Erik


The Orion Grassroots Network: 1,200+ grassroots groups working for conservation & more

DR. DOCTOR: He's very lucky you got him here when you did. He was in a very advanced state of vaginitis.

RANDY: Vaginitis?

DR. DOCTOR: It occurs when a person stops eating meat. Those sores on his skin were actually small  vaginas.  If we hadn't stopped it in time, Stan would have eventually just become one great big giant pussy.

KYLE: Whoa, dude.

DR. DOCTOR: We've got an IV of pure beef blood pumping into Stan's veins and the... sores are fading.

CARTMAN: Thank God we stopped it in time.

STAN: Well, I guess we learned somethng today: it's wrong to eat veal because the animals are so horribly mistreated, but if you don't eat meat at all you break out in vaginas.                        

But how do they taste?

Put the Carbon Back

Erik,
I certainly agree that the smaller environmental organizations, as well as local chapters of the large ones, should be cultivated.  But I do not know if it is so much an issue of effectiveness (or efficiency or whatever).  Both kinds of organization can be effective, on their respective scales; and the Nature Conservancy (in which I used to keep a membership, many years ago, but no longer -- not for any fault of theirs) and the others of that size, with offices of professionals in DC and other large cities, certainly need large pots of capital for the kinds of projects that they are committed to undertaking.

But you are absolutely right, there is definitely something very appealing about helping along any of the numerous grassroots projects that you look out for.  And not just appealing: that personal contact, that establishing of serious relationships with small numbers of committed persons, is essential, IMHO, to the serene vitality of the environmentalist movement.

To get back to Natalie's pumps, though, it seems to me not altogether obvious why, if she is vegan, and interested in sparing the cattle and other animals raised for their hides, she chose TNC as the beneficiary.  Not that there is anything wrong with TNC; and what they do is of terrific benefit to wildlife and biodiversity.  But there are other organizations that work much more directly on behalf of farm animals.

And then, there is a totally different ethical issue: Even though no animal (presumably) suffered and died to produce faux-patent leather, nevertheless, if the faux-leather still looks like leather, then the wearer may still be understood to be signaling that wearing leather is cool or OK.  I am not myself saying that that must be the case, and that therefore faux-leather is no good.  But there are people involved in animal welfare who would make that argument.

Sean,
the lofty discourse of "South Park" once again soars heavenward, way above my muddled earth-bound head.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

My point, I guess, is that the Big 10, or however many there are, really don't need celebrity help. After reading one of the 10's magazines recently, I noted in the back-of-the-mag a list of all of the people doing fundraising work at their main DC office, and it was close to 20 people. Then there's all the folks in all of its regional and state offices working to raise money, too. Each of the Big 10 have an army of help, and will always find a way to raise the money they need for their missions, which are important, I agree.  

But to put a relatively unknown yet effective project in the spotlight could win it so many more supporters, and bolster its mission and ability to make a difference hugely. Many grassroots groups are only constrained in the amount of good they can do by their budgets.

Projects that rescue unwanted animals from the pet trade would be a perfect match for this, or human development organizations like Green Empowerment, which installs renewable energy systems in remote villages in the developing world, empowering indigenous people to stay put in their home places while allowing them to refrigerate medicine or vaccines or use a satellite phone in case of an emergency. http://greenempowerment.org

Snow Leopard Trust is another. (Natalie's people, call me!) They've got an amazing staff on the ground around Central Asia working collaboratively to ensure that this majestic creature keeps dropping on yaks from icy ledges for all time: http://www.snowleopard.org

So the options are enormous for someone looking to make a difference. Of the 1,100 groups in the Orion Grassroots Network, 2/3 have a staff of between 1 and 5 people, and a small budget to match. A funding opportunity offered by celebrity endorsement/donation could mean an awful lot to these groups.

All that said, it also seems to me that the donating of proceeds to a very well known group is probably an important part of the marketing. Not many folks have yet heard of Green Empowerment, compared to the Nature Conservancy, even though they're doing great work on behalf of people and planet.

Erik

The Orion Grassroots Network: 1,200+ grassroots groups working for conservation & more

Something like the Farm Sanctuary, Animal Acres (or other farm animal rights advocates) -- kinda offset the slaughter of cows -- would have been a nice association.

The world would be a better place with more vaginas.  If men weren't such dicks, they'd be vaginas.  I'm just saying.

NoPunProductions.com ~ AmericaTheGreen.org

Yes, Erik, the celebrity endorsement/donation for a small group that next to no one has heard of would mean a great deal.  

E.g., the Snow Leopard Trust sounds brilliant.  It is easy enough to see how valuable it is likely to be for entire interrelated ecosystems, just to concentrate on that single charismatic species.  By the same token, maintaining the staff, providing for transportation between the US and the Himalayas, and supporting research not just on the natural-science aspects (e.g., how many leopards are there in any particular location?; are their numbers growing or shrinking?; what are they eating?) but on a number of other people-oriented subjects (economics, sociology, politics), obviously require a certain amount of steady substantial funding.

Next time I run into Natalie, I shall have to ask her why she chose the Nature Conservancy.  And of course I shall mention the snow leopards.

