Issue no. 32 Fall 2004

clubPETA’s Gift & Estate Planning Club

I am so pleased to have a new bookcoming out in January. It is called MakingKind Choices, and I hope that you will findit useful, not only personally but also as ameans to inspire others to act forthe animals who need each of us sodesperately.

Just last night, I saw a photographin a British newspaper that showed amonkey with her arms pinnedbehind her back, the typical wayprimates in labs are carried fromtheir cage to the procedure andback. The man holding her with thickgloves was huge compared to her, and Inoticed that she had clasped her feettogether and was looking up at him, veryfrightened, clearly wondering what wascoming next.

The story was about a “shortage” ofprimates for experiments. I wonder howmany people are haunted, as I am, by thatpicture and moved to do somethingmore today. Then again, how many simply

flipped the page and carried on readingabout real estate and the weather.

Making Kind Choices is all about gentlypersuading people to make

compassionate decisions atevery turn.

Almost every choicewe make, from what to buyand eat to what to say toour neighbors and what toteach our children, can be agrand opportunity toincorporate compassion, if

only we see it that way.Funnily enough, watching out for the

animals’ interests seems automatically tomean bringing a benefit to human beings.Helping them means helping myself withissues concerning my body, the Earth, myrelationship with other human beings, andmy role in the community.

We have a tremendous opportunityevery day to fill our hearts and hourswith as many positive experiences as we

can. For instance, how comforting toknow that when we pick up fallen babybirds from the sidewalk, we can helpthem gain their strength back and nourishthem properly rather than justremembering them throughout the dayand wondering if they have “made it.”How satisfying to switch on a news storyand think,“Yes, I know that some facecreams contain cow collagen, and I havealready protected myself from mad cowdisease by picking ones that don’t!” Evenbeing able to plan a relaxing or excitingvacation with animals in mind can be anempowering experience.

Life is full of possibilities for making apositive contribution.We only have to be open to them. As William Blakeadvises in Augaries of Innocence, you canstart to “see a World in a grain of sand,And a Heaven in a wild flower, HoldInfinity in the palm of your hand, andEternity in an hour.”

Ingrid’smessage

Life Is Full of Possibilitiesfor Making a

Positive Contribution

Augustus

Finding the Perfect Soap When the scents from the soap aislerise up around you and caress yournostrils or when you turn on the tapafter a hard day and look forward tosinking your aching limbs into a sudsyhot bath, who would think that you canmake a world of difference just bychoosing your soap carefully?

First, what’s in it? Well, I don’t knowabout you, but I don’t want pork fat, lard,and other tallow ingredients smeared onmy face, yet most commercial soaps usetallow from animal carcasses boileddown, or “rendered,” in giant vats. I’ll takepalm oil, coconut oil, or anything elsefrom a tree in my soap, but not that.

Second, the list of companies that donot test their soaps on animals, but useingredients and ingredient combinationsknown to be safe, is now very long. Lookfor the “no animal testing” and “noanimal ingredients” labels or checkPETA’s list of soap companies that doand that don’t test soaps cruelly.

Third, buying soaps from acooperative helps yourcommunity, but someconscientious soap companiesgive back a portion of theirproceeds to people in direneed. The best example isprobably The Body Shop.

Traveling Safely WithAnimals or Leaving ThemSafe at Home “Now, that’s ironic!”—One caged parrot to another as theirpeople head out the door, airline ticketsin hand.

“Look excited, look excited! Oh nevermind!”—Dog to goldfish, as he hears theirpeople returning home.

If you absolutely must leave animalsbehind when you go away, the very bestthing is to leave them at home wherethey feel comfortable. Boarding is atraumatic experience for most animals:They not only lose you, they also losethe safety and comfort of their home atthe same time.While you may like andtrust the person who runs a certainkennel or cattery, imagine for a momentbeing the cat or dog who must live onconcrete or in a cage while you are offon holiday!

This means finding a dog or cat orhamster “sitter.” Pick this person ascarefully as you would choose someoneto look after your baby or as a Frenchchef chooses vegetables. You cannot betoo careful. Being listed in the yellowpages doesn’t mean anything more than

being able to find the moneyto buy an ad. The best chanceof pinpointing a good one is toturn to a reliable relative orsomeone who has animals andwhom you have known foreons.

If you are driving with yourcat or your dog, be sure thathe or she is secure whenever adoor is open. A sudden bang

from a backfire, and a dog who is notleashed or a cat who is out of thecarrier may never be seen again.

The happy news is that pulling in forthe night with a dog or cat has never

been easier. Many hotels and motelsallow or even cater to animals in rooms,from economy chains like Motel 6 andSuper 8 to the Four Seasons Hotels andHotel Pierre in Manhattan.

