Month: April 2004

Hawaii HB 2495 HD1 – Animal control from aircraft

Report Title:

Animal control from aircraft

Description:

Allows federal agencies to conduct animal control activities from aircraft or conservation programs on state, county, or private land. Requires DLNR to promulgate guidelines to minimize the targeted animals’ suffering. (HB2495 HD1)

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

H.B. NO.

2495

TWENTY-SECOND LEGISLATURE, 2004

H.D. 1

STATE OF HAWAII

  

 

A BILL FOR AN ACT

 

RELATING TO ANIMAL CONTROL FROM AIRCRAFT.

 

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:

SECTION 1. Section 263-10, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended to read as follows:

Ӥ263-10 Hunting from aircraft; penalty. (a) Any aeronaut or passenger who, while in flight in, across, or above the State, intentionally kills or attempts to kill any birds or animals shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and punished by a fine of not [more] less than [$1,000,] $500, or by imprisonment for not more than one year, or both.

(b) Subsection (a) shall not apply to any authorized employee or agent of any federal agency that obtains the approval of the department of land and natural resources and the applicable landowner to conduct animal control activities from aircraft for the sole purpose of conducting conservation programs on state, county, or private land. The department of land and natural resources shall promulgate guidelines to minimize needless suffering and ensure that animals are killed quickly.“

SECTION 2. Statutory material to be repealed is bracketed and stricken. New statutory material is underscored.

SECTION 3. This Act shall take effect upon its approval.

PETA Protests at Civil Rights Speech

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals protested outside a speech given by Columbia University president Lee Bollinger to honor the 50th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka that found segregation in schools unconstitutional.

PETA activists have been protesting Bollinger’s public appearance since October in an effort to get Columbia to drop primate research at the university. PETA’s Alka Chandna connected animal rights with civil rights, telling The Memphis Flyer (emphasis added),

There are terrible things happening to the primates at Columbia. In one experiment, a researcher cuts out the left eyes of baboons and then induces a stroke by inserting a clamp into the eye socket, closing three critical arteries . . . We understand from a veterinarian who was working at Columbia that the animals were not given sufficient pain relief during or after the experiments.

Lee Bollinger has an excellent track record as far as civil rights are concerned, but we’d like him to also see that primates are complex and intelligent being with a social structure similar to our own. They shouldn’t be deprived of basic rights either. That a person of his caliber cannot understand that is shocking to us.

Perhaps if Chandna and other PETA activists were of the same caliber as Bollinger, they might understand.

Source:

Fighting for their rights. Bianca Phillips, Memphis Flyer, February 12, 2004.

Vegetarian Indian Village

KeralaNext.Com had an interesting report on the village of Bhubaneswar where all 500 residents have been vegetarian for several generations. The villagers have an impeccable logic for avoiding eating meat. KeralaNext.Com quoted local school teacher, Dharanidhar Das, 58,

We do not know for how long we have been vegetarians. The practice has been handed down over generations.

It began a villager who ate meat turned blind. Since then, none of the villagers have dared to eat non-vegetarian.

According to KeralaNext.Com, the villagers don’t even allow meat or fish vendors to pass through the village and that their pets have also adopted vegetarian diets — when cats or dogs are offered meat, they refuse to eat it.

Source:

Superstition reigns supreme in vegetarian villages. KeralaNext.Com, January 16, 2004.

American Anti-Vivisection Society Demands Immediate Halt to Xeno Research

Following research published in January that observed fused cells resulting from a mixing of human and pig DNA, the American Anti-Vivisection Society fired of a letter to the Department of Health and Human Services demanding an immediate halt to all xenotransplantation research.

Researchers at the Mayo Clinic implanted human blood cells into fetal pigs. Some cells taken from the adult pigs were hybrids — they contained both human and pig DNA material. In addition, the hybrid cells contained the porcine endogenous retrovirus. As New Scientist noted in its summary of the study,

Previous laboratory work has shown that while PERVs in pig cells cannot infect human cells, those in hybrid cells can. The discovery therefore suggests a serious potential problem for xenotransplantation.

