DawnWatch

DawnWatch: Slaughter of race horses on HBO as horse racing makes news 5/12/08 -- 6/2/08

Wed, 14 May 2008 03:59:00 GMT

Horse racing has been in the news since the Eight Belles Kentucky Derby tragedy (see the DawnWatch report at http://tinyurl.com/4dtuo4) and will surely stay there through the Preakness at Pimlico this Saturday, May 17. There is a wealth of opportunity for letters to the editor about the use and abuse of animals in entertainment, and specifically racing. While it is always worthwhile to respond to articles you find on the web (or that are sent to you on the web) from papers across the country or world, the easiest place to get published is in your local paper, so don't miss the opportunity this week to pick up on any story about racing in your local paper. Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Remember that shorter letters are more likely to be published.

The horse racing section from Thanking the Monkey, which is headed "Derby Winner Dinner," is now available on the website at http://www.thankingthemonkey.com/docs/RunningforTheirLives.pdf
While it is important not to take exact phrases, you may wish to read the section for letter ideas.

Perfectly timed for this season, the HBO show Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel, has included a segment on the slaughter of racing horses. I am yet to see it, but in December 2004 the same show aired a segment on greyhound racing that was superb. (The DawnWatch write-up is at
http://www.dawnwatch.com/12-04_Animal_Media_Alerts.htm#greyhound )

Here is the HBO teaser on the current segment:

"Hidden Horses
Few casual horse racing fans are aware that many former racing horses are slaughtered for profit. When a thoroughbred race horse reaches the end of its career or is simply no longer profitable on the track, it is often taken directly to auction and sold for meat. Because horse slaughter is no longer practiced in this country, these thoroughbreds are now being shipped by 'killer buyers' to slaughterhouses abroad, which are frequently less regulated and less humane than former U.S. slaughterhouses. Correspondent Bernard Goldberg, who recently won the 2008 Sports Emmy(r) for Outstanding Sports Journalism for his 2007 REAL SPORTS story on the NFL concussion crisis, traces the disturbing journey many of these young and healthy horses take from the track, to auctions, to slaughterhouses, and finally to the plates of European and Japanese diners who pay top dollar for the delicacy.
Correspondent: Bernard Goldberg
Producer: Joe Perskie"

The show aired first on Monday May 12, and will air many more times between now and June 2. Go to http://tinyurl.com/pfvo7 to see the schedule and work out when you should be tivoing.

The Animal Welfare Institute has a write-up on the show at
http://www.awionline.org/news/2008/hbo_real_sports.htm
It includes links to action alerts telling you how you can support the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act.

Whether or not you can watch, please make sure the HBO Real Sports producers receive they praise it deserves for taking on this issue. Enthusiastic positive feedback for animal friendly coverage encourages more of it. HBO Real Sports takes comments at:
http://tinyurl.com/39xqh3

I send thanks to the many folks spreading the word to me and others about this show.

A note to DawnWatch subscribers: Because my book came out this month, and the New York launch is this Sunday, my schedule has been crazy and my DawnWatch schedule has suffered. I miss regular DawnWatching terribly. I will be back in the full swing of it by mid June.

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)

Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read advance reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals” and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.

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Date: Tue May 13 21:59:39 2008

DawnWatch: KFI interview on "Thanking the Monkey" and animal cruelty -- 5/3/08

Fri, 09 May 2008 00:30:00 GMT

Wayne Resnick, on Los Angeles's largest talk radio station, KFI, interviewed me about "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way We Treat Animals" on his weekly show last Saturday, May 3.

The twenty minute interview is fun, but also covers some important ground about the shocking omissions under the Federal Animal Welfare Act and Humane Slaughter Laws. It is on the KFI website at
http://tinyurl.com/3jm5eh and starts exactly at 56 minutes. Or, it may be easier to find on my website, beginning right as my interview begins, at:
http://www.thankingthemonkey.com/reviews.php

Listen if you are in the mood, but it is most important that KFI hear that their listeners are happy when these topics are covered. Positive feedback will encourage more animal friendly coverage in the future, so please send a note of thanks to the show. The show email address provided on the website is christopherosbourn@clearchannel.com

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)

Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read advance reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals� and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.

To discontinue DawnWatch alerts go to http://www.DawnWatch.com/nothanks.php

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Date: Thu May 8 18:30:56 2008

DawnWatch: Extraordinary ABC report on egg farm horrors -- 5/5/08 plus NBC 5/6/08

Thu, 08 May 2008 19:32:00 GMT

Folks, apparently the alert below from May 6, on the Mercy For Animals battery cage investigation, did not send properly. (Learn more at www.mercyforanimals.org). So sorry. But it is definitely not too late to watch report and thank the ABC-I-team. Also, since then, on Tuesday May 6, NBC in Los Angeles aired an excellent report, which you can view at http://www.knbc.com/news/16178675/detail.html
(Thanks to Mira Tweti for making sure we saw it.)
Please post a comment on the bottom of that page, and also thank NBC at http://www.knbc.com/contactus/index.html:
It is so important that news stations learn that these stories are of interest to and appreciated by viewers.
---
Here's the alert of Dan Noyes's superb coverage:

Dan Noyes and San Francisco's ABC I-team aired a superb report last night, Monday May 5, on an egg farm investigation.
You can watch it on line at:
http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/iteam&id=6123922
and please post a comment on that page.

I urge anybody who doesn't quite understand why animal advocates don't eat eggs to take a look. It is stomach turning, but as Gretchen Wyler used to say, "We must not refuse to see with our eyes, what they must endure with their bodies."

Here are some of the quotes from the activist in the report:

"In six weeks, I saw so many instances of cruelty to the birds and neglect ....
It is impossible to have any degree of decent animal welfare at all in a battery cage operation."

" It was very common for the birds' necks or wings to get caught in the wire of the cages and a lot of the workers would just keep shoving or hitting the bird to try and push them in as fast as possible."

"When you have birds that have been there for two years, they look like absolute hell, they're missing most of their feathers, their covered in wounds. You see a lot fewer birds per cage because so many of them had died off."

Dan Noyes tells us:
"The activist also caught a manager on video not doing an effective job of wringing one hen's neck. The bird was still alive minutes later.
"He saw a worker stomping another hen.
"'As he's stomping on her, she's reacting to him stomping by trying to struggle and keeps flapping her wings and there were manure pits below those individual cages that were filled up with water, so he kicks her underneath an egg belt and she drowns in the manure water,' said the activist."

The report includes video footage of all of the above.

The coverage comes as California gears up for a ballot initiative that would ban cruel confinement systems including battery cages. It is so important that news teams hear how much their viewers, or their web viewers appreciate this kind of coverage of animal issues. Please, please, thank Dan Noyes and the I-team. Go to
http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/feature?section=resources&id=5792275

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)

Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read advance reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals� and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.

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Date: Thu May 8 13:32:19 2008

DawnWatch: NY Times columnist asks why we keeping giving horse racing "a pass." 5/4/08

Tue, 06 May 2008 03:01:00 GMT

William C. Rhoden, of the New York Times, has written eloquently on horse racing before. I quote him extensively in my section on the issue in Thanking the Monkey. And while every paper has carried the story of the death of Eight Bells at the Kentucky Derby on Saturday, I wish to share Rhoden's column, on the front page of the Sunday, May 4, New York Times sports section.
It is headed "Race's Aftermath Shows Sport's Brutal Side."

Rhoden opens with:

"Why do we keep giving thoroughbred horse racing a pass? Is it the tradition? The millions upon millions invested in the betting?

"Why isn't there more pressure to put the sport of kings under the umbrella of animal cruelty?

"The sport is at least as inhumane as greyhound racing and only a couple of steps removed from animal fighting.

"Is it the fact that horse racing is imbedded in the American fabric? And the Triple Crown is a nationally televised spectacle? Or is it the fact that death on the track is rarely seen by a mainstream television audience?

"The sentiment was summed up by Dr. Larry Bramlage on Saturday when, asked about fillies racing against colts, he said, 'One death is not an epidemic.'

