Anthony Marr's CARE-7 tour blog #20 - 6 Jun 2010
Florida
It is 1.5 months from the much anticipated Animal Rights National
Conference at the Hilton Mark Center in Alexandria VA (www.ARConference.org).
Alex Hershaft, the chair of the conference, has assigned to me the following
speeches (subject to change):
July 16, Friday, 10:30 am - Individual Activism (Camp, Corbett, Marr,
Sikora)
July 16, Friday, 5:00 pm - Abuse of Wildlife on Land and Water (Marr,
Muller, Vincent)
July 17, Saturday, 9:00-10:10 am plenary - Compassion into Action
(Burgess, Hilgart, Lucius, Marr)
July 17, Saturday, 11:30 am - Abuse of Urban Wildlife (Marr, Muller,
Robinson)
July 17, Saturday, 4 pm - Global Issues Affecting Animals (including
global warming) (Marr, Moncrief)
July 17, Saturday, 5 pm - Wildlife Campaigns (Erenberg, Fullmer, Marr,
Muller)
July 18, Sunday, 5 pm - Movement Networking (Marr, Moncrief, Muller,
Shoss)
July 19, Monday, 1 pm - Funeral Motorcade & Lobbying (Marr, Muller,
Wilkens)
Alex has also approved that in the Saturday evening awards banquet, a new
painting by artist Catherine Garneau, based on my 1998 photo of the tigress
Sita who lived in the Bandhavgarh National Park in India where I worked off
and on for three years, but was later sadly poached, will be auctioned off,
with the proceeds going to the Global Anti-Hunting Coalition.
Of note is the Saturday morning plenary speech (to the entire
congregation of approximately 1000) to be shared with my friend Lt. Col.
Robert Lucius of the U.S. Marines, host of my CARE-7 tour's Monterey CA
event, whom I recommended to Alex as a speaker. This is no mean feat, since
almost no new speaker at the conference could immediately garner a plenary
speech. Of course, I was only the door opener; it was Robert's own
impressive credential and exemplary work that won him the podium.
Before proceeding further, I have a disclaimer to make. It is against my
nature to engage in internet drama, flame wars and specifically naming
anyone in negative light, but this is an exception, and it is driven by the
persons whom I will name, whose devious, unethical and slanderous acts of
deceit against Catherine Garneau, one of the most honest and principled
people I know, and against myself, and were meant for the eyes of the
innocent public, has caused damage to the anti-hunting movement in general,
and the Global Anti-Hunting Coalition in particular. It will become clear by
the time you have reached the end of this blog.
The 1 pm starting time of the Motorcade, which has to be in the afternoon
to prevent drawing away conference attendees from set morning programs,
proved a problem, since the "March on Washington" was set for 10 am. The
Motorcade and the March were originally designed to be the same event. Given
nearly two-months' lead time, I saw no problem changing the time of the
March from 10 am to 1 pm to coincide with the Motorcade, so that the two
could stay as one, and made an announcement to that effect. Unfortunately,
the organizers of the March refused to change the time, and further
interpreted my announcement as an effort to "subvert" the March. Further, I
was accused of colluding with Alex Hershaft to set the time of 1 pm instead
of 10 am for the same purpose, to which Alex wrote: "Anthony Marr, for whom
I hold a great deal of admiration and respect, never discussed the march
with me and had absolutely nothing to do with my reaction." In spite of this
exoneration, the subversion accusation has continued and even intensified to
this day, so, with due regret, the Motorcade and the March will be two
separate events. The Motorcade will be co-conducted with Peter Muller and
Odette Wilkens, and joined by whomever conference attendees with cars who
may want to join us. Upon arrival in Washington DC, the vehicles will be
parked, and the participants will proceed on foot to lobby high-level
legislators chosen by Peter and Odette. It will not cross-paths with the
March, in spite of the further accusation that our intention was so that the
Motorcade would arrive at the climax of the March to steal its thunder.
