Species Unite
Stories that change the way the world treats animals.
S12 E12 · Thu, April 17, 2025
Rob Read: When the Ocean Bleeds
“One year, we actually offered the Faroe Islanders One million pounds to stop the hunts. 1 million pounds, which would go to promoting whale and dolphin tourism to the islands and marine conservation education to Faroese kids in schools. And the Faroese response to our offer was the most emphatic no you've ever had in your life. They actually held a hunt on the 1st of January. On the first day of that offer, they went out and deliberately killed pilot whales as their official no to us.” – Rob Read Rob Read is the leader of the Captain Paul Watson Foundation UK, otherwise known as Neptune's Pirates UK . He and his team have been working for years to end the suffering of many marine animals. Rob has initiated campaigns as well as actively operating boats, coordinating crew and flying drones, working on issues that include everything from seal shooting by wild salmon net fishermen around Scotland, in Japan against the Taiji dolphin hunts, in the Faroe Islands, against the drive hunts of pilot whales and dolphins, in Iceland against commercial fin whaling, and in Namibia, exposing the Namibian seal hunt. I asked Rob to come on the show to talk about the places in the world where whaling is still the norm. There are not that many left, but there shouldn't be any left. And that's what Rob and Captain Paul Watson Foundation are working to achieve. Links <span style= "font-size: 14.0pt; lin
S12 E11 · Thu, April 10, 2025
Andrew Stein: Living with Lions
“If we march into that village and we start trying to persecute people for using poison, something that's very illegal, nobody's going to talk to us. We're not going to find out where the poison came from. We're not going to be able to shut anything down. We should take the approach that people are using poison because they're desperate, because they see no other alternative.” – Andrew Stein Andrew Stein is a wildlife ecologist who spent the past 25 years studying human carnivore conflict from African wild dogs and lions in Kenya and Botswana to leopards and hyenas in Namibia. His work has long focused on finding ways for people and predators to coexist. He is the founder of CLAWS , an organization based in Botswana that's working at the intersection of cutting-edge wildlife research and community driven conservation. Since its start in 2014 and official launch as an NGO in 2020, CLAWS has been pioneering science-based, tech-forward strategies to reduce conflict between people and carnivores. By collaborating closely with local communities, especially traditional cattle herders, CLAWS supports both species conservation and rural livelihoods—making coexistence not just possible, but sustainable.
S12 E10 · Mon, March 31, 2025
Jaap de Roode: Doctors by Nature
"But it makes a lot of sense especially when you think about how traditional healers and shamans have worked, they haven't felt that separation from nature like Western medics do. And so to rely on the knowledge of other species actually makes a lot of sense. It's probably a lot more than we know at the moment." - Jaap de Roode Jaap de Roode is a biology professor at Emory University, and he is the author of an astonishing new book called Doctors by Nature How Ants, Apes, and Other Animals Heal Themselves . I say astonishing because I had no idea about so much of what he explores in his book. It never occurred to me to consider that other species use medicine and have been healing themselves forever. Jaap tells stories of animals across nature, from bumblebees to chimpanzees, how they use plants and natural substances to treat infections, to ward off parasites, to self-medicate. There's so much that we have learned from them, and there's so much more that we still can.
S12 E9 · Wed, March 19, 2025
Jonathan Birch: The Edge of Sentience
“I mean, organoids in general are very exciting replacements for animal research because you could model a kidney or a liver or a or a heart without taking them from a real animal, which it’s very important to support that kind of thing. But yes, when it's the brain, there's this fear that you might end up creating another sentient being. And then and then you've just replaced one sentient being with another and maybe not made things better at all. So it seems really, really important to guard against that risk.” – Jonathan Birch Dr. Jonathan Birch is a professor of philosophy at the London School of Economics and is Principal Investigator on the “Foundations of Animal Sentience” project, a European Union-funded project to develop better methods for studying the feelings of animals and new ways of using the science of animal minds to improve animal welfare policies and laws. In 2021, he led a review for the UK government that shaped the Animal Welfare (Sentience) Act 2022. In 2022-23, he was part of a working group that investigated the question of sentience in AI. Jonathan is here today to talk about his most recent book, The Edge of Sentience Risk and Precaution in Humans, Other Animals, and AI. The Edge of Sentience is an open access book published under a CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 license, meaning it can be distributed for free in any format.
S12 E8 · Wed, March 12, 2025
Elizabeth MeLampy: Forget the Camel
"The basic premise of the event is that hunters hunt rattlesnakes from the surrounding environment all across West Texas, and bring them into the roundup for the weekend. And during the roundup, these snakes are kept in a pit and then, one by one, beheaded and skinned in front of in front of audiences." - Elizabeth MeLampy Elizabeth MeLampy is a lawyer dedicated to animal rights and protection, and her passion for this work shines through in her latest book, Forget the Camel, the Madcap World of Animal Festivals and What They Say About Being Human . To research the book, Elizabeth traveled across the country, immersing herself in a wide range of animal festivals — from the Iditarod dog sled race to the rattlesnake roundup in Sweetwater, Texas. Elizabeth examines these festivals as revealing microcosms of our broader relationship with animals. Whether it's rattlesnake hunts, frog-jumping contests, ostrich races, or groundhog celebrations, these events reflect the ways humans use animals to express cultural identity, community pride, and historical traditions. Yet beneath the pageantry and excitement lies a deeper question: Is our fascination with these spectacles worth the toll it takes on the animals involved? With compassion and insight, Elizabeth invites readers to consider whether there’s a more ethical and empathetic way to honor our stories — one that respects both animals and the traditions they inspire. Please listen, share and read, Forget the Camel. It will be released on April 8 th , 2025. https://apollopublishers.com/index.php/forget-the-camel/
S12 E7 · Wed, March 05, 2025
Tom Sciolla: Free the Animals
"When we arrived, we had no records, we had nothing. We had no documentation. And one of one of the first things that you have to actually prove to all of these international government parties and so on, you need to you need to say, where did you get this elephant? And we had no idea. We were actually government officials, and we had this elephant, and we had no real idea of where this elephant came from." -Tom Sciolla In 2012, during a scorching heatwave in Buenos Aires, a polar bear named Winner died in the city zoo. His tragic death ignited outrage—not just for him, but for all the animals suffering in the zoo’s dire conditions. The protests grew, and the city listened. Instead of just making small improvements, Buenos Aires did something extraordinary: they took over the zoo. That’s when Thomas Sciolla, the new wildlife and conservation manager, stepped in. But he and his team didn’t just aim to make life better for the animals still trapped there—they decided to set them free. Over the past decade, they have relocated hundreds of animals to sanctuaries, giving them the lives they deserve and the closest thing to freedom they could ever have after lifetimes in captivity. The very last animal to be translocated will be moving in the next few weeks. Pupy, a female African elephant who has been at the zoo since 1993 will be moving across South America to Global Sanctuary for Elephants in Brazil. This is one of the most inspiring stories I’ve heard in a long time—a story of hope for animals, and a blueprint for how real change can happen. Please listen, share and follow Pupy's journey here: https://globalelephants.org/project-pupy/
S12 E6 · Wed, February 26, 2025
Andrianna Natsoulas: Don't Cage Our Oceans
“That's taxpayer’s money that is going to support research and development and pilot projects to develop a food system that is based on environmental destruction and greed and disregard for animals, fish, and any of the other marine mammals that might be around it. ” - Andrianna Natsoulas Andrianna Natsoulas is the campaign director for Don't Cage Our Oceans, an organization that exists to keep our oceans free from industrial fish farms. Offshore finfish farming is the mass cultivation of finfish in marine waters, in underwater or floating net pens, pods, and cages. Offshore finfish farms are factory farms that harm public health, the environment, and local communities and economies that rely on the ocean and its resources. Don’t Cage Our Oceans are a coalition of diverse organizations working together to stop the development of offshore finfish farming in the United States through federal law, policies, and coalition building. And, although it is not yet happening, right now the US Administration and Congress are promoting this kind of farming, which would be nothing short of disastrous for the oceans, the planet and the people and animals who live here. dontcageouroceans.org
S12 E5 · Wed, February 19, 2025
Jeff Sebo: The Moral Circle
“It is a little bit terrifying, because it means that AI systems are going to be entering this uncanny valley where we are not sure how to experience them in five or ten years. You might be talking to Siri on your phone, or ChatGPT on your laptop, or your Roomba, vacuuming your floor. You might be talking to these beings and genuinely be unsure whether they think and feel things when they talk back to you, and that is going to be an uncomfortable place to be.” Jeff Sebo Jeff Sebo works primarily on moral philosophy, legal philosophy, and philosophy of mind; animal minds, ethics, and policy; AI minds, ethics, and policy; global health and climate ethics and policy; and global priorities research. He is Associate Professor of Environmental Studies, Affiliated Professor of Bioethics, Medical Ethics, Philosophy, and Law, Director of the Center for Environmental and Animal Protection, Director of the Center for Mind, Ethics, and Policy, and Co-Director of the Wild Animal Welfare Program at New York University. He is also an author. His most recent book is called The Moral Circle: Who Matters, What Matters, and Why? Here he argues that we should extend moral consideration to a much broader spectrum of beings, including insects and even artificial intelligence. After reading his book, I couldn
S12 E4 · Wed, February 12, 2025
John Jurko: Rhino Man
“I think it's really the amounts of money that they're able to offer people paired with the violence that they're willing to put on people. It's very much like the drug cartels in Mexico, just more focused on poaching of wildlife.” – John Jurko John Jurko is a director and producer of the film, Rhino Man , an award winning documentary which highlights the courageous field rangers who risk their lives every day to protect rhinos and our natural world. The film follows Anton Mzimba , the head ranger of the Timbavati Private Nature Reserve, as he and his team battle to protect the rhinos. Anton faces long deployments away from family, dangerous working conditions, and constant threats to his life until he was assassinated for his work protecting the rhinos – this was while they were making the film. John is continuing to advocate to bring justice to his killers who have yet to be arrested. John also created and hosts The Rhino Man Podcast to further build awareness of the importance of rangers, the rhino poaching crisis, and our need to connect local communities to protected areas.
S12 E3 · Wed, February 05, 2025
Jason Edwards: From Icebergs to Iguanas
“I know that one day for me in Antarctica, one morning for me in Antarctica is a dream for someone who will never get there. Because it's hard to get to. So, I don't waste those opportunities. I don't sit there and go, ‘I'm in Antarctica again.’ No, my brain will not go to that space because I know that people would kill [to be there]. I am the portal sometimes, through which some people will experience different parts of the world. ” Jason Edwards Jason Edwards is an award-winning photographer, TV host, and conservationist. His image portfolio ranks among the largest of any photographer in the National Geographic Society's long history, and he has a new book out called, From Icebergs to Iguanas . It's a large format series of books illustrating his National Geographic imagery and his behind-the-scenes tales. It's stunning and it makes you feel very lucky to live on this planet. Through his commissioned assignments and as the face of National Geographic Channel's Pure Photography, Jason has taken his storytelling to televisions and streaming networks in dozens of countries and to every continent. His imagery has appeared in hundreds of publications including National Geographic Magazine, BBC Wildlife, Australian Geographic, Sports Illustrated, Conde Nast Traveler, and The New Yorker.
S12 E2 · Wed, January 29, 2025
Ella Driever and Sneha Sharma: The Timberline Pack
“We don't want Idaho to have a bad reputation. This is our home state. We love our home state. It's beautiful. We pride ourselves on our nature. We pride ourselves on our wildlife. And instead, we are continuing to do things that are… that are sickening. ” - Ella Driever In 1995, wolves were reintroduced to central Idaho, and in 2003 a Boise High school called Timberline officially adopted a local wolf pack. Throughout the 2000, students went on wolf tracking trips and in their wolf packs range. But in 2021, Idaho's legislature passed Senate Bill 1211, 1211 allows Idaho hunters to obtain an unlimited number of wolf tags, and it also allows Idaho's Department of Fish and Game to use taxpayer dollars to pay private contractors to kill wolves. That means bounties on wolves, including on public lands. And in 2021, the Idaho Fish and Game Commission expanded the wolf hunting season and hunting and trapping methods. So it's not too surprising to learn that also in 2021, the Timberline pack disappeared. The students, the ones that cared about wolves, at least, were devastated. Last summer I went to D.C. with some of the Species Unite team for a wolf rally on Capitol Hill. While I was there, two young women gave a talk about what happened at Timberline in 2021. Their names are Ella Driver and Sneha Sharma. They both graduated from Timberline High School and were there when their wolf pack disappeared. Please, listen and share.
