Home | Back to Program Schedule
Presenters: Dorchak, Hindi, Jaynes
Christine will describe the 2008 ballot question to end dog racing in Massachusetts and present an overview of commercial greyhound racing nationwide. GREY2K USA is a national greyhound protection group consisting of lawyers, lobbyists, veterinarians, adopters and others working together to end dog racing at 34 remaining tracks in 13 states nationwide. Eleven tracks have closed or ended live racing since Christmas Eve 2004, and Christine will describe the mechanics of effective campaigning against the cruelty of dog racing.
**********************************************************************************************
Silently Suffering Slaves: Trials
and Training Practices of Performing Elephants
This short presentation will provide a firm reason why
people should not attend animal circuses. The focus of
the presentation will be on elephants. A now almost classic
undercover video will be shown depicting common elephant
training practices, swaying stereotypic behavior observed
in captive elephants but never in the wild, and disturbing
instances of elephant rampages including the tragic gunning
down of one great beast.
Many people in the elephant AR
community are aware of this video shot and produced by
PETA; however, I feel it is worthwhile to revisit the footage
if one is familiar with it and open a new discussion on
performing elephants if one is not. Unfortunately going
to the circus is a distinct American tradition still practiced
by many families throughout America. The discussion will
center on how and why we still allow this silent suffering
of elephants in the contemporary world. The anachronistic
cruelty of elephant circuses must be stopped and these
African and Asian elephants must be retired to elephant
sanctuaries like the one in Hohenwald Tennessee. African
elephants are endangered and close to extinction. The flawed
anthropocentric theory of lethal sustainable use will not
save these animals and most circuses' elephant breeding
programs are extremely ineffective. All circus animals
suffer, but elephants seem to suffer worse. And they do
it in silence. Anyone who has seen them or studied them
in their natural environments know it is horrific to confine
them to such tiny, disturbing, and stressful lives. The
video that will be shown shows crippled elephants with
obviously injured joints and legs hobbling onto fairgrounds
to give children rides on their backs. And for what do
these animals suffer, far from their native lands and family
units, one might ask. The answer is simple and terrifying.
These endangered elephants are tortured and forced to perform
and chained up to twenty hours a day simply so we can go
and see them once every few years. It is not worth it and
it must end. Revisiting the video and opening the discussion,
hopefully "Silently
Suffering Slaves" will bring these elephants into the consciousness
of the AR community as strongly as factory farming and
other issues have been. The issue of perfoming animals
often takes a back seat to other issues such as the meat
industry, fur, and veganism. However, these intelligent
and kind elephants are vanishing from the planet. And we
must help them.
**********************************************************************************************