Another point of conflict with the organizers of the March, who are
champions of the Anti-Crush movement which I and the Global
Anti-Hunting-Coalition support, is regarding the two news bills HR-5092 and
HR-5337. HR-5092 targets "crush videos" specifically (which depict small
animals being crushed to death by women with their bare feet or stiletto
shoes), which I and the Global Anti-Hunting Coalition do support, whereas
the newer HR 5337, which is supposed to target ALL videos depicting cruelty
against animals, but specifically exempts hunting videos (which do depict
extreme cruelty against the hunted animals) as not being cruel, resulting
from the intense pressure exerted by the powerful hunting lobby and the NRA,
is not supported by the Global Anti-Hunting Coalition.
Here are two of the passages and associated comments:
[HR 5337 explicitly outlaws "depiction[s] of extreme animal cruelty," and
requires that such depicted conduct "must violate a criminal prohibition of
intentional cruelty to animals." This should substantially mitigate the
concerns that hunting videos or other depictions of the treatment of animals
that is criminal in some jurisdictions, but not cruel, might be included
within the sweep of the statute.]
and
[This legislation targets a very narrow and specific set of behaviors we
are trying to regulate, specially the depiction of extreme animal cruelty
that appeals to a particular sexual fetish. The Animal Torture Prevention
Act addresses this by requiring that a "depiction of extreme animal cruelty"
appeal "to the prurient interest." This clause focuses the legislation and
effectively prevents this bill from prohibiting hunting videos, a concern
the Court expressed in the Stevens opinion.]
Unfortunately, again, the organizers of the March interpret our not
supporting HR 5337, regardless of our supporting HR 5092, to be an effort by
the Global Anti-Hunting Coalition to undermining Anti-Crush, and the
Stop-Crush website is rife with this blatantly unfair sentiment, tarring and
feathering the Global Anti-Hunting Coalition and myself as being against the
Anti-Crush movement, contrary to fact. But so be it. The Global Anti-Hunting
Coalition by definition stands for the hunted animals, and there is no way
we can accept a bill which openly condones hunting videos as not being cruel
against the hunted animals. Quite on the contrary, hunting videos can depict
even more extreme cruelty than crush videos, because whereas the crushed
animals take a matter of minutes to die, some hunted animals take days,
weeks, even months, to die a lingering and agonizing death.
Here is a collection of excerpts from hunting videos. Decide for
yourselves whether extreme cruelty does not suffice the entire compilation.
MOVIE
I arrived in Tampa on May 29, and gave a speech in the afternoon of the
30th at the Walsingham Park in whose lake alligators reside. It was
organized by Sara Acord of the St. Petersberg Vegetarian/Vegan Meetup Group,
who, along with her beau Mitch Day, also served as my lodging host, in whose
house also live 3 dogs, 3 ferrets and an Abyssinian cat, and outside of
which live another 3 cats who are semi-feral. Their dogs are vegan, and they
make big pots of food for them - usually a kind of thick bean paste which,
with a few drops of Tabasco sauce, actually tastes quite nice. Right from
the start, they had asked me to raid their fridge whenever I wanted, but not
until I had ingested a substantial amount of the paste did Mitch inform me
that I had been gulping their dog food!
A detractor involved in the anti-crush vs anti-hunting spat, the same one
who has tried to urge people against donating to the Global Anti-Hunting
Coalition for funding my "expensive vacation tour", has been hazing me that
my vegan potluck speeches were worthless, a waste of my breath and the
audience's time. On the other hand, I regularly receive emails and messages
in praise of them. Here is an example I received just yesterday:
From Molly Rooke - "I am glad you came to speak on hunting and climate
change, and that I was able to attend, Saturday at the vegan potluck in
Bedford. I wish I could have stayed longer to speak to you afterward and I
meant to give you a donation for your work (sorry I don't have much money,
but I'm sure that any amount helps) so please... let me and others know how
we can help support your efforts financially. Thanks for all you are doing
for animals and the planet that supports us all."
One of the people present at the Walsingham Park talk was Carole Baskin,
CEO of the Big Cat Rescue, which I was to visit the next day, May 31, at 3
pm. Her reaction to my talk at Walsingham would be the true test of the
impact of my speech.
