ten to thirty people. I used to bring in photocopies to hand out of recent Animal Rights news, local topics of interest, and suggestions and ideas for campaigns that we could do as a group. We also formed a smaller core group that met separately. This core group broke off into special interest areas: lab testing and cruelty free products, companion animals, hunting, food, entertainment, etc. Each group was to be self directed and come up with its own campaigns.
At the time, there was a feeling of unity within the grassroots community. Perhaps it was because the movement was so new and we were all running full steam ahead for the same goals. And there was also a sense of these groups “belonging” to the larger picture and agendas of the national groups. We were their helpers in a sense. They had the larger memberships and the funds and the exposure, and came up with many of the ideas for campaigns. We would then join in and do our part, along with our own separate issues.
River Phoenix
As a grassroots group, we were involved in many exciting pursuits and projects. From the start, we began to publish and mail out a newsletter (no email back then) telling of our local campaigns and projects and showing what people could do and how to help. We held public lectures on Animal Rights at our local Town Hall. We were honored to have Ingrid Newkirk visit us and give a presentation to a standing room only crowd (hecklers and all). In 1990, Howard Lyman came to Woodstock and spoke about the Beyond Beef campaign. He warned us of a disease we had never heard of called “Mad Cow”, or CJD. Other WARM activities included holding hunting demos every year, hosting local Thanksgiving dinners, organizing a Spay/Neuter benefit, and exposing the cruelty involved in school dissection. One of the special highlights for us was meeting River Phoenix when he was visiting Woodstock with his band. He agreed to do a benefit for WARM at a local night-club!
WARM was very active in pushing for change in legislation. We worked on an anti leg-hold trap legislation and collected petitions for our local legislatures to ban the current leg trap bills that were coming up in session. We were also helpful in assisting other groups in persuading former Governor Mario Cuomo to veto the “Hunting Bear with Dogs” bill. Some members of WARM went to Hegins Pennsylvania to protest and disrupt the infamous yearly gruesome Hegins Pigeon Shoot. A few of our members were arrested there but we put up bail and they all returned home safely. Many of us also went to Washington, DC for the great 1990 March for Animals (and then the follow up and lesser March in 1996). The first march drew about 50,000 people and was a great show of strength. I attended all of the national Animal Rights conferences that I could get to and was thrilled to meet all the other activists and leaders and was inspired beyond my wildest dreams.
While all this was going on, I was formulating an idea for a Cruelty-Free store…Part II tomorrow!
People deserve to feel beautiful, inside and out. Feeling good about how you look increases confidence, thereby creating opportunities which can lead to constructive change, more energy, and even a more vibrant community. And then you feel even better, and the cycle continues.
Word!
To make yourself look/smell/feel lovely, you probably use cosmetics (creams, makeup, deodorant, etc). Most of us do- on average, American women use 10 a day, men use six a day.
But. There is an un-lovely fact that I hope that you’ll share widely: In the U.S. it is legal for the $50 billion cosmetics industry to put unlimited amounts of chemicals into personal care products, including chemicals linked to cancer and hormone disruption. In fact, cosmetics are among the least-regulated products on the market.
A woman using 10 personal care products a day exposes herself to approximately 130 unique chemicals, some of which can be potent even in super-small amounts. As the day goes on, she is probably also exposed to food pesticides, water contaminants (including hormones), air pollution, flame retardants in furniture, and BPA in plastic water containers. These exposures add up.
Some folks say, “Yeah, but so what? We’re all exposed, and we’re all fine.” I wish that were the case. We’re not all fine.
At the same time that unsafe and untested chemicals have been steadily introduced into our environment, learning and behavioral disorders, reproductive problems, and breast cancer incidence have dramatically risen. A growing body of evidence has linked the pollutants and man-made chemicals in our environment to the increasing risk of breast cancer and other diseases. The Breast Cancer Fund, a founding member of the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, has a great fact sheet on some of the cosmetics ingredients of concern.
Now listen up, because this is just whack: While the rates of breast cancer rise (beyond what genetics and increased detection can account for), products marketed to women and girls contain carcinogens – including products that we slather on our faces and bodies, paint on our lips and eyelids, and wash with in the shower while our pores are wide open, on a daily basis.
Women with cancer are no different- they want to feel as well and as sexy (crazy-sexy-well, actually) as possible. Knowing this, the American Cancer Society and Personal Care Products Council (the cosmetics industry trade group) joined forces to create Look Good, Feel Better (LGFB), workshops which provide beauty tips and cosmetics for cancer patients. Sounds like a great service, right?
Well, it would be, if the products in the LGFB kits were free of carcinogens, neurotoxins and hormone disruptors, or chemicals even suspected of having these Über-serious effects. Some of the corporate donors for LGFB are companies that not only use dangerous or suspect ingredients, but actively lobby against legislation that would make cosmetics safer for those of us who do not have cancer and would like to avoid getting it, or those of us living with it and trying to look and feel better. (See my colleague Stacy Malkan’s book Not Just A Pretty Face for the scoop on the trade group’s and big companies’ opposition to safer cosmetics legislation.)
The system is clearly broken when we allow carcinogens in products given to cancer patients. And it is simply egregious that some large companies that could make safer products are not doing so, and are instead launching projects like Look Good, Feel Better, and profiting off of pink ribbons.
This really fires me up, and gets me out of bed in the morning to go work for change via the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics.
The Campaign is a grassroots coalition- and we need you. Got 2 minutes for cancer prevention and corporate accountability? Please join the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics– and help to make cosmetics safe for everyone. Have more time? Great! Contact us and tell us how you’d like to use your voice, your blog, your skills, your company to tell the public, cosmetics companies and elected officials that cancer is not inevitable, hundreds of thousands of cases can be prevented, and we will no longer allow dangerous ingredients in common consumer products like cosmetics.
Mia Davis is the National Grassroots Coordinator of the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, and an all around Toxics Avenger who has worked on getting bisphenol A (BPA) off of store shelves throughout the country. Mia speaks and writes often for the Campaign, and works in collaboration with a diverse network of activists, citizens, health affected communities and scientists. When she’s not organizing to make the world less toxic she enjoys reading, cooking and eating, and the company of her amazing friends, family and creatures. www.safecosmetics.org, and follow Mia on Twitter @nontoxicissexy
