Here's a call to action to stop animal abuse!

A dish made with dog meat in South Korea Ok, I got this email and read it.  After I caught my breath, I decided to repost it here for you.  This is a good cause and the content of this email is indescribable.

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Bulletin from the cause: In Defense of Animals Go to Cause

For years IDA has been working with South Korean Activists to help dogs & cats being slaughtered for food... Please help TODAY!

In South Korea, dogs are routinely ...

Wrenched from steaming, squalid crates where they’re packed like sardines to sell in the marketplace

Strung up by their necks as other imprisoned dogs watch in terror, then

Ruthlessly beaten as they dangle helplessly, urinating and defecating on themselves in an agonizing spiral of death.

The entire sickening process can take an hour or more. Only then is “man’s best friend” deemed ready for the dinner plate. He’s blowtorched, then butchered for barbecue, the evening’s meal.

And cats? They’re boiled alive in pressure cookers to make an “elixir” (death juice!) called goyangi soju. It’s believed to cure rheumatism and neuralgia.

As many as TWO MILLION cats and dogs are slaughtered for the meat trade every year in South Korea.

Yes, it makes you angry. That’s why your donation to IDA is urgently needed now. Because incredibly – finally – there are glimmers of hope.

Only thanks to your support has IDA been able to campaign in South Korea all these years. Things are beginning to change. To end this practice we still have much work to do ...

At the front lines is one of IDA's partners on the ground in South Korea, an organization called Coexistence for Animal Rights on Earth (CARE). They’ve been remarkably effective:

They received a tip about a dog meat “farm” in the remote Gyeonggi Province. CARE activists visited the facility. What they found was appalling. Dogs were living in ramshackle cages. Some had injuries. All sat in piles of feces.

At the risk of arrest and personal injury, they rescued the dogs and brought them to CARE’s shelter to be treated, cleaned, and loved for the first time.

CARE filed a civil complaint against the facility and the owner agreed to demolish the buildings and not obtain any more dogs – a HUGE win for the dogs of South Korea!

With IDA’s assistance, CARE is gearing up for lawsuits against dog meat shops in Gyeonggi Province.

Grassroots protests against the dog meat trade are now held every Sunday in South Korea. CARE learned of a Goyang City government shelter selling rescued dogs and cats to meat traders. They investigated, gathered evidence and exposed the shelter to the media.

The heartless shelter employees who were trafficking in cruelty? FIRED! The illegal trade of animals in Goyang City shelters? HALTED!

Without IDA's support of CARE that you make possible, these recent victories for South Korea’s dogs and cats couldn’t continue.

Here are just a few things that your donation today will directly help fund ...

$10,000 will help CARE purchase a rescue van that will traverse all of South Korea, and hundreds of additional dogs and cats will be rescued each year. Help IDA support work on a groundbreaking documentary that will expose the truth to South Koreans about the deception behind the “dog-eating culture in South Korea.”

Print thousands of brochures, flyers and posters – to flood key government officials with petitions, phone calls, letters, e-mails and faxes.

In addition to your donation, there’s even more you can do ...

Our fifth annual International Day of Action is set for August 16, 2011.

Events have been held in numerous countries – including South Korea – on five different continents. In the U.S., IDA has had a presence at every single South Korean Embassy and Consulate. Your donation will fund the groundwork for the 2011 International Day of Action, which promises to be the biggest yet.

Thank you for your commitment to end the suffering of our animal friends. Whatever you are able to donate today will be put to immediate and cost-effective use to end the torture and killing of dogs and cats in South Korea – and help animals wherever they are in desperate need.

May the kindness you show today return to you in a hundred wonderful ways.

For the animals,

Elliot M. Katz, DVM
President and Founder
In Defense of Animals

Call to Action

Fundraising Project: In Defense of Animals Donate

Supreme Court voids ban on cruel videos

This is an article I found on Dogtime.com.  When I read this article I was sick.  How can it be okay to make and sell dog fighting videos, yet dog fighting itself is illegal?  If that holds water, then how can all the perverts get arrested for viewing kiddie porn videos on their own computers?  Where exactly is the difference?  In both cases, the innocent are damaged and others are profiting from said damage.  Please click the link to go read the comments at the original site.  This just makes no sense at all.
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Dogtime editor rules on the Court's latest decision.