Another was a 10 year-old boy named Spencer, whose reaction was to
immediately seek a solution, which reminds me of me. After the talk, he came
to me and asked whether "aerial algae" could do the trick to capture carbon
from the atmosphere. I cannot think of any aerial algae in nature, but it is
certainly a good idea to use plants as a CCS (carbon capture and
sequestration) system. His mother was very proud of him.
May 31, Monday, 3 pm, I arrived at the Big Cat Rescue sanctuary on Easy
Street, which harbors 20 species of cats, with no more than half of them was
I familiar. Last time I was there, back in 2004, there was a witty slogan
there saying "Life on Easy Street". I pulled over at the entrance sign to
take a pic of the Green Hornet next to it, and before I was done, a black
truck with BIG CAT RESCUE painted on its door, and who but Carole Baskin in
the driver's seat. After the "photo op", she led me through the sanctuary
and gave me a guided tour fit for a dignitary.
The camera person conducted a stop-by-stop video interview of me, asking
tough questions that only someone who has done the actual work can answer.
We made no less than a dozen stops and the entire blitz lasted easily a hour
and a half. They will process the raw footage into a mini-series and
broadcast it in their network some weeks down the road. When the interview
was done, she asked me if I would consider staying through the evening to
give her staff and volunteers a talk. I was frankly a bit pooped due to the
humid heat, and did not show immediate enthusiasm. She led me into an
air-conditioned room, gave me a cold bottle of water, and left me to chill.
After I had revived, she and Chris took me out again to shoot some casual
walk-around footage for the mini-series after which she led my car to a
separate build at the back of the 40 acre property where I'd be giving my
talk. By 6:45, most of the people had assembled. I decide for a Q&A rather
than a straight talk, and questions abounded. We did not wind up until 9 pm.
The next day, Carole released a blog about my visit to the sanctuary,
which is blogged separately in my blogsite
www.HomoSapiensSaveYourEarth.blogspot.com, but here it is again:
[ http://socialcomputingtechnology.com/?p=40515
http://dogscatsbirdspets.com/catcareblog/uncategorized/big-cat-news-anthony-marr-visits-big-cat-rescue-of-care-7-tour
http://bigcatnews.blogspot.com/
Anthony Marr Visits Big Cat Rescue during his CARE 7 Tour
Anthony Marr Met With Interns, Staff & Volunteers to Talk Tigers and
Global Warming tonight at the Lion's Lair Party Pavilion.
World renowned as the Champion of the Bengal Tiger, Anthony is on his 7th
CARE tour. While in FL he wanted to be sure to visit Big Cat Rescue again
and was gracious enough to let Chris film him on a wide range of topics
including Tony the truck stop tiger, the plight of back yard tigers in
America, poaching, tiger farming, canned hunts, lion meat on the menu, white
tigers, the decline of lion populations, wild leopards and global warming.
In the course of his film blitz through the sanctuary I asked if he would
join us for pizza tonight and he rearranged his schedule to accommodate us.
Due to the late nature of the event, we were only able to invite those who
were working this afternoon, and I even missed a couple of people by just a
few moments who had been working hard all day but had already gone home.
Tonight was a rare treat for those left standing at the end of a long day.
For three hours Big Cat Rescuers got to hear about his adventures in
India and get a first hand view of the magnificence and intelligence of cats
living wild as well as all of the challenges they face because of the value
of their skin, bones and organs. He shared stories of intrigue and suspense
as poachers were stalked, captured and often right back on the street within
hours. He brought the suffering of these cats to life in painting the
struggle for survival that is shared by the big cats and the humans with
whom they share dwindling resources. He separated the good from the bad and
the corrupt from the dedicated in his captivating portraits of the
politicians, law enforcement officials and conservation NGOs.
Anthony ended the night's discussion with the topic that is the fuel
behind his cross country trek: global warming. Despite being a physicist he
plainly set out in laymen's terms how it is that we are on the brink of
disaster while the man on the street is still saying, "What global warming?"
If you missed it tonight, you missed the simple analogy to a pot full of
water and ice cubes, but you can be the interns who were there can explain
it to you now. Or, you can read about it in Anthony Marr's latest books
"Omni-Science and the Human Destiny" and "Homo Sapiens! SAVE YOUR EARTH".