"But this isn't about one death. This is about the nature of a sport that routinely grinds up young horses.

"A national audience was exposed to the bittersweet experience of a tremendous victory by Big Brown and -- moments later -- the stunning news that Eight Belles had been euthanized. As we watched Big Brown's owner celebrate the unmitigated joy of winning the Derby, we watched Bramlage describe the details of Eight Belles's horrible death: She had completed the race, finishing a heroic second to Big Brown. She was around the turn at the start of the backstretch when her front ankles collapsed.

"Bramlage described the sickening image of what had happened: a condylar fracture on the left side and the left front that opened the skin, went through it and was contaminated.

'''She didn't have a front leg to stand on to be splinted and hauled off in the ambulance, so she was immediately euthanized,' Bramlage said.

"And that was that."

Rhoden discusses the reactions of those involved as they tow the industry line. He writes of leaving the stable where he had seen "Eight Belles in a heap." And he ends with:

"Thoroughbred racing is a brutal sport. Why do we keep giving it a pass?"

You'll find the full article on line at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/04/sports/othersports/04rhoden.html

You can thank Rhoden for his stance by emailing him at wcr@nytimes.com
A letter to the editor will keep the story alive on the editorial pages. So please send one to letters@nytimes.com

And why send a letter to your local editor? Smaller papers publish a high proportion of letters they receive.
Don't hesitate to ask me for help if you have trouble finding the correct email address for a letter to your editor.

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Remember that shorter letters are more likely to be published. And please be sure not to use any comments or phrases from me or from any other alerts in your letters. Editors are looking for original responses from their readers.

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)

Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read advance reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals� and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.

To discontinue DawnWatch alerts go to http://www.DawnWatch.com/nothanks.php

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Date: Mon May 5 21:01:58 2008

DawnWatch: Lead NY Times article on goat leg rescue at Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary 5/1/08

Fri, 02 May 2008 02:23:00 GMT

There is a lovely article, featuring Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary, on the front of the Metro section (page B1) of the Thursday, May 1, New York Times. The article, by Fernanda Santos, is headed, "A Rescued Goat Gets a Chance For a Normal Life On Four Legs."

It opens:

"They are both amputees: She lost part of her right leg to bone cancer at the age of 10, and he lost part of his left leg four months ago because of an injury he most likely suffered at a Brooklyn slaughterhouse.

Her name is Jenny Brown, and she is a 36-year-old television producer turned animal rights advocate. His name is Albie, and he is a goat of unknown age and breed.

They met last August, after Albie was plucked from Prospect Park and taken to the animal sanctuary Ms. Brown has owned here since 2004. Albie was malnourished and sickly at the time, his mouth covered in sores, his leg and hoof badly infected, Ms. Brown recalled. His injuries seemed to indicate that he had been hogtied before he broke free and made his way to the park.

Ms. Brown said that she tried to save Albie's leg, treating it with ointments and homeopathic remedies, but that the wound would not heal. In December, Albie's leg was amputated just above the knee.

He is now awaiting a prosthesis, a very rare indulgence for a farm animal. And the same technician who fitted Ms. Brown with a new artificial leg is also designing Albie's.

You'll find the full article on line, including an adorable picture of Jenny and Albie, at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/01/nyregion/01goat.html

It gives us a great opportunity for letters to the editor about the way non human animals are generally treated in our society. The New York Times takes letters at letters@nytimes.com

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Remember that shorter letters are more likely to be published.

You can learn more about the Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary at www.woodstockfas.org

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)

Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read advance reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals� and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.

To discontinue DawnWatch alerts go to http://www.DawnWatch.com/nothanks.php

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Date: Thu May 1 20:23:09 2008

DawnWatch: Veggie baseball star on NY TImes Sports front page 4/27/08

Mon, 28 Apr 2008 19:50:00 GMT

The lead story on the front page of the Sunday New York Times sports section, April 27, is headed "A Cleanup Hitter Who Leaves Something on His Plate." The article, by Alan Schwarz, is about the newly vegetarian sports star, Milwaukee's first baseman, Prince Fielder.