We live in a country in which our basic liberty is protected by law. And thanks to today's Supreme Court ruling, we can add one more freedom to the list that includes speech, religion, and assembly: We can legally profit from videos depicting people in spiked heels stomping on live animals until their bodies are pulverized. Crushed to death.
Thank you, Supreme Court justices (save Justice Alito), for upholding my right to sell footage showing the explicit maiming, torture, and killing of companion animals. I can now legally make money on dog fighting - or any other form of cruelty I happen to fancy.
"The First Amendment itself reflects a judgment by the American people that the benefits of its restrictions on the government outweigh its costs," said Chief Justice John Roberts.
According to cnn.com , "Roberts concluded Congress had not sufficiently shown 'depictions' of dog fighting enough to justify a special category of exclusion from free speech protection."
Just how many dogs should have to endure prolonged and intentional agony before the restrictions outweigh the costs? When does the scale tip away from depraved sadists in favor of a gentle and innocent animal?
In 1982, the Supreme Court ruled that the trafficking of child pornography does not fall under the protection of free speech. So the precedent is there. But the willingness of the Court to protect our dogs and cats is second to our right to produce images of bullfighting and deer hunting.
Roberts did concede one point. According to CNN, he "suggested a law specifically banning crush videos might be valid, since it was narrowly tailored to a specific type of commercial enterprise."
Might be valid? Your compassion is so overwhelming, Chief Justice Roberts, that I think I must now excuse myself to go be sick.
I love my American Pit Bull Terrier, but today, I certainly don't love being an American.
- Leslie Smith

The editor with her dog.

Here is the link to the original article and all the comments.  Please visit the site.

Related articles by Zemanta

• US court ends animal cruelty law (news.bbc.co.uk)
• Supreme Court Strikes Down Law Banning Depictions of Extreme Animal Cruelty (themoderatevoice.com)
• Court voids law aimed at animal cruelty videos (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
• Supreme Court Voids Ban on Dogfighting Videos (abcnews.go.com)
• High court: Animal-cruelty videos OK (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
• Justices reject ban on animal cruelty videos (msnbc.msn.com)

Boys, 10 and 12, charged with dogfighting

Here's an article and a news video that breaks my heart.  What, exactly, are we teaching our youth about respect and the value of life?  I read this article because I was sure there was an error in the ages of the perpetrators of this vicious abuse; imagine my surprise when I was wrong.

How can such young boys be so twisted?  Where are they learning these things?  How can we, as a society, help prevent this from becoming full-fledged epidemics?  These boys have lost their humanity before they even knew what that was.  I am so sad.
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Two boys — aged 10 and 12 — have been charged with fighting, baiting and cruelty to animals after deputies say they discovered the boys were operating a backyard dogfighting operation.

A neighbor called deputies in Orange County after the boys dumped a dead dog on his property. When deputies arrived to ask one of them about the allegations cops say the boy picked up a puppy and started beating it until deputies forced him to stop, according to Fox News in Orlando.

Three dogs were taken from the property after they were found covered with wounds, spray painted and living in unhealthy conditions.
 

OMG!!!! Who could be so seriously cruel and hateful?

Here is a blog post I found at Dandelion Arts that just stopped me cold.  I was dumbfounded and my heart was broken.  I absolutely cannot understand this behavior.  I am so grateful for the person who found and rescued this little boy.  He certainly has not experienced any kernel of kindness from humans in his life it seems.  Maybe, now, he can see that people don't have to be horrible and he can feel love.

This is just not acceptable behavior in a civilized nation.  This needs to be investigated and prosecuted.

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Helping poor little Prince Babe get to rescue...

I'll be helping this poor little urchin get to rescue next week. His name is PRINCE BABE, an approximately 5-year old Chihuahua that was found in a box near an apartment complex. Here is what the foster mom wrote about Babe:

As you can see he is quite pitiful. However, he looks tremendously better than when I got him on 1/4/10. When they first saw him at Whitfield Animal Hospital on 12/30/09, he weighed 4 lbs. He now is 5 lbs. and 11 ounces. He has also had several medicated baths which help with the peeling skin - a by-product of bad nutrition and a bacterial infection. He is taking antibiotics, prednisone, and soloxine. The first few days I had him, he just slept. I woke him up to eat after which he would go potty (he uses puppy pads.) I didn't think that was healthy so I took him to Dalton Animal Care where they put him on the medications and advised the medicated baths. They also clipped his nails, cleaned his ears, etc. It didn't take but a day on the meds before he actually became alive. He still doesn't play - don't think he knows how, but he does get up and roam around the house and eats like a horse. He also loves to be held and petted.

Such a sad little guy. I hope after our "transport train" gets him to his destination that he will be loved and cherished, instead of abandoned in a box suffering from disease and malnutrition. I don't understand this behavior.