Animal Rights and Radical Environmentalism: Misplaced Priorities

CHAPTER 91 — ANIMAL RIGHTS AND RADICAL ENVIRONMENTALISM: MISPLACED PRIORITIES

American Life League

When it comes to feelings, a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. They are all mammals. They all feel pain. There is no rational basis for saying that a human being has special rights ... 6 million people died in concentration camps, but 6 billion chickens will die this year in slaughterhouses.

Ingrid Newkirk, founder and director of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA).[1]

Anti-Life Philosophy.

[Environmental groups] are missing the boat because picking up the garbage is not the issue, having sewage treatment plants is not the issue those are really details of the bigger issue. It's like trying to talk about a pimple when you really have [overpopulation] cancer.

                                                                                            Jean-Michel Cousteau.[2]

We are all fellow travelers on Spaceship Earth. However, we have abused our planet beyond its ability to sustain us. People are a cancer upon this world, because we needlessly destroy nature and its works wherever we congregate.

The worst of our transgressions involves eating and otherwise mistreating animals, which is revolting in the extreme. We should treat our fellow beings with respect and love not eat them!

Such atrocious treatment of our fellow beings never took place when the ancient Pagan religions were observed. Animal and planet abuse only began with the advent of Christianity.

How can you anti-choice people call yourselves "pro-life" when you eat meat and wear leather shoes? You're being hypocritical!

Introduction.

A truly 'enlightened' society must, by definition, care for and feed its most helpless or oppressed members. However, national pride notwithstanding, the United States is anything but an enlightened society.

Our nation is a strange wonderland of inverted social values where caring has gone awry, and compassion is extended only to those persons and species that are considered "trendy" or 'Politically Correct.'

Summary of the Gaia Philosophy.

BE A HERO, SAVE A WHALE
SAVE A BABY, GO TO JAIL

                                                                                          Operation Rescue T-shirt.

The Roots.

The "mainstream" animal rights movement and the "mainstream" environmentalist movement share similar philosophies. Their outlooks, although opposed by many, generally attempt to balance the rights of mankind and the rest of nature, and recognize that it is in man's own best interests to preserve and nurture his environment.

However, the motivations and logic of the extreme animal rights and environmentalist movements are different in nature.

The "extreme" wings of both movements generally share the belief that the Earth is our "mother" in the literal sense, because it is a colossal living organism ("Gaia") that is progressing towards its own divinity ("theagenesis").

Although the 'Gaia' hypothesis has, in one form or another, existed almost since the beginning of recorded history, it has enjoyed a resurgence as an important foundation of the "New Age" movement. 'Gaia' was re-postulated in 1973 by 'evolutionary biologist' Lynn Margulis, professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amhurst. The word is Greek for Mother Earth, or "The Deep-Breasted One."[3]

On Becoming 'Little Gods.'

Another primary tenet of "New Age" thinking holds that it is natural that individual human beings can themselves become gods on earth, because (or, perhaps, in spite of) their ability to think.

If the earth can become a 'god,' and if human beings can become 'gods,' it is also logical (in a "New Age" manner) to assume that the intermediate link between humans and the living earth i.e., animal and plant life must also share in this "potential divinity."

Therefore, any imposition of man's will on either animals or earth is considered by the radical animal rights and environmentalist groups to be unacceptable meddling and an obstruction of other entity's personal "vision quests," or progressions towards divinity.

As Peter Singer says in his 1975 book Animal Liberation, "It can no longer be maintained by anyone but a religious fanatic that man is the darling of the whole universe, or that other animals were created to provide us with food, or that we have divine authority over them, and divine permission to kill them."

The Anti-Christian Core.

The radical animal rights and environmentalist movements believe that literally every being on earth is itself a type of divinity or "potential divinity." Since all objects we produce are extracted from natural resources, some even believe that such objects interfere with the earth's quest for its own godhood.

In other words, everyone and everything is a god, potential god, or part of a god or potential god.

This omnitheistic paganism is naturally antithetical to any monotheistic concept, and especially to the Christian religion, which teaches that the One God created everything, and reserves divinity to Himself.

So it is not surprising that there are absolutely no real Christians among the ranks of the radical animal rights and environmentalist groups. Such radicals are atheistic, anti-theistic, or paganistic in their outlook. This worldview is reflected in their writings, and in media coverage of their activities.

For example, Ted Turner, the Cable News Network anti-life propagandist who commonly refers to pro-lifers as "bozos," said that "The Christian faith the Judeo-Christian tradition says that God gave dominion over the planet to human beings; as for animals, they don't count for anything. That's another reason I didn't want to go there [Heaven]: No trees, no animals, just these fundamentalist Christians."[4]

By the way, 1990 'Humanist of the Year' Turner is the person who brought us the propagandistic "Captain Planet" cartoon show. This thinly-disguised political pitch features six children, all of whom hail from idyllic countries all except the American kid, Wheeler, who is shown fighting for his life against muggers in a filthy New York City slum. By vivid contrast, Kinka is a Soviet child from a beautiful cottage in the midst of a flower-filled field that invariably has thousands of butterflies in it.

Yeah, right (see the descriptions of several incredible Soviet ecological disasters later in this chapter it's a miracle that any butterflies survive in the former Soviet Union).

When the kids get into trouble they can't handle by themselves (which is often), they are backed up by the magic powers of the Earth Goddess Gaia the "New Age" patron saint whose voice is supplied by virulent pro-abort activist Whoopi Goldberg.

Turner, of course, claimed that he used only "totally impartial" advisors for his show. These paragons of fairness included Carl Sagan, who brought us the bogus "nuclear winter" theory, and Peter Dykstra, the head of Greenpeace.[5]

What of the Year?

Time Magazine's bizarre 1988 "Planet of the Year" issue lay bare the strange pro-nature and anti-Christian philosophy of the animal-rights and environmentalist movement;

Humanity's current predatory relationship with nature reflects a man-centered worldview that has evolved over the ages ... In many pagan societies, the earth was seen as a mother, a fertile giver of life. Mortals were subordinate to nature. The Judeo-Christian tradition introduced a radically different concept. The idea of dominion (engendered in the book of Genesis) could be interpreted as an invitation to use nature as a convenience. Thus, the spread of Christianity, which is generally considered to have paved the way for the development of technology, may at the same time have carried the seeds of the wanton exploitation of nature that often accompanied technical progress.

The magazine is predictably crammed with lurid color photographs of oil slicks, dead and rotting animals, toxic poisons leaching into the soil, smog, Everests of trash, and starving children (but nothing about aborted preborn children, naturally)!

The moral of the story, of course, is that society must turn away from outmoded Christianity and eventually towards a one-world government, enforced birth control, and abortion.

Pro-Animal and Anti-Jew.

It is fashionable for animal rights activists and environmentalists to beat up on Christians, but their latent anti-Semitism must be expressed in more careful and discreet terms.

Sylvia Cohen, an observer of extremist cults and political movements, noted in the June/July issue of Midstream Magazine that

There is a distinct and explicit anti-Jewish tone: These Animal Rights activists apply the imagery drawn from the Holocaust to describe conventional farming, fishing and the killing of animals for food; they use the same imagery in harassing Jewish biomedical researchers and they direct recurrent attacks on kosher slaughter ...

There is a disturbing intolerance in the Animal Rights movement towards those who disagree with its philosophy, and an unmistakable tinge of antipathy towards Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Its criticism of Christianity usually centers on Paul, Augustine, and Thomas Aquinas for their views on the relationship between man and beast. There is a sharper edge of intolerance towards Jews.

And Racists (and Nationalists), Too.

Not only are radical animal rights and environmental activists openly anti-Christian and covertly anti-Semitic, they hold deeply rooted racist beliefs as well.

David Foreman, founder of Earth First!, has said that famine ought to be allowed to run its course in Ethiopia, and has also called for an end to immigration from Mexico and Central America.[6]

Taking his cue from Margaret Sanger, Adolf Eichmann, and other eugenicists, Edward Abbey, author of the ecotage novel The Monkey Wrench Gang, complained of the wilderness degradation caused by "millions of hungry, ignorant, unskilled, and culturally-morally-genetically impoverished people."[6]

And Chris Manes, author of Green Rage, wrote a column for the Earth First! Journal asserted that AIDS could assist in population control, thus lessening the "ecological load" caused by human beings on this planet.[6]

The racism of the movement's leaders inevitably has a profound impact upon the directions taken by these radical groups. It seems that environmentally destructive actions undertaken for the benefit of rich, upper-class Whites receive much less emphasis from these groups than those taken to assist the underprivileged.

Civic leaders from San Francisco envisioned a badly-needed development consisting of 12,000 moderate-income houses and apartments on San Bruno Mountain five miles south of the city. This development would have greatly relieved the shortage of housing for low-income families in the Southern part of the county. But, when environmental activists discovered that the area was a nesting place for the rare Callippe Silverspot Butterfly (which has a life span of exactly one week), they raised such a ruckus that the development was reduced in size by more than 80 percent to only 2,200 units.