The work also suggests a possible route of infection for other viruses that have crossed from animals to humans.

The American Anti-Vivisection Society thinks that potential problem should result in an immediate halt to all such research. In a press release, the AAVS said,

Becuase organs from genetically-altered pigs have been heralded as the potential solution to alleviate the shortage of suitable human organs in the United States and elsewhere, the findings from this study provide an important case to abandon plans to transplant pig-derived cells, organs, and tissues into humans.

“This study clearly illustrates the dangers to public health that are inherent in xenotransplantation,” said AAVS Executive Director, Tina Nelson. “Not only could such transplants further jeopardize the lives of human patients who so desperately need a healthy organ, but also society as a whole, considering the likelihood of the patient also being infected with a dangerous retrovirus that could spread to other people.” The scientists involved postulate that HIV may have originated in this manner when an infected monkey bit a human and their stem cells fused. A retrovirus could also spread among scientists who work with the animals and/or their body parts and fluids.

. . .

“The solution to the organ donor shortage is not to place the burden on other animals but to change the donor system in the U.S. and make it a national priority. Xenotransplantation is similar to putting a filthy band-aid on an infected wound — it will not help but rather worsen the situation,” Nelson added. “I urge Secretary Thompson not to ignore these warnings signs.”

Oh sure, that makes sense — there’s a potential problem here, so lets stop all research!

Source:

Health Secretary Urged to Immediately Halt Trans-species Organ Transplants: Study Illustrates Dangers to Humans.

Pig-human chimeras contain cell surprise. New Scientist, January 13, 2004.

Neiman Marcus Stops Activist from Attending Shareholder Meeting

A popular strategy by activist groups of all stripes is to buy small amounts of stock in a company in order to voice displeasure at the company’s annual stock meeting. At its recent annual meeting, however, Neiman Marcus continued its long-standing practice of denying entry to animal rights activists who buy shares of the company for this purpose.

Fund for Animals issued a press release in January complaining that activist and Neiman Marcus shareholder Jennifer Allen was denied entry to that company’s annual meeting. In the press release, Allen said,

Neimna Marcus’s shareholders have a right to know that the company is supporting animal cruelty by selling fur and fur trim. Neiman Marcus can replace the real fur in its stores with the many warm and elegant alternatives available, and continue to produce profits for its shareholders.

Unfortunately, Neiman Marcus has a history of muzzling dissent among its shareholders. In 2002, five members of an animal advocacy group were also denied entry into the annual meeting, despite all being shareholders.

Those activists were with Compassion Over Killing and they were denied access on the grounds that they Neiman Marcus believed they planned “disruptive” actions. The Fund for Animals does not say what reason Allen was given by the company, but it was likely the same fear of disruption.

Back in 2002, Compassion Over Killing said it was looking at legal options to force Neiman Marcus to admit animal rights shareholders, but apparently never pursued the matter.

Source:

Taking stock of cruelty — anti-fur activist blocked from Neiman Marcus shareholder meeting. Press Release, Fund for Animals, January 16, 2004.

Animal Rights Extremists Threaten UK Judges and Their Families

In February animal rights extremists posted on a web site the names and addresses of two British judges involved in animal rights cases. And, for good measure, the extremists added the names and addresses of family members of the judges.

Justice Hallet, 54, was targeted because she granted an injunction preventing protesters from harassing Chiron employees, while Justice Owen, 59, has made a series of rulings in favor of Huntingdon Life Sciences and against animal rights activists harassing its employees.

The web site included a veiled threat that the judges are, “not immortal — they do not live in fireproof houses.”

The kicker, though, was Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty spokesman Greg Avery’s take on the threat — according to Avery, the research industry is behind the site,

Somebody involved in the industry has set this up. I don’t believe that it is anything to do with the animal-rights movement.

Right, and when Avery was harassing employees of Huntingdon Life Sciences, he was probably under some hypnotic spell implanted by the industry in order to make the animal rights movement look bad.

Watch out next week when we learn that Brian Cass actually beat himself up in 2001.

Sources:

Animal activists target judges. Christopher Hope, The Daily Telegraph (London), February 23, 2004.