“Don” Pacelle Hits the Heartland
from HumaneWatch:
“Don” Pacelle Hits the Heartland
Despite its name, the Humane Society of the United States is not a pet shelter group, and doesn’t run any pet shelters. But it does spend an inordinate amount of time attacking farmers as part of its self-admitted anti-agriculture agenda. Recently, one of the tactics HSUS has used to try to distinguish itself from its kooky allies at PETA is working with smaller agriculture groups as part of a divide-and-conquer strategy. This gives it “cover” against charges it’s anti-agriculture, while allowing it to throw its weight around attacking other farmers in the animal agriculture industry with an unrelenting series of attacks, whether frivolous lawsuits, SEC complaints, or similar assaults. Essentially, HSUS is trying to position itself as a friend of “family farmers” and merely an opponent of “Big Ag.” (A false dichotomy since most farmers are family farmers, but that’s a topic for another day.)
The latest deal that HSUS has cut is with a group called the Organization for Competitive Markets, a small cadre of beef interests that opposes thecheckoff program that pays for general advertising to promote beef-eating. (Think: “Beef. It’s what’s for dinner.”) HSUS’s legal team provided free research to OCM to support OCM’s lawsuit seeking to throw a wrench in the program. But is the enemy of OCM’s enemy its friend? One agriculture columnist checked out this latest link-up and came home skeptical of HSUS’s motives:
I sat through [HSUS CEO Wayne] Pacelle’s speech to OCM in Kansas City and I waited to hear him talk about markets and what the HSUS could do for family farmers. Pacelle talked…and talked. But he never got to the part about how the HSUS was going to help support family agriculture.
HSUS talks a big game about “humane” animal agriculture and “family farmers,” but is short on “walk” for a very good reason. If HSUS defined some food products from animals as “humane enough,” it couldn’t move the goalposts as easily in the future. It’s a lot harder to move a fixed goal than a wishy-washy one further towards veganism, and HSUS knows this. After all, despite claiming to be looking out for the egg industry, HSUS won’t serve a single egg at its annual conference, even a free-range, organic one.
Catering to a tiny fringe tells you who’s really running the show, and it’s not Mr. Moderate. After all, why does HSUS care about general marketingfinances? Since when is that in a “humane society’s” purview? It isn’t, nor are donors to HSUS who see the weepy commercials with dogs and cats knowledgeable that their donations are funding lawyers to engage in these shenanigans.
This is simply a political revenge move. One beef group opposing HSUS’s “egg bill” in Congress gets checkoff money. HSUS is just looking for a way to get even since, so far, that bill has basically gone nowhere. That’s not speculation—Wayne Pacelle actually said so himself.
Should it really shock us that HSUS is facing a lawsuit under a law designed to fight the mob?
So, if Pacelle wasn’t talking about how HSUS specifically intended to help small-scale agriculture, what was he talking about? The columnist reports:
Instead, Pacelle preached to a room full of people who grew animals for a living — who have lived with animals from the day they were born — about the “bond between us and animals” and how we have become “alienated from animals.”
That’s funny, especially given Pacelle’s own statements about the bond between animals and him—or lack thereof. He once told an interviewer “I don’t have a hands-on fondness for animals” and “there’s no special bond between me and other animals.” Given that HSUS has 50 in-house attorneys, we’d suspect there’s evidence he has more hands-on fondness for lawyers (to say nothing of the pension plan).
The columnist concludes:
And what has HSUS done, publicly, to bring over their largely urban constituency to support independent farmers and ranchers? Well, HSUS did pay for a few sweet rolls and some coffee at the OCM convention, a donation celebrated in a sign set next to the silverware. But what else?
Somehow, we bet the coffee wasn’t provided with cream. Remember, the only food item bearing HSUS’s logo is Tofurky, and HSUS promotes a “Guide to Vegetarian Eating.” Its food policy director is a former PETA activist who called a decrease in meat consumption “good news.” If animal agriculture groups want to work with HSUS, all they will change is their place in line for HSUS attacks.
Is their livelihood really worth some rolls and a cup o’ joe?
Posted on 08/29/2012 at 05:11 PM by the HumaneWatch Team
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Comments so far…follow the link…
COMMENTS:
A snake in the grass, is a snake in the grass, no matter how tall the grass
The great irony is that HSUS is much more likely to target medium and small size farmers than the industrial farmers it is so critical of. This move may delay that a little, but I think these smaller cattlemen have no idea what they have let into their beds, and will soon regret it.
