Comments on: Dan Mathews Fights For Bears, Critters

By: Gerardo Tristan

Gerardo Tristan — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 06:27:47 +0000

Some people here talk as if we were not animals! We are just another species on the earth; hello!! Biology 101!! As for all the crap about eating animals like in the wild, prefering non human animals over human animals and all the crap about medical research, bla , bla, bla;people is very missinformed and ignorant ..
Please do your homework before posting about these issues because many of you come across as very ignorant and bias.

The day you hunt with your very own hands a non human animal then you can eat it. Factory faming is BAD for non human animals, human animals, the environment and the poor people of the world( not every one is a fat american eating a hamburger and fucking up the environment and stealing resources from other countries).Meat is NOT sutainable for this world. Do you all think that all 6.3 billon humans can eat that crap? Do you think meat grows in trees? Think about all the energy and resources involved in growing, killing and transporting non human animals.

About medical research; the animal model is irrelevant and has proved to be bad for science progress and for finding cures, including AIDS…that’s why we still not moving forward!!

The truth is that we all all interconected and what happens to non human animals afect us. We should try to think in a more hollistic way about these issues.Thanks to wester compartimentation of reality and western stupid antrohpocentric thinking we have fucked up our planet and we have global warming among many maladies…human superiority is BullShit!!

If yo want to help human animals that’s great but dont be an idiot and demonize those who are doing something great for ALL (humans and non humans) by helping others species and promoting their rights and spreding compassion.

“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be seen in the way that nation treats the animals”
Mahatma Gandhi.

P.d My english is bad as I speak french and spanish as first lenguages..sorry.

By: Jennarator

Jennarator — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 04:32:25 +0000

No. 28 – They were trained vet staff euthanizing dying animals in horrible conditions. They were acquitted of all charges except littering. The animals were humanely killed. Their alleged littering was not authorized by PETA. Several thousand animals are killed in shelters every year nationwide – some by crude methods like gunshot or vehicle exhaust poisoning.
And does it matter? This isn’t a PETA interview. Animal cruelty is no more acceptable just because not everyone agrees that Mathews has an amazing story to tell about his passion for animals’ rights, and how everyone has an interest in having rights, animals and humans alike.
No. 30 – So true! Social progress doesn’t come about by sitting calmly. It takes an entire social movement to ask for change.

By: Antonio Pasolini

Antonio Pasolini — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 15:55:58 +0000

Peta’s job is not to judge the media culture we have now, but to use for its purpose so it’s absolutely right to use outlandish tactics to highlight the pain inflicted on animals by humans. The message is important and that’s what matters. Long live Peta!

By: alan brickman

alan brickman — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 23:48:03 +0000

peta is still sad….

By: Traffick

Traffick — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 22:18:12 +0000

I loved how you guys skipped over the whole story of how 2 PETA employees were charged with animal cruelty for driving around picking up animals, killing them then dumping their corpses in garbage pails at various grocery stores in the area.

Another thing the public should know, Mathews said that Andrew Cunanan was one of the most influential people of 1997. Why you ask, because he stop Gianni Versace from using fur. Nice

By: degan22

degan22 — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 21:35:39 +0000

Wow…a heated discussion on queerty. I’m riveted.

By: Matt

Matt — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 18:46:25 +0000

Hell’s Kitchen Guy. I have been to a slaughter house. I was raised on a farm. I never said it was like the wild. I feel bad for you living in a world that to you is gross and where people smell bad. Perhaps you should offer these people some old spice.

By: akaison

akaison — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 15:01:45 +0000

Incidentally- to have a legal consequence at all the levels I describe above, you would have to pass laws at those levels and then wait for case law to develop over decades to replicate what marriage already does in terms of accepted law. Rights regarding divorce, addressing children during divorce, and a million other things that are all well defined, LEGALLY, not religiously for a very long time. This isn’t a matter of gay versus straight. It’s a matter again of what you are suggesting the law creates all for the purpose of not using a single word, marriage. The fact that civil unions aren’t equal to marriage as was recently discussed in the press to me at least isn’t a surprise. It never could be because of the structure of legal issues being addressed by the legal construction.

