Tag Archive for 'vegan'

Make Your Own Vegan Deodorant

July 23, 2010 0 Comments Tags: , .

It’s hot out, you should be sweating.

Your body sweats for a reason— lymph nodes in your armpits rid your body of toxins via sweating, but anti-perspirants inhibit this natural function by filling your pores with aluminum and other toxic chemicals. Since breast tissue is connected to your lymph nodes, it’s no wonder many people are starting to examine the link between anti-perspirant and breast cancer.

That doesn’t mean you have to stink.

Adapted from this Passionate Homemaking blog, here’s all you need to make your own cheap, non-toxic, cruelty-free deodorant:

  • 5-6 Tbsp Coconut oil
  • 1/4 cup baking soda
  • 1/4 cup cornstarch
  • essential oil(s) [optional]

Combine equal portions of baking soda & cornstarch. Slowly add the coconut oil and work it in with a spoon until it gets to the consistency you desire. It should be about the same texture as the store-bought kind, solid but able to be applied easily. If it’s not getting thick enough, it may be too warm, try sticking it in the fridge for a half hour.

Optional: add a few drops of essential oil if you’d like it to be scented. In true hippie style, I prefer patchouli and lavender, but of course you can add whatever you like.

Store it in a small container with a lid (I use an old pesto jar) and apply it with your fingers (after applying it, you can rub the remains into your hands as a lotion.)

Keep in mind on really hot days it may separate a bit, but you can stir it up again and put it in the fridge for a few minutes and it’ll be good as new.

The coconut oil is the most expensive part (about $7), but you don’t use the entire container and it lasts long enough to still be a bargain compared to commercial products. The first jar I made lasted 7 months and cost less than $10.

That’s it!

Twenty Miles From the Conklin Dairy Farm…

May 27, 2010 9 Comments Tags: , .

Like many people that watched the Conklin Dairy abuse video, I hardly got any sleep Tuesday night. Those 3.5 minutes of footage evoked a level of rage I’ve never experienced in my entire life.

I was so consumed by anger I couldn’t begin to quantify it with words. I had to force myself to just copy and paste the story here, if I attempted to include any commentary it would’ve been pure expletives. Having returned to a slightly more rational frame of mind, I still continue to be haunted by its horrific images.

It helped a little to watch the next day as the story got tons of coverage by the media. Better yet was hearing about the first arrest. But that only brought up new anger about the lack of legal protection afforded to farm animals. The penalty for all of that cruelty inflicted? Only a second-degree misdemeanor in Ohio— a pathetic $750 fine and up to 90 days in jail. Nothing close to justice. Even more, we’re still waiting for Gary Conklin to be arrested. Clearly shown kicking a cow in the video, he has yet to be charged with anything.

The investigation is still in its beginning stages and there is plenty to be depressed and angry about.

Now is the perfect time to remember that 20 miles away from the Conklin Dairy Farm there’s a happy ending to one cruel chapter of the dairy industry. His name is Wesley.

WesleyNo use to his owner since he’s male and therefore can’t produce milk, he was chained up, starving, and almost too weak to stand when he was rescued by Mindy Mallett, founder of Sunrise Sanctuary.

If you think cows are mindless animals with no personalities, you have to meet this one. Everyone who has will agree: Wesley is a puppy trapped in a cow’s body. Given free reign to roam anywhere on the farm, he often walks onto the back deck and peers into Mindy’s window, whining to come inside. In the winter he likes to fall asleep covered up with a blanket. Oh, and I can hardly leave out this tip— Wesley loves apple juice.

Once you meet him you’ll understand what all the hype is about. Wesley is quite the charmer. A perfect reminder of how incredibly intelligent and loving these animals can be.

Sunrise Sanctuary is home to over 80 other rescued animals, including chickens, ducks, turkeys, goats, llamas, cats, dogs, and more. Each have their own story, some more horrific than others, but all have the same happy and compassionate ending.

They’re having a fundraiser on Saturday, June 12th, it’s the perfect opportunity to come out and meet Wesley, along with all the other animals. If you need a break from the heart-wrenching Conklin Dairy story, a visit to Sunrise is sure to lift your spirits.

Wesley is a reminder that groups like Sunrise Sanctuary and Mercy for Animals deserve our energy, not pieces of garbage like Conklin and Gregg. If you’re angry about what happened, I strongly suggest:

  1. Stop consuming ALL dairy. Conklin Dairy is not an exception, they are the rule. It does nothing to boycott whatever company may happen to distribute Conklin’s milk, the dairy industry is HUGE, there are countless more operating the same way. Even “humane” dairy farming is cruel. Like humans, cows only produce milk when they’re pregnant, so the cows are kept perpetually pregnant, the resulting baby calves taken away immediately and sold to the veal industry. If you’re opposed to eating veal, you should be opposed to the dairy industry that supplies it.
  2. Support compassion. Whether it’s financially or as a volunteer, I highly encourage you to support Mercy for Animals and their important undercover investigations, as well as rescue organizations like Sunrise Sanctuary.
  3. Sign the petition for Ohioans for Humane Farms, a citizen-backed ballot initiative to prevent some of the cruelest factory farming practices in Ohio. The measure will require the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board to adopt certain minimum standards that will prevent animal cruelty, improve health and food safety, support family farms and safeguard the environment throughout the state of Ohio.

Of course I’m as anxious as everyone else to see justice prevail in this story. While we wait, it helps to remember Wesley.

“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.”
- Gandhi

Ohio Dairy Farm Brutality

May 25, 2010 3 Comments Tags: , , .

I’m waaaay too angry to write at the moment, I can only copy this straight from Mercy for Animals’ website.

Un-fucking-believable. This happened 30 minutes from where I live.

Chilling undercover footage recorded during a new Mercy For Animals investigation exposes dairy farm workers sadistically abusing cows and young calves.

Captured on hidden camera, the shocking scenes of abuse reveal a culture of cruelty at Conklin Dairy Farms in Plain City, Ohio.

During a four-week investigation between April and May, MFA’s investigator documented farm workers:

  • Violently punching young calves in the face, body slamming them to the ground, and pulling and throwing them by their ears
  • Routinely using pitchforks to stab cows in the face, legs and stomach
  • Kicking “downed” cows (those too injured to stand) in the face and neck – abuse carried out and encouraged by the farm’s owner
  • Maliciously beating restrained cows in the face with crowbars – some attacks involving over 40 blows to the head
  • Twisting cows’ tails until the bones snapped
  • Punching cows’ udders
  • Bragging about stabbing, dragging, shooting, breaking bones, and beating cows and calves to death

After viewing the footage, Dr. Bernard Rollin, distinguished professor of animal science at Colorado State University, stated:

“This is probably the most gratuitous, sustained, sadistic animal abuse I have ever seen. The video depicts calculated, deliberate cruelty, based not on momentary rage but on taking pleasure through causing pain to cows and calves who are defenseless.”

Immediately upon completion of the investigation, Mercy For Animals contacted the City Prosecutor’s Office of Marysville regarding the ongoing pattern of abuse at Conklin Dairy Farms. MFA is pushing for employees of the facility to be criminally prosecuted for violating Ohio’s animal cruelty laws.

The deplorable conditions uncovered at Conklin Dairy Farms highlight the reality that animal agriculture is incapable of self-regulation and that meaningful federal and state laws must be implemented and strengthened to prevent egregious cruelty to farmed animals.

Although many of the abuses documented at Conklin Dairy Farms are sadistic in nature, numerous MFA undercover investigations at dairy farms, pig farms, egg farms, hatcheries and slaughterhouses have revealed that violence and abuse to farmed animals – whether malicious or institutionalized – runs rampant nationwide.

Compassionate consumers can end their direct financial support of farmed animal abuse by rejecting dairy, and other animal products, and adopting a vegan diet.

2010: Let’s Make it Great… For the Animals.

January 10, 2010 0 Comments Tags: , .

Long time no post, yet again… it happens. Life happens.

I know by now most people have had their fill of “Year in Review” postings, but too bad. This is one of them.

Last year saw many advances in the world of animal rights and veganism. I think it’s essential they be quantitatively revisited and acknowledged, to realize the enormity of change being affected as a movement, one small step at a time.

The first review I’d like to highlight is from Mercy for Animals, my favorite animal rights group.

Last year was chock full of accomplishments for MFA, and somehow they’ve managed to fit a whirlwind review into a 6.5 minute video. If you want to see what effective activism looks like, please watch. In the time it takes you to watch the video, 661,920 animals will have been killed (worldwide) for the meat and dairy industries. The numbers are heartbreaking and staggering— all the more reason to get involved NOW.

Mercy For Animals Year in Review: 2009

Vegan.com’s The Year in Meat: 2009

The other notable year-in-review I’d like to feature is a collection of media highlights compiled by Erik Marcus at Vegan.com.

Admittedly, it’s a lengthy read (over 5,000 words), but that’s because it was a busy year for the meat industry. And not in a good way. For anyone involved in the animal rights movement, this compilation is the best way to get up-to-speed with where things stand, and what battles lie ahead of us in the coming year.

If either (or both) of these postings strike a chord with you, please don’t let it stop there. Repost the links wherever you can think of— Facebook, Twitter, your blog, email, etc. Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you want support/ideas for how to get involved, I’ll do everything I can to help.

Raising compassionate awareness throughout our own social circles will only accelerate the overall societal awareness we’re after. Every person that wakes up to the horrors of the meat/dairy/egg/animal industries is one less person buying into the cruel system, and that equates to many lives saved.

Cheers to another big year for vegan activism… the animals are counting on us.

Happy Tofurkey Day

November 26, 2009 0 Comments Tags: , .

Don’t forget to say grace!

Undercover Investigation Reveals “Family Farm” Pig Cruelty

November 16, 2009 0 Comments Tags: , .

Looking at an image of a happy pig eating grass on the Country View Family Farms website, you’d be inclined to think “this family farm takes care of their animals” — right?