The most critical message that he brought to our awareness is that scientist
now agree that the models they had currently predicted which gave Earthlings
until 2040 to begin reversing the negative spiral we are on because of
methane produced via the mass production of animals as food and our failure
to implement green energy has now been shorted to the year 2013. To see the
NASA report bearing this out visit:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7139797.stm
To learn more about Anthony Marr and to help sponsor him on this CARE 7
tour visit:
http://www.youtube.com/AnthonyMarr
http://www.homosapienssaveyourearth.blogspot.com/
http://www.myspace.com/AnthonyMarr
Anthony Marr bio:
Anthony Marr has a physics degree and is the author of "OMNI-SCIENCE and
the Human Destiny" (2003) and �Homo Sapiens! SAVE YOUR EARTH!� (2008). A
full-time wildlife preservationist since 1995 and founder of the Global
Anti-Hunting Coalition (GAHC), he has been to India 3X for the tiger and
Japan twice for the whales & dolphins. He founded Heal Our Planet Earth
(HOPE) in 1999 and leads HOPE�s Global Emergency Operation (GEO) on mass
extinction due to global warming. A key speaker at the AR Conference since
2004, he is currently on his 7th Compassion for Animals Road Expedition
covering 40 states in 7 months.
For the cats,
Carole Baskin, CEO of Big Cat Rescue
an Educational Sanctuary home
to more than 100 big cats
12802 Easy Street Tampa, FL 33625
813.493.4564 fax 885.4457
[email protected]
http://www.BigCatRescue.org
Caring for cats - Ending the trade
Join more than 14,000 Big Cat Rescue fans http://www.facebook.com/pages/Big-Cat-Rescue-Tampa-FL/122174836956?ref=ts
Twitter: Follow Me and get a free wild cat screen saver or ecard account
@BigCatRescue
Posted by BigCatRescue at 9:12 PM ]
On June 1, Tuesday, I drove from Largo on the west coast of Florida to
Indialantic on the east coast. The drive was about 4.5 hours, and I arrived
in another Manhattan class apartment of Carole P, who took me to two
exceptional places over the next two days.
The first, on June 2, is the Wild Horse Rescue Center on 4970
International Drive, Mims, FL, 32454, headed by Diane Delano, President.
Being a horse-person since my birth (my Chinese surname Marr means "Horse"),
and been an active horseman since my 20s, and being freedom-minded all my
life, I am particularly interested in the wold horse and its treatment by
humans, particularly the BLM (Bureau of Land Management). The Mustang is not
a wild horse in the truest sense. It began as feral horses which were the
descendants of the Spanish horse brought over from Europe in the
Conquistador days. There was a breed of true wild horse in North America,
but they were exterminated by the "native" people thousands of years ago.
Still these Mustangs have lived in the wild for centuries, and have become
truly wild in body, mind, behavior and way of life. And now, the cattle
barons are taking over their land, and the BLM is doing their bidding, and
the Mustang is being harassed, chased, cornered, corralled, captured and
slaughtered, with only the lucky few being adopted. And adopting is what the
Wild Horse Rescue Center is all about. But it is not easy to train a wild
horse so that he is safe to handle and ride. And this is what the Wild horse
Rescue Center is about.
Diane showed Carol and I the horses currently there for training and
adoption, and they are mostly pony sized (14 hands) horses with lots of
substance and bone, with hard feet, and of good conformation. In the
training ring as we were watching was a young chestnut filly being gently
led by the halter, and praised with every right move she made. I could see
how tense she was, but not frightened. Just trying to understand what she
was supposed to do, and resisting her flight response. She will loosen up by
and by, and make a lovely equine companion for a girl. Diane showed us on
her cell phone a pathetically thin horse which could hardly stand up to
support his own meager weight, or lack there of. Then she showed us a
handsome bay well muscled and proud of stance. "That's him," she said, with
well deserve pride. If I had $125 on me, and I wanted a horse, I would have
taken him away.
To learn more about rescuing displaced Mustangs from slaughter, and the
Wild Horse Rescue Center, check out this link: www.mlwhr.com
On June 3, Thursday, Carol, who has a Mazda MX5 Miata, drove my car, a
Mazda MX6 Mystere, with me as passenger, to Fort Lauderdale to visit the
SPCA's Wildlife Care Center. When we arrived there, a rainstorm had just
passed, and another was on the horizon.
And it was lunch time. So we were led by Director of Development Laura
Gottlieb to a board room with a large table where we were served a vegan
lunch. A few minutes into the lunch, I realized that I had left my cell
phone in the car, so I excused myself and went out. While exiting the
building a tall and slender middle-aged woman with flowing blonde hair and
in business attire, entered the building while we were passing each other,
we exchanged glances, and she smiled and nodded. I said, "Hi, I'm Anthony
Marr." "I know who you are," she said, and entered the building. When I
returned to the boardroom, she was seated at one of the chairs, and talking
to Carol.
Laura introduced her to me as Sherry Slueter, the Executive Director. She
is a supremely confident woman, speaking with great authority, and every
word meticulously enunciated and every sentence superbly crafted. I was
immediately impressed, and being usually the speaker in a group setting, I
settled back and listened. She told us that she had spent 20 years as a
Broward County Sheriff specializing in animal abuse, who, by retirement time
just a year or two ago, had achieved the rank of Lieutenant. During her
service, she all but revolutionized animal welfare enforcement. At one
point, she related a dramatic event where she had to physically subdue a man
twice her size, with some help from fellow officers, at the expense of
several cracked ribs, as a result of which a new ordinance was instituted,
without which it could not have been done. By then, my sense of humor could
not be contained, so I said, looking at her intensely, "I have a serious
question for you." While she usually had a faint smile on her lips as she
was speaking, her expression turned serious too. "Tell me," I asked slowly,
"was the episode staged?" Carol burst out laughing, and Sherry grinned and
said, "Yes, with my broken ribs to show for it." I began to explain that
when I was physically assaulted by a hunter, and had 3 facial bones
fractured, some hunters said that it was staged, by me, to garner attention.
Sherry said, "I know all about that incident." She had done her homework.
For a stretch, she talked about animal rights activism - from the law
enforcement's view point, and gave excellent advice to us as activists. Of
course, she also talked about her experience with animals both an a law
enforcement officer and as the executive Director of the Wildlife Care
Center. I was highly impressed by her highly professional presentation,
until, at one point, while talking about how they cared about the animals in
the center, tears welled in her eyes, and she had to recomposed herself
before carrying on. This one little unspoken interlude spoke volumes about
her, and she won me over completely.
After spending well over an hour with us, Sherry left to attend to her
duties, and Laura gave us a guided tour through the facilities. While the
Big Cat Rescue Sanctuary was scenic and the Wild Horse Rescue Center was
rustic, the Wildlife Care Center was state-of-the-art. With a fully equipped
animal hospital, three resident vets, dozens of staff members and
volunteers, holding areas, aviaries, the center takes in and releases up to
14,000 wild animals every year.
One of the staff's titles was the releaser, about which I remarked that
it must be the happiest job on the planet.
While leaving the Center, I said to Laura that I'd always felt ambivolent
about the SPCA, but this Wildlife Care Center had changed my perception of
it substantially.
To find out something more about the Wildlife Care Center, go to:
www.WildlifeCareCenter.org
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Anthony Marr, Founder and President
Heal Our Planet Earth (HOPE)
Global Anti-Hunting Coalition (GAHC)
[email protected]
www.HOPE-CARE.org
www.ARConference.org
www.MySpace.com/AnthonyMarr
www.YouTube.com/AnthonyMarr
www.myspace.com/Anti-Hunting_Coalition
www.facebook.com/Anthony.Marr.001
www.facebook.com/Anthony-Hunting_Coalition
www.HomoSapiensSaveYourEarth.blogspot.com
www.facebook.com (search for �Anthony Marr Heal Our Planet Earth�
Touring cell: begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 216-386-7362
Return to Care Tour 7
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