It tells us:
"One of the most gregarious young stars in the sport, Fielder has begun to feel a bit like a circus seal, balancing the ball of vegetarianism on his nose while, all things being equal, still appreciating a good rack of ribs. Fielder, 23, decided to make the switch over the winter after reading how cattle and chickens were treated and 'was totally grossed out,' he said. His wife, Chanel, preferred a no-meat diet as it was, so he embraced a new approach.

"Fielder had been as carnivorous as your average puma -- pushing 200 pounds since he was 12, he scarfed down a 48-ounce porterhouse as a teenager and had barely slowed down since. (He played last year with 270 pounds on his 5-foot-11 frame, not all of it muscle.) But he figured he could get his protein from beans and shakes instead of meat and fish, leading to conversations since the beginning of spring training that have grown quite tiresome.

"Yes, he eats a lot of black bean burgers. No, he does not sneak chicken fingers behind Chanel's back. Yes, he has all the energy he always did, maybe more. No, his slow start (he entered Saturday batting .241 with just three home runs, but hit a go-ahead solo homer in a 4-3 victory over Florida on Saturday night) has had nothing to do with his diet. Yes, he has lost about five pounds, but is not hungry all the time. No, he does not munch on plain tofu, which still tastes like a wet eraser to him."

The article describes Fielder's meal at a Milwaukee restaurant and ends with:
"Less than 24 hours later, Fielder stood in the batter's box against one of baseball's best young left-handers, Cole Hamels of the Philadelphia Phillies. Fielder smoked two home runs in the Brewers' 5-4 win. Less filling, tasted great."

You'll find the whole delightful article on line at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/27/sports/baseball/27fielder.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin
OR
http://tinyurl.com/3thhfv

It presents a perfect opportunity for letters to the editor about the many joys of plant based diets.

The New York Times takes letters at letters@nytimes.com

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Remember that shorter letters are more likely to be published. And please be sure not to use any comments or phrases from me or from any other alerts in your letters. Editors are looking for original responses from their readers.

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)

Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read advance reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals� and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.

To discontinue DawnWatch alerts go to http://www.DawnWatch.com/nothanks.php

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Date: Mon Apr 28 13:50:14 2008

DawnWatch: Celebs and pet stores on Page Six, and Grizzly trainer death in much media 4/25/08

Sat, 26 Apr 2008 03:38:00 GMT

Before I report on the huge animal news this week, the killing a trainer by a grizzly bear, I will note a smaller and more trashy bit of news, which, however, touches on the important issue of pet store purchases. The New York Post's celebrity gossip page, "Page Six," today reported on my coverage, in "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way We Treat Animals" of Paris Hilton and Britney Spears's pet shop adventures. Unfortunately Page Six edited out the fun bits, and left us with the idea that I am "raging" against the celebs, rather than just having a bit of a go at them while making an important point. But still, I am pleased that an animal rights book, and this issue, is getting Page Six attention. You'll find the piece, headed "STIFLE THOSE ANIMAL IMPULSES," and with a big picture of Paris Hilton, on line at:
http://www.nypost.com/seven/04252008/gossip/pagesix/stifle_those_animal_impulses_108006.htm
or http://tinyurl.com/6bwja2
Now that Paris got us the attention, it would be great if people used the piece as a jump off point for letters to the editor about the horrors of pet stores and puppy mills, and the joys of adoption. The Post takes letters at http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/letters/letters_editor.htm

The big news in animal entertainment this week, was the killing of trainer Stephan Miller, by Grizzly Bear Rocky. The brief International Herald Tribune article, Thursday, April 24, (pg 6) told us only:

"A grizzly bear that appeared in a recent movie killed a 39-year-old trainer with a bite to his neck and had to be subdued with pepper spray. Three experienced handlers were working with the bear Tuesday at Randy Miller's Predators in Action facility when the bear bit the trainer, 39-year-old Stephan Miller, on the neck, a San Bernardino County sheriff's spokeswoman said."