San Mateo County Black activist Cliff Boxley railed against this "green bigotry," saying that "Conservationists are more interested in saving the habitats of birds than in the construction of low-income housing."[7]

On the international scene, DDT was found to thin the shells of the eggs of several species of birds, so the insecticide was not only banned in the United States, but companies manufacturing it were prohibited from shipping it overseas. Until DDT was extensively used in Ceylon (Sri Lanka), there were between two and three million people afflicted with malaria. This disease was wiped out by DDT. After the ban, the incidence of malaria once again exploded, and thousands died every year from the disease.[8] This disaster was simply ignored by the radical environmental groups, who apparently covet bird's eggs above thousands of human lives.

Hopelessness and Nihilism.

Out of Place and Out of Time.

When people begin to see themselves as morally equal to or lower than animals, a certain inevitable depressive world outlook must result. After all, if we are not the supreme creation of God, then we are a cancer. If we do not occupy a privileged place on this earth, we occupy the lowest rung of existence because we cause more damage than any other species. If we desire to escape responsibility in sexual and other matters, we may assuage our consciences by accepting culpability for 'destroying' our planet a psychological ploy called "substitution" that allows us to take no concrete action other than being politically correct in our speech.

Despairing Statements.

The attitude of "man as disease" is reflected in many statements made by animal rights activists such as Ingrid Newkirk, who once said that "We [humans] have grown like a cancer. We're the biggest blight on the face of the earth."[9] Although not an activist by any means, even Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes once remarked that "I see no reason for attributing to man a significance different in kind from that which belongs to a baboon or a grain of sand."[10]

Some environmentalists even wish for death not only for themselves, but for the entire human race. For them, the world is an unending circus of horrors, to be endured and survived until the blessed release that is afforded by the end of their lives.

Bill McKibben writes in The End of Nature that

We are not interested in the utility of a particular species or free-flowing river, or ecosystem, to mankind. They have intrinsic value, more value to me than another human body, or a billion of them. Human happiness, and certainly human fecundity, are not as important as a wild and healthy planet ... Somewhere along the line at about a billion years ago, maybe half that we quit the contract and became a cancer. We have become a plague upon ourselves and upon the earth ... Until such time as homo sapiens should decide to rejoin nature, some of us can only hope for the right virus to come along.[11]

Vehemently Yours.

Perhaps the most extreme statement of this nihilistic philosophy was made by what has to be the world's ultimate anti-life group The Voluntary Human Extinction Movement, or VHEMT, pronounced "vehement" for short.

Anti-people crusader Les U. Knight, Portland, Oregon substitute teacher and founder of VHEMT, said in his newsletter These Exit Times, that

The hopeful alternative to the extinction of millions of species of plants and animals is the voluntary extinction of one species: Homo sapiens us ... When every human makes the moral choice to live long and die out, Earth will be allowed to return to its former glory. Each time another one of us decides not to add another one of us to the burgeoning billions already squatting on this ravaged planet, another ray of hope shines through the gloom ... No matter what you're doing to improve life on planet Earth, I think you'll find that phasing out the human race will increase your chance of success.[12]

Knight seems not to notice that people will have a hard time 'improving life on planet Earth' if there are no people left to do the work!

The Roots.

Dr. Frederick Goodwin of the United States Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and Mental Health Administration struck at the root of such a hopeless Weltanschauung (world outlook) when he said that "At its core, the animal-rights thesis is a degradation of what it means to be human. As a psychiatrist, I see in that a kind of giving up on the human endeavor, a sense of hopelessness and despair."

The Desires.

One of the most interesting and concrete results of this hopeless worldview is the ridiculous vision for the future of mankind that many environmentalists hold. These visions are translated into wildly inaccurate predictions that even the most disreputable psychic would disavow.

It is also important to note that these predictions (some of which are shown in Figure 91-1) actually represent the type of society and world that the radical environmentalists and animal rights activists hope will come into existence through their efforts.

FIGURE 91-1
FRIGHTENING VISIONS: PREDICTIONS BY ANIMAL-RIGHTS ACTIVISTS AND ENVIRONMENTALISTS

The central fact is that the earth's climate seems to be cooling down. Meteorologists are almost unanimous in the view that the trend will reduce agricultural productivity.

Newsweek Magazine, April 28, 1975. Quoted in Brent Bozell, "Environmental Inaccuracy: Who Cares?" Conservative Chronicle, June 17, 1992, page 18.

The atmosphere may be reaching the limit of its capacity to absorb emitted carbon dioxide without falling into a disastrous greenhouse effect.

Newsweek Magazine, June 1, 1992. Quoted in Bozell, op.cit.

Jay Forrester predicted in his doomsday tract The Limits to Growth that the world would run out of gold in 1981, mercury by 1985, tin by 1987, zinc in 1990, petroleum by 1992, and copper, natural gas, and lead by 1993.

Paul Ehrlich predicts in his book The Population Bomb that 65 million Americans will die of hunger by 1985. He also said in 1968 that "The battle to feed humanity is already lost ... we will not be able to prevent large-scale famines in the next decade." By the next decade, of course, weight reduction clinics were everywhere and diet books consistently made best-seller lists. Never one to give up, Ehrlich in 1980 bet economist Julian Simon a thousand dollars that the prices of five strategic metals tungsten, copper, nickel, chrome, and tin would rise. All five fell, and Ehrlich paid up.

As described by syndicated columnist George Will. "'Earth Summit' Already Loses Luster With Environmental Pessimists." The Oregonian, May 31, 1992, page E3.

Due to the increasing severity of the food shortage, the following will be a typical menu by the year 1990;

Slug Soup
Wasp Grubs Fried in the Comb Termites Bantu
Moths Sauteed in Butter
New Carrots with Wireworm Sauce
Fricasseed Chicken with Chrysalides
Cauliflower Garnished with Caterpillars
Slag Beetle Larvae on Toast Chocolate Chirpies

Ronald L. Taylor, author of Butterflies in My Stomach. As described in David Wallechinsky and Amy and Irving Wallace. The Book of Predictions. New York: William Morrow and Company, 1980, 513 pages.

By 1995, worldwide compulsory birth control will be instituted. By 2000, the PLANNED PLANETHOOD (!) movement will triumph over all other systems of thought. In the same year, the control of conception will be removed from personal choice. Males will be sterilized at age 14 after depositing a semen sample in the frozen gamete bank. Conception will require approval of a state or federal committee, which will first investigate the genetic health of the two proposed genetic parents and will license conception only if the parents are of superior "stock." By the year, artificial insemination will be widely used to produce genetically superior offspring Margaret Sanger's dream of a "race of thoroughbreds" will finally become a reality.

These are among the many predictions by Judith Wurtman, G. Harry Stein, Robert Francoeur, John Catchings, Frederick Davies, Robert Truax and Jerrold S. Maxmen, as described in Wallechinsky and Wallace, op.cit.

The Objectives of the Movements.

[We desire] an end to all commercial logging ... the elimination of the automobile, coal-fired power plants, and manufacturing processes using petrochemicals ... and, most important[ly], the reduction of the human population to an ecologically sustainable level.

Christopher Manes, Green Rage: Radical Environmentalism and the Unmaking of Civilization.[13]

Headline Grabbers.

The vast majority of animal rights activists certainly have their hearts in the right places. They work quietly to better the lot of sick and abandoned wild and domestic animals, and help limit unnecessary damage to valuable species for the sake of biological diversity and humanitarianism.

However, as always, the radical fringe of any movement gets all the press. In the case of the animal rights and environmentalist movements, five percent of the people agitate for extreme, unworkable, and even harmful objectives.

These animal rights extremists demand that the eating of meat and the wearing of natural furs be outlawed; that all pet ownership be banned; that all zoos be dismantled; that no hunting or farming (even dairy farming) be allowed; and, of course, that all animal experimentation cease immediately.

Earth First! charter member Christopher Manes goes even further. He asserts that man must return to a nomadic hunter/gatherer existence and that we must recognize the "civil rights" of "tree people" and "rock people." In other words, human beings 'oppress' rocks when using them to construct roads or buildings!

It boggles the imagination to try to estimate how many people heap the ultimate indignity on "sand people" daily by using them for cat-box filler.

Manes' book (for which thousands of "tree people" made the ultimate sacrifice) acknowledges that ecoterrorism has caused hundreds of millions of dollars of damage and numerous murders and maimings.

Earth First!, by the way, is one of the sponsors of the ecophile's version of Woodstock, the "Mississippi Redwood Summer," where speakers equated trees with disenfranchised Blacks.

No Exceptions.

For animal rights extremists, there can be no exceptions to their rules. The president of Friends of Animals, the appropriately-named Priscilla Feral, says that "Animal experimentation is just plain wrong. Human beings have no right to the knowledge gained from experimentation on animals, even if it is done painlessly."[14] This attitude is remarkably similar to that of the scientists who believe that medical knowledge gained by the Nazis during their hideous experiments on human beings should be off-limits to modern researchers,

Ingrid Newkirk of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), states flatly that pet ownership is "... an absolutely abysmal situation brought about by human manipulation."[14]

Even the very mainstream Humane Society's literature states flatly that "There is no rational basis for maintaining a moral distinction between the treatment of humans and other animals."[14]

Such attitudes, if codified, will inevitably lead to expensive, useless and ludicrous results. As always, if we want to see the future of our society, we must look to Sweden, where the Animal Bill of Rights dictates that each pig must have a separate bed, which ideally must be changed each night.[14]

The Maltreatment of Animals.

