Animal Writings

-- Bradley Millar

"Its [foie gras'] texture meltingly soft as a chocolate truffle, its flavor a mouth-filling meatiness sweetness that helps justify humanity's million-year struggle to the top of the food chain."

"Chou used the fact that foie gras has been around for a long time to imply that its continued practice is defensible. Following that logic, we could defend the practice of human slavery, which has been around since the dawn of civilization. Anyone who has any natural analytic sense or has taken Philosophy 101 can tell you that we cannot justify a practice using the basis of culture or tradition."

"There is a story told of St Kevin of Glendalough. Standing at prayer in a traditional Celtic monastic position with his arms outstretched in the form of a cross, a blackbird came and built a nest and laid her eggs in it. In order not to disturb the eggs, St Kevin stayed in the position until the eggs were hatched. At one point an angel came to Kevin and ordered him to stop the penance. The saint replied, 'It is no great thing for me to bear this pain of holding my hand under the blackbird for the sake of heaven's king.'"

"There is more than this simple cooperation with creation however. There is also the harmony that the animals themselves bring to the human sphere."

"This may be the reason why pets are so important to humans. It is a sign of the new creation, of the restoration of kinship between two different parts of creation. With one or two (or more!) animals in the household, it is an icon of both Paradise and of the kingdom of God as each of us are called to name our animals as Adam did, and live in communion with them without fear. This is a way in which it can be said that our pets smell in us the fragrance, or, one might say, the perfume, of Adam before the fall.

To paraphrase Isaiah, when the human can lie down with the cat, or the dog, or the guinea pig, or, God help us, the snake, we aid the advancement of the Kingdom just a little, work to recreate Paradise just a little, and so give new meaning to such menial tasks as cleaning out the litter box."

"Our Mission
The mission of the Chimpanzee Collaboratory is: To make significant and measurable progress in protecting the lives and establishing the legal rights of chimpanzees.

The State of Chimpanzees Today
Chimpanzees and other great apes are disappearing from their natural habitats in Africa and Asia at an alarming and unprecedented rate. Several factors are responsible for the decline of these species, the most serious being deforestation, the bushmeat trade, and capture for use as research subjects and pets. Around the world thousands of chimpanzees are living in captivity in research laboratories, zoos, entertainment facilities and as pets in peoples' homes. A small number of fortunate animals have been retired to sanctuaries.

Chimpanzees are highly intelligent and sensitive animals, capable of complex thoughts and actions. With emotions similar to those we call joy, anger, grief, sorrow, pleasure, boredom and depression, these remarkable animals are mentally and physiologically similar to humans. Ironically, because of these similarities, chimpanzees are used and abused by humans in the name of science, entertainment and education. Conveniently, however, they are seen by society to be just different enough that they have been deprived of the most basic legal rights."

"[Biologist Marian Stamp] Dawkins explains that if hens kept all their lives on wire floors are suddenly given access to a floor of wood-shavings or peat, they have 'an immediate and strong preference for these more natural floors over the wire ones. ... They dustbathe, eat particles of peat and scratch with their feet. It is not just the extra comfort afforded by a soft floor that attracts them, but all the behavior they can do there as well.'

By contrast, when hens are forced to stand and sit on wire mesh, their feet can become sore, cracked and deformed. The hen's claws, which are designed to scratch vigorously, and thus stay short and blunt, become long, thin, twisted and broken. They can curl around the wire floor and entrap the hen, causing her to starve to death inches from her food and water.

The overriding issue is that hens are birds with behavior patterns that have no outlet in a cage. And it isn't just animal advocates who point this out.

Concerning battery cages for hens, Dr. Lesley Rogers writes in her book, The Development of Brain and Behaviour in the Chicken: 'In no way can these living conditions meet the demands of a complex nervous system designed to form a multitude of memories and to make complex decisions.'"

"Animal producers often talk about the animals they raise and slaughter for food as if the animals themselves did not exist. Either that or they claim that their animals are happy and healthy, even when the evidence shows otherwise.

A double standard prevails. If animal advocates say, for example, that a hen confined in a battery cage is miserable, we’re accused of anthropomorphism — of attributing human feelings to chickens — but if egg producers say the hen is happy, the claim is accepted as 'science.'