S12 E1 · Wed, January 22, 2025
Cheryl Martinez: Veginner Cooking
“I know that veganism can be a little daunting for some, and they feel like it's either you go fully vegan or you're not allowed in the club. ” – Cheryl Martinez Because it's January and because a lot of people may have made some big resolutions a few weeks ago, we are going to talk about one of them – plant-based eating. Because, well I think it’s a really good resolution to do all year long. I think one of the big resistance points for even trying plant-based for a month, is that many people seem to worry that switching their diet to vegan means there's a lot of food they can't eat anymore, but, I think it’s the opposite. Eating vegan has led to so many options and flavors that I had never knew existed. This episode is with Cheryl Martinez. Cheryl is the founder of Veginner Cooking , which is all about making plant-based eating accessible and exciting for everyone – whether they’re doing vegan til dinner, or meatless Mondays or are making the shift to full on vegan. Cheryl's built a community of over 200,000 Veginners, that is vegan beginners, and she shares with them delicious recipes, tips, advice, and all sorts of really good info on how to make easy, delicious and healthy plant-based foods. Please listen, share and check out Veginner Cooking . Veginner Cooking: https://www.veginnercooking.com/ Veginner Recipes: https://www.veginnercooking.com/blog
S11 E33 · Wed, January 15, 2025
Patti Truant Anderson: Polling and the Surprising Results Around What People Really Think About the Food System
Text “Do people even want to know about some of these issues? Because I think some of the meat production concerns, it's kind of like people would rather in some cases, I think some people might not really want to know all the nitty gritty. They don't want to know how the sausage is made. That poses an interesting question and challenge about how you communicate about some of these issues, when maybe there's a resistance among a subset of people who don't want to know more.” - Patti Truant Anderson Today’s episode is the final installment in our special four-part series where we take a deep dive into the food system with experts from the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future. Our guest is Patti Truant Anderson, a senior program officer at the Center and a faculty associate in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Patti’s work focuses on public health risks, environmental challenges tied to food production, and how to communicate these critical issues more effectively. Patti and I explore how polling helps uncover public perceptions around food systems and why the country isn’t as polarized on these issues as we might think. We also talk about the challenge of engaging people who may resist learning about the harsh realities of our food system. This episode is not just about data—it’s about how we can foster a shared understanding and move forward, even in times of deep political division. Links: Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future - https://clf.jhsph.edu/ Patti Truant Anderson - https://clf.jhsph.edu/about-us/staff/patti-truant-anderson
S11 E32 · Wed, December 25, 2024
Tom Philpott: The Human Cost of Meatpacking
“People in the animal welfare world, I think, should broaden their purview to the human parts of it and sort of work in coalition. Like if you can really expose the labor conditions, you're weakening the industry, and if you can increase labor regulations, if you can make it to where workers don't routinely get repetitive stress injuries and they're not breathing in harsh chemicals, and if you slow the kill line down, that hits their profits and you are weakening the industry. And, also remember, this industry doesn't just slaughter billions of animals a year, it also makes life hell for the people who work in it. Expand your level of solidarity to those people.” – Tom Philpott This is the third episode in a special for part series, where we go deep into the food system with some of the brightest minds at the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future . In this episode, we dive into one of the many hidden and hideous aspects of our food system: the exploitation of workers in industrial meat production. Tom Philpott is a senior research associate at the Center. He joined in 2022 after a distinguished three-decade career in journalism, reporting on the injustices and ecological ramifications of the industrial food system. He is the author of the critically acclaimed book, Perilous Bounty. I asked Tom to shed some light on the grueling conditions faced by meatpacking workers, from dangerous line spades to repetitive injuries and the shocking lack of basic protections, and even though much of this was exposed during the covid 19 pandemic, to explain how it’s all still happening. Tom also hosts the Center for a Livable Future’s podcast, it’s called Unconfined . It’s really good. Take a listen to learn a whole lot more about the impacts of food animal production. Links <p class=
S11 E31 · Wed, December 18, 2024
Keeve Nachman: A Masterclass in Persistence
“I remember during my training having professors tell me, ‘one day you might do something important and you'll tick off a vested interest, and they're going to come into a meeting with you, and they're going to bring a copy of your dissertation and slam it on the table and start challenging you.’ And that is exactly what happened.” – Keeve Nachman This is the 2 nd episode in a special four-part series about where we go deep into the food system with some of the brightest minds at the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future . This conversation is Dr. Keeve Nachman , a powerhouse in the fields of environmental health, risk assessment, and food systems research. Keeve is the Robert S. Lawrence Professor and Associate Director of the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future. He’s also a leading voice on issues like antibiotic resistance and industrial agriculture’s impact on public health. I asked Keeve to come on the show to talk about how his work helped ban the use of arsenic in our food system—a fight that spanned 15 years and had a ripple effect around the globe. Keeve’s story is a masterclass in persistence and the power of science-driven policy change. We also explore his ongoing efforts to address antibiotic misuse in industrial agriculture, a growing threat to global public health, and discuss what it will take to create lasting change in our food system. Links : Keeve Nachman: https://clf.jhsph.edu/about-us/staff/keeve-nachman Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future: https://clf.jhsph.edu/ Unconfined Podcast https://clf.jhsph.edu/unconfined-podcast
S11 E30 · Wed, December 11, 2024
Brent Kim: From Farm to Fork and Beyond
“My colleague and I went out to Arizona because there was a community that was concerned about the expansion of an egg laying operation, essentially in their backyard. At full capacity, that operation was slated to house 12 million birds. 12 million birds. It's like New York City, but with chickens.” – Brent Kim We know that what we eat has an enormous impact on billions of animals, our health and the health of the planet. If we fail to change our diets and the food system, the planet will face increasingly severe environmental, social, and economic consequences, many of which are already beginning to unfold. We know this, we know that there is much we could be doing about it, on large and small scales, yet the urgency is not there. I think the more knowledge we have, the more we are willing to demand change and even change ourselves. So, I wanted to go deeper into the food system to get a better understanding of its impact on public health, the planet, ecosystems and social justice, and mostly - to hear about how we change it. This episode marks the beginning of a special four-part series with some of the experts from the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future . This conversation is with Brent Kim . Brent is a program officer for the Center’s Food Production and Public Health program. His research spans issues from farm to fork with published works on sustainable diets, climate change and industrial food, animal production, food and agriculture policy, soil safety, and urban food systems. He and I talk about much of it, how to change it and solutions for a much better future. Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future https://clf.jhsph.edu/ Brent Kim https://clf.jhsph.edu/about-us/staff/brent-kim Unconfined Podcast
S11 E29 · Tue, December 03, 2024
JG Collomb: Wildlife Conservation Network
"In the case of lions, they're not easy neighbors. They're also not the worst neighbors. I think in in most cases, it's a matter of learning how to live next to nature, next to other animals and animals that can potentially be dangerous." - JG Collomb JG Collomb is the CEO of Wildlife Conservation Network, an organization that connects global donors with community based conservationists, and they're changing the way the world finds and funds often overlooked projects in the field and helps foster coexistence between communities and the animals who live among them. Please listen, share and check out the Wildlife Conversation Network.
S11 E28 · Sat, November 30, 2024
Aidan Alexander and Thom Norman: The Animals That Need Our Help the Most
“I think there's a lot of people out there who feel the way I felt for many years, which is, ‘look, I feel a bit guilty, I know in some sense that having the diet I have makes me complicit in some things that I don't like. It makes me a bit uncomfortable, but it doesn't feel like there’s anything I can do about it right now. I have this guilt. I'd like to do something about it, but just all the options I'm presented with seem a bit shit.’ So, when we present people with something else that they can do, many of the people we've spoken to say it's quite a relief to know that they don't have to sit with this tension. You know, psychologists call it the meat paradox, the thing where we love animals, but we also eat them. How can we resolve this? Well, one thing that can maybe help us resolve this kind of cognitive dissonance is to actually be a part of helping animals even whilst you still haven't changed your diet.” - Aidan Alexander The animals that need our help the most are animals that live on factory farms. Yet charities protecting farmed animals receive 28 times less donations than pet charities. There are all sorts of reasons for this, which we get into in this episode. This conversation is with Aidan Alexander and Tom Norman. Aidan and Tom have started an organization called FarmKind . It is a way to support your favorite charities, that is, nonprofits that you’re already supporting - pet charities, conservation charities, etc. but also at the same time to help animals that are living on factory farms. Why? Because factory farming is the biggest source of suffering for animals on the planet. Helping to protect these animals and bring factory farming to an end is one of the biggest ways to help animals in need. FarmKind makes it easy to make a difference for millions of factory farm animals when you donate to the causes you care about. FarmKind helps people who feel compassion for animals to help the animals most in need and support their favorite charities at the same. OR FarmKind helps anyone be a part of the solution to factory farming, regardless of their diet. Because diet change isn’t the only way to help farmed animals. Donating is an incredibly pow
S11 E27 · Sun, November 24, 2024
Peter Lehner: Cows, Corn and Crap
"We may think that we're just eating our dinner tonight, but when you multiply it by all of that food every day, every day of the year, everyone in the country, everybody in the world, it's a tremendous production. Just to give you a sense, in the US, we slaughter about 18,000 animals every minute for food just in the United States." - Peter Lehner Agriculture and our food system are responsible for about a third of greenhouse gas emissions. That is an enormous amount. Yet, the food system is all too often left out of climate conversations and is rarely held accountable for its destruction to our planet. I asked Peter Lehner to come on the show to explain some of this, to talk about agriculture's role in climate and how and why they are so often left off the hook. I asked Peter Lehner to come on the show and explain what agriculture's role is in climate, and how and why they are so often left off the hook. Peter is one of the leading experts on the impact of agriculture and climate change. He directs Earth Justice's Sustainable Food and Farming program, developing litigation, administrative and legislative strategies to promote a more just and environmentally sound agriculture system and to reduce health, environmental and climate harms from the production of our food. He is also the author of farming for Our Future The Science, Law and Policy of Climate Neutral Agriculture. He also teaches at Columbia and Yale Law schools. Please listen and share.
S11 E26 · Wed, November 13, 2024
Mark Elbroch: If We Want Mountain Lions the East, We'll Have to Bring Them
"Why do we need large carnivores? O bviously as a scientist, I like talk about the biological roles that they play and the ecological roles, but I will drift and say that I think they're important for spirit and sort of human health more broadly, whether that be mental health, spiritual health, whatever, that sense of wildness that they bring to a landscape, that they force you to listen when you're in the woods, that you hear sticks break around you, that you hear what the birds are doing so that you know whether there's something coming around the next bend. These are all, in my opinion, truly enriching moments and necessary for human spirit and really for human health." - Mark Elbroch Mark: [00:12:23] These are all, in my opinion, truly enriching moments and necessary for human spirit and [00:12:30] really for human health Mark Elbroch is an ecologist and author, storyteller and the director of the Puma Program for Panthera , the global wild cat conservation organization. Mark has been on the podcast before to talk about cougars, but something has changed since the last time he was on. For years, many people in the scientific community, and this is backed by research, have claimed that cougars would return to their historic range in the eastern US in the next 10 to 20 years. But there's a new study from Panthera that says that this is not true, that they won’t make it to the East Coast even by 2100, which means, if we want cougars in the east we're going to have to help them. This is a big deal because we do want cougars in the east. Large predators make fragile ecosystems strong. Mountain lions interact with nearly 500 other species and their reintroduction could lead to<a href= "https://nsojournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ecog.06098'" target="_blank"
S11 E25 · Wed, October 30, 2024
Rev. Dr. LoraKim Joyner: The Parrot Crisis
“And so I've been doing this for about 40 years, and I still don’t get tired of seeing parrots. I see a parrot or I see a bird and I go, I belong. There is such beauty in the world. Oh my gosh. It's like everything is okay for a minute you're intrigued, you're curious, you're seeing beauty, you're seeing flight. But at the same time, you've trained yourself to hold the tragedy because there aren't nearly as many as there used to be and there's all kinds of complex threats against them, and there's little we can do. So you see a wild parrot that is also the internal conversation, they're in trouble, it's not like it was or it should be or could be. So that's what it's like to see a parrot is to see the beautiful and the tragic.” – Rev. Dr. LoraKim Joyner I only learned recently that parrots are the most endangered group of birds on the planet. As with so many other species, our tendency to take and take is what is driving parrots toward extinction. We've been stealing them from the wild for 60 years to live these pitiful lives in cages, in people's kitchens. That, combined with habitat loss and climate change is pushing these spectacular birds to the brink of extinction. This conversation is with Rev. Dr. LoraKim Joyner, a wildlife veterinarian, a conservationist, a Unitarian minister, and co-founder of One Earth Conservation. LoraKim has spent the last 40 years in Latin and South America, working with communities to save their parrots – by building their capacity to transform poachers into protectors. One Earth Conservation grows conservationists of all ages by empowering and standing in solidarity and resistance with the people of the Americas. They have projects in Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Guyana, Paraguay, and Suriname. To learn more: https://www.oneearthconservation.org/
S11 E24 · Thu, October 17, 2024
Sam Tucker: AI and the Future for Animals
“In terms of specialized AI within these industries. They're years and years ahead of where the animal movement currently is. Factory farms are increasingly using AI as well to do things like predicting the growth rate of chickens so that they can set the environmental variables up perfectly to exploit these animals as efficiently as possible.” – Sam Tucker Sam Tucker is the founder of Open Paws , a nonprofit aimed at creating ethically aligned AI systems and he’s the creator of Veg 3 , an AI chatbot promoting animal rights. Sam’s expertise in AI development and animal protection provides both a practical and theoretical understanding of how to create technologies that benefit all species. I asked Sam to come on the show because I want to understand how we, Species Unite and other organizations like us can be using AI to be way more effective.