By: akaison

akaison — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 14:56:36 +0000

The concept of marriage involves legal rights at the international, federal, state, local and interstate levels. Marriage is a legal relationship, and always has been. Sadly, many of you don’t know this. Take a basic course in property law and you realize this. There are laws at each of those levels affecting everything from immigration rights to federal taxes to state and local taxes to visitation to disposition of property between the states (ie, if you own property in VA, but you live in VT, or whever they have Civil Union, does VA recognize any relationship at all legally ? THe anser right now is no). The concept that you are creating out of your own mind doesn’t have any legal definitions at any of those levels. More importantly, you aren’t fooling anyone. Indeed, much of this is already known. Conservatives, christians and all those pesky people making those laws would still vote against it because as has been seen- they still frame it as marriage no matter whatyou call it. You are reinventing the wheel, and achieving nothing.

By: M Shane

M Shane — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 01:42:27 +0000

I don’t understand why people don’t discuss the issue on those terms. I believe actually that they should eliminate “marriage” legal classification and establish a universal status free of any religious connotation for any two or maybe more people. Isn’t thier something like that in some European countries.
I think that it gets a little confusing where I currently live because gay people have always sought to live in arrangements like straight people. There are a lot of gay people but there has always been little gay life outside of these unions, which just mirror straight families for family approval. Strange but true. Fortunately I havn’t lived here all of my life. I always assumed that it was an option to have civil unions with all of the rights invoked by marriage.

By: Charley

Charley — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 00:15:40 +0000

M Shane. I don’t disagree. What you call it. It could be called civil Federal Unions as long as we get the same benefits. Call it union of cocksucking pagans, I don’t care. It’s the benefits or lack of them that make us a second class citizen, and cause such damage to our self esteem as American citizens, and because we don’t get the same shake as other citizens, this creates protests.

By: akaison

akaison — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 23:33:49 +0000

Try going to hospice, and see whether the new images will change that.

By: M Shane

M Shane — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 21:53:28 +0000

One of the only memories that I hold onto is that of when I worked, as a studemt in an amimal lab where they did brain research. I don’t know how really important it was, but I was in charge of aneasthtizing animals, helping operate etc. what they did still remains with me as an ugly sense of cruelty that I can’t really shake.

By: akaison

akaison — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 21:51:56 +0000

Key word “fewer” and “will” not is now replacting animal research. It doesn’t say that they can replace animal studies with present science, the topic of my post.

By: Jennarator

Jennarator — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 19:14:22 +0000

No. 17 – Please do some research, this isn’t a debate, this is a comments section for Mathews’ book. I suggest you start here: http://iccvam.niehs.nih.gov/me.....2May03.pdf (Hint – the title is “Fewer tests on animals and safer drugs: new EU
tests save 200,000 rabbits per year” and the tests use human blood cells; it goes on to say innovative research will replace existing animal-based test methods with in-vitro tests that are more accurate, quicker and more cost-effective.

By: akaison

akaison — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 17:30:03 +0000

Actually the last poster is inaccurate. There is no way to test drugs using just tissue. The issues often raised are systemic- as in entire organisms. There is also no way to model that. Believe what you want to believe, but don’t make up facts.

Aside, I also find it odd that we are suppose to be sympathetic to animals, but according to one poster, not to ourselves. It’s not either/or. Setting it up as such is your issue.

By: Jennarator

Jennarator — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 04:04:29 +0000

No. 4 – Animals eat animals in the wild sure, but breeding billions of animals each year, confining them, torturing them, and eating them instead of spending 16 times fewer resources on plant foods and eating those – which hurt no one – is deliberate cruelty and wasteful. Plus, we are closely related to primates, who eat mostly plants. Try Gardenburger riblets – you’ll see.
No. 11 – PETA has not stalled AIDS research. Animal testing has a failure rate of more than 9 out of ten of tests. Computer simulations, tissues grown in labs, and human studies are more reliable, less expensive, FAR more accurate, and do not involve say, drilling holes in monkey’s skulls or electrocuting cats. Tylenol kills cats, and we all remember Tholidomide and Vioxx, both worked wonders in animal tests and caused serious repercussions once applied to humans. Don’t ask PETA, ask a researcher at Harvard – animal tests stall science, they don’t further it. stopanimaltest.com has more. Peace!

By: Jason

Jason — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 03:09:08 +0000

I think the work he does in defense of animals is laudatory. These gay people who only see the gay issue could care less about anything other than their self interests. The true test of a human being is when they can emphathize with people not like them. For example when Jews defend Muslims, Whites defend Blacks, Straights defend Gays and when Humans defend Animals.