In reality, animal producers may be more justly accused of anthropomorphism than animal advocates, if, by this word, it means the attribution of human feelings to other species in order to justify exploiting them.

For example, in a recent article in Feedstuffs (July 18), Trent Loos writes that if today’s 'food' animals could speak, 'I am sure they, too, would tell you of the pride they feel about their role in the cycle of life.' You can’t get more anthropomorphic than that."

Real Men are kind to animals.

Or -- Maybe the Question Should Be: "Do We Feel Pain?"

^*Quoted by Richard Schwartz, author of Judaism and Vegetarianism, in Judaism and Animal Rights: Clasical and Contemporary Responses

By Eileen McAfee

Since "Richmond", I have worked with many localities to help improve conditions in their pounds/shelters. Most often I did this quietly, behind the scenes, with no media publicity nor negative PR for the locality. I have spoken before City Councils, Boards of Supervisors, the Board of Agriculture and the General Assembly about the issue of impounded animals. Nothing, however, prepared me for the response of the Chesterfield County Board of Supervisors when I, and five other speakers, made a presentation to them on April 13, 2005 about ongoing animal abuse at the Chesterfield Pound. Their response was nothing less than a well-orchestrated, well-rehearsed ambush of private citizens by police and administrative officials. (The Chesterfield Pound is under the Police Department. The Pound Manager is a Police Captain. She is referred to by staff as "The Captain".)


Data from the Office of the State Veterinarian documents that the Chesterfield Pound has the highest number of animals "Found Dead in Cage" of any pound/shelter in Virginia: 525 in 2003, 481 in 2004. The Pound takes in over 6,000 animals per year and has a 1.2 million dollar budget. In her defense, the Pound Manager states she is the only manager who honestly reports the number of dead. Since there are currently 136 pounds and shelters in VA, this would mean 135 Managers are dishonest.)

For at least 10 years, employees, volunteers and private citizens have met with Chesterfield Police officials and administrators in an attempt to remedy problems at the pound, to no avail.

Five former employees met at my home with Style Weekly Reporter Brandon Walters and gave eyewitness accounts of animal cruelty at the facility. (The employees had quit their jobs because they could no longer tolerate conditions at the pound; they had not been fired and were, therefore, not "disgruntled" employees seeking retaliation.)

They alleged the "bagging" (in plastic bags) of dying animals who were then placed onto a truck in the hot sun to finish the dying process without benefit of any veterinary care nor humane euthanasia; the high mortality rate of animals who were simply found dead in their cages because of a lack of veterinary care; and many other abusive practices.

They reported that during their "Exit Interviews" with Human Resources, HR staff took "pages and pages of notes" documenting their complaints, but no changes were made at the pound.

In August, 2004 — exactly one year ago — I met with Major Thierry Dupuis and presented him with a four-page list of alleged violations. Major Dupuis seemed very concerned and sincere. I sent him a "thank you" note the following day for our productive meeting.

1. Cats are transported to the gas chamber in an inhumane manner. They are gathered up in a rough manner by the chamber operator and crammed together into one cage (known as "the hearse"). They end up sitting on top of each other; their legs protrude out of the open wire cage. They are terrified and bite, scratch and fight with each other. The "hearse" is then placed in the chamber and the cats are all gassed together — fighting until they succumb.


2. The chamber is overcrowded with dogs. The dogs fight with each other in the chamber while being gassed.


3. Sick, injured, elderly, and pregnant animals who are unable to walk are dragged by a catchpole down the corridor inside the shelter to the outdoors where they continue to be dragged over to the gas chamber and are gassed. Most of these animals have upper respiratory illness and cannot properly assimilate the gas for a humane death.


4. Animals are not determined to be dead before they are disposed of at the landfill. The pound has no functioning stethoscope. Other means of determining death are not always used: Thoracic palpation, corneal reflex, toe pinch and visual observation.


5. Cages and bowls are filthy.


6. Animals are not separated by sex, age, size and temperament. Animals have become pregnant at the pound. Vicious fights between dogs result in serious injury and death.