In time, we'll look on those who work in animal laboratories with the horror now reserved for the men and women who experimented on Jews in Auschwitz ... That, too, the Nazis said, was 'for the greater benefit of the master race.'

News release from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.[15]

Laboratory Experiments.

Nothing agitates animal-rights groups more than the use of animals in laboratories for purposes considered 'frivolous' by the activists. This is natural because, in their minds, the sacrifice of one being for an equal or lesser being is illogical and evil.

The posters and advertisements used by animal-rights people invariably portray the 'hard cases,' or those animals that people can most readily identify with: Puppies with big, sad eyes, cats, and apes. However, of the 60 to 90 million animals 'used' (and killed) each year for research and testing, about 90 percent are rodents, which are certainly not photogenic and therefore rarely used in animal-rights literature and publicity.

The director of the National Anti-Vivisection Society acknowledges that the number of animals he quotes as being used by researchers each year is much too high, a tactic identical to that used by pro-abortionists who claimed that "5,000 to 10,000 women used to die each year from illegal abortions." He also coaches his followers to "Never appear to be opposed to animal research. Claim that your only concern is the source of the animals."[16]

Small mammals are 'used' to test the toxicity of colognes, cosmetics, food colorings, and many other substances ultimately intended for human consumption. Among other testing methods, these compounds may be injected into the animal's esophagus or dripped into its eyes. Many of these cosmetics have been proven toxic when the mammals experienced convulsions or died. The practical effect of these tests was to prevent toxic or even deadly items from reaching the human market.

Animal research has led to vaccines against polio, measles, mumps, diphtheria, whooping cough, and rubella. It has led to cures for smallpox effective diabetes treatment, and the discovery of at least three lifesaving antibiotics.

Surgery on animals has led to the development of techniques for implanting cardiac pacemakers, for reattaching severed limbs, and for transplanting hearts, lungs, kidneys, and liver. Animal research also produced the cure for acute lymphocytic leukemia in children.

The animals themselves also benefit from animal research. Such research has led to immunizations against distemper, anthrax, rabies, tetanus, and feline leukemia.

According to the 1988 National Academy of Sciences report on animal research, "Animal experimentation has contributed to an increase in average life expectancy of about 25 years since 1900," a claim backed up by former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, who estimates that animal research has added twenty years to the average person's life in the last two generations.

Despite PETA propaganda that claims otherwise, a 1988 American Medical Association survey found that 97 percent of the country's 570,000 doctors support animal research.

One interesting group that supports animal rights in general but opposes the radical animal-rights movement is iiFAR (incurably ill For Animal Research), Post Office Box 1873, Bridgeview, Illinois 60455.

Maltreatment of Farm Animals.

Other cases of animal maltreatment are less justified in the eyes of animal-rights activists and probably in the opinion of a large segment of the public.

For example, since farm animals are not currently protected by Federal legislation, virtually any mistreatment short of outright intentional torture is tolerated.

From the age of three days, veal calves are commonly confined in 22-inch wide crates, and they are not allowed enough room to walk or to even turn around. Their constant liquid-only diet inflicts permanent diarrhea upon them. This and the fact that they never see the sun guarantees the desirable white (anemic) meat of the so-called "milk-fed calf."

But Why All the Fuss?

There is undoubtedly a tremendous amount of cruelty inflicted upon animals in this country.

And why not?

If we, as a nation, have so callously displayed our disregard for the welfare of our own species through abortion, forced sterilization, infanticide, euthanasia, and genocide, why should we place a higher priority on lesser species? We should instead strive for consistency and become 'equal opportunity abusers,' with no particular regard for any species.

The public is constantly exposed to a parade of horrific visions of war, disease, and destruction on television while a large percentage of our people have obtained an abortion or assisted in obtaining one. We have become jaded by death. Why should we become excited about the killing of animals, even if such killing is cruel and entirely unjustified?

Mainstream Animal-Rights Tactics.

We are trying to pretend that the environment can be handled by becoming again children of nature. You know children of nature today play electronic guitars. Every time I hear an anti-technology ballad sung on an electronic guitar with the latest amplifiers, I kind of wonder.

Professor Peter F. Drucker, who offered the nation's first college course on the environment in 1947.[17]

CPCs for Apes.

As with most other movements, the vast majority of animal-rights groups and individuals employ legal, low-key means to protect various species of animals that are in danger, either as individuals or as a species.

For example, Alan Sweatt's San Antonio farm "Primarily Primates" houses about two hundred former pets and circus animals that were retired rather than euthanized. This makes his facility roughly the equivalent of a crisis pregnancy center.

Some of his apes had endured torment for years at the hands of circus trainers or sadistic and neglectful private owners. Sweatt invests considerable time in his attempts to "detraumatize" these animals, with impressive results.

"Rescue Missions" for Animals.

There are many other parallels between the animal-rights movement and the pro-life movement. However, some of the illegal tactics routinely employed by animal-rights groups would never be tolerated if pro-life activists used them.

For example, it is common for the Animal Rights Front (ARF) and other groups to block hunters from entering Connecticut game preserves with their cars and bodies. If the hunters do manage to gain entry, the activists dog their heels all day and make enough noise to scare away deer and other game.

This is essentially the animal-rights equivalent of the pro-life "rescue mission." Yet no animal-rights activists have ever been hit with an injunction or a multi-million dollar Federal anti-racketeering lawsuit, and their activities are tolerated by police and game wardens.

Endangering People to Save Animals.

Their tactics are clear. Work to increase the costs of research, and stop its progress with red tape and lawsuits.

                                                                            Nobel laureate Dr. David H. Hubel.

Introduction.

The most extreme "Meat is Murder" people, including such organizations as the Animal Liberation Front (ALF), routinely break into and destroy research labs, vandalize veal farms and rustle cattle, and spray graffiti everywhere with virtual impunity.

Why is this behavior winked at by authorities?

Because animal rights is a 'trendy' Neoliberal cause.

Attempted Murder By Nail Bomb.

The overt expression of the radical animal-rights viewpoint has sometimes taken murderous directions.

Leon Hirsch is a businessman whose company manufactures surgical instruments used in transplants. This company primarily tests these instruments on approximately 1,000 abandoned dogs annually. Hirsch, who has also received numerous death threats, found a remotely-controlled nail bomb outside his home in 1988. Experts say that this bomb would have killed him had it detonated. The perpetrator, Fran Trutt, pleaded 'no contest' to charges of attempted murder, possession of explosives, and bomb manufacturing.

Trutt received a sentence of exactly one year in prison.[18] Contrast this to the sentences received by pro-lifers who endanger only property: Four years in prison for Joan Andrews, who caused $215 damage to an abortion suction machine in Florida, and 20 years for Curt Beseda, who torched an Everett, Washington abortion mill. Nobody was hurt in these latter two incidents. The reason that pro-lifers receive much more severe sentences than animal rights activists who commit the same act is that the pro-lifers represent a more credible threat to an institution that the government is deeply committed to supporting: The abortion/population control complex.

In a separate incident, a bomb being transported by two Earth First! members exploded prematurely in California, and the San Francisco Chronicle and Examiner immediately painted it as an FBI attempt on their lives.

A typical Earth First! magazine reads more like Soldier of Fortune: A single recent issue featured stories on activists sinking whaling ships, smashing computers and chainsaws with sledgehammers, destroying logging equipment, getting into fistfights and gun battles, getting blown up by bombs, and even performing the equivalent of a kamikaze mission by standing under falling trees.

Lab Trashing.

It is interesting to examine the direct-action tactics used by animal rights activists to accomplish their goals.

Alex Pacheco, a charter member of PETA, got a job with research psychologist Edward Taub in Silver Spring, Maryland, in 1981. Taub studied monkeys under a National Institute for Health grant in order to try to find ways to allow stroke victims to regain the use of paralyzed limbs.

When Taub took a vacation, Pacheco provided false information to police that resulted in confiscation of all of the lab animals and the charging of Taub with 119 counts of cruelty to animals. It took Taub five years to clear himself of all charges in court, while the animal rights people continued to phone and mail him death threats.

On October 26, 1986, members of the Animal Liberation Front, which is listed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation as one of the ten most dangerous terrorist organizations in the country, broke into research buildings at the University of Oregon at Eugene and destroyed microscopes, an electrocardiogram machine, an incubator, a sterilizer, and an X-ray machine, and stole 150 research animals. More than a dozen projects were trashed, including neuroscientist Barbara Gordon-Lickey's research into visual defects in newborns.[19]

In 1988, animal-rights activists destroyed the epilepsy and Alzheimer's research laboratory at the University of California at Los Angeles. The leader of the responsible group received a sentence of 45 days in jail, with most of the time off for good behavior. None of the other 'raiders' were punished or even charged with a crime.

Contrast this to the 2-1/2 years actually served by Joan Andrews (mostly in solitary confinement) for damaging a suction machine in a Florida abortion mill, and multi-year sentences doled out to nonviolent, nondestructive pro-life rescuers on their third or fourth misdemeanor trespass conviction.

