More horses reach finish line

Race horses can have a brief, exciting and even glorious life. It's after their careers end that they're in danger of being sold for slaughter, euthanized or abandoned. Last Sunday, a NYTimes editorial estimated one of these three fates befalls two out of three horses.

A scandal last spring, with nearly 200 former racers being readied for slaughter, called public attention to what can happen to horses, even when -- as was true here -- they're owned by a prominent, successful breeder.

One result: the New York Racing Association announced that breeders or trainers who sell horses for slaughter will be banned. Threat of punishment may be the only deterrent to people who would do such a thing.

Better yet, as the scandal story spread, individuals and organizations came to the horses' rescue, and many have been given homes on ranches and as "recreational companions." One group, the
Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation, buys horses for rural prisons where they're cared for by minimum-security inmates. Speaking about his horse, one inmate said, "The little guy just wants to run free."
#

Happy Thanksgiving

. . . "And that Thanksgiving turkey? Even if it is raised “free range,” it still lives a life of pain and confinement that ends with the butcher’s knife.

“How can intelligent people who purport to be deeply concerned with animal welfare and respectful of life turn a blind eye to such practices? And how can people continue to eat meat when they become aware that nearly 53 billion land animals are slaughtered every year for human consumption? The simple answer is that most people just don’t care about the lives or fortunes of animals. If they did care, they would learn as much as possible about the ways in which our society systematically abuses animals, and they would make what is at once a very simple and a very difficult choice: to forswear the consumption of animal products of all kinds. . . . ”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/22/opinion/22steiner.html

For the chickens

The McDonald’s on Cass St. in Trenton will be a happening place at lunchtime next Wednesday, July 15. PETA – People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals – is coming to town for a demonstration outside, hoping to help convince McDonald’s, which is the largest seller of chicken meat in the US, to make its suppliers use a less cruel method of slaughter.

Less cruel than what, you ask? It involves “breaking birds’ wings and legs, scalding them to death in defeathering tanks, and abusing them in other heinous ways.” Enough of an idea? PETA hopes McDonald’s will agree to adopt a process called “controlled atmosphere killing,” or CAK.

A takeoff on the corporation’s “Happy Meal,” PETA’s “Unhappy Meal” that will be given away on the 15th will include a bloody chick whose throat was cut while s/he was still conscious and a cardboard cutout of an evil Ronald McDonald – both inside a carton printed with information about McDonald’s cruelty.

The giveaway is scheduled for 11:45-1 pm at McDonald’s, 603 Cass Street, Trenton. To RSVP or ask questions, email CassandraC@peta.org. Please come -- and bring a friend “for the animals.”

More specifics before the event.
#