S11 E23 · Wed, October 09, 2024
Shannon Keith: Freedom Fields
“We enacted what's called the Beagle Freedom Project Bill. Basically, what it said was, if you're a facility that tests on dogs and cats, when the testing is over, you are mandated to release those animals to give them a second chance at life to a 501C3 charity like Beagle Freedom Project or any other type of facility like that, like a rescue facility. You wouldn't believe how hard that was to pass.” – Shannon Keith The story sounds like a dream: hundreds of animals used for research and testing are now free and the former prison that they were forced to call home has been torn down to become a safe and loving animal sanctuary. This conversation was done as a live interview a few weeks ago. It's with me and Shannon Keith, the president and founder of the Beagle Freedom Project . I invited her on to discuss the shutdown of a massive dog and cat testing laboratory in Nowata, Oklahoma. Not only did the Beagle Freedom Project and Shannon shut down this laboratory, but they rescued all of the dogs and cats that were being tested on there, and they took over the laboratory and it's grounds and are in the process of transforming it into a 30-acre sanctuary called Freedom Fields . The closure of this laboratory ends one-third of the toxic flea and tick testing industry in the United States, sparing the lives of thousands of dogs and cats. Beagle Freedom Project is the world’s leading organization for rescuing and rehoming animals used in experimental research. Since 2010, they have liberated thousands of animals while working to end their abuse through education, advocacy, and legislation. We talk about the shutdown, the rescue of hundreds of animals that were being tested on, and the magic of transforming a dark and terrifying animal research lab into a beautiful sanctuary. And, we discuss not only how to help these former research animals, but also the more than one hundred million still being used for testing and research in the United States.
S11 E22 · Wed, September 25, 2024
Chimp Crazy: Angela Scott: The Whistleblower
"And the thing that really makes me sad is that we humanize them when they're little, by putting them in diapers and feeding them bottles and dressing them in clothes. And then we demonize them when they grow up and act like the wild animal that they are, because people think if they neuter them, if they get their teeth removed - not my chimp, my chimp is not going to act like that." - Angela Scott Last week we released an episode with Brittany Peet, PETA's general counsel for captive animal law enforcement, who is featured in the HBO docuseries, Chimp Crazy. If you haven't seen it, please see it. It's made by Eric Goode, the guy who made Tiger King , and it is equally shocking. It also shines a light on the need to pass the Captive Primate Safety Act and there are many high hopes that that act could get passed this year because of Chimp Crazy . Chimp Crazy focuses on chimpanzee owners, private owners that buy cute baby chimps, dress them up and treat them like human children until they are 5 or 6 years old, when the chimps become large, and very strong wild animals. This part usually ends badly. Well, it always ends badly for the chimps but quite often it does for the humans too. This conversation is with Angela Scott, the whistleblower in Chimp Crazy , and for this entire case. A little background: Angela volunteered at a place called Chimp Party for a woman named Connie Casey. Connie and her husband Mike bred and sold chimpanzees and other primates for decades. PETA got involved because of the horrific conditions these chimps were living in. Angela was the whistleblower who worked with PETA. But before the case could fully go through, Connie gave her chimps to a woman named Tonya Haddix. And the chimps were in Tanya’s care when they were rescued, all except for one, a chimp named Tonka. Tanya tried to keep Tonka for herself and she hid him from PETA for months in a cage in her basement. All of the chimps, including Tonka, were eventually saved because of Angela’s willingness to go back to Connies and film what she saw. Angela’s stories o
S11 E21 · Wed, September 18, 2024
Chimp Crazy: Brittany Peet: The Attorney
“I mean, it's an addiction, an obsession, a sickness that these people seem to have that they don't think that it could happen to them. And even when it does, they are still in denial about it.” - Brittany Peet There's a new docuseries on HBO called, Chimp Crazy. If you haven't seen it, see it. It's made by Eric Goode, the guy who made Tiger King, and it is equally shocking . Chimp Crazy focuses on chimpanzee owners, private owners that buy cute baby chimps, dress them up and treat them like human children until they are 5 or 6 years old, when the chimps become large, and very strong wild animals. This part usually ends badly. Well, it always ends badly for the chimps but quite often it does for the humans too. This conversation is with Brittany Peet , PETA's general counsel for captive animal law enforcement. Brittany makes quite a few appearances in Chimp Crazy - she is one of the PETA lawyers who freed the captive chimps in the show, and has spent her career working to free many other captive, chimps, primates and other wild animals throughout the US. Please listen, share and if you haven’t seen it, please watch Chimp Crazy .
S11 E20 · Wed, September 04, 2024
Katherine Baxter: Elephants Don't Like Sunflowers
"So this relationship to ourselves, to other people, to other animals - whether farm animals or wild animals, it's very bizarre how we have gotten it so twisted in what we expect and what we feel entitled to over here in the the Global North." - Katherine Baxter Katherine Baxter is the CEO of the Africa Network for Animal Welfare-USA (ANAW). ANAW-USA works to advance the welfare of animals, humans and the environment by facilitating mutually beneficial and reciprocal exchanges between the United States and Africa. Their mission is to work with their sister organization in Kenya, ANAW, and other partners, to advance the inseparable welfare of animals, humans, and the environment by facilitating mutually beneficial exchanges of resources and knowledge between the United States and Africa. I asked Katherine to come on the show to talk about ANAW and some of ANAW's coexistence programs in Kenya, including an incredible sunflower project has solved huge problems with human-elephant conflict. It makes me crazy that we in the US are incredibly resistant to many (or most) coexistence programs yet our stakes are pretty low. In the US, if a wolf kills a sheep, the rancher is reimbursed and except for the poor sheep, life goes on. Whereas in villages close to Tsavo National Park in Kenya, people lose entire crops to elephant herds, are financially ruined, and some even lose their lives - yet they are much more willing to explore and try coexistence programs that benefit all - the crops, the people and the elephants. If we want to live in a country where wildlife and predators still roam, then we need to put the guns down and start paying attention to ideas and initiatives like the ones that Katherine talks about here. We have much to learn.
S11 E19 · Wed, August 21, 2024
Emma Hakansson: Collective Fashion Justice
“There are more native crocodiles living in cages and concrete pens that are owned by Hermes or supplying Louis Vuitton than live in their natural habitat. So, that is so clearly not conservation. And we're talking like hundreds of thousands of crocodiles. ” – Emma Hakansson We are destroying the planet, killing billions of animals and making life insufferable for humans all over the world, all in the name of fashion. But, Emma Hakansson is on a mission to change all of it. She is the founding director of Collective Fashion Justice , an organization dedicated to creating a total ethics fashion system which prioritizes the wellbeing of people, our fellow animals and the planet, before profit. And some of the bags are even like Nile crocodile and crocodiles from different parts of the world and the level of exclusivity is based on like how rare that skin is. And it seems to not even connect in their mind that, like, maybe if an animal is rare, it means that they should be being protected rather than made into a bag that you think is special. And I think that's where a disconnect from nature comes into play. Like if we really connected with nature and saw the beauty of it, we would want to protect it more in its natural state, and we would see higher value in fashion that appreciates nature and takes inspiration from nature, but that doesn't take from it and destroy it or kill it. – Emma Hakansson Emma has consulted on passed progressive fashion legislation in New York City, spoken at the European Parliament, been invited to provide expertise in Parliament inquiries in Australia, and offered her expertise to global brands and fashion councils seeking to improve their ethics and sustainability. Her latest book, Total Ethics Fashion , explores the namesake term that she coined to guide the fashion industry forward. Please listen and share and if you do purchase somethi
S11 E18 · Wed, August 07, 2024
Pete Paxton: Good People Who Do Bad Things
"I cannot put enough emphasis on this. I have seen so many things that are so weird that even when I would show it to law enforcement at first, before there were like a lot of these cases coming out, law enforcement would look and they'd be like, “what? Why would someone do this?” Right? As if what I'm showing them wasn't real. And what I learned to say to get past that is, I would say to cops, “how many times have you seen someone do something for reasons they can't even explain to themselves?" - Pete Paxton For the past 23 years, Pete Paxton has been working undercover in puppy mills, factory farms, slaughterhouses, pet stores, and on-board commercial fishing boats to document horrific cruelty. Some of these high-stress, horror show jobs last for weeks while others go on for months at a time - months of ten-hour days, doing hard, heavy labor, witnessing animals being abused or killed and watching your co-workers hurt the already abused animals even more. Pete does it because he is good at it, because he loves animals and because his work has often resulted in big change for animals. What perplexes me the most about Pete, is that after 23 years of working in hellish places like slaughterhouses and factory farms, he hasn’t become dark and dour. Instead, he is the opposite. He's extremely funny, super engaging and seriously joyful . He doesn’t allow this work to take him down. Most people I know, me included, would be a shell of a human being after a couple of hours in his world. Pete is also the author of Rescue Dogs and has had two HBO documentaries made about him and his work, Dealing Dogs and Death on a Factory Farm .
S11 E17 · Mon, July 22, 2024
Ingrid Newkirk: 75 Years of Badassery
“You asked what kind of army we are. Cleveland Amory once said it. He said, “the army of the kind.” And that's it. If there's anything going on, we find it irresistible not to speak out, to do something, to say something, to enlist other people to help because we're not some superhuman force, we're a collection of humans.” Ingrid Newkirk Ingrid Newkirk co-founded People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) in 1980, and since then, I don’t think there has been a single day that she has not fought against injustice toward animals. She is not only a hero for millions of animals but also for humans, for showing all of us how to make change happen and for inspiring us to do it. Since it was founded, PETA has exposed horrific animal abuse in laboratories, leading to many firsts, including canceled funding, closed facilities, seizure of animals, and charges filed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. PETA has also closed the largest horse-slaughter operation in North America, convinced dozens of major designers and hundreds of companies to stop using fur, ended all car-crash tests on animals, helped schools switch to innovative animal-free dissection tools , and provided millions of people with information on being vegan , companion animal care , and countless other issues. Ingrid just celebrated her 75th birthday, so we got together to take a look back at her life and the life of PETA. Happy Birthday, Ingrid!
S11 E16 · Wed, July 10, 2024
Vanessa Barboni Hallik: Another Tomorrow
“ 50% of clothing that gets created ends up in a landfill in the first year. When we're using way too much resource in the first place, the fact that half of that is going directly to landfill in the first year is insane. And then, what actually makes it into our closets, we wear about 20% of on a trailing 12 month basis. So if you think about just the actual amount of utility that we get out of this massive system is insane. And that's just the waste part of it.” – Vanessa Barboni Hallik Vanessa Barboni Hallik is the founder and CEO of Another Tomorrow, a luxury brand that is doing fashion better. Much much better. They’re a B Corp Certified end-to-end sustainable design company with a mission to model a new future for fashion with a fully digitized product eco-system delivering technology-enabled transparency and authenticated recommerce. If other brands would follow Another Tomorrow's lead, humans, the planet and billions of animals would benefit enormously. Vanessa is also an investor in early-stage companies positioned to catalyze systemic change. And she serves on the Advisory Board for Harvard's Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, where current work focuses on the ethics of AI. Prior to founding Another Tomorrow, Vanessa was a Managing Director at Morgan Stanley, where she held several leadership roles in the emerging markets institutional securities business.