I suppose that since these guys have initiated the relationship, all we can do is watch and wait, but we mustn’t be misled. There is no way that HSUS will actually support any kind of livestock agriculture in any meaningful way, whatever they are saying now.
Good luck to them – they will certainly need it.
They’re trying the same divide and conquer bs here in Colo in that they want to “help” the small farmer. Yeah, right. They’re also working to get a ballot initiative going ala Missouri to get those awful puppy mills regulated. (Translation; anyone with even one intact female.) Too bad there isn’t an initiative to ban them from the state.
HSUS doesn’t look down the road at the consiquences of their actions. Let’s just say that hsus achieved their goal in making everyone in the world vegans. It won’t happen but let’s just say it did for a minute. Every nation in the world has its wealth partly judged on the quantity of food animals and herds of cattle and goats and chickens, ect. In its coustody. So say we don’t eat any animals or animal products anymore. Animals become useless and nothing more then a food bill. No need for cattle anymore. Nor turkeys, goats, chickens, pigs, lambs, ect. They all become an unnessessary food bill. In rather large quantities. Now what? What do we do with all these animals now? These huge food bills with no profit? This, of course, would be absolutly detrimental to all these species!!! They would die off of starvation or be killed in massive slaughters because they are unwanted and no longer usefull to anyone or anything. They would devistate grazing lands! Demolish federal reserves and decemate wild animal populations by eating up all the food!!!! Do these people fail to look at the consiquences of their agendas???? What are they not understanding?????
Hey, please don’t demean snakes in that fashion, by comparing them to Wayne Pacelle.
HSUS is trying to ban snakes, too. Their reputation as pets has suffered terribly due to HSUS and media efforts, and the lies continue to spread. HSUS feels free to attack reptile and exotic animal ownership openly, since keepers are a minority in comparison with other pet owners. They always go for the lowest-hanging fruit, first. We have not proven to be the pushovers they were hoping for.
The UEP /HSUS eggbill is bad for smaller egg farmers. Many will not be able to obtain financing and will be forced to go out of business. This will further consolidate the egg industry.
If Pacelle really was concerned about the small farmer he would renegotiate the agreement and grandfather all existing cages. That would allow each farmer to convert when he felt the economics permitted him to do so. There would be a gradual transition….no drop dead date. It would eliminate 20% or more of the farmers going out of business at one time and creating an egg shortage(like in Europe) with the resulting spike in egg prices.
No Dice! Go find your gullible victims elsewhere.
Pacelle and hsus hast not told you, but the agreement between hsus and the egg industry ended June 30, 2012. There is no place at the discussion table for hsus with the egg folks. Hsus received the “boot” on 6-30-12.
@ Danielle Ballasty – Why do you think they aren’t looking at the consequences of their actions?
They know perfectly well what the consequences of their actions is. What you may be overlooking is that they don’t give a tinker’s dam for the animals, which is clear from their callous and even abusive handling of any animals they actually get their hands on. They dump all their pet ‘rescues’ in overcrowded underfunded public shelters, which have high kill rates even before the new arrivals get there. They dumped Denisa Malott’s horses in a bare lot too small for them with only a stagnant, stinking pond for a water source and no feed. Ms. Malott had to petition the court for permission to feed her horses, which she was denied access to. They actively OPPOSE no kill sheltering. They demand the death of all bully breed ‘rescues’ all over the country after the raids. This is just a small start for them.
Consider:
“We have no ethical obligation to preserve the different breeds of livestock produced through selective breeding. . One generation and out. We have no problem with the extinction of domestic animals. They are creations of human selective breeding.” Wayne Pacelle, CEO of Humane Society of the US, formerly of Friends of Animals and Fund for Animals, Animal People, May, 1993
One way or another they will see all livestock breeding ended and the rest slaughtered, preferably by chemical means so that the carcasses are not even useful for animal food. They are also targeting circuses and zoos – One thing the end of horse slaughter accomplished for them was an end of useful horse meat, since policy in many places is now chemical euthanasia for horses by a vet. No more euthanasia by the bolt or bullet, therefore rendering equine carcasses a half ton or so of toxic waste, which has to be cremated at the owner’s cost. This is a great burden to horsemen. Horses are also a major target for the AR activists. They have begun to persecute horse shows; recently they targeted Tennessee Walkers at the Tennessee Walking Horse National Celebration:
Their agenda amounts to a scorched earth policy where animal use is concerned, and they will see as many killed as they possibly can, in whatever ways they can devise.