On April 3, 1989, the ALF broke into four buildings at Tucson's University of Arizona, smashed medical equipment, spray-painted graffiti like "Nazi" and "Scum," and stole or released 1,231 animals. They then torched two of the research buildings, causing $200,000 in damage. One of the 15 projects halted involved research on creating an effective disinfectant for Cryptosporidium-contaminated water that would save thousands of lives in developing countries. The ALF 'commandos' unwittingly released 30 mice infected with the virus, an incurable strain of diarrhea that is invariably fatal to AIDS patients and malnourished children.[20]

On July 4, 1989, members of the Animal Liberation Front broke into a Texas Tech University laboratory and destroyed more than $70,000 worth of medical equipment. They stole five cats being used by Dr. John Orem in researching Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), which kills more than 5,000 babies every year. The destruction wrought by the ALF halted Orem's progress entirely. Nobody will ever know how many babies died as a result of ALF's attack.

The ALF is particularly active in Great Britain, where its attacks occur on a weekly basis. For example, during the Christmas 1988 season, it firebombed and destroyed five department stores and fur sellers. Bombs were defused at two other sites. These actions may very well resulted in massive loss of human life. The ALF and the Animal Rights Militia have also taken credit for acts of arson that destroyed a San Jose meat company.[21]

Other Acts of Terrorism.

The above acts are by no means the only anti-personnel actions that have been carried out by radical animal rights activists. Other violent attacks include the following.

• In June of 1990, a British veterinarian was severely injured when her car was bombed. An animal rights group claimed responsibility, and a member of the group who called in to a local radio talk show said that it was "unfortunate that she survived." An Animal Liberation Front caller on another show said of another researcher, "The sooner he is killed, the better."[19]

• Also in June of 1990, animal rights activists tried to kill a Bristol University researcher with a car bomb, but instead blew up a 13-month old baby in his carriage nearby. The baby survived with burns, shrapnel wounds, and a severed finger.[19]

• On May 2, 1980, a crew of U.S. Forest Service personnel were using backpack-mounted sprayers to apply herbicide to an area of young conifers in the Siskiyou National Forest. They were confronted with 80 angry environmental activists armed with knives and clubs, who promised to "split your heads." The crew attempted to escape, but was trapped by the mob. The head of the team shouted that they would end the spraying, saying later that "If I hadn't done it, someone would have surely been badly hurt or killed."[22]

• In May of 1982, ecoterrorists bombed four British Columbia Hydro 500-kilovolt transformers, causing $6 million in damage. Police received a letter from an environmental group that called itself "Direct Action," and which condemned 'patriarchy' and read "We must make this an insecure and uninhabitable place for capitalists and their projects. This is the best contribution we can make towards protecting the earth and struggling for a liberated society."[22]

• In May of 1981, radical environmentalists destroyed a $180,000 helicopter leased by Publisher's Paper Company for the purpose of spraying brush control herbicides on a commercial Douglas Fir plantation near Toledo, Oregon. A letter from the "People's Brigade for a Healthy Genetic Future" claimed responsibility.[22]

• In January of 1981, ecoterrorists destroyed Montana Power Company's timber-truss Franklin Bridge, the only vehicular access to the Rattlesnake Wilderness and National Recreation Area.

• Earth First! member Judi Bari, a pro-abort who has tried to disrupt pro-life events in the past, was blown up when a nail bomb she was transporting in her car detonated while she was driving it. She claimed that she had no knowledge of the existence of the bomb in her car, and blamed it on a (conveniently unnamed) "right-wing fundamentalist with a history of violence."

The 'Ecotage' Phenomenon.

Introduction.

As described above, some extremist animal rights activists and environmentalists attempt to murder human beings, an activity that is rightly classified as 'terrorism.'

Other environmentalists engage in 'ecotage' or 'monkeywrenching,' which is the destruction of equipment and supplies used by loggers and other groups that present an immediate perceived threat to a specific segment of the ecosphere.

These activities are not intended to harm human beings.

To make the difference more understandable to pro-lifers, clinic bombing is the anti-abortion equivalent of 'ecotage.' Any attempt to kill or mutilate abortionists would properly be classified as murder or terrorism. Of course, all pro-life activities (even silent prayer) have been labeled "terrorism" by pro-aborts, and this propensity for exaggeration has muddied the waters considerably.

Origins of the Submovement. Many animal rights/environmental extremists point to Edward Abbey's 1975 book The Monkey Wrench Gang (a action-adventure novel about a band of "ecoteurs") as the spiritual beginning of their movement. This is reflected in Earth First!'s motto, "No compromise in defense of Mother Earth!"

Advocating Destruction.

Not only do some animal-rights activists destroy property and endanger lives, they proudly revel in the resulting publicity and urge others to violent action in their publications.

The Anarchist newsletter Business As Usual parrots the same Marxist psychobabble that the extreme Neofeminists do: "Real freedom in our lives cannot be achieved without the massive escalation of attacks on the capitalist system of oppression."[23] The magazine proudly lists dozens of attacks on department stores, supermarkets, and fast-food outlets that its writers judge to be supporting cruelty to animals.

Edward Abbey (mentioned above) claims that "I'm not advocating illegal activity, unless you're accompanied by your parents or at night."[22]

And David Foreman, founder of Earth First!, says that "I would not encourage anyone to monkeywrench; that is an entirely personal decision. More importantly, I would not want to discourage anyone from monkeywrenching. Those willing to commit ecotage are needed today as never before."[23]

Substitute the words "bomb abortion clinics" for "monkeywrench" in the above quotes, and then imagine how the environmental/population control people would react!

It is not only individual environmentalists who advocate and encourage destruction of property. The 25,000 member group Environmental Action sponsored an 'ecotage' contest, where participants wrote up their ideas and submitted them. The group published the best ideas from the contest in its 1971 Pocket Book Ecotage![22] George Foreman also published a book entitled Ecodefense: A Field Guide to Monkeywrenching, which contains chapters on road and tree spiking and the destruction of bulldozers and aircraft.[23]

What would the reaction of the media be if radical pro-lifers published a Clinic Bombing Manual for Babysavers?

Is there really any doubt?

No Fur-Wearers, Please.

A popular target of animal-rights activists are fur-wearing women. For example, Trans-World Unlimited sponsors "Fur-Free Friday," an annual New York City parade that has for years been led by talk-show host Bob Barker. During this procession, participants routinely assault and spit on women wearing fur coats. Furriers have had their windows smashed and their property vandalized; in one instance, animal-rights vandals slashed and destroyed $400,000 worth of furs.

This type of activity clearly violates the Neoliberal 'Prime Directive' of consistency because, as Utne Reader author Richard Ryan points out;

It's not hard to see that the attacks on fur-wearing females (as opposed to leather-wearing men) play simultaneously on cheap populism and cheaper sexism. You can scream at women in mink coats emerging from ritzy department stores and be fairly certain they're not going to physically retaliate ... It would be more interesting to watch zoophiles gathered in front of a biker bar, hollering slogans at the leather-sporting clientele as they swagger up to their Harleys.

But we're not likely to see that anytime soon, are we?

No Condemnation.

It is significant indeed that none of the 'mainstream' environmental groups like the Sierra Club or the National Wildlife Federation have ever condemned either specific acts of ecotage or the practice in general.[22]

If we use the logic of pro-abortionists that any pro-lifers who do not vigorously condemn clinic bombings in fact support them and are therefore also contributing to "an atmosphere of intimidation and harassment" we may also conclude that the mainline environmental groups support eco-terrorism.

The Role of the Media.

Despite their terroristic tactics, the ALF and other organizations are often lionized in the press. Contrast this to the American media's treatment of people who take pains to destroy abortion mills when nobody is present.

As additional evidence of bias, the media simply will not tolerate any depiction of the results of the act of abortion itself. In nearly one hundred documented cases from all over the country, pro-lifers have attempted to purchase advertising that features graphic photographs of aborted preborn babies and, in the vast majority of cases, they have been turned down, because, as the media censors say, such material is "in bad taste."

Curiously, the media seems to have no trouble at all in publishing garish photographs of current war scenes, the effects of the atomic bombs on people at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, or even of dead Jews stacked like cordwood at Nazi concentration camps in the aftermath of World War II.

And the 'mainline' media also accepts for publication the most graphic and revolting imaginable photos proffered by animal rights groups;

• A graphic ad in the April 16, 1989 issue of the New York Times, paid for by the International Wildlife Coalition, featured closeup photos of butchered elephants. The title of the ad was "African Chainsaw Massacre." A nearly identical photo by the African Wildlife Foundation in their Times (Sunday Edition) ad of February 12, 1989, showed an extreme closeup photograph of an adult elephant with the entire front half of its head hacked off. This ad was entitled "Today, in America, Someone Will Slaughter An Elephant For a Bracelet."

• Another popular ad featured in many major newspapers showed a monkey apparently being stretched and crushed to death by a crude mechanical apparatus. This ad, entitled "Dear President Bush: Animals, Too, Need a Kinder, Gentler World," was signed by, among many others, Paul and Linda McCartney, Doris Day, Ryan O'Neal, Abigail Van Buren ("Dear Abby"), John Denver, James Coburn, Kim Basinger, Loretta Swit, Angie Dickinson, Ali MacGraw, Telly Savalas, Whoopi Goldberg, and Elvira, many of whom regularly march for "abortion rights."