Those few lines offer an opportunity for letters to the editor about the suffering of animals used in entertainment. The International Herald Tribune takes letters at letters@iht.com
------------------

The Los Angeles Times, April 24, included an article, by David Kelly, headed, "Trainers want bear spared;
Slain man's colleagues say the grizzly who killed him is not aggressive and should not be euthanized." (Pg B3)

It opens:

"Friends and colleagues of an animal trainer killed by a performing bear called it a 'freak accident' Wednesday and said the 700-pound grizzly should not be euthanized. The animal, they said, did not intend to kill the bear expert.

"'The same thing he was doing I have done a hundred times. We wrestle the bears in a loving way,' said Joel Almquist, an animal trainer who has worked extensively with Rocky, the 5-year-old grizzly who killed 39-year-old Stephan Miller on Tuesday with a single bite to the neck.

"'This bear has never shown aggression,' Almquist said. 'It was a flash bite, a real quick . . . bam. Unfortunately, we are built like tissue paper compared to them.'"

The article ends with a quote from Karen Rosa, director of the American Humane Assn.'s film and television unit:

"This does not sound like an aggressive attack. It sounds like it happened in the course of playing...But we would probably not be comfortable working with Rocky on the set. It would be a liability issue."

That brings up the question of Rocky's future.

You'll find the full article on line at:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/inland/la-me-bear24apr24,0,6884821.story

A discussion of the sadness of the animal entertainment industry would be truly useful on the editorial pages of the Los Angeles Times, in the world entertainment capitol. So please send a letter.
The Los Angeles Times takes letters at letters@latimes.com

In 'Thanking the Monkey', I title Chapter Three, on animal entertainment, "All the World's a Cage."
You can view the first few pages of each chapter on line at http://tinyurl.com/4wd4hq
In the first few pages of Chapter Three, I discuss what I call the ABCDs of animal entertainment: Aquisition, Brutality, Confinement, Disposal. They might be of interest with regard to the current bear story.

You can watch the beautiful bear, Rocky, in the movie "Semi-Pro" with Will Ferrell, and training for the movie, at the links below.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GnPt3RIIsA&NR=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPeXZWalpOo
Note the chain link fenced area in which the bear lives.

The story has been in countless papers. If it is in yours, please take the opportunity to send a letter to your editor about the lives of animals in the Hollywood entertainment business.

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)

Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read advance reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals� and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.

To discontinue DawnWatch alerts go to http://www.DawnWatch.com/nothanks.php

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Date: Fri Apr 25 21:38:57 2008

DawnWatch: NY Times and International Herald Tribune on in vitro meat 4/21/08

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 04:15:00 GMT

The International Herald Tribune and the New York Times, Monday, April 21, both have stories about in vitro meat. The IHT story is brief, and headed, "Fake meat divides animal rights group; ." (P 6)

It reports:
"People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals wants to pay a million dollars for fake meat. The group was to announce Monday that it would sponsor a $1 million prize to the 'first person to come up with a method to produce commercially viable quantities of in vitro meat at competitive prices by 2012.'

"For several years, scientists have worked to develop technologies to grow tissue cultures that could be consumed like meat without the expense of land and feed and the disease potential of real meat.

"Lisa Lange, a vice president of the organization, said, 'As the largest animal rights organization in the world, it's our job to introduce the philosophy and hammer it home that animals are not ours to eat.'"

The New York Times is a lengthier version of the same story, written by John Schwartz. It focuses more on the internal battle within PETA, as exemplified by Lisa Lange's quote above, contrasted with Ingrid Newkirk's full, even monetary, support for in vitro meat. It is headed, "PETA's Latest Tactic: $1 Million for Fake Meat."

Both the International Herald Tribune and New York Times have the longer version of the story on their websites at
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/04/21/america/21meat.php and
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/21/us/21meat.html?hp respectively.

You can respond with a letter to letters@iht.com or to letters@nytimes. com

Whether you think the idea of meat grown in test tubes is disgusting, or you think it isn't nearly as disgusting as slices of killed animals' bodies, the story opens the door for letters discussing the horrors of factory farming. As Tuesday April 22 is Earth Day, comments on factory farming's impact on the environment are particularly topical.