S11 E15 · Tue, June 25, 2024
Melanie Challenger: Animals in the Room
“I think one of the reasons dignity matters to animals is that they are objectified. They are stripped of their agency very often, and they're also caught up in power relations with human beings that do not go in their favor in, in the overwhelming number of cases. But it's also grounds why they have a right to be subjects of justice, doesn't it? So, it is the fact that they are subjects, that they are agents, that they their voices matter in a political sense.” – Melanie Challenger Melanie Challenger wears a lot of hats— she’s an artist, philosopher, poet and writer, deputy co-chair of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics and a Vice President of the RSPCA UK. She is the author of On Extinction: How we became estranged from nature (2011), <span style="font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; border: none windowtext 1.0pt; mso-border-alt: none windowtext 0in; padding: 0in
S11 E14 · Wed, June 12, 2024
Gene Grant: Scores of Chimpanzees Are Still Stuck in Labs
“Anybody with half a heart could understand that this is a very bad deal for these feeling beings. Waking up every day at the same place where these horrible things happened, it's not right. ” – Gene Grant It’s been almost a decade since the National Institutes of Health ended the use of chimpanzees for biomedical research. But today we still have scores of chimpanzees sitting in labs. They’re not being tested on, but they are still waiting to be moved into a sanctuary. This is happening even though there is a law in place that established a federal sanctuary system to provide lifetime care for chimpanzees retired from medical research. 26 of these former research chimpanzees live in the Alamogordo Primate Facility on Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico. I asked Gene Grant, the chief program and policy officer for Animal Protection New Mexico , to come on the show and talk about why all these years later, these chimps have still not been moved to a sanctuary. And how that changes. LINKS Animal Protection New Mexico https://apnm.org/ Chimp Haven https://chimphaven.org/donate/ https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/23/science/chimpanzees-research-retirement.html
S11 E13 · Mon, May 27, 2024
Chloe Sorvino: Raw Deal: Hidden Corruption, Corporate Greed and the Fight for the Future of Meat
“There was a farmer who I met. He had the craziest [story], but not crazy because it's happening everywhere. A hog horn rammed into him and he got a disease. No one had any idea what it was. He went septic. He almost died. And he figured out that his herd had gotten an antibiotic resistant bug because of the way he was farming.” – Chloe Sorvino Chloe Sorvino leads coverage of food and agriculture as a staff writer at Forbes. She writes the newsletter, Mind Feeder , and founded the Forbes newsletter <a style= "background-image: unset; background-position: unset; background-size: unset; background-repeat: unset; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; cursor: pointer; color: var(--image-block-collage-inline-link-color); text-decoration: 1px solid currentcolor; text-underline-offset: 0.2em; text-decoration-skip-ink: auto; box-shadow: .2em 0 0 var(--image-block-collage-image-title-bg-color),-.2em 0 0 var(--image-block-collage-image-title-bg-color); font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; orphans: 2; widow
S11 E12 · Wed, May 08, 2024
Nina Rao: Saving Wild Tigers
“We want to know that we're not separate from all beings - because most of our grief, our fear, our anger comes from feeling separate, not feeling connected, we're constantly finding ways to connect.” – Nina Rao Nina Rao runs an organization called Saving Wild Tigers , a project that raises funds and supports conservation efforts for tigers throughout India. Three of the eight tiger subspecies that roamed Asia only 50 years ago are gone. And the remaining population is under severe threats from habitat loss, hunting of its prey and poaching. The future is uncertain for tigers. Saving Wild Tiger’s supports the immediate needs of the wild tigers: protecting the tiger, its habitat, its prey and its protectors; supporting the surrounding villages (community-based conservation), scientific studies to understand the needs of the tigers and control of poaching and international trade of tiger parts. Nina also is a chantress . She learned traditional chants (bhajans) from her grandfather in a village in south India when she was nine years old. The chants quietly stayed with her until she rediscovered chanting with Krishna Das, in New York in 1996. Krishna Das is a singer/chanter known globally or his performances of Hindu devotional music called kirtan. <span style=
S11 E11 · Wed, April 24, 2024
Bill Wasik and Monica Murphy: Our Kindred Creatures
"I think that's often the solution when feeling sort of bogged down in the issues of our day is when you zoom out and you look at sort of the whole arc of change, you can sort of get inspired that, yeah, we've come a long way." - Monica Murphy Bill Wasik is the editorial director of The New York Times Magazine and Monica Murphy is a veterinarian and writer. Their latest book, Our Kindred Creatures: How Americans Came to Feel the Way They Do About Animals, comes out today, April 23rd. It's a book about moral change and a moral revolution, one that took place from the 1860s to the 1890s in the United States. Over those three decades, the way we treated animals completely changed. It was the time of the birth of the ASPCA, of many SPCAs, of the anti-vivisection movement, and of the first animal shelters. It was a time of massive change. Even though I think most people who listen to this podcast know that we need a much larger moral revolution in terms of how we treat animals, this book gave me so much hope that it can actually be done. Please listen, share and read Our Kindred Creatures. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/634494/our-kindred-creatures-by-bill-wasik-and-monica-murphy/
S11 E10 · Wed, April 10, 2024
Suzanne Lee: BIOFABRICATE
“Wouldn't it be amazing if you went into Nike Town and the same pair of shoes or the same style [but]each pair was different because it had been grown and was not the result of a plastic, you know, a plastic polymer or an animal that had been so heavily finished that they all look the same. That, or me, would be mind blowing, where you and I could have the same handbag, but they're from the same brand, in the same shape, it's the exact same model, but the material is slightly different on every single one, like the leaves on a tree. ” – Suzanne Lee Suzanne Lee is the Founder & CEO of BIOFABRICATE , a global network that serves the needs of bio innovators, which are material makers, consumer brands and investors. BIOFABRICATE is where design meets biology. Suzanne is a pioneer in this space. She started growing materials from microbes for the fashion industry in 2022, coining the term 'Biocouture ™'. She is also the author of Fashioning the Future: Tomorrow’s Wardrobe . She is a special advisor to Parley For The Oceans, The Mills Fabrica and Fashion for Good on biomaterials, a TED Senior Fellow, and a Launch Material Innovator - an initiative of NASA, Nike, USAID and the US State Department. Formerly Suzanne was the Chief Creative Officer of Modern Meadow, a biomaterials start-up in New York (2014-2019).
S11 E9 · Thu, April 04, 2024
Dr. Patricia Wright: For the Love of Lemurs
“He called me into his office and he said, ‘you see that picture above my desk?’ I said, ‘yes.’ It kind of looked like an animal that reminded me of a squirrel. He said, ‘that is a lemur that we think is extinct in the wild. If you can, please go to Madagascar and find out if it's extinct or not.’” – Patricia Wright Dr. Patricia Wright is an anthropologist, a conservationist, and a professor at Stony Brook University in New York, and she's probably the world's leading expert on lemurs. There are over 100 species of lemurs, which are prosimians - a type of primate and they only exist on the island of Madagascar. Patricia spends half her time, six months a year in Madagascar studying lemurs, and has done so since the 80s, when she discovered a new species of lemur, the Golden Bamboo Lemur, and she also established Ranomafana National Park. It is almost an understatement to say that Patricia is a trailblazer— she has done the impossible again and again . Her story is will astound you.
S11 E8 · Wed, March 27, 2024
Danielle Celermajer: Summertime: Reflections on a Vanishing Future
“ When those fires happened, it was about 8 o’clock in the morning. It goes completely black, so the sky is completely black. There's no light. The sound is like being under a train. It's unbelievably loud. And of course, the heat. You are right in the heat of the fire and the smell and the taste. So, every one of his senses was taken from one world. A world where it was light, where he could move around to another world without the meta narrative that human beings have, that we're in an age of climate catastrophe. ” – Danielle Celermajer Danielle Celermajer a professor of sociology and criminology at the University of Sydney. She's deputy director of the Sydney Environment Institute and lead of the Multispecies Justice project . Her research focus is on Multispecies Justice, or how the concepts, practices and institutionalization of justice needs to be transformed to take into account ecological realities and the ethical standing of all earth beings. Danielle lives on a multi-species community in rural Australia. She lived through Australia’s Black Summer fires in 2019/2020 and wrote a book about them called, Summertime: Reflections on a Vanishing Future . It’s a book that should be required reading for the entire world. Please listen, sha
S11 E7 · Fri, March 15, 2024
Nicole Green: Better Science
“ There's this hidden curriculum, right? With dissection you're supposed to be learning the anatomy, the physiology of a particular animal. But really, what students are learning is that these animals are meaningless. They're basically just a tool for you to cut into and then discard after you're done with your so-called learning. ” – Nicole Green In US schools, kids dissect on millions of animals - frogs, dogs, cats, pigs and many other species and none of it is necessary. We have solutions and alternatives that are far better than cutting up dead animals. Nicole Green is the director of Animalearn , a national advocacy program that helps educators and students find innovative, non-animal science teaching resources. For over 20 years Nicole has worked to enlighten the public about the latest technology that is available in the science education sector, including AR/VR. Nicole and Animalearn are bringing these solutions to teachers, schools and kids all over the country. If you want to learn more, or rent free, humane alternatives for your classroom, go to the Science Bank .
S11 E6 · Tue, March 05, 2024
Carl Safina: What Owls Know, What Humans Believe
“We live so disconnected from the natural world, and many people live much more disconnected than I am because I've made the natural world my life, my work. But if it's still surprising me and we live so disconnectedly, why is that? Because these owls have been here, all these other creatures have been here since before we got here. They're a normal part of the world. And yet what they do and what they can do, what they're capable of, is so surprising. Why is it so surprising? Why don't we know? Is it a limitation of our human intelligence and our human emotional capacity, or are we taught our disconnection? ” - Carl Safina Carl Safina is an ecologist and author who writes extensively about our human relationship with the natural world and what we can do to make it better. His most recent book is called, Alife and Me: What Owls Know, What Humans Believe . It’s about rescuing a baby owl, watching her grow up, and what he learned from her and himself in the process . And, it's about our relationship with nature and the beauty and the magic that surrounds us. His writing has won several awards, including a MacArthur Genius Prize, Pew and Guggenheim fellowships, and the John Burrows, James Beard, and George Rabb metals. He is the first Endowed Professor for Nature and Humanity at Stony Brook University and the founding president of the not for profit, <a href="https://www.safinacenter.org/" target="_blank"
S11 E5 · Wed, February 21, 2024
Lisa Jones-Engel: STOP the Georgia Monkey Farm!
“ One after another, citizens came up. And they just hammered that council with additional concerns. You know, one of the guys, his place is 500ft from there. He's like, ‘what do you think this is going to do to me, to my family? How dare you expose me and my family and this community! None of you all live around there. How could you have not brought this to a vote?’ A woman got up and started talking about the research modernization deal. Another woman got up and started talking about land values. A man got up and started talking about malaria. I mean, it's just one after another. They came up and I just, I don't know… I could have just started levitating because I was so buoyed by what this community was doing. And it has not stopped since then. ” – Lisa Jones-Engel There's a small town in Georgia called Bainbridge. It has 15,000 residents, and recently those 15,000 residents were duped by their city and county officials. What happened was that some people came in and proposed a deal to build a $400 million monkey breeding facility, and city and county officials not only agreed to do it, but they gave them almost $60 million in handouts, a 20-year tax abatement, and hundreds of acres of public land. And when the people of Bainbridge found out, they reached out to PETA’s Senior Science Advisor, Dr. Lisa Jones Engel. Lisa spent many years working with primates in biomedical laboratories. She knows more about the industry than just about anyone. In 2019, when she couldn't take it anymore , she left the biomedical world and joined forces with PETA with the aim to take the primate testing industry down. And that is exactly what she’s doing.
S11 E4 · Wed, February 07, 2024
Faraz Harsini: The Leaders of the Future
Dr. Faraz Harsini has been advocating for animal rights for over a decade. He is the CEO and founder of Allied Scholars for Animal Protection (ASAP), a non-profit organization that supports students who are interested in advocating for animal protection and pursuing careers that can make a difference. He is also a Bioprocessing Senior Scientist at the Good Food Institute , where he works on advancing scientific and technological methods to produce alternative proteins on a large scale. Dr. Harsini's educational background includes a Bachelor's degree in chemical engineering, with a focus on process design and nanobiotechnology. He also has a Master's degree in biotechnology and cancer research, as well as a PhD in Cell Physiology and Molecular Biophysics. Before joining GFI, he worked in the biopharmaceutical industry, developing therapeutic proteins for diseases such as Covid19, influenza, cancer, and inflammatory diseases. Dr. Harsini collaborates with organizations like PCRM to promote alternatives to animal testing and to combat animal exploitation. He speaks at colleges about his personal experience as an immigrant, a first-generation college student, and a member of the LGBT community, connecting the oppression of animals to other forms of oppression. Dr. Harsini believes that the root cause of many global issues affecting humans and animals is linked to the food system. Therefore, he aims to change the food system through his work at GFI and to train and support students to become future leaders in animal protection through ASAP. LINKS: alliedscholars.org instagram.com/alliedscholars/ gfi.org
S11 E3 · Fri, February 02, 2024
Poorva Joshipura: Survival at Stake
“…but what's happening lately is that mink on fur farms have been starting to be infected with H5n1 bird flu. So, the World Health Organization is worried that this disease is now changing to better infect mammals. Of course, we are mammals. And of course, if it's on fur farms, there's human mammals on the fur farms who can be infected by the bird flu, just the same way that COVID kept pinging back and forth between animals and fur farms and the humans who work there. And so this is a real concern because it’s a 60% mortality rate, I mean, that can wipe out most of humanity. ” – Poorva Joshipura Poorva Joshipura has spent her entire career at PETA. She's currently PETA's Senior Vice President of International Affairs. Poorva’s second book, Survival at Stake , was just released. It’s about how we treat animals and how our current ways of doing things, from factory farming to animal testing to the use of animals in materials and everywhere else we exploit them greatly affects us all. Our treatment of animals is linked to pandemics, epidemics, antibiotic resistance, climate change, deforestation, loss of biodiversity, and many other horrors that humans and the planet are currently facing. It’s all connected and unless we change how we treat animals, and remove them from all of the systems that they’re innocent victims of, things don’t look so good for our survival as a species.