Bravo to you PETA!

By: M Shane

M Shane — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 02:21:55 +0000

Charlie:
Then we don’t disagree. My presumption is that the same legal options sould go with “civil unions”. i always think of marriage as being more of a religious distinction.

Re; eating animals: One of the best “animals rights” films I saw was someone cutting up a kitten. Imagine cutting up and eating your cat or dog.

By: Charley

Charley — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 02:05:01 +0000

Hell’s Kitchen
But Wooley Mammouth meat was a good source of protein. See 10,000 B.C. They (we) wouldn’t have survived without it. Nothing (plant life) grows in the winter. They depended on meat to survive. The earlier settlers to this country salted meat and ate it with beans while crossing the ocean. Otherwise they would not have had any strength to build a new settlement in this country. USA was built on big meat. Don’t forget it.

By: hells kitchen guy

hells kitchen guy — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 01:52:36 +0000

Matt – go to a slaughterhouse and then tell me that it’s like the wild. Tolstoy said anyone who eats meat should have to kill the animal he eats. THAT’S the way it’s done “in the wild.”

For civilized, urban man to eat meat is barbaric, cruel, wasteful and unhealthy. It also makes you smell bad and fat.

Bottom line: It’s just gross.

By: Jimy

Jimy — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 23:48:22 +0000

While I am a huge animal rights activist, I draw the line at medical research.

PETA has slowed down medical research for AIDS and other life threatening diseases and that aint cool.

By: Charley

Charley — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 23:33:51 +0000

P.S. There is another Matthews, a porn star that looks very much like this stud from New Orleans. He is hung like a horse. Haven’t seen him in many movies lately. Hope he is well.

By: Charley

Charley — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 23:27:56 +0000

M. Shane
It’s a complex issue. Some people think I am for gay marriage because of the federal tax benefits that automatically come with civil marriage. Not so, it is mostly psychological and will boost the self esteem of millions of LGBT’s to know that they do have the same civil liberties and rights as other citizens. Under Civil Unions as it stands now, we can’t get Federal benefits, like social security for your spouse, because of DOMA.
It is discrimination in the tax law. It is worth fighting for when gays pay taxes, and religions pay none. Underlying issues about seperation of church and state which our forefathers fought for. Many a gay man was hung in the Massachusettes Bay Colony for having sex with another man. We have come a long way, and we can’t give up. As a card carrying atheist, I know about Sullivan and Bauer, but their resoning in my opinion, is based on supernatural nonsense.

By: akaison

akaison — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 20:14:25 +0000

The last post is example of what I mean by short sightedness speak. You think its great he’s work for the rights of animals,but only think its okay, and somewhat necessary to work on the rights of humans? Look, you can say that’s not what you mean, but your word choice as with his points out your priority. Animals- important work. Humans, no so much. Compassion begsins be understandin not everything is about you and your friend, or what you do or think about gay marriage. Rights aren’t about that. if they were, then black people would still be sitting in the back of the bus because some black people didn’t see it as that important. It’s a silly argument to argue rights based on that. If you want to use that kind of logic, you need to realize th same can and is said of animal rights causes.

By: M Shane

M Shane — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 19:10:22 +0000

It’s fortunate that Dan can work at something which is worthwhile, and he sounds dedicated and knowledgable. J.M Coetzee wrote an imncredible book called “The Lives of Animals” were Ithink he expressed the feelings that I have, and they come from the experience of being with animals and with compassion, which is not a part of most peoples lives- We have become such rabid consumers that we are only aware of the end product of what we get, not how it comes to us
In the same way we want gasoline with no consideration to how many innocent people are tortured and murdered to get it. I think that we take for granted that kind of learned coldbloodedness,

As far as the marriage issue goes, I don’t think that he speaks up against marriage, rather he
seems to think that there are more important things that we could be concerned with. Lately I’ve been hearing from more gay people whio were in the midst of “horrible” divorce proceedings . I think that marriage is ok but by no means do I think that it should be a central concern, unless you’re despirate to find legitimacy by being like mom and dad.

There are a lot more imortant concerns, is what he is saying, and I agree. We have really failed sadly at employment rights, finding a place for young people to be nurtured, and for older people to find friendship and belonging.
I think that something like civil unions are much more realistic, with flexability for different kinds of relations-maybe with more than one person. Gay people have traditionally been able to develope more sophisticated relations.