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Remember that shorter letters are more likely to be published.

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)

Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read advance reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals� and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.

To discontinue DawnWatch alerts go to http://www.DawnWatch.com/nothanks.php

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Date: Mon Apr 21 22:15:09 2008

DawnWatch: Thanking the Monkey update -- new book by Karen Dawn coming out 4/29/08

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 00:57:00 GMT

Before I start DawnWatching for the week, I will give an update on my book "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals" which goes on sale next Tuesday, April 29!
(It can be ordered now at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0061351857/dawnwatch)

If you haven't been to the promo site yet, please check it out: www.ThankingtheMonkey.com
Or you can skip the website and browse the book -- the first few pages of each chapter -- on line at http://tinyurl.com/4wd4hq

The website includes a fun video with animal friendly actors like Alicia Silverstone and Emily Deschanel saying nice things about the animals and the book. There are some delightful endorsements, from smart folks like Nobel prize winner JM Coetzee, and feminist icon Gloria Steinem, and from pop icons too. My favorite might be from Anthony Kiedis of the Red Hot Chili Peppers:

"I am sick of being ignorant. This book is education with a smile, information with a kiss from a dog who just drank out of a toilet, and should be required reading for all college students."

There are kind advance reviews posted, including a "starred review" from Publisher's Weekly. And there are also a couple of profiles on me on the "reviews" page. The one from Veg News basically says I am a social butterfly and a drunk -- but at least I am fun. The profile is beautifully written, however, and ends with a perfect line about the book:

"VN Associate Editor Elizabeth Castoria got in touch with both her manic and depressive sides while reading Thanking the Monkey."

I think that sums the book up well. It includes some information that would be hard to stomach without the occasional belly laugh it provides, thanks to a decent joke or two and the brilliant cartoons from Bizarro and other sources.

And now, brand new, the website has a link to that place where you browse inside the book online! It will show you the contents page, and the first few pages of each chapter, so you can read a little and get a feel for the look of the book.

If you have a newsletter or a blog, and would like a copy of the book to review or just to help plug, please drop me a line with an email about your list or blog so I can get Harper Collins to get you an advance copy this week.

MySpace folks -- let's be friends! Thanking the Monkey is at www.myspace.com/thankingthemonkey

Or if you are a Facebooker, please join the Thanking The Monkey facebook group, and ask your facebook friends to sign up.

Those of you who are keen on YouTube might make consider making a kind comment about the video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzxB6MKbPYE -- that would be much appreciated. And please forward it to your friends.

Book launches and parties are coming up in May. The page marked "events" on the Thanking the Monkey website will have the schedule, and the list of special guests, who will be reading sections of the book with me. It is being updated all the time, so keep checking back. I will tell you below some of what we have at the moment, in case you find I am in your neighborhood, and want to come by or to organize a speech or an interview.

Here is what we have at the moment:

April 22 -- that's tomorrow, Earth Day! The book won't be out yet, but I am speaking at the Los Angeles Earth Day event, a brief appearance on the main stage at 2:20 and then in the Environmental Tent, at 2:45, on Diet and Global warming: http://www.earthdayla.org/

May 3: I will be reading and signing at the delightful Animal Acres hoedown. Some other special guests are "Skinny Bitch" Rory Freedman and actress Jorja Fox, and, most importantly, the wonderful animal residents of Animal Acres. Learn more at: http://www.animalacres.org/events.html

MAY 4: My LOS ANGELES BOOK LAUNCH at The Cottage in Pacific Palisades. These lovely folks are coming and doing some reading: Ray Abruzzo (Sopranos), Emily Deschanel (Bones), Jorja Fox (CSI), Daniela Sea (The L Word), Jane Velez Mitchell (CNN and other national news anchor and commentator), and Persia While (Girlfriends). James Cromwell will be there if Oliver Stone hasn't flown him to Louisiana. And we have some other exciting actors pending... Find out more, and rsvp at www.ThankingtheMonkey.com under "events."