S11 E2 · Wed, January 17, 2024
Mark Vins: Brave Wilderness
"The stonefish is the most toxic, venomous fish on the planet. The stonefish is one of the only fish stings that has been known to kill people. Now, I knew this going in, right? I did my homework. So that was one where I went on a limb, perhaps? Maybe too far." - Mark Vins Mark Vins is an Emmy Award winning wildlife and adventure filmmaker, and the co-founder of the Brave Wilderness YouTube channel. Mark and his co-founder, Coyote Peterson, created the Brave Wilderness Channel to bring people closer to animals and nature and crazy encounters all over the world. Some of them include things like watching Mark and Coyote get stung and bitten by some of the most painful stings and bites out there. Brave Wilderness has 21 million subscribers and their videos have had more than 4 billion views. Mark is also one of the leading ambassadors for Leonardo DiCaprio's organization Re:wild . Mark made a documentary with Re:wild called Brave Mission . It's about Virunga National Park in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the mountain gorillas who live there and the women and men who protect them. This single video has raised over $700,000 to help the rangers in Virunga. Please listen, share and watch Brave Wilderness but don’t attempt any of those bites or stings at home. Brave Wilderness: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6E2mP01ZLH_kbAyeazCNdg Brave Mission https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gynj76XsUQ&list=PLbfmhGxamZ80F53Ezr5CPifRPmiSzm_a7&index=1 Mark Vins: <s
S11 E1 · Thu, January 11, 2024
Damien Mander: Akashinga: The Brave Ones
“You're seeing young men going to prison or getting buried in the ground because they're out there poaching rhinos. And, it just drove a bigger wedge between conservation efforts and the communities. There’s only so many times you can look into the eyes of a woman who’s lost a brother or a husband or a father or an uncle and expect that we’re going to have some sort of relationship with that community. It was the same as Iraq, you've got an occupying force there, which is what we were as a conservation body, and there were no hearts and minds. So, we started doing a lot of research into, what was the most effective tool in community development in Africa. And what we found was an overwhelming body of evidence that said empowering women was the single greatest force for positive change, not only in Africa but across the world.” - Damien Mander Damien Mander is the founder and CEO of Akashinga, an organization that is changing everything we ever thought we knew about how conservation works. Formerly known as the International Anti-Poaching Foundation (IAPF), Akashinga is a nature conservation organization that creates resilient ecosystems where nature, wildlife and communities will thrive together for years to come. Akashinga Rangers are Africa's first plant-based all women anti-poaching unit, and they are revolutionizing the ways that animals are protected, the communities are supported and that wilderness landscapes are restored and safeguarded. Damien is an Iraq war veteran who served as a Naval clearance diver <span style= "font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-decoration-style:
S10 E20 · Sat, December 23, 2023
Collette Adkins: They're Shooting Wolves from Helicopters in Idaho
"In Montana they allow using dogs to chase down wolves, which essentially becomes like state sanctioned dog fighting. You have this horrible scenario where the packs of dogs are surrounding the wolf pack, and it just comes to a bloody end. These are blood sports. This is something that we should be way beyond as a society." - Collette Adkins Collette Adkins is the carnivore conservation director at the Center for Biological Diversity. She focuses on combating the exploitation and cruel treatment of wolves and other rare wildlife. I wanted to talk to Collette because it's been a while since we've talked about wolves on here, and unfortunately their situation is as dire as ever. Idaho, Montana and Wyoming are killing them as fast as they can and in more horrific ways. One of those ways is that in Idaho, they're shooting wolves from helicopters. And Collette is the primary author of a petition to get this banned. Please listen and share. In gratitude, Elizabeth Novogratz
S10 E19 · Mon, December 04, 2023
Brett Matthews: Kate Farms
“In the US alone, there are 100 million people with prediabetes or diabetes, 33 million people with some kind of chronic or various stages of kidney disease, 122 million people with cardiovascular disease, 10 million with GI issues, and 50 million people have food allergies. And, as you know, the food insecurity and malnourishment in the country is growing, unfortunately, particularly with our kiddos.” – Brett Matthews Brett Matthews is the CEO of Kate Farms , organic plant-based nutrition shakes and formulas that have helped hundreds of thousands of children and adults along their journeys towards health. Brett’s son had severe health issues in high school, and proper nutrition was critical in his healing. Brett learned about the power of food to heal and invested in Kate Farms in 2014, became Chairman and later CEO. There are thousands of stories of children and adults whose lives have been dramatically improved because of Kate Farms. They are a game-changer for bringing healthy nutrition into our hospitals and our homes. katefarms.com
S10 E18 · Wed, November 15, 2023
Rebecca Cappelli: SLAY
“I was at a restaurant and the veil dropped in an instant. The curse broke and I could see for the first time. ‘Oh, wow, I'm eating body parts.’ And I turned around and I saw my bag and it was an expensive Fendi bag. And I looked at it and I'm like, ‘this is not leather. This is the skin of an individual. This is a scam. ’” – Rebecca Cappelli Rebecca Cappelli is an award-winning filmmaker and an animal rights activist. Her most recent film, SLAY is a hugely powerful documentary that follows Rebecca through seven countries as she uncovers the dark side of the fashion industry. What she finds will leave you thunder-struck. At least, it did me. With her, we learn what the industry is doing to our planet, to its workers and to the animals that are killed for fur, leather and wool. I think that most people have seen or heard stories in the media about the harms that fashion causes to both the planet and the people in the industry, but it’s rare to hear about the animals, even though 2.5 billion of them are killed every year for our shoes, bags and clothing. Somehow and not by accident, they’ve remained invisible. Until now. SLAY will change you, I promise. Please listen, share and go watch SLAY. LINKS: SLAY.film Letusbehereos.com SLAY is available on: Prime Video : https://www.amazon.com/SLAY-Bandana-Tewari/dp/B0B8MG6B1T/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2DL14WZ5RK9EZ&keywords=slay+documentary&qid=1700070198&sprefix=slay+documentary%2Caps%2C74&sr=8-1 Apple TV and iTunes: https://tv.apple.com/us/movie/slay/umc.cmc.14tluhp4jkjzjxaj5w7juyn79 See SLAY for free on WaterBear @waterbearnetwork https://j
S10 E17 · Wed, November 01, 2023
Aaron Cohen: The Farm Bill, The EATS Act and What You Need to Know
“I call the act a poison pill, because really, what it is, is if it ever gets inserted into the farm bill or if it gets passed on its own, it prevents all of the animal centered organizations, all the environmental organizations, all the family farm and rural community organizations that push back against factory farming. It wipes out all of the progress that they've made.” Aaron Cohen is the senior director of advocacy at Farm Sanctuary . I asked Aaron to come on the show because I wanted to talk about some important things happening in our government right now. Starting with the delayed passage of the Farm Bill. The Farm Bill covers laws that govern food and farming and has a tremendous impact on farming livlihoods, how food is grown, and what kinds of food are grown. A group of Congressional lawmakers are pushing to include the Ending Agricultural Trade Suppression (EATS) Act as part of the 2023 Farm Bill. If passed, the EATS Act would have serious implications for animal welfare and every ounce of progress that the animal protection movement has made against factory farming. It could also have a huge effect on farmer well-being, worker safety, the spread of zoonotic diseases and pollution. It’d be disastrous.
S10 E16 · Wed, October 25, 2023
David Rothenberg is an Interspecies Musician
“ I really felt like I turned into a bird. The way I was playing was changed. Like I played the way nobody would play a clarinet unless they had spent weeks listening to nightingales.” – David Rothenberg David Rothenberg is, amongst many other things, an interspecies musician. That means he makes music with whales and birds and insects and even with many plants and animals that reside in ponds. He's also a writer, he's written many books, including Why Birds Sing , Whale Music and Nightingales in Berlin , which was also made into a film . And he is a professor of philosophy and music at the New Jersey Institute of Technology. Please listen, share and then go outside and listen to the music being made by the many non-human animals around you.
S10 E15 · Wed, October 18, 2023
Annick Ireland: Immaculate Vegan
“Fashion is a really easy way to get in because it doesn't really involve any sacrifice, does it? I think for a lot of people, the thought of going vegan food-wise just seems like a really big deal. Whereas buying a vegan handbag, you get to buy a beautiful handbag and it's vegan.” Annick Ireland Even though it’s 2023 and it feels like much of the world is at least dipping their toes into all things plant-based, it can still be a challenge to navigate the world of vegan fashion. Shoes, boots, bags, coats and anything else that was once made with animal products, are now being made with sustainable, cruelty-free and stunningly beautiful materials, but because this industry is still in its infancy, finding the brands can be tricky. Enter Annick Ireland, the co-Founder & CEO of Immaculate Vegan , an online vegan marketplace that is changing the world for animal loving shoppers. Immaculate Vegan was launched in 2019 by Annick and her co-founder, Simon Bell because they wanted to help people to make better choices that positively impact animals, people and the planet when they shop. They offer a 100% vegan, highly curated collection of premium fashion using the most innovative and sustainable materials — all made ethically, and amplified by original content and an engaged community of changemakers.
S10 E14 · Tue, October 10, 2023
Gemunu de Silva: Save America’s Horses from Slaughter
“Ultimately, this is a dumping ground. The industry is not going to be spending money on horses that are going to be killed for human consumption, so ultimately, in their last six months, they suffer. They suffer terribly. ” – Gemunu de Silva In the United States we do not eat horse meat and we do not slaughter our horses, but we seem to be fine with letting other countries slaughter and eat our horses. We send our live horses to Mexico and Canada to be slaughtered and their meat is then sent to Europe and Japan for consumption. This makes zero sense for a horse loving country. What are we doing? Why are we letting other countries torture, kill and eat our horses? There's a way to stop this madness. A bipartisan bill called the Save Americans Forgotten Equines Act (SAFE) that has been introduced to Congress. If it passes, it will not only ban horse slaughter in the US by law, but it would also prohibit the exportation of our horses for slaughter. This conversation is with Gemunu DeSilva. Gem’s been on the podcast before, this is his fourth appearance. I asked him to come on the show this time because his organization, Tracks Investigations , recently conducted their fourth investigation into Canada’s largest horse slaughter plant. Gem explains what happens to these US horses once they arrive in Canada. It’s worse than you can imagine. LINKS: Tracks Investigations: https://www.tracksinvestigations.org/ SAFE Act petition https://www.speciesunite.com/sa
S10 E13 · Wed, October 04, 2023
Monica Engebretson: Why Does the US Still Test on Animals for Cosmetics, Even Though 44 Other Countries Have Banned It?
“When we do polls on this, we've got all political parties high support for ending cosmetics animal testing, from Republicans, Independents, Democrats - age gaps between the boomers and the zoomers, everybody is in agreement. You know, it's one of those issues that you cannot get more unity on a single issue.” – Monica Engebretson Monica Engebretson is the North American head of public affairs for Cruelty Free International , the leading organization working to end animal testing worldwide. They are working to end all animal testing, but for this conversation, we focused on cosmetics – for two reasons: we’ve done many episodes on animals used in medical research and experimentation and not enough on cosmetics and because I think many people are unaware that even we still test for cosmetics. In the US, it’s no longer required by law that cosmetic companies test on animals, yet we are still doing it. It makes no sense that we have not banned cosmetics testing. Canada has. Mexico has. In fact, 44 other countries have. I wanted Monica to explain how and why this is still happening – and the answers are complicated. The good news is that last month, the Humane Cosmetics Act was reintroduced and if passed, it would end safety testing of cosmetic products on animals and prohibit the sale of products developed using animal testing in the United States. Please listen and share and then, if you live in the US please make a phone call to your Senators and Representatives and politely ask them to support the Humane Cosmetics Act. Find yours here: usa.gov/elected-officials <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; color: r
S10 E12 · Wed, September 27, 2023
Alexis Gauthier: The Michelin Starred French Chef Who Turned Vegan
“ I understand that when you have been [going to] a restaurant for many years, for some customers, it's normal to think that somehow you own it a little bit, like, ‘Oh, this is my table, this is my restaurant.’ And, then when the restaurant changes completely, you feel really betrayed… I invited them. I invited a lot of people, a lot of my regular customers. I said, ‘don't worry, we have changed. But nothing has changed, you know, just come. I invite you and your family. You come and eat just like you used to do, and you are going to love it.’ And they did not. And they took revenge. Took revenge.” – Alexis Gauthier Alexis Gauthier opened his first restaurant in London when he was 24 and he received his first Michelin star a couple of years later. He’s a French chef who has run Gauthier Soho for many years. And for a great part of that time his restaurant served traditional French food. But, in 2016 Alexis became vegan and in 2021 he removed all animal products from his restaurant menus. This created quite the uproar. Alexis and I met in London last week and I had dinner at Gauthier Soho the day after we had this conversation. The food is even better than what he describes, truly, it was one of the best meals I've ever had. Please listen, share and then sign up for the Species Unite 30 Day Vegan Challenge . Links: Species Unite: SpeciesUnite.com Gauthier Soho: https://www.gauthiersoho.co.uk/ Studio Gauthier: https://www.studiogauthier.co.uk/ 123V: https://www.123vegan.co.uk/ 123V Bakery: https://123vegan.co.uk/bakery.php <p class="MsoNo
S10 E11 · Wed, September 20, 2023
Ellie Laks: The Gentle Barn
“The truth is that in between all of those wonderful events was huge debt, maxing out 20 different credit cards and absolutely annihilating my credit, moving from that little half acre backyard into where we are now in Santa Clarita, refinancing the house five times, having people show up in the middle of the night to repo our cars, the bank trying to take the house, my parents doing literal intervention, saying, ‘Ellie, stop your nonsense.’” – Ellie Laks Ellie Laks is the founder of The Gentle Barn , a sanctuary that houses and heals some of the most traumatized animals around. And in turn, those animals heal the humans who come there. It's a pretty remarkable place. It started out on half an acre in Ellie's backyard, and it grew to many many acres and multiple locations. There's one in California, one in Tennessee and a third in Missouri. Since its inception, The Gentle Barn has saved thousands of animals and been host to over 500,000 people.
Wed, September 13, 2023
Dr. Christopher Servheen: Anti-Predator Polices Based on Bar Room Biology and Fear are Coming for the Grizzly Bears
“I think the thing revolves around the control of nature. You know, I mean, you get way back to that. Some people are really uncomfortable around nature existing as it should, and they feel that we need to fix things." - Dr. Chistopher Servheen Grizzly bears are protected under the federal Endangered Species Act. But Republican lawmakers in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming are trying to change that. They are pressing the Biden administration to turn management of grizzly bears back over to the states, which would mean there would be a hunting season for grizzly bears, which would probably look something like what we're doing to wolves in those same states, which is nothing short of a massacre. Dr. Christoph Servheen spent 35 years, from 1981 until 2016, fighting to bring back grizzly bears. In 1981, they were on their way out. There were only 30 breeding females in the greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Most people thought that there was no way to save them. But, because of Chris and people like him and because of The Federal Endangered Species Act, a conservation miracle occurred. They brought the bears back, an act that many consider to be one of conservations biggest success stories. But now, in 2023, because of politicians in the Northern Rockies, the future for grizzly bears could be very bleak.
S10 E9 · Wed, September 06, 2023
Galina Hale: The Most Rational Vegan
“…people say, okay, recycle, and then somebody sees you throwing out a little candy wrapper. Nobody's going to point at you say, ‘Huh, I saw you threw away a recyclable piece” Right? But if I say I'm vegan and then I eat a slice of halal and halal is made with eggs, somebody will say, ‘Oh, it has eggs, you're not really vegan.’ And so that's just kind of weird. – Galina Hale Galina is a professor of economics at UC Santa Cruz. She's also the co-founder and Chief Research Officer of FSI— Food System Innovations , where her husband, David, is CEO. David was on the podcast a couple of weeks ago. Galina served as a Research Advisor at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, and as an assistant professor of economics at Yale University. Galina’s current research interests focus on attracting mainstream finance to climate solutions, the sustainability of the global food system, and international financial stability, especially with respect to climate risks. Galina has published over 30 articles in leading economics and finance peer-reviewed journals. She serves on multiple editorial boards and presents her work regularly at scholarly and policy meetings worldwide. Galina is also a long-distance athlete. She's completed multiple marathons, triathlons and the Ironman. Links: Speciesunite.com FSI - https://fsi.org/ Galina Hale - https://sites.google.com/view/galinahale/
S10 E8 · Wed, August 30, 2023
Joey Pringle is Betting on Animal Free Leather
”We’re already starting to see this happening, like there's a leather tannery in Vietnam called Isa TanTeck, where leather runs through the blood. That's what they specialize at. They came out with their own mycelium material. A leather tannery has come out with their own mycelium material. Are they in it? Are they in it for the passion of saving animals and the vegan kind of philosophies? No, they're in it because they're smart people and they've got good scientists and they've been able to create a new a new product line.” – Joey Pringle Joey Pringle is the founder and co-owner of Veshin Factory , an original equipment and design manufacturer specializing in luxury bags and accessories made from leather alternatives. They work with brands during product design and manufacturing stages to help them make the switch to next gen materials. Veshin was founded with the goal of helping brands go animal free, but because of a partnership with Natural Fiber Welding, maker of Mirum, it’s fast become a leader in plastic-free manufacturing too. Currently, Joey lives in Colombia where he is piloting Veshin Factory's second factory.
S10 E7 · Wed, August 23, 2023
Jessica Kruger: Her Whole Life Changed Because Her Mom Went to Farm Sanctuary
“And it's true that as much as online makes things much more accessible in so many ways, sometimes it's the feeling and seeing that actually really gets people over the line, because they're like, ‘Oh, wow, that feels really… that looks really good. Oh, look at it on me. Oh, you can style it like this as well. And oh, you can go over the shoulder like, yeah…’ the touch is really important for consumer goods” – Jessica Kruger Jessica Kruger is the founder of a vegan handbag company called Shaker . They had a rebrand in June, they were originally founded as LUXTRA in 2018. With the rebrand, came new design and new material. Shaker’s handbags are made with MIRUM® - the first high-end leather alternative that is 100% plastic-free, which is a HUGE deal. I spent time with Jessica in London and saw Shaker’s bags in person. And they are absolutely stunning. Jessica originally started her journey of building cruelty-free businesses in 2014 when she opened ETHOS – one of London’s best loved meat-free restaurants - after her mother volunteered at Farm Sanctuary <span style= "font-variant-ligatu
S10 E6 · Wed, August 16, 2023
David Meyer is Removing Animals from Our Food System (and he’s a Nine Time World Champion of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu)
“We're the first species that has enough mixture of intelligence and capabilities to actually screw it all up. That is our distinction. You know, there's a lot of species on the planet who are now looking to us to say, ‘Well, okay, you're the first to be there. Do you screw it up for everybody or do you figure out how to transcend this?’” David Meyer David Meyer is co-founder of Food System Innovations , and co-founder and CEO of Humane America Animal Foundation . He has worked in animal advocacy since the ‘90s. He founded and ran Adopt-a-pet.com for over two decades. He eventually sold it so that he could focus on Food System Innovations, where the mission is to remove animals from our food system. He has been a vegan for decades and has won NINE world championships in Brazilian jiu jitsu, all on a plant-based diet. LINKS: Speciesunite.com Fsi.org humaneamerica.org
S10 E5 · Wed, August 09, 2023
Karen Davis: This Conversation Will Change How You See Chickens
“Chickens have full color spectrum vision. That means they see the entire spectrum of colors from the infrared to the ultraviolet. The reason that roosters crow when for humans it is still dark outside is because they see the sunrise before we do, because they see infrared light. So, they're up and about in what for them is daylight, when for us it is dark out.” – Karen Davis Karen Davis is the president and founder of United Poultry Concerns . They’re an organization that promotes the compassionate and respectful treatment of domesticated birds. They also have a sanctuary for chickens in Virginia. Karen and I did this interview as a live episode in June. I wanted to talk to Karen about chickens for a couple of reasons, one because they’re the most abused land animal on the planet; but also because I wanted to know more about them. Before this conversation I knew very little about chickens. And Karen knows everything there is to know them. She has been advocating for them, studying them, saving them, and writing about them for decades. Her most recent book is called For the Birds: From Exploitation to Liberation . Every year, a staggering 70 billion chickens are raised and slaughtered for meat, and around 300 million more are kept for egg production. And every single one of them is an intelligent, sentient individual.
S10 E4 · Wed, August 02, 2023
Vicki von Holzhausen: Liquidplant
“Somebody told me, when I was a young designer at Mercedes, they said, ‘well, it takes like... 20 cows to upholster this sedan.’ …Clearly people believe that cows, that the leather, is a byproduct of the food industry, but that's not necessarily true. When you part out the cow, the leather is actually the most valuable component of the cow. - Vicki von Holzhausen Vicki von Holzhausen is a former car designer who decided to make a vegan leather that could rival animal leather. After much research and many experiments, she and her team developed a sustainable leather alternative. They tested it out as a handbag which then became a luxurious line of vegan handbags and accessories, called von Holzhausen . But that wasn't enough, because Vicki’s bigger mission was and is to remove animal leather from the materials system. So, they headed back into the lab and continued to create more and better leather alternatives. While they were there, von Holzhausen’s mission grew even bigger. Yes, they’d continue to develop beautiful and sustainable materials to replace animal leather, but why not replace plastic too? Earlier this year, the von Holzhausen team announced the introduction of the Liquidplant , the world’s first 100% plant-based, high-performance topcoat, making plastic-free materials a reality. Liquidplant can replace plastic topcoats in all kinds of materials, including synthetic leather paper, wood, plastic and fabric, meaning it can and will change the world. “… when you think about deforestation, the microplastic pollution, if we can start to chip away at eliminating whole areas where leather and plastic polyurethane are being used, then we will make a dramatic impact.” - Vicki von Holzhausen
S10 E3 · Wed, July 26, 2023
Catalina Lopez: Octopus Factory Farming is Set to Begin
Catalina Lopez is the director of the Aquatic Animal Alliance at the Aquatic Life Institute . They're a nonprofit focused on improving the lives of aquatic animals, specifically in the food system. I wanted to talk to Catalina about octopuses. This year, we're set to see the world's first octopus factory farm open in the Canary Islands. Just when it seemed humans could not get worse, we decide to farm octopuses? This is a terrible idea for so many reasons, from animal welfare to environmental concerns. It’s cruel and it’s unethical and it’s an enormous step in the wrong direction. We should be shutting down factory farms, not looking for new sentient and intelligent species to torture inside of them. https://ali.fish/
S10 E2 · Wed, July 19, 2023
Marielle Williamson is Suing Her School District and The US Department of Agriculture
“Despite all the information that we see promoting dairy [in school], you cannot promote plant-based milk unless you also promote dairy even more. It just goes to show that there's something more to it. ” – Marielle Williamson Mariel Williamson recently graduated from high in Los Angeles. This past spring, while still a student, she was told by her school that she couldn't share information about plant-based milk or be critical of the dairy industry unless she provided pro dairy content as well. So, Marielle is suing - both the Los Angeles Unified School District and the Unites States Department of Agriculture, for violating her First Amendment righ t.
S10 E1 · Wed, July 12, 2023
Rose Patterson: Animal Rising
Rose Patterson is part of Animal Rising , the animal activist movement that's disrupting animal exploitation all over the UK. Animal Rising used to be called Animal Rebellion, that is until April. And since April, which is only a few months ago, they’ve exploded - they are everywhere. They have disrupted horse races and greyhound races, they've broken into labs, they've stolen beagles, they've stolen King Charles's lambs. And they've received a huge amount of press because of their actions. Much of that press has been TV time, which means that conversations about how we treat animals, not just in the ways mentioned above but in our food system, are taking place all over the media in the UK. Animal Rising is changing the game for what activism looks like. Rose and I met a couple of weeks ago in London, where she lives. She and another Animal Rising activist had just tried and failed to go on a trip to the US.
S9 E22 · Wed, June 21, 2023
Kartick Satyanarayan: The Bear Man of India
“Right from the beginning I think I was infected with this disease. It's a very, very contagious disease of not knowing how to say no to an animal in distress. So, alongside of the bears, we were rescuing everything else: crocodiles, snakes, birds, deer, foxes, jackals, you know, I mean, you nam e it.” - Kartick S atyanarayan Kartik S atyanarayan is the co-founder and CEO of Wildlife SOS , an organization that was founded in 1995 with the mission to make lasting changes to protect and conserve India’s natural heritage, forests and biodiversity. Kartick and Wildlife SOS work towards protecting wildlife, conserving habitat, studying biodiversity, conducting research, and creating alternative and sustainable livelihoods for erstwhile communities that depend on wildlife for sustenance. They run several projects to support bear conservation in India, including the largest rehabilitation center in the world for sloth bears. Kartik is often referred to as the 'Bear Man of India' because of his efforts to put an end to the illegal practice of dancing bears. But in reality, he and Wildlife SOS work to protect all of India's wildlife, including the elephants. They rescue, treat and care for elephants that are exploited in the abusive tourism and “begging elephant” industries and work to end the plight of injured and sick elephants that are forced to work in unnatural conditions. Kartick’s stories are extraordinary and his love for India’s wildlife is indeed contagious. wildlifesos.org
S9 E21 · Wed, June 14, 2023
Elizabeth Baker: Organs on a Chip, Reconstructed Human Epidermis, Human Simulators and other Highly Effective and Seriously Ethical Methods to Replace Animals in Research and Experimentation
“ I think we are at the point where so many of these methods have shown in studies to be more predictive for humans that it really is an issue of human health. We need to do better for patients. We know we can and that these methods exist, so we need to use them.” -Elizabeth Baker This past season, we’ve focused quite a bit on animal research and experimentation, and a lot of our focus has been really on just how bad it is, how bad it is for the animals, how bad it is for science, and how bad it is for taxpayers who are spending so much money on this stuff. What we haven't focused enough on are solutions. And there are solutions. There are many many human relevant methods that are here to replace animal testing and there are many more on the way . Elizabeth is the director of research policy for the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. They're a nationwide organization of physicians and laypersons that promote preventative medicine. They conduct clinical research, and they advocate for more effective, efficient and ethical medical research, product testing and training. pcrm.org
S9 E20 · Wed, June 07, 2023
Daniel Kaul: The Brutal Life Cycle of Captive Lions
“We don't know one case where a lion which was hand fed or bottle fed was released successfully in the wild. Of course, if they see humans and they understand that humans is the connection to food, it will be always a danger to put those lions back in the wild. And many of those companies use that as an excuse why this conservation project is important, but we don't think so and we don't believe that of course. It's in my opinion, nonsense.” – Daniel Kaul Daniel Kaul is the founder of Natucate , an environmental travel company that works to build a safer, more sustainable eco-tourism industry. Unfortunately, the eco-tourism industry has been hijacked by a lot of bad players who are taking advantage of animal lovers. And, some of the animals that are suffering the most because of these bad players, are lions . Please listen, share and don’t participate in tourism that involves interacting with wild animals. Natucate: https://www.natucate.com/en
S9 E19 · Wed, May 31, 2023
Peter Singer: Animal Liberation NOW
“I think to some extent it shows that we don't want to have knowledge that will make us uncomfortable or make us feel that we're doing something wrong. And I get that from people quite often, you know, that don't really know me very well, but they ask me what I'm doing and I mention something about I've written about animals and the way animals raised for food are treated. And then they’ll say, ‘Oh, don't tell me, you'll spoil my dinner. ’” – Peter Singer In 1975, Peter Singer changed the way we talk about how we treat animals in our food system, in research and everywhere else we use, exploit and torture them. He gave the world Animal Liberation , the book that gave birth to generations of animal activists, advocates, vegans and the animal rights movement. And last week, a new version of Animal Liberation entered the world, Animal Liberation NOW. This version is much more than a revised edition, it’s more like a whole new book, because a lot has happened in 50 years, and sadly, a lot hasn't happened. Peter and I met the day before the book came out to talk about what has changed and more importantly, what needs to change NOW. Please listen, share and then go read Animal Liberation NOW .
S9 E18 · Wed, May 24, 2023
Alka Chandna: Comparing Hells
“It’s like comparing hells - it's a different type of hell, right? It's just like one hideous place where you're neglected and you have all manner of suffering to another place where it's a different set of conditions of suffering and misery. ” – Dr. Alka Chandna This conversation took place a couple of weeks ago as a live event. It's with me and Dr. Alka Chandna, PETA's Vice President of Laboratory Investigations. At the time I called it, The Realities of Animal Testing , which is a pretty horrible name as nobody really wants to know the realities of animal testing. But I think it's so important that we do know, because the more we know, the more we can change. Alka has spent the past two decades at PETA fighting to end cruelty towards animals. She is an expert on animal experimentation. She has submitted dozens of complaints to highlight violations of US federal animal welfare laws, guidelines, and policies. And, she's has worked on numerous campaigns to end animal testing and has had original research published in peer-reviewed journals on policies pertaining to problems with oversight of animal experimentation. Please listen and gain a deeper understanding of why testing on animals needs to be a thing of the past and why it's crucial to move towards human relevant methods. LINKS: PETA: https://www.peta.org/ Alka Chandna Twitter: https://twitter.com/alkac1?lang=en
S9 E17 · Wed, May 17, 2023
Natalie Deana: Bad Girls Who Do Good Things
“ We'd never worked in this industry. We'd not got any prior experience in fashion ourselves. But we thought, how hard could it be? Famous last words. How hard could it be to design a handbag? Turns out very hard, very hard.” – Natalie Deana Natalie Deanna is the co-founder of Frida Rome , a conscious luxury brand that makes stunning vegan handbags, handbags inspired by and designed for, “bad girls who do good things.” “’Bad Girls Who Do Good Things,’ was a tagline we came up with even before the brand really started to flourish… And it was, I guess the cheekier side, the more kind of out there arm to what we want to grow as a big empire. Essentially, we want to take over the world with cruelty free brands .” – Natalie Deana Please listen, share and check out FridaRome.com
S9 E16 · Wed, May 10, 2023
Verde Camilla Parmigiani: Vegan Hospitality
“It's very disappointing when I see these menus that are from starter to main courses, all animal proteins… How can you not have like 30% of the menu be plant based? For what reason? Do you need to have animal proteins in every single dish? There's no need for it… People don't need that. The planet doesn’t need that.” - Verde Camilla Parmigiani Verde Camilla Parmigiani is the founder of Vegan Set . She helps hotels create successful plant-based experiences. She founded Vegan Set in 2016 with the aim of showing that a vegan lifestyle can be synonymous with luxury. Camilla and I met a couple of months ago. Before I met her, it just didn't really occur to me that I could and should be asking way more from hotels when it comes to not only vegan food, but the whole package. veganset.com
S9 E15 · Thu, May 04, 2023
Feeding Tomorrow: The Future of Meat
“So, if you listen to the experts, we're to be raising dramatically more animals for food in the future. The only way around that, I think, is through technologies that will render the exploitation of these animals obsolete. I mean, technologies have changed so much about how we live here on Earth today. Instead of whipping horses, we now use bikes and cars. Instead of harpooning whales, we now use electricity. You know, instead of live plucking geese for their quills, we now tap on glass screens to write messages to each other. And all of these technologies at first seemed very foreign." - Paul Shapiro At Species Unite, we get a lot of email and comments every time we do a news story or a podcast on cultivated meat or new alternative proteins. I think in part because the industry is changing and moving so fast and I think in part because I always assume people know more than they do. So, we thought it’d be helpful to invite some of the leaders in the space onto a panel to explain where we are, where we're going and what the road to one day having an animal free food system looks like. This conversation is a live panel that we did a couple of weeks ago with some of the top leaders who are shaping the future of how we eat: Paul Shapiro, the CEO of the The Better Meat Co ., and Anne Palermo, the CEO of <a href= "https://speciesunite.lt.acemlnb.com/Prod/link-tracker?notrack=1&redirectUrl=aHR0cHMlM0ElMkYlMkZ3d3cuYXF1YWN1bHR1cmVkZm9vZHMuY29tJTJGJTNGdXRtX3NvdXJjZSUzREFjdGl2ZUNhbXBhaWduJTI2dXRtX21lZGl1bSUzRGVtYWlsJTI2dXRtX2NvbnRlbnQlM0QlMjVGMCUyNTlGJTI1OTUlMjU5MiUyQkV2ZW50JTJCUmVtaW5kZXIlMjUyMSUyQlRoZSUyQkZ1dHVyZSUyQm9mJTJCTWVhdCUyNnV0bV9jYW1wYWlnbiUzREV2ZW50JTI1M0ElMkJGdXR1cmUlMkJGb29kJTJCUGFuZWwlMkJzZWNvbmQlMkJzZW5k&sig=2rHWWjMwZEunjC2h11X1i3MNNpMUpZg7zUkrvQKPcmso&iat=1681353676&a=%7C%7C1001926718%7C%7C&account=speciesunite%2Eactivehosted%2Ecom&email=xzF9hQ5IJTcsP8Hi3DYM%2FJ06p9brp0%2FbI0LeqdB04Sh9vXTLAVK4Ahlp%3ASIDHGGgpLqcMrWIYP7MPSN2Guvru2fHj&s=a5cec6d83cc4738235cddb7a7821c20b&i=760A870A1A7568" tar
S9 E14 · Wed, April 26, 2023
Lisa Jones-Engel: 1000 Monkeys
“What I did not expect to see from farmed monkeys being bought and transported into the US, were monkeys who were coming in with things like Ebola like viruses, malaria, tuberculosis, simian retrovirus, herpes viruses, salmonella, Yersinia, Campylobacter, unnamed deadly diarrheal diseases. They were coming in with Tier 1 Select agents. I mean, we're talking pathogens so deadly that the government has identified them as potential bioterrorism threats.” – Lisa Jones-Engel In 2022, 1000 long-tailed macaques were stolen from the wild in Cambodia. They were then illegally imported to Charles River Laboratories in Texas. Illegal because they were wild caught and not born in captivity, which is the law for importing primates into the US for research and experimentation, they are required to be captive bred. These macaques are now caught in the middle of an ongoing federal investigation into primate importers. Charles River wants to send them back to Cambodia, which means that from there they’ll go to labs in other countries. PETA is fighting hard to get them sent to Born Free’s Primate Sanctuary in Texas. One of the leaders in this battle is Dr. Lisa Jones-Engel. A couple of weeks ago, Lisa came on the show for a live episode to talk about the fate of these monkeys and what could be the beginning of the end of importing primates for experimentation. Because we did this interview as a webinar and Lisa was in a remote part of Alaska, the sound isn’t the best, but this is a super important episode. Lisa spent many years working in biomedical laboratories with primates. She knows everything that goes on on the inside of these facilities and knows first-hand that no one in there is looking out for these animals. In 2019, when she couldn't take it anymore, Lisa left the biomedical world and joined forces with PETA. She's PETA's Senior Science Advisor, and not only leading the fight to save these 1000 monkeys, but also to end all imports and then, to end the use of primates in animal research and experimentation period. I think that she can do it. Links: PETA Petition https://support.peta.org/page/50306/action/1?locale=en-US PETA https://www.peta.org/media/news-releases/trafficked-monkeys-still-stateside-peta-pledges-1-million-for-sanctuary-placement/ <
S9 E13 · Wed, April 19, 2023
Hanne Strager: The Killer Whale Journals
“ I also heard the sounds of killer whales. They were calling to each other loud and clear. these melodious whistles and calls which went right into my ear pieces. I realized that even if I couldn't see them, they were there somewhere beneath me in the ocean. They were communicating with each other. They were staying in contact. It was like a big family .” - Hanne Strager Hanne Strager is a biologist, whale researcher, and author. She is the co-founder of the Andenes Whale Centre in Norway and she has served as the Director of Exhibitions at the Natural History Museum of Denmark. She's written many books. Her most recent, The Killer Whale Journals , was released on April 3rd. It's a compilation about killer whales, killer whales in Hannah's life and killer whales throughout history. And it is extraordinary. Links: Hanne Strager The Killer Whale Journals
S9 E12 · Wed, April 12, 2023
Mark Elbroch: The Secret Lives of Mountain Lions
“Our cultures are built around stories, right? We connect through stories, we learn through stories and stories are often stronger when they have characters, characters we can connect with. And I think that that been a struggle for many, many animals, all kinds of animals, that they don’t have a face or a character that people can connect with.” – Mark Elbroch Before I met Mark Elbroch and read his book, The Cougar Conundrum: Sharing the World with a Successful Predator , I thought I knew at least a little bit about mountain lions. After meeting him and reading his book, I realized that I had actually known very little and much of what I thought I knew was wrong. Mark on the other hand, knows a lot about mountain lions, more than just about anyone on the planet. Mark is an ecologist, author, storyteller and the Director of the Puma Program for Panthera , the global wild cat conservation organization. He’s also an animal tracker working to preserve ancient skills and elevate their applications in our modern world. His research has challenged everything we thought we knew about the social lives of mountain lions. Maybe you know a thing or two about them, but I would bet that just about anyone who listens to this conversation learns a great deal about these mysterious and extraordinary animals. LINKS: Mark Elbroch Panthera Mark’s Books <a href= "https://www.amazon.com/Cougar-Conundrum-Sharing-Successful-Predator/dp/161091998X/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=
S9 E11 · Wed, April 05, 2023
Parneet Pal: The Human Animal
“Our bodies have co-evolved over millennia with the help of all these other beautiful animal species, with the millions of species of bacteria, fungi, and viruses that live on our bodies and inside our bodies .” – Parneet Pal This episode is a little bit different than what we usually do at Species Unite. We are still talking about an animal, but this time it’s the human animal. Parneet Pal is an educator, science communicator and wellbeing expert working at the intersection of business, lifestyle medicine (nutrition, exercise, sleep, stress management, mental and emotional health) and behavior change. A Harvard- and Columbia-trained physician, she looks for the connections and interdependence within human and planetary systems that make them resilient and regenerative. Her work is focused on solutions for business leadership that architect the future of an equitable society: a wellbeing economy where health is the default. Parneet is the very first guest to come on the show to talk about humans. In many ways I don't find it all that much different because we're in just as much peril as most of the non-human animals across the globe. We are in a massive crisis, well, many of them and just like our non-human animal friends, we are also in desperate need of solutions. LINKS for Parneet Pal: https://www.parneetpal.com/ LinkedIn Twitter
S9 E10 · Wed, March 29, 2023
Animal Rights Legend: Ronnie Lee
“And then instead of heroes, we started being referred to as terrorists. But that made no difference to us. I mean, we kind of carried on regardless, and we started trying to do as much damage as we could to inflict economic loss on these companies. ” – Ronnie Lee Ronnie Lee founded the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) in 1974. The Animal Liberation Front is a global movement dedicated to the liberation of animals from human oppression. They engage in and promote non-violent direct action in protest against incidents of animal cruelty. Ronnie served three prison sentences in the 70s and 80s for actions he took against places like animal testing facilities and breeding facilities for testing. He has been vegan for 51 years and is still out there every day fighting for animals.
S9 E9 · Wed, March 22, 2023
Christie Lagally: The Game Changer
There's a fundamental mismatch between how we make plant-based meat and the facilities that are making it . Whe n you're using the wrong tool, when you're trying to use a spoon to cut a piece of vegetable, it just doesn't work. It's the same kind of thing for making plant-based meat. ” – Christie Lagally Christie Lagally is the founder and CEO at Rebellyous Foods , a food manufacturing technology and production company. They make delicious plant-based chicken, but they also make production equipment. Up until now, almost all plant-based meat has been made in animal meat production facilities, which just don't have the capability or function to make plant-based meat. Five years ago, Christie left her job as an engineer at Boeing so she could transform everything that we know about producing plant-based meat. She’s done it and later this year, Rebellyous is launching the Mock Two, production equipment that is not only going to transform the entire plant-based meat space, but it’s also going to allow for price parity with animal meat. A game changer for the entire industry. Rebellyous Foods: https://www.rebellyous.com/
S9 E8 · Thu, March 16, 2023
Laura Lee Cascada: The Only US Octopus Farm has been Temporarily Shut Down
“But what the tour guide told us, was that eventually, as they grew, they now have their own octopus catchers. They called them the octopus whisperers, and they said that these people know exactly where the octopuses are going to be and when, so they know how to go get them and bring them back to the facility. ” – Laura Lee Cascada In October of last year, Laura Lee Cascada published an investigation into the Kanaloa Octopus Farm on the Big Island in Hawaii. The Kanaloa Octopus Farm was capturing wild Hawaiian Day octopuses and keeping them in these tiny, isolated tanks while also conducting breeding experiments, under the guise of conservation. What made it even more bizarre was that they were also a tourist attraction. People could pay to come to the octopus farm and see and touch and pet the octopuses in these tiny tanks. So, it was like an octopus petting zoo/breeding farm. What they were really doing was trying to figure out how to breed these octopuses, which is really difficult to do in captivity. But it's the first step to US octopus factory farming. In January, they received a cease and desist letter because they did not have the required permits for the above. So, for the moment, their octopus program is temporarily shut down. We need to keep it shut down and we need to ban octopus farming in this country before it really starts. The world’s first octopus factory farm is set to open in the Canary Islands this year, adding to the very long list of cruel and abusive industries across the planet. Let’s not let that happen here. I asked Laura to talk about her investigation and what all this really means for octopuses and for the future of farming them for food. Links: <
S9 E7 · Wed, March 08, 2023
Rachel Fobar: Why is the USDA in Charge of Enforcing the Animal Welfare Act? And Why Won’t They Enforce It?