Unless they are stopped soon, their vegan agenda can be accomplished – or at least, they can do so much damage to livestock agriculture that it will be very difficult to recover it, and the majority of the population will just not be able to afford animal protein in their diet.
The worst thing is that they have been able to influence so many people to accept that they care about animals, and are only trying to ‘stop animal abuse’. Many people are accepting the idea of the diet as ‘healthy’ – and though only a tiny percentage of them can actually live long term with no animal protein, many will voluntarily try to do that; by the time they discover it is neither healthy nor natural they will be trapped in a position where they can’t afford to revert.
The general public has learned that all pet breeders are ‘abusers’:
“Our goal is to make [the public think of] breeding [dogs and cats] like drunk driving and smoking.” Kim Sturla, former director of the Peninsula Humane Society and Western Director of Fund for Animals, stated during Kill the Crisis, not the Animals campaign and workshops, 1991
This goal has been fully realized in the US, and we are getting much too close to the idea that ‘all animal livestock production is abusive’ too.
Another bad sign from the Vegan Propaganda Machine:
And another:
They are getting bolder, and it IS a global effort.
Don’t be misled by the use of the term ‘vegetarian’ in that last article. The press tends to use the terms ‘vegan’ and ‘vegetarian’ interchangeably, to the delight of the AR activists. And don’t assume we have ‘plenty of time’ to stop the trend. If we can’t stop them very soon, the damage will be done long before 2050.
And remember that animal protein – not just meat, but eggs and dairy – can be produced on land that will support no other form of agriculture. It is just not possible to ‘reform’ agriculture in the ways they pretend are possible.
They are much too close to their goals for comfort, if you consider all the aspects of the thing. We need to stop them NOW.
@ Charlie – Do you mean that farmers will NOT be forced to convert to the ‘enhanced caging’ that the UEP negotiated?
If so, that is good news indeed …
Lynn:
All I know is that some egg producers became unhappy (angry) with the partnership and realized they had beed duped. The partnership was ended 6-30-12. Pacelle keeps silent about the end of the deal and keeps touting it when he lobbies for passage of egg bills in Congress. Some more of hsus deception.
Lynn – Thank you for that comprehensive debunking of the toxic notion that the AR movement is “just misguided” or “doesn’t understand the consequences of its actions”.
Another cause for concern for anyone who remembers the Holocaust is the AR movement’s extremely cozy relationship with the “Zero Population Growth” eugenicists. For those unfamiliar with the term, these are the racist elitists who want to “cull” the human population down to “sustainable levels”, usually starting with the populations of places like Africa and South America.
The ZPG eugenicists, too, are disturbingly close to selling their ugly Utopian vision. They want the human race pared back to, then forcibly maintained at, a world population of about 500 million people, by any means necessary.
Either of these groups of fanatic ideologues by themselves would be scary enough, but their tight-knit relationship with each other is frankly terrifying.
Hi BADKarma – long time no see 
Thanks for the kudos. We need to spread the word to *all* animal users, because far too many of them are seeing only what is happening to their own little branch of animal use. For instance, dog breeders often don’t understand what is happening to small farmers, though they are beginning to see what has happened to small dog breeders. Most people’s experience is limited to only a very few species, often only one. So not only can the ARAs ‘divide and conquer’ within the single breeder group, which has been so successful with dogs, but they can easily turn horsemen against dog/cat breeders, livestock farmers can be turned against exotics breeders and horses … only a few examples of this. People who wouldn’t dream of supporting any more ‘regulation’ of the species they are working with can often be easily recruited to support draconian bills which will decimate other species.
And the ‘environmental’ groups are on the bandwagon too – we must be very cautious and even cynical of *all* regulation of animal contact.
You are absolutely right – these alliances really are terrifying.
Top Cats Roar... 
Okay, so the vegan AR’s know the consequences of what they (HSUS) are doing… supposedly. Has anyone considered the long-term results of those conclusions though? The majority of corn, hay, and other agriculture is not for juman, but animal, use. Without animals, there’ll be no profit in harvesting hay. And only a small minority of people in the US eat feild corn -which comprises the biggest percentage of a farmer’s corn crops. Most flora depends on fauna for propagation. Without animals, it wouldn’t be long before the vegan’s food sources dry up too.