May 10 -- Worldfest LA! I will be speaking, reading, selling and signing. Go to http://www.worldfestevents.com/

May 17 -- The wonderful folks from Farm Sanctuary are giving me an award (the greatest honor of my life so far) at their New York gala. There is nothing more fun and glamorous, and also kind, than a Farm Sanctuary gala. Learn more at http://www.farmsanctuary.org/gala08/

The next day, May 18, is New York's Veggie Pride Parade! It culminates in Washington Square Park, where I will be signing at 1pm and giving out vegan treats : ) http://www.veggieprideparade.org/

And that evening MAY 18, 5-8pm, is my NEW YORK BOOK LAUNCH in the Soho Grand Yard. Heather Mills McCartney is coming and doing some reading (on dog and cat fur, of course) and quite a few other wonderful guests are in the process of being confirmed. I will post more on the events page closer to the date.

(A little birdie has told me it is Jenny Brown from Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary's birthday on May 18, so I hope she'll be around and we'll have a terrific vegan birthday cake! http://www.woodstockfas.org/ )

Now how is that for a fun weekend in New York?

May 26 I will be in Houston on "Go Vegan Texas!" -- the show on which I did my first ever radio hosting! That one is a fund drive, so we'll have lots of signed books (signed by some of the cool folks in the book, not just me) and other fabulous prizes. The show generally airs at 10am Central (and streams live) but starts a little later on fund drive days. Go to http://www.govegantexas.org/upcomingshow.php to learn more.

May 27 I will be at the San Antonio Vegetarian Society.

June 1st I will be back in Los Angeles at Book Expo America: http://www.bookexpoamerica.com/

I will probably also be in DC, Ohio, and San Francisco during May -- still working on the schedule.

ANIMAL FRIENDLY RADIO:
I have many press and media events scheduled in May -- KFI radio and weird cooking shows and all sorts of things. I am particularly pleased to get support from, and be supporting, the animal friendly shows. I noted Go Vegan Texas above. I will also be live on Talking Animals, the Tampa NPR station, Wednesday May 7th at 11:30 Eastern. The show streams live and takes callers:
http://www.talkinganimals.net/
And I will also be doing the El Paso NPR show, Animal Concerns of Texas, during May: http://www.ktep.org/program_detail.sstg?id=103

I so look forward to traveling with the book, and meeting the wonderful activists I have come to love online.
I thank you all for your support for this work, and for everything you do for the animals,

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn
www.DawnWatch.com and
www.ThankingtheMonkey.com

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. )

Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read advance reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals� and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.

To discontinue DawnWatch alerts go to http://www.DawnWatch.com/nothanks.php

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Date: Mon Apr 21 18:57:17 2008

DawnWatch: Newsweek tells us that Botox safety animal tests were inaccurate 4/21/08 edition

Sun, 20 Apr 2008 03:38:00 GMT

The current, April 21, issue of Newsweek (US edition, pg 45) has an article by Sharon Begley headed,

"A New Reason To Frown; Does Botox get into the brain? Troubling research contradicts earlier findings about the treatment."

It opens by telling us that versions of botulinum, such as Botox and Myobloc, were rigorously tested on animals and "preclinical testing showed that after being injected, they did not travel along the body's highways--nerve cells--to the brain and spinal cord."

Then:

"Oops. In a reversal of the usual sequence in science, researchers have discovered, after millions of people have received the drug, something fundamental about how Botox can act. Contrary to what turned up in preclinical testing, botulinum toxin can travel along neurons from the injection site into the brain, at least in lab animals. Researchers at Italy's Institute of Neuroscience injected rats and mice with botulinum neurotoxin A in doses comparable to those used in people."

We read, "'The discovery was quite serendipitous ... and surprising,' Matteo Caleo, who led the study, told the journal Science. 'A significant portion of the toxin is active where it's not intended to be.'"

Begley writes that the discovery puts in a new light "the hospitalizations and deaths that have been reported following Botox injections" -- deaths that have followed its administration for medical rather than cosmetic purposes.

The article ends with:
"With the new evidence that Botox can spread to the brain in ways that preclinical tests failed to turn up, it's enough to bring back those Botox-erased frown lines."

You'll find the full piece on line at
http://www.newsweek.com/id/131749

Given that the more recent discovery was described as "serendipitous," and was not part of the pre drug release testing, the article presents an excellent opportunity for letters to the editor discussing both the medical dangers and the ethical implications of animal testing to guarantee human product safety.
An excellent site where you will find information is www.pcrm.org

Note: Not only was Botox tested on animals, each batch is tested using the notorious LD 50 test in which the concentration is tested by checking the dosage it takes to kill 50% of the test animals.

Newsweek takes letters at letters@newsweek.com

Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Remember that shorter letters are more likely to be published. And please be sure not to use any comments or phrases from me or from any other alerts in your letters. Editors are looking for original responses from their readers.

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)

Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read advance reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals� and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.

To discontinue DawnWatch alerts go to http://www.DawnWatch.com/nothanks.php

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Date: Sat Apr 19 21:38:33 2008

Dawnwatch: UK Guardian on global hunger -- "If you care, eat less meat" 15 April, 2008

Wed, 16 Apr 2008 04:39:00 GMT

The Tuesday, April 15 Guardian (London) has a commentary piece, by George Monbiot, headed

"Credit crunch? The real crisis is global hunger. And if you care, eat less meat: A food recession is under way. Biofuels are a crime against humanity, but - take it from a flesh eater - flesh eating is worse." (p 27)

He opens with:
"Never mind the economic crisis. Focus for a moment on a more urgent threat: the great food recession that is sweeping the world faster than the credit crunch. You have probably seen the figures by now: the price of rice has risen by three-quarters over the past year, that of wheat by 130%. There are food crises in 37 countries. One hundred million people, according to the World Bank, could be pushed into deeper poverty by the high prices.

"But I bet that you have missed the most telling statistic. At 2.1bn tonnes, the global grain harvest broke all records last year - it beat the previous year's by almost 5%. The crisis, in other words, has begun before world food supplies are hit by climate change. If hunger can strike now, what will happen if harvests decline?

"There is plenty of food. It is just not reaching human stomachs. Of the 2.13bn tonnes likely to be consumed this year, only 1.01bn, according to the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organisation, will feed people."

Monbiot writes briefly, and compellingly, about the impact of biofuels, but then writes:

"But there is a bigger reason for global hunger, which is attracting less attention only because it has been there for longer. While 100m tonnes of food will be diverted this year to feed cars, 760m tonnes will be snatched from the mouths of humans to feed animals - which could cover the global food deficit 14 times. If you care about hunger, eat less meat."

He writes:

"In his magazine The Land, Simon Fairlie has updated the figures produced 30 years ago in Kenneth Mellanby's book Can Britain Feed Itself? Fairlie found that a vegan diet produced by means of conventional agriculture would require only 3m hectares of arable land (around half Britain's current total). Even if we reduced our consumption of meat by half, a mixed farming system would need 4.4m hectares of arable fields and 6.4 million hectares of pasture. A vegan Britain could make a massive contribution to global food stocks.

Monbiot tells us that he himself did not manage to follow a strict vegan diet, but he notes:

"The Food and Agriculture Organisation calculates that animal keeping is responsible for 18% of greenhouse gas emissions. The environmental impacts are especially grave in places where livestock graze freely. The only reasonable answer to the question of how much meat we should eat is as little as possible. Let's reserve it - as most societies have done until recently - for special occasions."

You'll find the full article on Monbiot's website at
http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2008/04/15/the-pleasures-of-the-flesh/

You can respond to The Guardian, where it was printed, singing the praises of plant based diets or sharing information on the evils of factory farming, with a letter to letters@guardian.co.uk
The paper advises, "We do not publish letters where only an email address is supplied; please include a full postal address and a reference to the relevant article. If you do not want your email address published, please say so. We may edit letters."

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)

Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read advance reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals� and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.

To discontinue DawnWatch alerts go to http://www.DawnWatch.com/nothanks.php

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Date: Tue Apr 15 22:39:43 2008