I think that some people percieve marriage as being the be all and end all of gay rights, and they are wrong- too much Sullivan and Bawer
(acceptablity with heterosexuals).

I thought that the interview was great, Andrew.

By: akaison

akaison — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 18:15:17 +0000

He should really stick to the activist work he knows. Going into the ramifications of the marriage issue comes across , well , a bit clueless.

For example, the fact is, it wasn’t the national organizations that pushed for gay marriage, it was couples experiencing the issues of having live their day to day lives. The national orgs wanted to hold back.

It wasn’t gays who tried to make marriage illegal or legal in Virginia. It was conservatives trying to help Bush win in 2004. Nearly every case of gay marriage in conservative states has been conservative activism, not gay. His comment on gay marriage is a little like pointing at Matthew Shepard to say “what did you do to lead them to beat you up?” In fact, it’s worse. Not all of us have been gay bashes or subject to violence or can expect to be subjected to it. That’s a bizzare thing for him to say too. But all of us can and probably do at some pt expect to have people in our lives with whom we may want to share property, etc, and want to control our own affair. I can only hope he really hasn’t fully thought about the implications of his arguments.

I think he needs to realize that efforts such as marriage can take decades to happen too. It seems his core argument is we must wait until society is ready? But, that’s not how progress works or happens.

Think of it in terms of the African American Civil Rights movement. It took from the 1910s when the NAACP came up with the legal civil rights strategy to 1955 (Brown v Board) for there to be a total overtturning of the Jim Crow and legalized discrimination. There were a lot of skirmages a long the way. Indeed, there was a proposal to amend the U.S. Constitution to ban marriage between blacks and whites at one point. There was even the missengenation laws– believe Loving v Virginia. So it’s ironic that he would mention Virginia. This was a process that was on going. Its a strategy that many, including the environmental movement, have adopted.

He also doesn’t seen to fully understand how these things are connected. Matthew Sheppard is connected to gay marriage is connected to gays in the military. Its about changing the mainstream perception rather than waiting for it to change. Again, change doesn’t happen on its own. Don’t get how a PETA activist doesn’t get that.

Its this pushing of the envelop which makes gay ghettos not as necessary. That makes the need to create laws to protect us from bashing less necessary.

It allow him, despite the fact he may not fully appreciate it, to live his life in whatever fashion he wants. The point of pushing the envelop can be summed up the concept some of you may know called the overton window:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window

Each time we push over time, the more acceptable it becomes. We lose in the short term, but we gain much more in the long. 15 years go, civil unions were unthinkable. Gays could be attacked without backlash in the media. Things changed because of the continual push to change them. I don’t understand how he as an activist can’t appreciate this.

By: Ken

Ken — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 18:10:39 +0000

He comes across as an insensitive idiot. Because gay marriage is not “his issue,” he derides it as being about inheriting a car. Um, Dan, how about “I’m worried about being able to visit my dying lover in the hospital”? Does that do anything for you?

By a similar logic, PETA is all about luxury condos for chickens.

Pathetic.

By: Matt

Matt — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 18:06:31 +0000

Here is my whole issue with Peta. Animals eat other animals in the wild and it’s probably not a pleasant experience for the ones that are being eaten. So why shouldn’t humans eat meat? I mean weren’t we eating meat as cavemen. Isn’t it in our evolutional development to eat meat? I just think there are more pressing issues in the world than what one chooses to eat. To say eating meat is cannablism is just retarded.

By: blackiemiko

blackiemiko — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 17:54:52 +0000

kudos to PETA. They are a wonderful organization. I respect their work. :)

By: afrolito

afrolito — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 17:35:22 +0000

I fucking LOATHE PETA, and everything they stand for. They are insane nazi wackos, with a distorted view of reality.

Dan Mathews is sorta hot though.

By: Charley

Charley — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 16:34:50 +0000

Gay Marriage is about the constitution, “Equal Justice Under The Law”. Legal issues are probably boring to this attractive entertainer/model, but discrimination in marriage is at the heart of injustice and that includes gay bashing. To be treated as equal in the eyes of the tax law is to send a message that we are first class citizens, like everyone else.
It’s great that he goes along with Pam Anderson to save the chickens, and supports The Matthew Sheppard Foundation. But there are deeper subjects, beyond Elizabeth Taylor and her thoughts on marriage.
He might find the book, The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene interesting. That is what PETA and alot of us artists are following.