• "Citizens for Environmental Responsibility" displayed a color photo of a dead, oil-caked seal in their April 24, 1989 Washington Post "Boycott Exxon" ad.

The Environmentalism/Abortion Link.

Every time you turn on an electric light, you are making another brainless baby.

                                                                 Environmental activist Helen Caldicott.[24]

The Basic "Logic."

It is curious indeed that pro-abortion groups hysterically denounce pro-life clinic bombers for endangering human lives, but support with their silence the destruction of research laboratories, massive endangerment of human life, and the release of deadly diseases by animal-rights activists.

There is compelling evidence that some animal-rights activists truly believe that the life of an animal is much more important than the life of a human being. For example, some animal-rights extremists condemn the "crime of vivisection" as immoral and unscientific, asserting that they would prefer experimentation done for the sake of human beings to be performed on human beings.

And only in the United States could there exist a group entitled 'Animal Rights Activists for Choice.'

The attitude of radical environmental activists towards abortion, and the basic logic behind this view, can be summed up with a pair of very simple (and simplistic) equations;

WHY MANY ENVIRONMENTALISTS SUPPORT
ABORTION: THE PSYCHOLOGICAL EQUATION
PEOPLE = ENVIRONMENTAL DAMAGE
THEREFORE,
MORE PEOPLE = BAD
\           /
ABORTION = LESS PEOPLE
THEREFORE,
ABORTION = GOOD

Animals Above Humans.

One of the many curious outgrowths of the extreme animal-rights movement is a cadre of members who pale at the thought of inflicting any discomfort upon animals, but shrug indifferently when confronted with the specter of a late-term unborn baby writhing in agony as it is torn limb from limb by the steel instruments of the abortionist.

Molly Yard, president of the National Organization for Women, neatly tied abortion and radical environmentalism together when she said that "The abortion question is not just about women's rights, but about life on the planet environmental catastrophe awaits the world if the population continues to grow at its present rate."[25]

The following environmental and animal-rights organizations have gone on record as favoring repeal of the Mexico City Policy and restoration of Federal funding to the United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA), the chief architect of China's one-child population control policy. This program includes mass forced sterilization and abortion, as described in Chapter 50 of Volume II, "Forced Abortions."

PRO-ABORTION ENVIRONMENTAL AND ANIMAL RIGHTS ORGANIZATIONS

Defenders of Wildlife
Environmental Action
Environmental Policy Institute *
Friends of the Earth (FOE) *
Global Tomorrow Coalition
Izaak Walton League
National Audobon Society *
National Parks and Conservation Association
National Wildlife Federation
Natural Resources Council of America
Natural Resources Defense Council
Renew America
Sierra Club *
The Oceanic Society
The Wilderness Society
Trout Unlimited
Union of Concerned Scientists

* Identified as an "Organization Working to Solve Population Problems" on pages 246 and 247 of Paul R. and Anne H. Ehrlich's 1990 book entitled The Population Explosion.

These environmental groups claim that they only favor "family planning" and "population control." However, their leadership is fully aware of the fact that the Mexico City Policy and the cutoff of funds to the UNFPA only affected those "population control" programs that funded coerced abortions.

'Mystagoguery' in Action.

Of course, when the line between human and animal is blurred, the potential for abuse by pro-abortionists escalates geometrically. Advocates of behavior that was formerly thought to be immoral or unethical use the mighty weapon of 'mystagoguery' to advance their cause. This is the needless complication of a simple issue in order to create a 'grey area' that may be exploited in the midst of the resulting moral confusion.

The animal rights movement has handily provided one more cover under which pro-abortionists may more easily create and exploit this 'grey area' for its own purposes.

One good example of a person who has recently used this tactic is 'bioethicist' Mary Anne Warren, whose pet project is the harvesting of organs from late-term aborted preborns and anencephalic newborn babies. She writes that

If we are to make a reasoned judgment about the moral status of fetuses, and of nonhuman animals, alien life forms, intelligent machines and other problematic entities, we must develop a criterion of moral rights that is species-neutral. That is, it will not do to make 'genetic humanity,' or mere genetic affiliation to the human species, either a necessary or a sufficient condition for the possession of full moral rights.

[The criteria for personhood is] an entity that has the actual, not merely potential capacity for consciousness, complex, sophisticated perception, rationality, self-awareness and self-motivated behavior.[26]

Note the jumble of false comparisons and open-ended qualifications that make up the thick smoke screen behind which Warren attempts to justify her ghoulish desires. She readily concedes that the preborn "look disconcertingly like people," but states as a fact that "they do not desire life, or anything else, any more than trees or amoebas do."[26]

Might Warren be remembering her own preborn existence?

The Official Government Position: Animals Are More Important Than People.

To the degree that other species have no voice in the political process, they will be exploited and destroyed. We need to think in wider terms how to build into our political system, into the fabric of our society, a practical way of giving voice to other living beings.

Mary O'Brien, staff scientist for the Environmental Law Alliance Worldwide (E-LAW).[22]

The Heart of the Matter.

Sadly, the view that humans are less important than animals is also the official (but largely unpublicized) position of our own government at every level.

Divisions of major Federal government agencies have as their sole purpose the protection of various animal species and their habitat (i.e., the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers). These agencies can levy huge fines for killing or injuring non-human species even those as yet unborn!

Meanwhile, abortionists rake in hundreds of millions of dollars every year for killing preborn human babies.

Animal-rights activists strongly oppose the use of condemned animals for research. Strangely, the logic of their opponents the animal researchers is identical to that of the fetal organ harvesters: Since the animal is slated for euthanasia, why not use it for the benefit of mankind?

The State's Example.

The state, by its legal actions, reveals that it values castoff cats and dogs more than the unborn child. No state has yet banned fetal experimentation, while eleven states now prohibit the selling of stray animals after their impoundment for research. Ironically, the practical effect of these regulations is that these strays are put to sleep much sooner.

Of course, it is common knowledge among pro-lifers that the government values unborn animals much more than unborn human beings.

It is illegal to transport pregnant lobsters (no, this is not a joke) anywhere on the East Coast for fear of damaging them or their offspring. This means that the Federal government recognizes lobsters as lobsters from conception.[27]

Anyone destroying or tampering with eagle eggs is subject to a $5,000 fine and one year's imprisonment. This means that the Federal government recognizes eagles as eagles from conception.

Cattle used as breeding stock must be capitalized, which means that all associated costs must be recorded. These costs begin at conception! According to The General Explanation of the Tax Reform Act of 1986 (commonly referred to as the "Blue Book"), issued by the Joint Committee on Taxation, "The preproductive period of [farm] animals begins at the time of acquisition, breeding, or embryo implantation."

This means that the Federal government recognizes calves as calves from implantation.[27]

Laws across the United States are virtually uniform in addressing the avoidance of pain to animals. Yet no law even attempts to ameliorate the awful pain felt by the 15,000 third-trimester babies who are cut apart and left to die in aluminum buckets every year in this country.

There are almost too many examples of our government's People Last! policy to count, but some of the more ludicrous and hypocritical instances are shown below.

• In Rhode Island, "cruelty to animals" is a misdemeanor punishable by up to 11 months in jail and a $500 fine. One Providence woman was arrested and charged under this statute for starving her dog to death. In the same state, Marcia Gray, a human being, was starved to death, even though she had never requested such 'treatment.' She was merely "inconvenient," presumably just as the dog was, and so was "put to sleep," just as the dog was. But there is no fine or jail term in Rhode Island for starving a human being to death.[28]

• A Los Angeles woman baked her boyfriend's parrot after an argument with him and was subsequently sentenced to 30 days in a County jail. She was also prohibited from owning a pet for three years.[29] Presumably, she was not severely beaten by police with name tags removed, as were hundreds of pro-life activists during massive rescues in the same city in 1989.

• A panel of Florida judges said that a fertilized turtle egg was "marine life" and that a turtle's life begins the moment the egg is laid, in an opinion that included a fine of $108,800 levied against James Bivens, who pleaded guilty to poaching turtle eggs from John D. MacArthur State Park. Bivens was also sentenced to 60 days in jail, all of which he served.[30] Joan Andrews, who caused $215 damage to an abortion suction machine, languished in a Florida jail for two and a half years.

• An Illinois man was fined $500 in 1984 for inadvertently killing a female white-tailed deer. He said that he shot at extreme range and mistook the doe for a buck. Unfortunately for him, the doe was pregnant, so he was fined.[31] This is typical of local and state hunting laws. It also means that the government recognizes deer as deer from conception.[27]

• The May 6, 1982 Washington Post reported that a Maryland veterinarian was suspended from his practice and fined $3,000 "in the starvation death of a dog."[32] Yet every year in this country more than 2,000 newborn human beings are allowed to die of starvation and thirst because their parents deem that their lives are not of sufficient quality. Bloomington's Baby Doe was merely the most publicized of these thousands of deaths.

• It is illegal to offer goldfish in games of chance in Massachusetts, because the Supreme Judicial Court of that state ruled that this practice tends to "dull humanitarian feelings and corrupt morals." Remember that this is the same court that upheld forced public funding for abortions.[33]

• An unidentified person shot an American bald eagle on December 2, 1981 in Maryland's Patuxent State Park, and the Izaak Walton League of America, the National Wildlife Federation, and the United States Fish and Wildlife Service immediately joined forces, offering a $4,500 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the perpetrator. Yet people in the same state screamed in outrage when pro-lifers posted reward posters for information leading to the arrest and conviction of abortionists.[34]

• Finally, an unidentified person attacked a 500-year old oak tree near Magnolia Springs, Alabama, with a chain saw in October of 1990. Local government 'rescuers' responded to this "act of terrorism" by putting up a tent labeled "+ ICU +" (intensive care unit) over the base of the tree. This tent was equipped with a furnace, air conditioner, and 24-hour armed guard with telephone.[35]

There's "Inappropriate,' and Then ...

One vivid example of how completely our values have been inverted took place recently in (where else)? The People's Republic of Massachusetts, where Attorney General James Shannon allowed several questions regarding animal rights to be put to the voters via a general ballot. These ballot measures, which failed, would have extended animal rights to the extent that they would have been nearly equal to human rights. These measures would also have created absolute pandemonium in Massachusett's farming and agricultural sectors.

However, the same Attorney General rejected as "inappropriate" a nonbinding public policy question requested by 26,000 voters that would have posed to the voters a multiple-choice question regarding when human life begins.

It is very interesting that the good Attorney General was a past president of the local Planned Parenthood chapter.[36]

The Conclusion.

The conclusion that can be drawn from all of this is obvious. Our government values preborn lobsters, eagles, cattle, and deer much more than the preborn human being, which it considers nothing more than garbage.

This situation is so ridiculous that even some secular media spokesmen have parodied the animal-rights people. Syndicated humor columnist Dave Barry, in his March 13, 1989 weekly column, wrote that;

You're going to be sure that we made this up, but we didn't. It seems that a Rockville, Maryland restaurant called "The House of Chinese Gourmet" installed a lobster tank, which greatly upset some customers who belong to a group called the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, whose members apparently have (1) a deep respect for all living things, and (2) a tremendous amount of spare time. They bought seven lobsters from the restaurant for $40, removed them from the tank (according to the article, a PETA member "talked softly and rubbed the lobsters to reassure them"), and then paid $200 to fly the lobsters to Portland, Maine, where they (the lobsters) were released in the ocean, where we are sure they will live happy, productive lives until they are recaptured by lobstermen, who will re-sell them to The House of Chinese Gourmet, which will re-sell them to PETA, and thus will the great Cycle of Life continue until the lobsters become so airsick that they deliberately hurl themselves into boiling water.

On Vegetarianism.

Everyone (at least in California) has noticed the slogan "LOVE ANIMALS, DON'T EAT THEM" stenciled on public sidewalks and on the walls of packing houses and shops that sell fur coats. This philosophy has led to books with the silliest themes imaginable, i.e., The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory.

The general idea is that animals are all part of the 'eco-community,' and are co-equal with human beings in every way except that they are superior to humans in some ways. The idea of actually eating such exquisite creatures is anathema. Trans-Species Unlimited even urges "total abstention from animal products, including dairy and eggs."

There is a lot to be said for vegetarianism. The human gastrointestinal system is not designed to efficiently process meat. The human intestine is sized for digesting vegetables, and expends a disproportionate amount of energy on heavy chunks of meat. Some sources assert, very persuasively, that many or most of the country's half-million annual cases of intestinal cancer are caused by the prolonged additional stress of digesting meat.

There would also be vast advantages for everyone if the human race occupied a lower rung in the food chain. The average person consumes about 60 million calories of food energy in a 70-year lifespan. This is equivalent to either 100 tons of grain eaten directly, or more than 500 tons of grain if converted to meat at a 10 percent caloric conversion efficiency ratio.

The implications for feeding the world are obvious. Medard Gabel, in his 1979 book Ho Ping: Food for Everyone, says that we now cultivate 12.7 percent of our 52,426,568 square miles of land for food production. He also shows that we could cut land use in half by using all of our grain to feed humans instead of animals.

Disasters Behind the 'Iron Curtain.'

Ecological Inconsistency.

One of the biggest flaws in animal rights/environmentalist logic is the "Spaceship Earth" simile. Ecologists say, rightly so, that our planet is a closed and limited system that can be profoundly affected by man's activities at any point on, above, or under its surface.

Yet their words and their actions contrast sharply, depending upon who is doing the damage.

Our American media is positively saturated with concerns about our environment. We are bombarded constantly with words and images describing oil-soaked birds, clearcutting, the 'dangers' of nuclear power, and strident warnings about the ozone layer and the 'greenhouse effect.'

Environmental groups seem to assume that the United States, as the world's leading industrialized country, is one huge environmental disaster riding on the razor's edge of habitability. Moreover, these groups point to the United States as the world's number one polluter.

However, the environmentalists and the press mysteriously remain silent about the much greater disasters in the former Soviet Union ecological nightmares on a scale so vast they literally stagger the imagination.

The ecological situation in the former Soviet Union has always been bad, but has reached true crisis proportions in the last few years. Following are several examples of gigantic ecological disasters that have plagued the Soviet Union in just a single year 1990.

Massive Rocket Fuel Spill.

In May of 1990, more than ten thousand tons (3 million gallons) of rocket fuel leaked out of ruptured tanks at the Sverodvinsk nuclear submarine facility and into the White Sea. One-third of all marine life died in the area, including 100,000 seals and 5,000,000 fish.[37]

The Sea of Azov Disaster.

In July of 1990, enough raw, untreated human sewage to fill a train 135 miles long (700,000 tons) was dumped into the Sea of Azov (a large arm of the Black Sea), closing all resorts and residences on the sea, which now has been described by Moscow Television as a "literal sewer." It is not known if the shores will be habitable for years.[37]

Poisoned Water Supplies.

Also in July of 1990, the entire water supply of two large cities, Bryansk and Yaroslavi, was cut off after huge spills of formaldehyde and phenol into their reservoirs.[37]

A Thousand Spills.

In the Siberian Hizhnevartovsk and Novourengoi oil fields, 400,000 tons (115 million gallons) of crude oil were spilled and lost in a single weekend. In the first half of 1990 alone, more than three-quarters of a million tons of oil were spilled in 1,100 separate accidents and oil pipeline breaks.[37]

Sludged Beaches.

In early August, the Soviet Union's third largest city, Vladivostok, was closed to all visitors. All roads were blocked and all beaches for miles in each direction were closed. All of the city's five sewage treatment plants had broken down simultaneously, allowing more than 575,000 tons of untreated sewage to be dumped into the Sea of Japan every day.[37]

Shrunken Seas.

The volume of the Sea of Aral in Soviet Uzbekistan has shrunk by more than 40 percent since 1960 because of water withdrawals for cotton irrigation. The withered lake is surrounded by miles of salt flats, and chemical-laden dust saturates the air during the frequent local windstorms.

Because its supply of safe and clean water has dried up, two-thirds of the entire Karakalpak population living on the shores of the Sea are currently suffering from hepatitis, typhus, or cancer of the esophagus and throat. Infant mortality in the area is hovering at ten percent, 100 times the national average.[37]

Krakow's Destruction.

Stalin decided to "proletarianize" Krakow, Poland, by building giant steel mills there. Now the home of the current Catholic Pope has become one of the filthiest and unhealthiest cities in the world. Steel mills burning sulfur-laden soft coal belch half a million tons of pollutants into the air annually, dissolving artwork and statues for scores of miles around. More than 85 percent of the area's industrial workers retire early on disability, mostly because of lung diseases. Most food grown in the region of Krakow would be declared unfit even for animals to eat in the United States, let alone humans![37]

The Soviet Press.

Why has the American public not been informed about these ecological outrages? Not one percent of Americans know that an average of 40 percent of all original Soviet forest cover has been destroyed by pollutants. Nor do they realize that air over the former East Germany contains, on the average, nine times the pollutants of air over the former West Germany.

The fault for this pervasive ignorance certainly cannot be laid on the doorstep of the Soviet press, which has reported all of these disasters in great detail in all of its media outlets, many of which (including Pravda) are translated into English every day.

The fault lies with the American press and American environmental organizations.

The Soviet press, for example, informed the Moscow office of Greenpeace about all of the disasters described above, but not a word on any of them has appeared in any Greenpeace literature.

When the Soviet's primitive Chernobyl nuclear plant suffered a severe accident, Greenpeace indignation and anger was not directed at other equally primitive Soviet nuclear plants, but instead at the much safer and more modern plants in our own country! This is despite the fact that Chernobyl released about 50 pounds of highly concentrated radioactive waste into the atmosphere, including one of the deadliest isotopes known, Cesium 137. It is expected that the disaster will be responsible for between 17,000 and 475,000 excess deaths due to radiation-induced cancer.[38]

This rather one-sided attitude definitely gives the lie to the "Spaceship Earth" concept. After all, if any disaster has an impact on the entire planet, it should not matter to the radical environmentalists where such a disaster originates!

The Flaws In Animal-Rights Logic.

If abandoning animal research means that there are some things we cannot learn, then so be it ... We have no basic right not to be harmed by those natural diseases we are heir to.

                                                              T. Regan, The Case for Animal Rights.[39]

'Speciesism.'

A philosophy that holds animals superior to human beings is bound to run into logic problems.

This is often glaringly obvious in the many animal-rights bumperstickers decorating battered, many-hued Volkswagen busses as they clatter down the road, merrily belching oily smoke into the air;

TYPICAL EARTH FIRST! BUMPERSTICKERS

PREGNANCY: JUST ANOTHER DEADLY
SEXUALLY TRANSMITTED DISEASE

ANOTHER MORMON ON DRUGS
DARWIN
(Picture of a Christian fish with feet)

HAYDUKE LIVES!

I'D RATHER BE MONKEYWRENCHING

LOVE YOUR MOTHER, DON'T BECOME ONE

VISUALIZE INDUSTRIAL COLLAPSE

THE VARIEGATED LOUSEWORT [SPOTTED
OWL, SNAIL DARTER] HAS A RIGHT TO LIVE

NO MORE BABIES!

OUR FORESTS DO NOT OWE
THE TIMBER INDUSTRY A LIVING

DREAM BACK THE BISON,
SING BACK THE SWAN

THE EARTH DOES NOT BELONG TO US
WE BELONG TO THE EARTH

MORE WILDERNESS LESS PEOPLE
(picture of a newborn baby with a slash through it), 
advertised as "Send a message to the breeders"

Reference: These and other bumperstickers were advertised in the Earth First! Journal ("The Radical Environmental Journal"), Brigid (February 2), 1993, page 37.

The 'WE BELONG TO THE EARTH' bumpersticker is an expression of the 'New Age' belief that the Earth is the Supreme Being and is evolving towards divinity, a process known as 'theagenesis.'

Peter Singer, author of Animal Liberation, says that we shouldn't eat anything bigger than a shrimp. Singer is the 'ethicist' who said "To give preference to the life of a being simply because it is a member of our species would put us in the same position as racists."[40]

In other words, he accuses others of "species-ism" if they do not support his animal-rights activities. But isn't Singer's attitude towards living things that are smaller than shrimp just a form of "size-ism?" Don't little tiny things have just as much right to live as great big things? After all, it is the great big things that sit at the top of the food chain and cause most of the environmental damage and if we can go to the trouble of eliminating the eating of all animals larger than shrimp, why don't we go all the way and eliminate the eating of shrimp and those animals smaller than shrimp, as well?

Evidently Singer has a taste for shrimp!

Humanity's Uniqueness.

Although we can duplicate most of what animals can do (with mechanical assistance, of course), no animal can duplicate the most unique essence of humanity: To reason. No animal could invent a telephone or even use one. A logical person simply cannot deny that we are superior to animals in the one place where it really counts.

If we grant animals co-equal status, we have some very thorny problems on our hands, because, if animals are to be granted the same rights as humans, they must necessarily be burdened with the same responsibilities.

• If we no longer have the right to eat meat, in the interest of fairness, we must also ban other animals from eating meat. However, some animals, including all cats, must eat meat, because they derive essential amino acids from meat and only from meat.

• If animals are to have real rights, they must have adequate representation. Perhaps we could elect a peacock to the Presidency, and a few louseworts to Congress. Actually, if we really intend to be consistent about all of this, we should not discriminate against any non-human life. This means that we must extend protection to insects and bacteria, as well. Since insects make up 99.99 percent of all visible life, they should run everything under the principle of proportional representation. Ban Raid! Down with Orkin!

• The average lion in captivity lives to be about 15 years old. The average wild lion lives to be two and a half years old. Borneo and Malaysia orangutans live for 35 years in the wild; in captivity, they will live half a century. 'Wild' humans live to be about 35; 'captive' ones, to 70.[41] These numbers suggest that it is truly a kindness in some ways to keep animals in well-tended zoos, despite protestations by animal rights activists that such constitutes an 'unnatural environment.'

The Pro-Life Advantage.

There is certainly one advantage that pro-lifers have over animal-rights activists. We get queasy feelings in the pits of our stomachs whenever we pass a known abortion mill. Animal-rights activists must get the same feeling whenever they pass any McDonald's, Arby's, Burger King, or Wendy's. And there are a hundred fast-food hamburger outlets for every abortion mill!

Scripture On Animal Rights.

The animal-rights movement essentially attacks man as being made in the image and likeness of God by placing animals on the same level as man. If there is no essential difference between man and animals, there is no soul for any species, and all beings either were or were not equally redeemed and saved by the Blood of Christ, either option of which is utter nonsense.

When Jesus cast the demons out of the man into 2,000 pigs, He did not interfere when all of these animals rushed into the water and drowned themselves;

When he arrived at the other side in the region of the Gadarenes, two demon-possessed men coming from the tombs met him. They were so violent that no one could pass that way.

"What do you want with us, Son of God," they shouted. "Have you come here to torture us before the appointed time?"

Some distance from them, a large herd of pigs was feeding. The demons begged Jesus, "If you drive us out, send us into the herd of pigs."

He said to them, "Go!" So they came out and went into the pigs, and the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and died in the water.

                                                                                Matthew 8:28-32, Luke 8:26-33.

Jesus tells us about God's concern for a single sparrow but of his infinitely greater concern for us. However, when we turn our backs on Him and think of man as merely another animal, abortion becomes reasonable. So does any other procedure that can be applied to animals: Fetal experimentation and organ harvesting, sterilization, artificial insemination, euthanasia, chimeral monstrosities ...

Despite lofty pronouncements by Ted Turner and his anti-theistic ilk, Scripture doesn't tell us that animals are worthless, because God would not have created them if they were. The Bible only tells us that man is made in the image of God and therefore occupies a unique place in Creation.

The very first chapter of the Bible says it all for Christians;

God blessed them [Adam and Eve], saying "be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth and conquer it. Be masters of the fish of the sea, the birds of Heaven, and all living animals on the earth."

And the Lord God made for Adam and his wife garments of skin, and clothed them.

                                                                                                Genesis 1:28-30, 3:21.

Other Scripture verses directly address the relationship between animal rights and human beings;

Yet you have made him [man] little less than a god,
you have crowned him with glory and splendor;
made him lord over the work of your hands,
set all things under his feet.
Sheep and oxen, all these,
yes, wild animals too.
Birds in the air, fish in the sea,
traveling the paths of the ocean.

                                                                                                         Psalm 8:7-9.

Look at the birds in the sky. They do not sow or reap or gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they are?

                                                                                                        Matthew 6:26.

Why, every hair on your head has been counted. So there is no need to be afraid; you are worth more than hundreds of sparrows.

                                                                                                        Matthew 10:31.

References: Animal Rights and Environmentalism.

[1] Ingrid Newkirk, founder and director of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), quoted by syndicated columnist Stephen Chapman in the December 6, 1989 Chicago Tribune. Also see "Animal Rights Activists Take Their Protests Too Fur." The Oregonian, December 6, 1989, page C5.

[2] Jean-Michel Cousteau. Quoted in Richard L. Hill. "Explorer Finds No. 1 Threat in a Word: Overpopulation." The Oregonian, October 8, 1992, page B1.

[3] Mary O'Brien, staff scientist for the Environmental Law Alliance Worldwide (E-LAW). Quoted in Kristine Rosemary. "Ecofeminism Finding Fertile Environment." The Oregonian, March 12, 1992, page B9.

[4] Ted Turner, 1990 Humanist of the Year, "Humanism's Fighting Chance." The Humanist, January/February 1991, page 15.

[5] Joseph Farah. "'Captain Planet:' Worse Than Imagined." New Dimensions Magazine, March 1991, page 73.

[6] Stephen Talbot. "Earth First! What Next?" Mother Jones, November/December 1990, pages 46 to 49 and 76 to 80.

[7] Ronald A. Taylor. "Do Environmentalists Care About Poor People?" U.S. News and World Report, April 2, 1984, pages 51 and 52.

[8] D. Keith Mano. "On Environmentalism." National Review, February 10, 1989, pages 63, 65 and 66.

[9] Ingrid Newkirk of PETA, quoted in Charles Oliver. "Liberation Zoology." Reason Magazine, June 1990, pages 22 to 27.

[10] Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, quoted in Richard Hertz. Chance and Symbol. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1948. Page 107.

[11] David M. Graber quoting Bill McKibben's The End of Nature in the Los Angeles Times book review, as printed in the Orange County (California) Register, October 28, 1990.

[12] Les U. Knight of VHEMT, quoted in Joel Dippold. "Live Well and Die." The Portland [Oregon] Alliance, March 1991, page 5. See also "That's Outrageous!, A Compilation: The Dodo Solution." Reader's Digest, April 1992, page 147.

[13] Christopher Manes. Green Rage: Radical Environmentalism and the Unmaking of Civilization. New York: Little, Brown, 1990. Quoted in Bruce Frohnen. "Humans Last!" National Review, September 17, 1990, page 50.

[14] Priscilla Feral, quoted in the New York Times, October 25, 1988, page 1.

[15] PETA news release, quoted in K. McCabe. "Beyond Cruelty." The Washingtonian, February 1990, pages 72 to 195.

[16] K. McCabe. "Who Will Live, Who Will Die?" The Washingtonian, August 1986, pages 112 to 157.

[17] Professor Peter F. Drucker, who offered the nation's first college course on the environment in 1947. "Politics and Economics of the Environment." Transcript of April 13, 1971 speech in Los Angeles during The Claremont Colleges Annual Lecture Series. Published by the Friends of The Claremont Colleges, Claremont, California, June, 1971. Page 8.

