Wayne Pacelle was recently interviewed on the agricultural talk show AgriTalk (listen here). One lady who is an animal abolitionist provides some escerpts here, and for those who are not aware of how abolitionists think, her comments are educational. The entire transcript is here.
A few of my comments are below.
First, regardless of what you think of animal rights activists, you have to say that Wayne Pacelle does a good job as the CEO of his organization. He must manage the millions of dollars of donations from people with disparate views. The common thread of those views is extending more compassion to animals, and Wayne manages to capture this thread while not exposing the disagreements many HSUS members have by not using words like "animal welfare" or "animal rights". He replaces these words with "human responsibility." Brilliant management.
I was glad to see that they were able to discuss "science". Hopefully the listeners understood that "science" does not in any way support the use of gestation crates or battery cages.
The discussion about hunting was interesting, because Pacelle said that HSUS is not opposed to hunting. He said they only focus on worst abuses in hunting. In my research for my book, however, I found out that as a college student Pacelle would enter the woods where individuals were hunting and make a commotion to scare the wildlife away. This demonstrates that what Pacelle believes and what the HSUS policy is are often two different things.
Interesting Facts From The Interview
- Most of the HSUS board of directors are not vegetarians.
- I had always heard HSUS has a vegan cafeteria, but Pacelle claims they do not have a cageteria.
Last thought: Am I the only one sick of asking whether Pacelle and HSUS managers are vegans are not? Does that have anything to do with the actions of HSUS?
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