Country View Family Farms Cruelty

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The latest undercover investigation by Mercy For Animals uncovered:

  • Workers grabbing piglets by their fragile ears or legs and throwing them across the room and slamming them into transport carts.
  • Workers tattooing sows by repeatedly driving sharp metal spikes into their flesh.
  • Sows with untreated rectal prolapses and deep, infected sores and scrapes from constant rubbing against the bars of their stalls.
  • Workers cutting off piglets’ tails with dull pliers and castrating them by ripping out their testes with their bare hands – all without anesthesia.
  • Thousands of pregnant pigs confined in two-feet wide metal stalls so small that they could only take one step forward or backward and could not turn around or lie down comfortably.
  • Injured, sick and runt piglets being tossed into overcrowded gassing kill carts, slowly suffocating from CO2.
  • Workers firing steel rods into sows’ heads, sometimes as many as four separate times, before the sows fell and died.

Does that mesh well with your vision of a traditional family farm?

Country View Family Farms cruelty

Believe it or not, the company has an “Animal Handling Philosophy”:

“To be responsible stewards of the animals placed in our care, educating and training our pork producers and transporters to constantly maintain the highest level of integrity in animal welfare and bio-security, while reinforcing our commitment to safe, wholesome product our consumers can trust.”

It seems as though gas chambers, tossing of babies, extreme confinement, agonizing slaughter and overall hell is now part of being a “responsible steward.”

This investigation is but another nail in the coffin of the “humane meat” myth. Consumers are frequently duped into thinking they aren’t supporting cruelty if they buy their meat from Whole Foods, a family farm, or look for a “humanely raised” sticker on the packaging.

But there is no such thing as humane animal consumption. Factory farmed or not, ALL those animals die, some just have less hellish lives than others. The word humane is a facade, like “family farm“, unregulated labels designed to fool consumers into paying higher prices for the same tortured animal products.

Country View Family Farms cruelty

As is always the case with animal cruelty investigations, words will never fully convey what raw video shows. Some parts are so horrific, Fox News will not show it on the air.


(Can’t see the video? Click here.)

If this video is hard to watch, makes you cringe, makes you cry, makes you angry, or all of the above — I strongly suggest you opt out of this disgusting food system and go vegan. It’s easy to get started, click here to order a FREE vegetarian starter kit.

If you can afford it, please also consider making a donation to Mercy for Animals. They need our support in order to keep doing critical undercover investigations.

Celebrate a Compassionate Thanksgiving

November 12, 2009 0 Comments Tags: .

Every year, millions of turkeys are killed for the Thanksgiving holiday. How odd that the centerpiece for a day celebrating life’s blessings is a corpse on the table.

No doubt, American holidays are very meat-centric. Rather than participate in this mass slaughter, why not celebrate a compassionate holiday and serve a vegan dinner this year?

“Are You Insane?! What’s Wrong With Turkey?”

GentleThanksgiving.org provides a great overview of the life and death of most Thanksgiving turkeys:

The nearly 300 million turkeys killed each year in the U.S. spend their entire lives crammed in large sheds with little room to move. Artificially inseminated and selectively bred to gain enormous amounts of weight, they suffer heart attacks, broken limbs, lameness, and death from their genetically-induced accelerated growth rate.

Factory farm conditions are so harsh that the turkeys must be pumped full of antibiotics just to stay alive. Shortly after birth, they have their snoods and parts of their toes and beaks cut off with hot blades, without the use of anesthetic, to reduce damage from from stress-induced aggression. They are then delivered by conveyer belt to a carousel where they get a power injection, usually of an antibiotic, whacked into the back of their necks.

The rest of their lives they are forced to endure crowding, living in their own waste, and ravaging diseases. As many as 25,000 birds may be housed in a single shed. Their eyes and lungs are burned by toxic fumes emanating from their excrement. Conditions are so severe that about 9% of turkeys raised for food (or over 26 million) didn’t survive long enough to make it to the slaughterhouse.

After 16 weeks of misery, they are hung on a conveyer belt, their throats are cut, and they are dumped — sometimes still fully conscious — into scalding water to strip their feathers.


(Can’t see the video? Click here.)

What to Make Instead?

A Google search for “vegan Thanksgiving recipes” yields approximately 8,860,000 results. There is no shortage of delicious vegan Thanksgiving recipes! Here are some of my favorites:

Adopt-a-Turkey

Olive

For people who want to do even more than just prepare a vegan meal, The Farm Sanctuary has a wonderful program for people who choose to help turkeys, rather than kill them. The Adopt-a-Turkey Project “seeks to end the misery of commercially-raised turkeys by offering a compassionate alternative for Thanksgiving. Since 1986, Farm Sanctuary has rescued more than 1,000 turkeys, placed hundreds into loving homes through our annual Turkey Express adoption event, educated millions of people about their plight, and provided resources for a cruelty-free holiday.”

Continue reading ‘Celebrate a Compassionate Thanksgiving’