7. Animals are intentionally sprayed with high pressure water hoses during cleaning of cages. Animals become soaking wet from head to toe with water and hazardous chemicals. Feces and urine is sprayed up onto them. Animals' eyes become infected. They suffer burns from the chemicals on their abdomens, feet and testicles. Their mouths are burned when they lick themselves for relief.


8. Illness is rampant. Sick and healthy animals are housed together.


9. Animals routinely go without veterinary care. The contract Veterinarian, Dr. William Dunnavant, never comes into the pound to treat animals. Few animals requiring veterinary care are ever taken to him.


10. The pound manager has no training at all in animal care or pound management.


11. The pound manager and the chamber operator falsified State Veterinarian Inspection Reports by affixing their signatures and initials to these official government documents, verifying, when asked by inspectors, that cats were transported and gassed humanely, according to law, when they were not.


12. Animals suspected of rabies are decapitated (as required to diagnose rabies), but in full view of cats housed in the room in which the decapitation is performed.

Within two weeks of our meeting and without ever contacting me for a follow-up meeting, I was shocked to read a statement in the Chesterfield Observer by Major Dupuis that "all allegations are unfounded." I had not contacted the media at that point and I had told Dupuis in our meeting that I would not. My preference was to quietly and confidentially resolve the problems. I then saw Major Dupuis in a completely different light and not the honest, concerned, gentleman he appeared to be at our meeting.

Many incidents of retaliation by the County against me have occurred in an effort to make me "go away". They will be detailed in a future posting. But I didn't go away and I didn't stop. My motto, "I'm not stopping!" has carried me through the process with Chesterfield that ultimately resulted in their (finally, as of August 8, 2005) acknowledging and correcting violations.


Several weeks before our presentation, we had to request, in writing, to speak to the Board, and state our topic of discussion. Each speaker's name was listed on the Meeting Agenda. Speakers were allocated five minutes, with a total time of 30 minutes for our entire presentation. No personal attacks were allowed. These were all reasonable requirements.

Six of us registered to speak. We were: An attorney, two teachers, a former social worker and two homemakers. NONE of us belong to any animal rights groups nor terrorist organizations, etc.

The only organizations I personally belong to are: 1.) A culinary guild, and 2.) A Task Force on animal cruelty and human violence. I serve on the Executive Committee of this organization along with two other individuals. Membership of the task force consists of representatives from Richmond, Henrico and Chesterfield County Commonwealth Attorneys Offices, the U.S. Attorney's Office, the Attorney General's Office, Animal Control Officers and Police Officers from the foregoing localities. I belong to no animal rights organizations. I am not a member of any animal advocacye group, though my husband and I have contributed financially to some of them.

Our total group, including speakers, consisted of 30 individuals who were present in the audience in support of the issue. We were all professional in dress, conduct and presentations.

Noticeable because of their numbers, was the large contingency of police officers and police officials present. There were at least 50 officers. Since this was our first time speaking before the Board, if any of us thought twice about it, I think we assumed (as did I), that there was police business before the Board.

Likewise with the Court Reporter sitting at the dais along with the Board of Supervisors — just a County employee recording the minutes. We learned later from a Reporter that the police were geared up for a possible riot situation and the Court Reporter worked for an attorney hired by the Pound Manager.

Each of our speakers, four of whom were eyewitnesses to many of the violations, presented a portion of the whole story. We gave accounts of animal abuse, cruelty and neglect occurring at the pound, for which no one was being held accountable, and the falsification of State Veterinarian Inspection Reports by Pound Management, again with no one held accountable. We did not mention anyone by name.

I made two recommendations:

1. That the County call in the State Police to investigate in order to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest by the Chesterfield Police investigating one of their own. Eight months had transpired since I first brought the problems to the Police Dept. and nothing had been done to investigate nor hold anyone accountable. As stated above, within two weeks of my first meeting with police officials, Major Dupuis announced to the media that all allegations were "unfounded". During the intervening eight months, police officials (Chief Baker and Major Dupuis) appeared on television denigrating me and stating my accusations were untrue, groundless and unfounded.


2. Hire either the Humane Society of the United States or the ASPCA, two organizations that have pound/shelter outreach programs to evaluate procedures and practices at the pound. I called it a "win-win" remedy. If they found nothing wrong, then so be it, "your critics will be silenced". If they found problems, they would help the County remedy them and "your critics will sing your praises."

Subsequently, my husband and I offered to pay for the entire cost of an evaluation: ten thousand dollars. Chesterfield County Administrator Lane Ramsey responded by acknowledging our "generous offer", but wrote, "your money would be better spent donating it to the pound."

I gave the Board a file folder that contained:

• The list of alleged violations with their concomitant VA Criminal Codes and/or the State Veterinarian Guidelines, Rules or Regulations governing each alleged violation.


• Correspondence to me from Captain Daniel Kelly admitting that cats had been gassed inhumanely, but stating their case was "closed".


• Copies of the falsified State Veterinarian Inspection Reports for the years 1998 through 2004 which were signed and initialed by management attesting to State Veterinary Inspectors that cats were not gassed inhumanely.


• Names and contact numbers of witnesses and the incidents they observed.


• Correspondence from me to Captain Kelly offering, on two occasions, to bring witnesses forward to the Police to be interviewed. (I received no response from Captain Kelly).


• The Internal Audit of the Pound — by their own auditors — that showed other records had been falsified.

After we all had spoken, I was called back up before the Board by Member Renny Bush-Humphrey and threatened by Member Kelly Miller about having accused people of criminal behavior for falsifying government records. Bush-Humphrey asked me: "For the record, are you saying..." (she reiterated my allegations). I responded "Yes". Bush-Humphrey, very concerned, asked Chairman Ed Barber to "Please look into what Ms. McAfee means about a conflict of interest." Mr. Barber noted that he would certainly do this.

Board Members "Dickie" King, Renny Bush-Humphrey and Kelly Miller all stated their support for and friendship with the Manager. (They stated her name.) "Dickie" King asked the audience if they had seen the movie, "The Texas Chain-Saw Massacre", stating that he had never heard of anything more horrific than what I had presented since seeing the movie.

Since I obviously already knew I was being tape recorded, televised and a Court Reporter was transcribing our statements, I thought it was odd to be called back up. An attorney later told me it was nothing less than an attempt to intimidate me and make me back down from my statements — a common ploy by some officials.

Board Chairman Ed Barber then asked the Chief of Police, "Are your people ready?" Police Chief Col. Carl Baker, Captain Daniel Kelly, Contract Veterinarian Dr. William Dunnavant and three citizen supporters spoke (Carl Wilkins, Joe Lay and Gail Lay). None of them were listed on the Meeting Agenda and none of them had a time limit. In the end, it would be clear that "personal attacks" were allowed for special people. (Unbeknownst to us at the time, the citizens who spoke in support of the pound and its Manager are volunteers with the Police Department, as is the Pound Manager.)

They described us as animal rights terrorists, "people who destroy laboratories, release the animals and throw blood on people wearing fur coats." They also accused us of doing something in boats — I don't remember exactly what, only that it was something very bad. Carl Wilkins quoted statements from unidentified sources about animal rights terrorists. He said he was "in the process of connecting the dots" and though (he) hadn't "quite connected them all yet" as soon as he did, the Board "would be the first to know." This was an insinuation that we were all connected to some subversive organizations.

Joe Lay told the Board it was "time to draw a line in the sand" and say 'No More!' to people like us.

The Police speakers stated I had no evidence to substantiate any of the allegations; all my allegations were "unfounded"; and that none of what I alleged were criminal violations. Captain Kelly stated "When I met with Mrs. McAfee...", though we had never met; I had never even seen him before the meeting. He also stated, "She admitted writing an anonymous letter (to us) in 2002", though I had previously specifically denied writing the letter when it was shown to me by a police official. (The letter outlined serious animal abuse allegations). Inexplicably, Captain Kelly, "in charge" of the "investigation", insisted on calling me "Mrs. Mackelfee" throughout his presentation. Call me picky, but something tells me he knew my real name.)

Board Chairman Ed Barber then turned to Member Kelly Miller and said: "I know you have some things you want to say. Even though we're to break for dinner, go ahead and take all the time you need". (Translation: to beat up Mrs. McAfee for having dared to criticize one of our own!)

As I sat in the front row, without benefit of a microphone and at a much lower level that Miller who was up on the dais with a microphone, Miller proceeded to angrily accuse me, while pointing at me, of "going to the Commonwealth Attorney's Office" with witnesses in order to file a criminal complaint. When I stood up and politely said, "May I tell you what Mr. Davenport said?" (my exact words) he retorted, "You be quiet; I don't want to hear from you!" I sat down.

Miller then told the audience (which included the television audience as well), they had made a big mistake in selecting someone like me to lead them and they had done a disservice to their cause.

He accused me of having sent him and other Board members, "the most malicious, willfully harmful letters I have ever read! And Madame, you have crossed the line!" (Subsequently, exercising my Freedom of Information Act rights, I requested copies of letters written by me that anyone deemed malicious and harmful or in any way unprofessional. The County responded they had none to send me.)

Miller then accused me of "probably being one of those people who support partial-birth abortion!" and carried on about it being the most horrendous abomination that has happened to mankind. He berated me further by stating, "I didn't see YOU down at the General Assembly opposing it!"

Because I asked, "Why are we talking about this?" — with a waive of his arm he ordered a Deputy Sheriff to "Remove this woman!" (My sense was he would really have liked to say, "Off with her head!") The Deputy, looking as puzzled as I felt, walked over to me and we walked out together.^*

Although I distantly heard a male voice say, "Ma'am, don't leave; I don't want you to leave", in the shock of it all, I couldn't tell where the voice came from. When I watched a tape of the meeting, I learned it was Board Chairman Ed Barber's voice. I subsequently was told by an attorney that only the Chairman has the authority to have a citizen removed from a Board Meeting; Mr. Miller had overstepped his limitations. On the other hand...maybe Mr. Barber didn't want me to leave, because they weren't through beating me up...<sup>**

*</sup>A reporter told me this was the second time Miller had done this to a woman. He ordered a woman out last winter. It was late at night, cold and raining and he made her leave the building. She had to wait outside, alone, in the dark, until the person providing transportation for her came out of the meeting. The driver did not realize she had to actually leave the building, stayed in the meeting and the woman was left standing outside for a long time.

^**Surprisingly, the Minutes of the April 13 meeting make no mention whatsoever of Board Member Kelly Miller's "partial-birth abortion" diatribe and do not document that a Deputy Sheriff was ordered to remove me. Although I have asked that the minutes be corrected, they were not.


In 1999, to silence my criticism about deplorable conditions and practices occurring in the City of Richmond pound, City officials maliciously and very publicly accused me of "racism" — among many other actions — to defame me and destroy my credibility. They sent this false accusation far and wide, all the way up to the Governor.

Unbeknownst to them at the time, I had worked for L.A. County DPSS (welfare department) for many years. My AFDC caseload of 140 families (the equivalent of 700 individuals), was 95 percent minorities. I held degrees in Criminal Justice and Social Work.

I sued the City for defamation. During settlement conferences, the city tried to get me to drop my charges of perjury, Witness tampering and obstruction of justice against the Pound Manager (all of which occurred during the course of litigation and the city's determination to "win at any cost"), by stating the Pound Manager was "a single mother" — give her a break.

Unbeknownst to them, I had raised my child completely alone from the time she was 16 months old until age 20, when I remarried. I worked and/or went to school full time to support us. Being a "single mother" does not equate to a privilege to break the law.

When my daughter was ten, I went to college. I received two degrees in three years and graduated Magna cum Laude with plans to immediately enter graduate school to pursue masters degrees in Social Work and Gerontology. (If there were two of me, I would take on the treatment of patients in nursing homes, which is often very similar to the treatment of animals in pounds/shelters across the nation, in that the helpless are taken advantage of and abused by the people who control them.)

My daughter's diagnosis of Ewing's sarcoma (bone cancer) at age 13 put these plans on hold. She was hospitalized many times for tests, surgery and the effects of aggressive, multi-modality chemotherapy; her clavicle was resected; she suffered second and third degree radiation burns, a stroke, and almost died on two occasions. She missed all of eighth and ninth grades.

On April 13, 2005, I (and others) was maliciously maligned as an animal rights terrorist by the Chesterfield County Board of Supervisors. I was portrayed as someone who would "firebomb" animal labs, release the animals, throw blood on people wearing fur coats, and do something in "boats" (I'm not sure what — only that it was something very bad.) The pound vet, Dr. William Dunnavant, opened his remarks to the Board with the statement he "feared for his safety and that of his staff", though no Board member ever asked "Why?"

Unbeknownst to my current accusers, my husband, Dr. Donald McAfee, is a neuroscientist, a professor of pharmacology and a "pharmaceutical executive". For the last fourteen years, among many other projects, he has worked laboriously on taking a single molecule from "the bench to market". This drug, which targets Parkinson's Disease, is now in its final stages and will be available to the public in about two years. It has been tested in thousands of patients across the U.S. and Europe. So effective is it in releasing patients from their "frozen" bodies, the FDA has allowed these "test" patients to continue to receive it, a rare occurrence when a clinical trial ends.

Unbeknownst to my current accusers, I worked as a social worker in oncology in a major cancer research hospital. "My" hospital's animal facilities were broken into by the Animal Liberation Front (ALF). The animals were taken and some of the labs destroyed. Years of research suffered.

We were all outraged by the ALF's unconscionable actions, seeing them as ultimately harming patients who otherwise would have benefitted from the fruits of this now-destroyed research. We spoke out to the media and decried the ALF's vicious acts. We felt personally insulted and personally attacked by ALF's allegations of wrongdoing by "our" hospital. We dug in our heels, adopting the attitude that we were right and our accusers wrong.

Unbeknownst to me at the time, this would be my awakening to how animals are treated in some research laboratories and, eventually, my knowledge about the mistreatment of animals in many pounds and shelters.

Ultimately, the Federal Government stepped in and investigated practices in our hospital's labs. Federal grant money was suspended. New guidelines for animal care were instituted and the physical environment for the animals upgraded. Gradually, very gradually, our attitudes changed about who was right and who was wrong, though I don't like to use the terms "right and wrong" in a situation like this. It was more of a need to open our minds and allow ourselves to be educated about the problems in order to fix them.

I am known for my phrase "I'm not stopping!" This commitment came about as a result of watching Jill, my precious child, my only child, dying. This once physically beautiful adolescent (to say nothing of her inner beauty and grace), lay face down on the floor one night in the bedroom we shared. She was too sick to sleep in her own room, alone. Her skeletal body, partially paralyzed on one side from an adverse effect of Vincristine, and her bald head, once covered with waist-length blonde hair, made her almost unrecognizable to me. She couldn't speak. She slowly raised one hand off the rug and tapped the floor with it. She gently shook her head back and forth — I knew what she was trying to tell me: "No, no...no more; I can't go through any more", and I knew it was time to let her go. She had suffered enough; the treatment had become worse than the disease.

If my heart could break any more than it already had throughout our long journey which brought us to the point we were that night — laying on the rug together, alone — then I guess it did. I held her frail body in my arms; both of us quietly sobbing; we had no strength left.

Unbeknownst to me, an inner, spiritual strength I didn't even know I possessed, started welling up in me. My feelings of resignation and acceptance of the inevitable were replaced with a powerful sense of determination and commitment. I wasn't going to stop; I wasn't going to give up. I sat up and with a voice of confidence and hope, told my daughter, "I'm not stopping! I may lose you to cancer, but I'm not going to lose you because we didn't do everything we could to save you!"

I may not be successful in helping to remedy the problems at the Chesterfield County Pound, but it won't be for lack of trying.

My daughter survived; she is married, has three little children, lives in and works for several European government agencies as a bioterrorism consultant and will receive her Doctorate in Political Science this year. We are very lucky...and blessed.

As for my husband, despite Board members Renny Bush-Humphrey, "Dickie" King and Kelly Miller's vicious attacks on me at the Board Meeting, were they stricken with Parkinson's Disease, he would be there to offer them information about the disease and about "his" drug. He would only ask one thing in return: Keep an open mind to what you are hearing from your critics. Can they all be wrong?



Next Post: Retaliation and Cover-Up by Chesterfield Officials

My name is Eileen McAfee and I live in Virginia. I became interested in improving Virginia's animal pounds and shelters in 1996, after seeing and reading shocking media stories of animal abuse by staff at the City of Richmond Animal Pound (not to be confused with the Richmond SPCA which is professionally and humanely administered.)

