At long last...

[Pajarita]

I can't tell you how happy this makes me! Now we need to fight so they would send them to a good natural preserve instead of their own facility (I don't trust these people at all!).

http://www.msn.com/en-us/entertainment/ ... ocid=edgsp

[Chantilly]

Aww this is wonderful, Yes they need to go to a good preserve. I hate circus's that have animals. Its just way to cruel.It will be nice for these old girls to catch a break.

[Wolf]

Ringling Brothers, circus is a whole lot different than one might expect and they usually treat their animals better than most individuals do. Their is rarely any time of the day or night that they are not covered up in animal rights activists that are trying to shut them down. They are watched to such a degree that if their animals get their meals 15 minutes late, regardless of the reason there will be at least 20 animal rights groups screaming foul.

I am not intending to discredit these groups or to defend the circus either. There was a time that their animals were not treated properly, just as there were times when we did not realize that we were doing our parrots wrong.

[Pajarita]

Wolf, the only way you can train an elephant is through pain when it's a baby. They are HUGE animals, stronger than many men put together so, unless you create a fear so deep very early in life so that the only thing the animal will think of doing when given an order is complying, you can't control them. Now, I don't know about anybody else but, to me, hurting a baby is too cruel for words and it shouldn't matter if you are an animal rights activist or not. It's basic human decency... and I won't even go into the cruelty of keeping these super intelligent, gently, loving and self-aware animals in chains their entire life just so people can see them performing tricks.

See this:http://www.ringlingbeatsanimals.com/

The reason why this circus stopped using elephants in their shows was not only that people starting boycotting their shows, sending petitions, etc., it was also that the hooks used to control them were illegal in many cities so they were getting more and more limited as to where they could perform. It wasn't love for the elephants that changed their minds, it was profit loss.

Here is an update on the campaign: https://www.change.org/p/give-your-elep ... dium=email

[Wolf]

That may be the way that elephants are trained, I do not know, but they used to think that pain was they only way to train a horse as well, but that is not true and I personally have never mat any animal that has to be caused pain in order to train them, they all respond to love, but then I really don't know any elephants.

[Michael]

Orca training is far more benign and humane than elephant training. Shame they shut that down first instead of elephants.

Be careful what you ask for, it won't be long that the animal rights fanatics run out of venues to shut down. You can be sure they will come after you and your parrots when they do run out of causes to protest for!

[Pajarita]

Well, Michael, I am one of those 'animal rights fanatics' and I can assure you I would never do anything to take your parrots away from you or anybody else that is treating them right. I also have many more companion animals than you or most people have and would NEVER consider living without any or banning other people from having them so, although this is what PIJAC wants everybody to think, it's not true. It's nothing but self-serving propaganda from a lobbying organization that represents pet stores, breeders, etc. And I don't know of any animal right activist that feels this way, either, although I am sure there are some in Peta. We just don't want animals to suffer. I am not even a vegetarian, I think it's completely unnatural and detriment to human health to eat only vegetables but I refuse to support any industry that is based on the misery and suffering of animals - be it the entertainment, food or whatever kind of industry.

[Michael]

And I don't know of any animal right activist that feels this way, either, although I am sure there are some in Peta. We just don't want animals to suffer. I am not even a vegetarian, I think it's completely unnatural and detriment to human health to eat only vegetables but I refuse to support any industry that is based on the misery and suffering of animals - be it the entertainment, food or whatever kind of industry.

And when all other "animal rights" causes are exhausted, you can bet your comrades will come after you for eating meat. There's no end to this sort of thinking. I totally agree that animal abuse needs to be reduced and better living increased. But the activism doesn't end. Activists thrive on activism. Getting what they campaign for doesn't satiate them. They always find new things to go after if they reach their prior goals.

[Pajarita]

How many animal right activists do you personally know and how many of them are like that, Michael? Or is it that you just think that animal right activists are different from everybody else? Because the gradual change of a little something today and a little something more tomorrow is what has civilized mankind so it's not just animal right activists that take this approach, it's the approach everybody who wants to make a change would take. It's like slavery in USA. They started with the emancipation declaration, then voting rights, then desegregation, then civil rights and, right now, we are fighting about profiling. The 'saga' against racial discrimination has not yet finished, it's an ongoing thing until we get to a point that everybody feels is fair for everybody. Well, it's the same thing with animal cruelty. People used to believe that animals did not feel at all, not even physical pain - they used to perform vivisections on alert animals all the time, for heaven's sake! Terrible cruelties were performed on animals every single day without a second thought. But then the 'bleeding hearts' (like me ) started pushing for some minimum 'decency' and they got governments to enact animal cruelty laws which were revolutionary when first enacted (1800's) but which we now realize are inadequate due to what science (and us) now knows about them (and there are already a number of countries that have improved their animal cruelty laws - unfortunately, USA lags behind them). The funny thing is most people, like you, think that animal right activists think they are different or apart from 'normal' people but animal cruelty laws started happening at exactly the same time that human rights were (anti-slavery, women suffrage, child labor laws, etc) so, obviously, the frame of mind that is repulsed by animal cruelty goes hand in hand with the frame of mind that wants people to have better conditions (rights?). I think that's VERY telling. And, in reality, it started way before the term 'animal right activist' was even coined or that animal cruelty laws were dreamed of, Leonardo da Vinci's (1400's) disgust of animal cruelty is well documented as it is the fact that seeing birds kept in small cages was particularly distressing to him.

Personally, I don't see how any normal person would ever think that something like the 'crush' industry, dog fights rings, the poaching of animals for ignorant pseudo medical reasons like the Chinese and Vietnamese do, or putting shampoo or soap in a bunny's eyes over and over and over just to see how long it takes for the poor thing to go blind, etc. needs to be protected... And I know that a lot of people have been influenced by the propaganda that PIJAC puts out to discredit the animal rights movement and its activists but, to tell you the truth, the way I see it, animal right activists are just people who feel a stronger empathy for animals than the average population does at that point in time and, as we know that sociopaths have the same lack of empathy toward animals as they do to people, then one could say that animal right activists are the exact opposite of a sociopath. Maybe we should start calling ourselves the 'unsociopaths' instead

[Wolf]

I really think that this may be the type of thing that accounts for Michael's thoughts concerning animal rights activists. http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/in-cal ... spartandhp

This is a story that I ran across on MSN this morning about a boycott of the largest vegan restaurant chain in California because the owners eat meat at home while still running their chain of vegan restaurants. It make you wonder about where the activists are heading, which is what I believe that Michael is trying to point out.

Personally I take animal rights activist one at a time and listen to each one of those that I know to try and understand what their beliefs are and in just what direction they are headed. There have been a lot of good things, especially concerning animal abuse, that has come about because of the animal rights people. There are also some real wingnuts involved in it as well, but with any thing of this nature this does not surprise me in any manner. There are the good and the not so good on both sides of the issue, in my opinion.