[18] "Activist Gets Prison Term." The Oregonian, April 18, 1990, page A10.

[19] L. Horton. "The Enduring Animal Issue." Journal of the National Cancer Institute, 1989:736-743. Also see L. Horton. "Putting the Politics of Research With Animals in Perspective." J. Soc. Res. Adm. 1988; 19(3):5-15.

[20] "2 Fires Set: Animals Freed." The Oregonian, April 4, 1989, page A9.

[21] New York Times, January 13, 1988, page 1. As described in the Portland, Oregon Alliance, February 1989, page 13.

[22] As described in Ron Arnold. "Eco-Terrorism." Reason, February 1983, pages 31 to 36.

[23] Writer for the Anarchist Newsletter Business As Usual, quoted in New Dimensions Magazine, December 1989, page 42.

[24] Environmental activist Helen Caldicott. Quoted by syndicated columnist Theodore Roszak. "Environmentalists' Wild Alarms Risk Their Cause." The Oregonian, June 14, 1992, pages D7 and D10.

[25] Proletarian Revolution, Fall 1989.

[26] Mary Anne Warren. "Can the Fetus be an Organ Farm?" Hastings Center Report, October 1978.

[27] As described in the American Family Association Journal,*** February 1989, page 9. Also see The Joint Committee on Taxation. The General Explanation of the Tax Reform Act of 1986. May 4, 1987, page 513. See also Section 803 of the Tax Reform Act of 1986.

[28] Mary Senander. "Animal Rights, Humans Wronged." Catholic Twin Circle, April 2, 1989, page 6.

[29] "Woman Gets 30 Days for Baking Parrot." The Stafford [Virginia] Star Advertiser, Week of December 19, 1988, page 6.

[30] Associated Press. "Judges Uphold $108,800 Fine Over Poached Eggs." St. Petersburg [Florida] Times, March 16, 1990, page 2.

[31] As described in the National Federation for Decency Journal,*** July/August 1985.

[32] As described in J.P. McFadden's introduction to The Human Life Review, Summer 1982, page 4.

[33] Newsletter of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, February 1986, page 5.

[34] "League Offers $1000 Reward in Eagle Killing." The Wheaton [Maryland] News, January 1, 1982.

[35] "News In Brief: Save the Tree." The Oregonian, March 19, 1991, page A2.

[36] Richard J. Mullaney's letter entitled "Animal Rights? Fetal Rights?" Fidelity Magazine, March 1989, page 7.

[37] Jack Wheeler. "Where is the Outcry Over Soviet Eco-Disasters?" The Oregonian, September 5, 1990, page B5. Also see Sandra Miesel. "Commissars Pollute, Too." National Catholic Register, July 8, 1990, page 5.

[38] William Broad. "Mountain of Trouble." The Eugene Register-Guard, November 18, 1990.

[39] T. Regan. The Case for Animal Rights. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983.

[40] Book review of J. Robert Nelson's Human Life: A Biblical Perspective for Bioethics, by James Manney. National Right to Life News, October 24, 1985, page 9. Also see Joseph Sobran's Washington Watch. "Nice Kitties?" The Wanderer, April 20, 1989, page 5.

[41] Vicki Hearne. "What's Wrong With Animal Rights: Of Hounds, Horses, and Jeffersonian Happiness." Harper's, September 1991, pages 59 to 64.

References: Animal Rights and Environmentalism.

Ethics & Medics. Subtitled A Catholic Perspective on Moral Issues in the Health and Life Sciences, 
this venerable monthly comments on all of the important developments in the life issues, to include animal rights and euthanasia. Subscribe by writing to The Pope John Center, 186 Forbes Road, Braintree, Massachusetts 02184, telephone: (617) 848-6965.

Greenhaven Press. Biomedical Ethics: Opposing Viewpoints. 
Greenhaven Press Opposing Viewpoints Series, Post Office Box 289009, San Diego, California 92128-9009. 1987, 216 pages. Each section includes several essays by leading authorities on both sides of each issue. The questions asked are: "Is Genetic Engineering Ethical?;" "Are Organ Transplants Ethical?;" "Should Limits Be Placed On Reproductive Technology?;" "Should Animals Be Used in Scientific Research?;" and "What Ethical Standards Should Guide the Health Care System?" Authors include Tibor R. Macan, Malcolm Muggeridge, and the Ethics Committee of the American Fertility Society. A catalog is available from the above address and can be obtained by calling 1-(800) 231-5163.

Greenhaven Press. The Environmental Crisis: Opposing Viewpoints. 
Greenhaven Press Opposing Viewpoints Series, Post Office Box 289009, San Diego, California 92128-9009. 1986, 263 pages. Each section includes several essays by leading authorities on both sides of each issue. The questions asked are: "Is There an Environmental Crisis?;" "Should Corporations Be Held Responsible for Environmental Disasters?;" "Have Pollution Regulations Improved the Environment?;" "Is Nuclear Power an Acceptable Risk?;" "How Dangerous Are Toxic Wastes?;" and "How Harmful is Acid Rain?" Authors include Ralph Nader, Ben J. Wattenberg, and John S. Herrington. A catalog is available from the above address and can be obtained by calling 1-(800) 231-5163.

Greenhaven Press. Science and Technology: Opposing Viewpoints. 
Volume I. Greenhaven Press Opposing Viewpoints Series, Post Office Box 289009, San Diego, California 92128-9009. 1989, 440 pages. Each section includes several essays by leading authorities on both sides of each issue: Creationism in the schools, current artificial birth technologies, genetic engineering, organ transplants, animal experimentation, and the Strategic Defense Initiative are just a few of the topics whose main pro- and con arguments are thoroughly covered in this excellent 440-page volume. This topic is covered by a series of books, beginning with a basic set of essays entitled Sources and continuing with an additional and updated annual series of essays. A catalog is available from the above address and can be obtained by calling 1-(800) 231-5163.

Human Life International. Project Population Myths. 
36 pages, June 1992. This fact-filled booklet aggressively debunks the eight primary myths set forth by the population controllers: The earth cannot feed us, the exponential growth rate is a population time bomb, planet Earth is too small, excessive population is incompatible with national economic health, Earth does not have enough natural resources, contraception and abortion are necessary, population growth causes severe environmental impacts, and the Chinese forced-abortion program is a good policy. Available from Human Life International, 7845-E Airpark Road, Gaithersburg, Virginia 20879.

Jacqueline Kasun, Ph.D. Population and Environment: Debunking the Myths. 
Population Research Institute, Post Office Box 2024, Baltimore, Maryland 21297-0330. Telephone: (301) 670-1864. 1991, 18 pages. This booklet clearly outlines the history and major fallacies of the population control movement and describes some of the connections between environmental groups and the population control cartel. A good introductory presentation for those who want to become familiar with "the enemy."

Carol Levine (Editor). Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Bio-Ethical Issues. 
Dushkin Publishing Group, Inc., Guilford, Connecticut. 1984, 297 pages. Leading thinkers on both sides of bioethical issues express their opinions in scholarly essays on subjects including abortion, in-vitro fertilization, surrogate motherhood, involuntary sterilization of the retarded, informed consent, active euthanasia, withholding treatment from handicapped newborns, suicide, the insanity defense, animal experimentation, prisoners volunteering for research, justifiable deception in research, organ harvesting from the dead, and genetic engineering. A good primer on the bioethical issues.

Christopher Manes. Green Rage: Radical Environmentalism and the Unmaking of Civilization. 
New York: Little, Brown, 1990. An interesting book in which the author demonstrates that the primary objective of the radical environmental/animal rights agenda is the complete dismantling of industrial/ technical society, which would preferably be replaced by an agarian/gatherer/hunter type of system.

Harlan B. Miller and William H. Williams. Ethics and Animals. 
Humana Press, Crescent Manor, Post Office Box 2148, Clifton, New Jersey 07015. 1983, 400 pages. This collection of about 30 essays from distinguished authors on both sides of the "animal rights" debate offers probably the most complete grounding in this issue available today. Topics include animal rights, the killing of animals, their suffering, "speciesism," animal intelligence, experimentation on animals, animals in law, literature, and philosophy, animals and their relationships to humans, the moral status of animals, animal liberation, and the ethics of eating meat.

Tom Regan. The Case for Animal Rights. 
Berkeley, University of California Press. 1983, 425 pages. The author, the "intellectual leader of the animal rights movement," has written the most scholarly and persuasive tome to date on why animals should be given respect and rights because they are creatures that have expectations, desires, memories, and other attributes. The author's basic thesis is that animals have value other than that assigned by others (oddly enough, the same argument used by pro-lifers). Unfortunately, his views are written from a purely Humanistic standpoint and therefore he winds up saying things that are just as extreme as better-known animal rights activists, only in many more words. For example, he argues that "If abandoning animal research means that there are some things we cannot learn, then so be it ... We have no basic right not to be harmed by those natural diseases we are heir to." The book is very interesting reading for pro-lifers because the author, if he were a pro-lifer, could be arguing for the protection for the unborn.

© American Life League BBS — 1-703-659-7111

This is a chapter of the Pro-Life Activist’s Encyclopedia published by American Life League.