Among many other cruel and illegal practices, untrained and uncertified staff at the Richmond pound performed euthanasia on fully conscious (no sedation) dogs by hoisting them up on their hind legs with a catch pole, attempting to stick them in the heart with a syringe and inject euthanasia solution into their heart. Cats were "heart stuck" by being held down on the floor by a staff member's foot. The impossibility of actually hitting the heart of an animal frantically struggling as s/he dangled at the end of a catchpole or under someone's boot, resulted in the syringe most often striking the lung and the animal literally drowning in his/her own blood. That was euthanasia at our tax-supported pound: strangling, stabbing and drowning helpless animals.

Were it not for the courage of two very brave Animal Control Officers (ACOs) who took their story to the media (after having informed City management to no avail), we would have never known about this cruel practice. Needless to say, both ACOs were fired.

It took three very long years for me, dedicated and caring pound employees, and several other citizens to remedy the problems at the City of Richmond pound. Efforts included the filing of two lawsuits by my husband and me against the City, the Pound Manager Selina Deale, and her cohort: Richmond Deputy Administrator Anthony Romanello.

It should be completely unnecessary for private citizens to have to "fix" these public facilities. There is often great personal risk involved as well as enormous financial expense when citizens, out of necessity and a sense of commitment, undertake this task. (Details of the Richmond pound and our lawsuits will be posted in the future.)

In 1999, I reviewed State Veterinarian Inspection Reports for all (110) pounds and shelters in Virginia which were on file with the Office of Veterinary Services. Using the Inspectors' own words, documents and findings, I discovered that only 10% of our facilities were in compliance with State Laws, Regulations, Rules and Guidelines. I produced a Report entitled, "The State of Virginia's Pound & Shelters."

In 2002, I updated this report for the Governor's Commission on Efficiency and Effectiveness in Government. My focus was the Office of Veterinary Services and the waste of taxpayer dollars in the administration of Virginia's pounds and shelters. By 2002, there were 136 pounds and shelters in Virginia; a mere 4% were in compliance.

"The live cows cause a lot of injuries," said Martin Fuentes, an IBP worker whose arm was kicked and shattered by a dying cow. "The line is never stopped simply because an animal is alive."

The hitch, IBP workers say, is that some "stunned" cattle wake up. "If you put a knife into the cow, it's going to make a noise: It says, 'Moo!'" said Moreno, the former second-legger, who began working in the stockyard last year. "They move the head and the eyes and the leg like the cow wants to walk."

"I've seen thousands and thousands of cows go through the slaughter process alive," IBP veteran Fuentes, the worker who was injured while working on live cattle, said in an affidavit. "The cows can get seven minutes down the line and still be alive. I've been in the side-puller where they're still alive. All the hide is stripped out down the neck there."

One worker said IBP pressured him to sign a statement denying that he had seen live cattle on the line. "I knew that what I wrote wasn't true," said the worker, who did not want to be identified for fear of losing his job. "Cows still go alive every day. When cows go alive, it's because they don't give me time to kill them."

IBP, the nation's top beef processor...suggested the events may have been staged...

—Job 12:7-10

"There was a guy that got his hand in a skinner in debone one time. It rips the skin off of chicken thighs and drumsticks to be deboned. It mangled his hand bad enough that he couldn't use it anymore. Don't know where the skin went. It just disappeared into the chicken that went in to become nuggets. I guess someone ate it long ago."

"I got my smock tangled up in the drive chain of our hanging belt one time. Luckily for me, I carried a pretty sharp pocketknife. I whipped it out and cut my smock loose before it pulled me into the gears. I still got into trouble for missing shackles and they charged me $15 for the smock I cut up."

2004 Rodeos: A SHARK Investigation's Reflections

...I also caught on film another significant remark the following weekend in Oregon. Announcer Chad Nicholson, an especially obnoxious rodeo defender, was droning on about "animal rights idiots" spreading falsehoods about rodeo and how they thought they knew more about the rodeo business than the rodeo folks. He said they should be there at the rodeo and get the "real deal." As he was saying this, I was filming a cowboy behind the bucking chute delivering several thousand volts of electricity to a horse.