One suspicion I have is that she may originally have been inclining to name PETA the beneficiary, or some subsidiary of PETA, but then was dissuaded because of the not altogether fair disfavor that PETA has won for itself in the minds of many.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

Your Chuck Taylor's can take you only so far. Pretty much, everything that is non-fabric looks like leather...and this is most shoes. I think that it is not quite the same as fur and faux fur, which look so distinctly like the actual animal.

NoPunProductions.com ~ AmericaTheGreen.org

About another part of the female body which draws the pleasurable attention of many men, some clever French thinker observed, "Men have great fondness for women's breasts; but they would never wish to have them themselves."

On organizations promoting the welfare of farm animals: I think I first heard of Farm Sanctuary not long ago, when, back in November, one of their spokespersons did a Q&A on turkeys at bestfriends.org.  They are a great group.

Have you seen the recent movie "The Year of the Dog"?  I do not recommend it; the basic idea is promising -- how a 30-something (40-something?) single woman reacts to the death of her dog (a very sweet little beagle), and to the lack of understanding of the people around her -- , but in fact they are an uninteresting collection of bubbleheads, and the movie is pretty joyless.

Anyway, the heroine "adopts" a chicken for her young niece, at some farm in southern California which gives a comfortable safe home to farm animals; and they spend a happy afternoon visiting the chicken and all the other animals.  I got the impression that it is a real place, not just made up for the movie, but I did not make note of its name.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

The more variety and styles of vegan shoes, the better. Personally I look for affordable when I look for non-leather shoes, but I realize there are many fashionistas out there who need a good pair of fancy shoes and if there are an increasing amount of vegan versions of dress shoes, that's great.  Though I rarely buy shoes, or any new clothing item in general, I like the UK-based Vegetarian Shoes company because they're sweatshop free and fairly affordable.

I also wonder what materials were actually used. With small exception, most non-leather shoes are made with PVC. Not exactly the most eco-friendly material. So what's more important?

Brenna

Of course, even if leather shoes don't have PVC in their construction they still can have harsh environmental impacts beyond the environmental costs and oil inputs of raising the cows.  Tanning compounds, usually industrial salts, are notoriously hard to dispose of.  I heard an NPR story recently that pointed to hexavalent chromium as still being the most commonly used tanning compound because of its low price.   Sound familiar?  It's the compound that was found in the drinking water in "Erin Brokovich".  But you don't have to drink the stuff, it's also toxic when inhaled.  In "A Civil Action" it's a tannery that polluted the ground water with TCE (trichloroethylene), a common industrial solvent.   Okay, enough environmental pop culture, but seriously, tanneries are, and have been for centuries, eco-nightmares!  

Ultimately, we should be trying to reduce our overall consumption and just make do with the shoes that we have.  I suppose it's kinda nice that Natalie Portman is stumping for non-leather shoes.  But how much does a $250 pair of shoes affect the consumption habits of everyday Americans?  The most animal and planet-friendly shoes are still the ones that you wear for a really long time.  "Green" or "animal-friendly"  consumption is still consumption.  

But the fact that "all proceeds will benefit The Nature Conservancy" is unfortunate

I just read a really interesting essay in a new book, "The Future of Nature: Writing on a human ecology from Orion Magazine"

http://www.milkweed.org/component/page,shop.product_detai ...

The essay is called "Conservation Refugees" and it speaks about native people are a displaced by the Nature Syndicate!  

One fact from that essay stood out for me.  Over twelve (12%) of the earths survees, 11.75 square miles, is no protected!!  That's incredible!   When we speak of "big oil" running things, we also have to think about what "big Nature" is doing with all that land!!

Texeme.Construct(function(x)=Participation(x))

How about a poll Grist?  Who are the main competitors in this arena?  Will the winner be eaten by lions?  Polar bears?

Will she pose with solar panels?  Recline on giant wind machine blades hoisted by massive cranes.  

How about Hillary?  Older women are currently in demand as sex symbols.  The shallowness of the Brittainey/Paris gene pool has left the culture flat.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

And it's created some surprising enemies for them:
this quote stood out for me:

"We are enemies of conservation," declared Maasai leader Martin Saning'o, standing before a session of the November 2004 World Conservation Congress sponsored by IUCN in Bangkok, Thailand. The nomadic Maasai, who have over the past thirty years lost most of their grazing range to conservation projects throughout eastern Africa, hadn't always felt that way. In fact, Saning'o reminded his audience, "...we were the original conservationists."

The whole thing is here:

http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/articles/article/1 ...

It's good that BINGOs like Nature Conservancy buy land with the money they raise, but sometimes their approach is lacking.

Erik


The Orion Grassroots Network: 1,200+ grassroots groups working for conservation & more

The richest 10% only make up 10% of the population...and they can screw themselves.  Wearing leather is the least of their karma problems.

Amazingdrx, how about we don't treat women of any age as decorative objects and then laugh about their death and dismemberment?

I too am angry as hell about pretty nearly everything in contemporary america, and I won't take it anymore!  Yah yah yah, what not soup again!  Ooops got carried away.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog