Thursday, May 28, 2009

NZ Vegan Podcast Episode 23 - A rare white tiger was killed in New Zealand today. Just want to be a voice for that tiger and all the other animals

Listen HERE

Today there was a story from here in New Zealand that I just had to mention, funny how things closer to home can seem to affect you more - wrongly or rightly I am as prone to that as anyone else. I mourn this tiger and I remind myself that the pig slaughtered in Egypt from swine flu paranoia or the chicken gassed in Canada by KFC or the "free range" hen in Austria being slaughtered at the end of her short tortured life or the rat in the lab in Kentucky or the sable in the fur farm in Russia or the sheep in the slaughterhouse here in New Zealand and all of the millions and millions of equally innocent victims that also died today, in all parts of all places all over the world, and are dying right now by the million are all just as valid as this tiger, who was killed today. I am not trivializing the death of the zookeeper who was fatally injured, but it is certain the loss of his life is receiving plenty of respect and mourners and I am sure they are paying homage to him as we speak. Well, I am paying homage to this tiger and his fellow animals, because I know that not enough people are thinking about them or talking about them, and they need our voices.

Here is the video about Post Traumatic Stress in animals, specifically elephants, which mentions the tragic death of a volunteer at a sanctuary and how the caretaker and elephant involved coped with the tragedy. They didn't kill the elephant - because these people get it. Although of course I don't know if they are vegan. I would love to talk to them about veganism - I think we would have a good chance getting through to people like them. And who knows - they may be vegan?

2 comments:

  1. Elizabeth... so sorry this story was so upsetting for you.

    Thought you'd be interest to know that White Tigers don't even exist in the wild. They are a breed made by man to perpetuate the myths behind saving "exotic species". Of course, they do it all for the money.

    White tigers are a result of birth defects and bad genetics. Big Cat Rescue explains much more about them and their plight at the hands of man:

    http://www.bigcatrescue.org/cats/wild/white_tigers.htm

    Thank you for honoring this one whose fate was so tragic...

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  2. Wow I didn't know that at all. I am not doing my research again. Thanks so much for bringing me up to date on the origins of this tiger, and why they are so rare. I can't imagine the suffering of their lives, of his life as a caged attraction, all we know for sure is it was violently ended in a terrible tragedy, which is pretty much the norm for all non-humans unlucky enough to be our property.

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