Incorporating Dog- and Cat-Friendly Elements Into Our (andTheir) Home Chances are that you come and gofrom your home daily. And chances are,your dog and cat spend most of theirlives inside without much to do whenyou are gone, i.e., most of the time.Dogs need more than evenings andweekends at the dog park. They needto smell the great outdoors and “readthe news” on lampposts as often aspossible, and cats can go out on aharness or on a supervised romp in theyard.

If you have shut-in cats, modificationscan be made to liven up their lives andkeep their minds from going numb. First,do be sure they can look out thewindow, even if that simply meanspushing a piece of furniture, like a heavybureau, up to it and putting a piece ofbedding on top of it for them to loungeon while enjoying the view. For addedjoy, hanging a bird feeder out there inwinter allows them to watch “cat TV.”

A few nesting boxes, scratching posts,a place or two to jump up and get adifferent view, some peek-a-boo cutoutsinto cupboards or, at floor level, into anadjoining room are all possibilities toconsider.

Looking for home hazards can betime well spent. Many a dog or cat hasbeen hurt and even killed by being

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caught in a recliner chair or other largefolding bed or from curling up in thewarmth of a dryer among the clotheswhen the door was left open (alwayscheck before turning the clothes dryeron and never, ever ignore thumpingnoises). Commercial oven cleaners andfabric protectors, conventionalantifreeze, and other unexpectedpoisons are to be avoided, and it’salways good to check before bringinghome a new plant that it is not toxic ifeaten. Like children, animals must, ofcourse, be kept away from the stove,and burners should be dutifully turnedoff and covered (I use a pan of water)while they cool.

Making Your Workplace a Healthy,Helping Place No matter what our jobs, we spendmuch of our lives at work, so it iscomforting to realize that there areopportunities galore to make thatsecond home moreprogressive and humane.

Everyone eats! Andwhat our associateseat is important fortheir health and theoutput of theenterprise they workfor. You can actuallyimprove workplaceattendance by revolutionizingthe workplace cafeteria with healthymeals. If your workplace does not havea cafeteria, the managers of restaurantsclose by are likely to be pleased to hearfrom you.

Does your office recycle? It’s simpleenough to do, and the community isalways looking to list which companieshave joined in and will even publicizehow many pounds (or tons) of recyclingyou achieve in a year. Tell the boss: Oneton of recycled paper uses 64 percentless energy, uses 50 percent less water,

creates 74 percent less air pollution,saves 17 trees, and creates five times

more jobs than one ton of paperfrom virgin pulp wood.

Lots of companieshave matching giftprograms to encouragepersonnel to be generousto those in need.Your giftto save a forest or to feed

a hungry child in Appalachiaor closer to home can be

doubled if you can persuade thecompany to follow in the footsteps ofcompanies as different from each otheras Avon and The Washington Post.

Another way to help is to link upwith your local Meals on Wheels. Someof these excellent programs to feed theelderly and disabled, like the one inTarrant County,Texas, have come torealize that an alarming number of theirclients—who anxiously await that onedaily meal—have an only friend in theworld who shares it with them, theirprecious dog or cat. This meal sharing

could have very serious consequencesfor both the primary clients and theiranimals, as there isn’t much to goaround from a little tray, delivered justonce a day.

Being Ready for AnimalEmergencies on the Road Some people are quite squeamish orafraid when it comes to touching,moving, or handling animalsfound in distress, let alonegetting them into thecar. Having a smallanimal emergency kitin your trunk canmake your kind act alot easier to perform.

My firstrecommendation is tomake the container for thekit useful in and of itself. Use a catcarrier, for instance, either a cardboardone (available from any veterinarian orpet supply store) or, better yet, a sturdyplastic [one].

What to put in the basic kit:• A nylon lead• A towel• Names, addresses, and phonenumbers that you might need, such asyour local wildlife rescue/rehabilitationcenter, humane society, veterinarians,and 24-hour emergency veterinaryservices• A pop-top can of smelly cat food• A gauze bandage to staunch bleedingor to use to make a muzzle

Community Volunteering andLeading by Example Jennie Taylor Martin has a 3-year-oldchild to care for and she runs PETA’scatalog, so she is very busy. OneSunday afternoon, chores done, shefelt the desire to go out and dosomething for her “pet” cause, animalrights. What she really wanted was a

Excerpts From list of ideas she could run her thumbdown and pick something from to dothat weekend that would make adifference.That’s how the WeekendWarrior card set came about.

Jennie created the Weekend Warriorwhen she envisioned 52 cards, one foreach weekend of the year, outlining astep-by-step project that can easily betaken care of in a few hours or less.We can put our spare hours, whetherone weekend, every weekend, or evena weekday evening, to great use andmake our community, our world, abetter place.

Here are a few of Jennie’s favorites:•Cook a vegan meal to take as a treatto your coworkers and turn them onto healthy, humane cuisine! Be sure tohave the recipe handy and be gentle,not pushy, in the presentation.•Sign up with a communitygroup of people who walkAIDS patients’ dogs.•Wear a message shirtwhile walking or joggingor put a button on yourjacket that says, “AskMe Why I’m Vegan.”•Clean up a beach,riverbank, stream, or patch of ground.•Leave a tidy pile of vegetarian starterkits or Animal Times or other usefulnewsletters near the Stairmasters atthe gym or wherever people read orgather.•Record an educational message ontoyour answering machine.

A Special Passover: CelebratingFreedom With a Vegan Seder Philip and Hannah Schein are greatcooks.They also cherish Jewishvalues—particularly important to themis the teaching that all suffering mattersto God—and they very much wantthese wonderful values to be extended

to cover modern-day circumstances,such as factory farming andenvironmental degradation.

Hannah points out that in Exodus,we are told that Moses, Judaism’sgreatest prophet and teacher, waschosen by God to lead the Israelites to freedom because he had shownkindness to a lamb when he was asimple shepherd. That means, she says,that the lamb shank, which is usedsymbolically to represent sacrifices atthe Temple, can easily be replaced withsomething else. Like other vegetarians,she has chosen to use a beet instead,an alternative sanctioned by theTalmud.

Rabbi David Rosen has pointed outthat objects on the seder plate aresymbolic, hence there is no sin inimprovising and has suggested using abeet instead of a shankbone and a

mushroom to represent the Festiveoffering instead of an egg.

As Roberta Kalechofsky wrote inher article, “The Four Questions andthe Four Answers,” one interpretationof the reason behind the tradition ofdipping greens twice in salt water hasvegetarian roots: “Once toremember our past in theGarden ofEden andonce to

remember the future when we will allbe vegetarians again.”

Speaking Out: Using Your Voicefor Social Change The fear of conflict and of sounding orlooking ridiculous can be a powerfulsilencing force in our society, but wecannot let that happen. Imagine if RosaParks had sat quietly at the back of thebus! Each of us is a good person withimportant principles and decent valuesthat we mustn’t ever allow to betrampled just because we were a bittoo jittery to put them forward.

Never underestimate your influence!Who, me? Yes, you!

Did you know that the person whospeaks up first on a moral issue, statingan opinion, is the most likely toinfluence others? If we allow our pointof view to be known, we will swaypeople, but if we stand quietly and letsomeone expressing an opposing viewgo unchallenged, we hurt our cause.

Who cares if our voice shakes—atleast we’re using it. Who cares if wehaven’t formulated the best speech? All that matters is that we say, “I thinkthat’s wrong,” or, “Let’s do somethingkind instead.”

Human nature is such that thosewho heard what you said will replaythe tapes in their minds. At somepoint, what you said will resonate withwhat they hear again in another forumperhaps, and chances are, they willnever feel as comfortable saying ordoing that ugly thing again.

It’s not as hard as one might think tobe the squeaky wheel that gets oiled toserve justice.The world will be a betterplace if we ask for more considerationof the Earth and each other, no matterwhat form we come in. Your voice is a

very powerful tool in reducingoppression and lessening

suffering. Here’s to its use!

Making Kind Choices: Practical and Inspirational Changes YouCan Make to Help Animals and Change Your Life, by Ingrid E. Newkirk

3 Augustus Club2 Augustus Club

“As this book explores,

acts of kindness, even

in the simplest ways,

are what make our lives

meaningful, bringing

happiness to ourselves

and others.”

—The Dalai Lama

4 Augustus Club

5 Augustus Club

What happens when you get very old and don’twant to cook anymore? What about nursinghomes? Would they fix you decent meals or justdelete the meat?

—Noëlle Valentine,Altoona, Fla. PETA recommends Amy’s frozen vegetarian meals as an alternative to cooking. Gardenburger is also launching a line of complete frozen meals in September. These are good options to keep around for a quick and easy microwavable dinner. Regarding nursing homes, PETA suggests addressing this issue with the food-service manager and requesting healthy vegetarian options from Sysco’s new Moonrose line. Sysco is the biggest food-service distributor and supplies most commercial kitchens. If the food-service manager still does not oblige, then contact us at 757-622-7382 for help.

Can you address the recent allegations by KFCthat PETA’s investigator at the KFC chickenslaughterhouse in Moorefield, W.Va., could have,and should have, stopped the abuse of the

chickens by simply following internal procedures and filing acomplaint?—Anonymous

These allegations are, of course, not true. But theyare not unfamiliar, as this tactic is an old trick among thecompanies that we fight that profit from exploiting animals.

PETA’s investigator did in fact file a complaint early on, butno action was taken by the Moorefield plant. It was apparentthat management at the plant knew what the workers weredoing and had decided to turn a blind eye. Our investigator wastherefore left with no other recourse but to tough it out andcontinue filming until we had sufficient documentation to giveevidence to the world about what was happening behind thoseclosed doors.

The actions at the Moorefield plant are indefensible, andKFC is pulling out all the stops in a desperate attempt todeflect attention and relieve itself of responsibility. But we willkeep the spotlight on KFC until it decides to better the livesand deaths of the chickens it uses by adopting ourrecommendations.The chickens deserve at least that.

Diana Moreton, who calls herself “The Vegilante,” isan avid writer, poet, and singer. In the followingpoem, she pays tribute to our legendary Augustus.

Grandfather Augustus

Grandfather Augustuskind, serene

treated cruellycold and mean

prodded, pokedin “science’s” name

madman Taubbastard to blame

millions of travestiesfought in your name

battle the mythsly political game

we wear your wisenesson our lapels

in remembrance ofyour living hell

we hope in your deathmankind will learnthere is no reason

to torture and burn.

Welcome to the first A.C. Members’ Exchange! Here is your opportunity toexchange ideas with your fellow Augustus Club members, present questions,and provide answers in an open forum.The responses were overwhelming fromour “Share Your Ideas” survey, and we want to keep the channels ofcommunication open.

You can send your submissions by mail to: PETA/A.C. Members’Exchange, 501 Front St., Norfolk, VA 23510, Attn.: Planned Giving.You can also

visit www.augustusclub.org and click on the A.C. Members’ Exchange link to enter your information.We ask that you include your name andaddress, although we will not print your name if you request to remain anonymous.We will try to print as many submissions as possible.

A.C.Members’Exchange

1999

© D

iana

Mor

eton

Best known to her family and friends as“Connie,” Constance Matheson Bakerhad a heart for animals. She dedicatedmuch of her life to ensuring their careand protection and demonstrated herunconditional love forthem through herlongtime support of PETAand her volunteer workat local shelters, includingthe Humane Society ofMoore County, N.C.,which she cofounded in1966.

Mrs. Baker was accompanied in life byher beloved German shepherd Kazan,whom she adopted from the shelter.Blessed with many talents, hercommunity involvement extended toworking in behalf of children, thehandicapped, and the elderly as well.

Mrs. Baker passed away in April of

2000. However, through her trust, sheinsured that her dedication to the care

and protection ofanimals wouldcontinue after herpassing by leaving avery generous gift toPETA. Her legacy has

helped us purchase a small officebuilding less than one-half mile fromPETA’s headquarters, allowing us toexpand and strengthen our effortsto end animal abuse.

As this issue goes to print, PETAwill be holding a ceremony dedicatingthis new building in honor of Connie and her compassion for animals. “TheConstance Matheson Baker Center forthe Ethical Treatment of Animals” willserve to shine a light for generations tocome on the gruesome face of cruelty toanimals.Thank you, Mrs. Baker!

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Introducing The Constance Matheson BakerCenter for the Ethical Treatment of Animals

With a foreward by Sir Paul McCartney“The goal of Making Kind Choices is tohelp people who, like me, want to make the most out of not only the specialoccasions, but the everyday parts of theirlives, even their chores.”— Ingrid E. Newkirk

Although not out until January 2005,you can preorder Making Kind Choicesby calling 1-800-483-4366 or by visitingPETACatalog.org.

Put Your Stamp on 2004With an End-of-Year Gift to Animals

The year may be winding down, but ourtireless work to protect animals fromcruelty and suffering certainly is not.The year’s end is an opportune time forcharitable giving, and so, as 2004 drawsto a close, we hope that you will keepPETA and all animals in mind as youconsider your year-end giving.

Donations made to PETA before theclock strikes midnight on December 31not only provide important support andstability to our programs but, becausePETA is a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofitorganization, can also bring you taxbenefits next April.

Here are three ways that you can

support PETA’s work for animals andhelp reduce your taxes:• Make a donation of cash.You willbe eligible for a charitable deduction forthe full amount of your gift.• Make a donation of stock, realestate, or personal property(including all types of cars, boats, andother vehicles) and you may qualify fora reduction in your taxes for the full fairmarket value of your gift.What’s more,you can save on capital gains taxes ifyou donate appreciated assets that youhave owned for more than one year.Even depreciated stock can benefit bothyou and animals!

• Join PETA’s annuity program. Inexchange for your gift of $5,000 ormore, PETA will pay you and/or yourdesignated recipient fixed paymentseach year for life. In addition, you maybe able to take advantage of significanttax benefits—such as an immediatefederal income-tax deduction and, if youmake a gift of appreciated securities,possible capital gains tax savings.

For information on how you canmake a year-end gift to PETA, pleasecontact PETA’s planned gifts manager,Tim Enstice, at 757-962-8213 or viae-mail at TimE@petaf.org.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals501 Front St., Norfolk, VA 23510 • 757-622-7382 • PETA.org