Enewsletter
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Enewsletter • May 7, 2008 | ||
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Note from Vegan OutreachWOW! New Record!During Fall semester 2007, Adopt a College activists set a new distribution record of 415,622 booklets handed directly to students on 471 campuses across North America -- breaking the previous record by 20%!
Based on our estimates, efforts of AAC activists to date will spare nearly two million animals from the horrors of factory farms each year. Overall distribution for 2008 is also well ahead of last year's pace, having already passed three-quarters of a million booklets -- over 6,000 a day! To keep up with demand, Vegan Outreach has spent more on printing and shipping in the past few months than ever before, and more printings are needed very soon. This has only been possible with your very generous support! Because of your donations, thousands and thousands of people are reached every day with concrete, detailed, illustrated information documenting the animals' plight and the compassionate alternative. We will continue to do our very best to make your contributions go as far as possible for the animals. Thanks so much!
Product of the WeekLynn Chorn, one of Vegan Outreach's very first members, has created a new, ultra-premium vegan hand and body lotion. Four years in the making, Malcolm's Miracle works great and lasts a long time! Send your nominees for Product of the Week to product (at) veganoutreach (dot) org; previous products can be found here.
Notes from All OverPew Commission Condemns Factory FarmingThe prestigious Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production, a project of the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, just concluded its 2.5-year study of American animal agriculture with unanimous findings from its 15 members. The Commission was chaired by former Kansas governor John Carlin and included, among others, former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman, and former Dean of the Univ. of Tennessee's College of Veterinary Medicine Dr. Michael Blackwell.
Right: a crippled chicken being raised for meat; below, how hens spend their lives. Photos by COK. The Washington Post published a great story on page A2 entitled, "Report Targets Cost of Factory Farming." USA Today’s story begins, "The way America produces meat, milk and eggs is unsustainable, creates significant risks to public health from antibiotic resistance and disease, damages the environment and unnecessarily harms animals, a report released Tuesday says." The Wall Street Journal’s coverage focuses both on the problems caused by factory farming, and the Commission’s conclusion that the "agriculture industry is exerting ‘significant influence’ on academic research." The Des Moines Register’s piece highlights the fact that the Commission is accusing "some livestock interests of trying to disrupt a wide-ranging study of the industry by threatening to yank financing for scientists and universities."
Egg-Free PledgeHave you given up meat, but still haven't quit eggs? Know someone who needs to take that step? Compassion Over Killing, who runs the informative EggIndustry.com website, invites you to take the 30-Day Egg-Free Pledge!
Notes from Our MembersTwo classmates have
made changes in their
diets and in their hearts because
of VO pamphlets I gave them. One
has cut all meat out of her diet.
Another interviewed me for a research
paper concerning farm animal treatment,
and has decided to go vegan! She
expressed an interest in leafleting
in the future, too.
Above, Molly Schulman leafleting at CUNY Baruch, photo by Jenna Calabrese; below, Aashish Bhimani leaflets at George Mason U, photo by Jon Camp. Leafleting with Nina
[Gucciardo] at Lansing
Community College was a good experience,
as most students took a booklet,
and many people stopped to talk
to us. When I went to offer one
student a leaflet, she said she
already got one earlier, and was
never eating meat again. 
At Montclair State
University, I head
some really positive comments, including:
"I got one of these last fall
when you guys were here and it made
me go vegetarian!" "I
really like this brochure -- it's
so well put together. I got one
last year and I based my entire
persuasive speech project on it!" I had a lot of great
conversations at the
University of Colorado, Boulder
today. One guy said he knows it's
time to go veg, and that his writing
professor is a vegan and introduced
the class to animal issues via various
reading and writing assignments.
Another came back asking for more
Even If flyers to use in the music
class he's been teaching since 1968
at the University. I asked him how
he would incorporate the subject
matter into his music class. He
said, "This is important information
that people need to be made aware
of." A woman also came back
asked for extra Even If flyers to
distribute in her next class. Annetta Stoker and
I just completed a
mini tour of 10 colleges through
the Dallas region to give the students
something to ponder over the summer.
A number of students expressed interest
and concern, and I know that those
whom we overheard represent many
dozens more that will make changes.
For example, at Texas Woman's University,
we ran into another student who
was giving a presentation on vegetarian
and animal rights issues. A student
at Texas Christian University told
us that receiving the booklet was
a sign, after hearing about vegetarian
and factory farm animals several
times recently -- now he had concrete
information in hand. This shows
that we need to reach out to those
who don't know about these industries
with detailed information.
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The
panel concluded that factory farms
pose unacceptable risks to public
health, the environment, and animal
welfare. It also issued a series
of recommendations, including a
phase-out of battery cages, gestation
crates, veal crates, foie gras,
and tail-docking of dairy cows,
along with inclusion of poultry
under the Humane Methods of Slaughter
Act. 
At
the University of New Hampshire,
a lot of students
remarked how sad the booklet was,
and I saw a fair amount of students
intently reading them. One guy walked
past me and sincerely said, "That
booklet really opened my eyes."