Cruel or Usual?

The steer leaps from the chute, kicking up a trail of dust. A horse jolts behind, carrying a rope-slinging cowboy.

As the cowboy snares the beast's head and horns, the rope slacks at the steer's feet. But in the momentum of the moving horse, the rope tightens, yanking the steer's legs skyward while its head slams into the dirt. The cowboy rushes to tie its legs.

The rodeo crowd mellows as the steer - a castrated bull weighing some 600 pounds - lies still. Its eyes blink as several rodeo hands roll its motionless body onto a flat wooden palette that is dragged away by horses. Once penned, the creature doesn't get up. It probably can't stand, says Steve Hindi, president of the Illinois-based nonprofit Showing Animals Respect and Kindness (SHARK). Hindi's camera operators covertly caught captured the incident described above during the Professional Rodeo Cowboy's Association's national finals for steer roping in Amarillo, Texas. The steer, Hindi says, appears paralyzed and should have been put out of its misery.

...In its statement, the rodeo association calls describes Hindi's group as extremist.

— The Rev. Andrew Linzey

Corporate animal exploiters, lying through their teeth, often pick some rigged and arbitrary benchmark as proof that the animals are "productive" and thus content and well cared for.

The Fur Commission claims that the thick coat on fur farm animals is the best indicator of their good health. Animals in fur farms go mad from being encaged in a tiny wire-frame prison cell from which they can't escape. Spend a few hours in a closet, or a day in small room, disconnected from your regular world. Now imagine several months of that. You'd go mad, too. The animals suffer from a variety of diseases and disorders including "screw-neck," deafness, sterility, excessive bleeding, and behavioral abnormalities. Most are killed when under a year old, before chronic conditions set in. Tortured animals can produce one season of thick fur with enough genetic and environmental manipulation. It has absolutely no bearing on their mental or physical health; no more than does a child abuse victim's thick head of hair.

Egg producers claim that the high volume of eggs coming out of each battery-caged hen is evidence of the hens' happiness and healthiness. The hens are specially bred to lay high numbers of eggs. The near-constant light in the sheds in which they're housed forces their pituitary glands into overdrive, which makes them lay more eggs. The hens are "spent" after a year or two, and they look pitiful, like death warmed over. After a life in which every tiny joy and deep desire is completely denied, they're slaughtered.

Industrial milk operations not only make false health claims about their product (which makes you gain weight and seems to be inconsequential to bone health), but about the animals they "milk" for maximum profit. They tout the ultra-high milk output of factory farm dairy cows as "high productivity." Cows on modern large-scale dairy farms spend most of their day on dirt or hooked up to milk machines. They're injected with bovine growth hormone, which makes their udders swell and artificially increases milk production. Half are lame by the time they're five years old. Then they're slaughtered.

Lactating women: imagine that through inbreeding and forced hormone injections your milk secretions increased to four times normal volume, and took a debilitating toll on your health. Is this how you would want to be considered "productive?"

These types of lies are disgusting because they whitewash the animals' suffering. They are insulting to the animals and anyone with compassion and common sense. The liars count on — and encourage — consumers being willfully ignorant, gullible, and afraid of the truth. The lies persist because if consumers are fooled, it's good for business.

These lies are the modern equivalent of the plantation owner claiming that he must treat his slaves well, otherwise they wouldn't pick so much cotton.

Two silver linings:

1) We're past the point where the corporate killers are claiming that the animals are incapable of feeling pain or have no quality of life interests. (We still hear that with fish, but watch that fade over the next few years as the evidence of fish having complex brains and emotions becomes overwhelming.)

2) Fur-farm lies in particular are becoming more bizarre and approaching the point where nobody except the most die-hard deniers will believe them, as the fur industry dodges the truth and thinks up new stories to cover up the obvious: the animals made into fur suffer like Hell.

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Related Article:

Milk Machines - Dangers in the Dairy Industry. Discusses the effects of Monsanto's Bovine Growth Hormone (BGH) on cows and humans who drink milk. Includes disturbing account of FDA reviewer who apparently was fired because he raised legitimate concerns about the safety and animal welfare impact of BGH. One case of many in which the hegemony of Monsanto and Government gets rid of complainers.