“It's almost like the Animal Welfare Act is like a safety, a security blanket, because it's like, ‘Oh, we have the Animal Welfare Act to protect the animals, they're okay.’ And they don't realize that it's actually not very strong and that it's not being very aggressively enforced. ” – Rachel Fobar In February, Eric Kleinman from the Animal Welfare Institute was on the podcast. He came on to talk about the Envigo Dogs - the 4000 beagles that were rescued last summer from a breeding facility for lab animals, and trafficked monkeys, and the many many failures of the USDA to enforce the Animal Welfare Act. Before Eric and I met, he sent me a ton of articles on much of the above, and many of them were National Geographic stories written by Rachel Fobar. Rachel is a National Geographic reporter who covers wildlife crime and exploitation, everything from the USDA’s failures to roadside zoos to monkeys being forced to work in Thailand’s coconut trade. I asked Rachel to come on the show because I want to better understand why it is that we are allowing the USDA, who almost never does their job, to be in charge of the Animal Welfare Act. LINKS: Rachel Fobar: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/meet-the-team-wildlife-watch?loggedin=true&rnd=1677336327384 Rachel’s Articles for National Geographic: https://www.nationalgeographic.com /author/rachel-fobar
S9 E6 · Wed, March 01, 2023
Meena Alagappan: Teach Heart
“ There was a law on the books [in New York], even back in 1917, that required that every publicly funded elementary school needs to provide instruction in the humane treatment and protection of animals. ” - Meena Alagappan Meena Alagappan runs an organization called, Humane Education Advocates Reaching Teachers, otherwise known as HEART. Heart is a full service, humane education provider in New York City, Chicago and Indianapolis. I met Meena because we, Species Unite are doing a wolf education program, so I asked her for some help and for some resources. She was beyond generous with both, and in the process I learned a lot about the work that HEART is doing - and what they're doing is changing thousands upon thousands of students lives and should be required in every classroom in this country. LINKS: HEART: https://teachheart.org/ HEART Educator Resources: https://teachheart.org/library/
S9 E5 · Wed, February 22, 2023
Paul Joslin: Raised By Wolves
"I have often asked myself, ‘why is it that wolves don't kill people?’ Every year there are records of lions, tigers, bears and other large carnivores killing people. For wolves it very rarely ever happens. They are certainly quite capable of hauling down much larger prey than ourselves such as moose and bison. I think it has a lot to do with the dramatically different way that wolves raise their young compared to most other large carnivores." - Paul Joslin Dr. Paul Joslin is a wildlife biologist who has spent decades with wolves and other predators in the US, Canada, India and Iran. His wolf research began in Ontario in the 1960s at a time when we did not know a lot about the daily lives of wolves. His is stories are extraordinary. He lived alone in the wilderness for months at a time, tracking wolves to gain a deeper understanding of their lives. He did this before google maps, before there were even trails in many of these places, so he created his own. His knowledge and wisdom on wolves go deep, while his work took him all over the world. I have been on a quest to understand the wolf hatred that seems to permeate the United States, especially Montana, Wyoming and Idaho, where we are currently slaughtering all of our wolves, but it’s not just here, wolf hatred is global – as humans everywhere seem to abhor these remarkable animals. So, I asked Paul to come on the show and give his two cents as to why so many humans fear and hate an animal that does almost zero harm to us.
S9 E4 · Wed, February 15, 2023
Chris Wlach: The Limits of the Law and the Places Where He Finds Hope
“I give a presentation to law students on animal law every now and then, and I tell them I can teach you everything you need to know about federal animal protection law in 10 seconds. I say there isn't really much. There are very few laws, especially at the federal level, protecting farmed animals. ” - Chris Wlach Chris is an attorney and he is an animal welfare and humane education advocate. He’s a major force in New York City animal law and has advocated for many of the city’s non-human animals, including the carriage horses in Manhattan. The carriage horse issue has been going on for decades, horses are hit by cars, they collapse in the street, it’s a horribly abusive industry. Chris also advocates for animals up to the federal level. He came on the show to talk about animals and our legal system, its many limitations, and the places where he finds hope. Links: NYC Bar Animal Law Committee: https://www.nycbar.org/member-and-career-services/committees/animal-law-committee HEART: https://teachheart.org/
S9 E3 · Wed, February 08, 2023
Eric Kleiman: Trafficked Monkeys, the Envigo Beagles and the Many Abject Failures of the USDA
“There is this long history, and what's important about history is history informs the present. History shows this is how we got here. Fred Colston was like a villain out of central casting. I mean… it's almost like he was twirling his mustache… And he blamed me. He blamed me for bankrupting his lab. I mean, that's in documents from the federal government, not me by name, but In Defense of Animals. The thing is, at least he was honest about his viewpoints. At least he was honest to say, ‘these chimpanzees, I want to raise them like cattle.’ Whereas today you've got these slick PR people like Inotiv or Envigo, ‘Oh, animal welfare is our highest priority.’ It's the same mindset. At least he was honest about it. They're not honest anymore.” – Eric Kleiman You've probably heard of Envigo. They were the ones who owned the 4000 beagles that were rescued in Virginia last summer. The Beagles were living at a breeding facility, a breeding facility for research animals, and their conditions were so abusive and horrific that they got rescued. That doesn't happen very often. It was a big deal. And more recently, federal prosecutors charged eight members of an international monkey smuggling ring that allegedly supplied trafficked and endangered monkeys to Envigo, Orient and Worldwide Primates. The USDA are the people who are supposed to be at least somewhat on the side of animals in all of this. They are supposed to be doing inspections and shutting places like these down. But they’re not. They're not the people who shut down Envigo and rescued all those dogs, because they're not doing their job. They've rarely done their job. And this job needs to go to someone else because animals need someone who's actually on their team. Today’s episode is about the people who are doing the work. This conversation is with Eric Kleinman. Eric is a researcher at the Animal Welfare Institute and he knows more about this stuff than I think anyone. I'm going to warn you in advance, it's complicated and there are a lot of acronyms (one that you need to know is APHIS – Animal and Plant Health Inspection Services, a part of the USDA). It’s also extremely important. Links: AWI: https://awionline.org/ To learn more: https://www.nationalgeographic.co.uk/animals/2022/06/what-do-we-owe-former-lab-chimps https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/toothless-and-paltry-critics-slam-usda-fines-for-animal-welfare-violations <a href= "https://www.science.org/content/article/indictment-monkey-importers-could-disrupt-u-s-drug-an
S9 E2 · Wed, February 01, 2023
Leif Cocks: The Plight of Orangutans and the Fight for the Last Scraps of the Rainforest
“If you really do understand science and persons - such as humans and orangutans, you must realize that that love is certainly not unscientific thing to give.” -Leif Cocks In December, I spent ten days in Bukit Tigapuluh National Park in Central Sumatra. I was there with Leif Cocks, the founder of The Orangutan Project and hundreds of orangutans. We were deep in the rainforest, surrounded by all the sounds of the jungle, no phone, no wifi, no shower aside from a bucket. And even though I didn’t see any tigers, they were there, as were monkeys, gibbons, elephants, spotted leopards, mouse deer and thousands of other species. And, I was with Leif, one of the world’s most prominent orangutan experts. It was extraordinary. But it was also devastating. Because on the very many hour drive from the airport in Jambi, a drive that not that many years ago would have been hours and hours through rain forest, all I saw were palm oil plantations. There is very little of the rainforest left. Humans have destroyed 80 percent of it and the destruction is ongoing. And of course, millions of animals have died in the past couple of decades because of said destruction. “We're fighting over scraps of the last remaining rainforest.” - Leif Cocks Leif has spent the past 35 years working with and for orangutans. He first met them when he was in his early 20s, working as a zookeeper at the Perth Zoo in Australia. He quickly realized two things, they are one of the most intelligent species on the planet and they don’t belong in captivity (like all non-human animals) and that if we don’t do something quickly, we are going to lose them. So, in 1998, while still at the zoo, Leif founded the Orangutan Project and since then he has been a key player in developing conservation plans for orangutans and influencing positive change for their protection and survival. It was a gift to be able to see Leif’s work in person and to meet his many, many soulful and wise orange friends. He is fighting for them and for what’s left of the rainforest in Sumatra and Borneo and he and the Orangutan Project need our help. Links: The Orangutan Project: https://www.theorangutanproject.org/ Donate to the Orangutan Project: https://www.theorangutanproject.org/donate/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theorangutanproject/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theorangutanproject Twitter: https://twitter.com/OrangutanTOP
S9 E1 · Wed, January 25, 2023
Dr. Katherine Roe: Harvard’s House of Horrors
“These animals are being held captive in a laboratory. They have none of what they need for their own physical and mental well-being. And there is an enormous amount of research suggesting that the biology and the behavior of animals in laboratories is nothing like even those animals in the wild. I mean, right down to their heart rate and their core temperature and their microbiome. So basically, you can't trust data from a mouse in a laboratory to reflect on a mouse in a field. So it really has no chance of being related to us.” - Dr. Katherine Roe Dr. Roe is a neuroscientist and PETA's chief of science advancement and outreach. She completed a post-doctoral fellowship at Johns Hopkins University and had an impressive eight-year stint as a clinical neuroscientist at the National Institutes of Health. Today, she’s working to end cruel animal experiments, including the recently exposed maternal-and sensory-deprivation experiments being conducted on infant monkeys at Harvard Medical School. “You would expect Harvard University and, in this case, this is at Harvard Medical School to be conducting the most cutting edge, the most human relevant, the most ethical research on the planet. That is not the case with these experiments.” – Dr. Katherine Roe LINKS: https://headlines.peta.org/research-modernization-new-deal/?utm_source=PETA::Vanity%20URL&utm_medium=Promo&utm_campaign=0720::viv::PETA::Vanity%20URL::PETAorg-RMD https://headlines.peta.org/harvard-baby-monkeys/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/monkey-study-harvard-reignites-debate-animal-testing/
S8 E26 · Tue, December 13, 2022
Tanya O'Callaghan: The Plant-based Bassist
"So then, you know, you have the Twisted Sister crew doing yoga and eating kale salad. it's so good. Like, now I'm literally known as the plant-based bassist.” -Tanya O’Callaghan Tanya O’ Callaghan, aka, the Plant-based Bassist, has toured, recorded, written and worked with legends such as Maynard James Keenan (Tool/APC), Dee Snider (Twisted Sister) Steven Adler (Guns N’ Roses) Nuno Bettencourt (Extreme), The Riverdance, The Voice, Orianthi, Michael Angelo Batio, Kevin Godley, Sharon Corr (The Corrs) and David Gray, to name a few… She spent much of this year on tour with White Snake and is about to take off again, this time with Bruce Dickinson from Iron Maiden. During the break in between, she came to New York City. She and I dined on some of the city’s best vegan dishes while attempting to solve many of the world’s problems, especially those relating to our food system. She is as passionate and outspoken about veganism and animal rights as anyone I’ve ever met, and the best part is that she has figured out a way to combine that message with the music. Please listen and share. ps. This is our last episode of Season 8. We will be back in early 2023 with Season 9. Links https://tanyaocallaghan.com/ https://www.instagram.com/tanyaocallaghan_official/ https://www.facebook.com/tanya.o.callaghan.3 http://www.highwaytohealthshow.com/
S8 E25 · Wed, November 30, 2022
Rebecca Mink: The Pioneer
“I said, ‘let's go on Zappos and look up Zappos and vegan.’ And so I searched it… and I said, ‘let's see what you get when you search that.’ And they had gardening clogs, they had like a croc shoe. And I said, ‘why don't you guys go look at how many people opt out after they see that and then you might buy my shoes.’ That was a Friday and Monday they bought 18 styles.” Rebecca Mink Rebecca Mink is the founder of the very first vegan luxury shoe brand, Mink Shoes . Mink Shoes have been around since the year 2000, way before anybody was making anything luxury vegan. She started the brand because for the years leading up to it, she’d been a celebrity wardrobe stylist and there was nothing vegan out there to put on their feet. “I was buying 25 or 30 thousand dollars of leather shoes a month for these clients, and I was sick over it. I was walking into the shoe department of Neiman Marcus and getting the best of this and that… shopping and buying things that I didn't believe in. I could do [vegan] everything except for the shoes, everything. I could even get away with certain belts, metal belts, different things. But I could not put someone on the red carpet in what we had at that time, which was Payless.” – Rebecca Mink Over the years, she has made custom shoes for celebs like Miley Cyrus, Natalie Portman, Madonna, Pamela Anderson, and Jennifer Lopez. Rebecca’s next big thing is the launch of Mink Vegan Leather , a bio-based leather made from upcycled plants, coming to the world in 2023. LINKS: https://minkshoes.com/ https://minkshoes.com/pages/vegan-leather https://www.instagram.com/minkshoes/
S8 E24 · Wed, November 23, 2022
Prabhat Sinha: The Wolf God is Watching You
“There are written documents that talk about how the same wolf follows a flock of sheep for 300 miles and they come back again with that flock of sheep. And those shepherds can identify those wolves. And within the group, they've even given the names to those wolves… And they have this saying: Don't do something wrong, the Wolf God is watching you.” - Prabhat Sinha Prabhat Sinha grew up swimming after ducks and fish in a rural farming village in Mhaswad, India. At 13, he left for the US, learned English, became a competitive high school athlete and then went on to Georgetown University. He became a sports agent for NBA players and Olympians and he was really good at it. But, he knew it wasn’t enough. He knew that sports had given him the opportunities that changed his life and he wanted the same thing for other kids from rural India. So, he made his way home and set up Mann Deshi Champions, a sports academy that has developed over 8000 athletes from rural India. Since his return, he’s noticed that many of the animals that he frequently saw in his youth are increasingly rare to spot. Animals like wolves, jackals and hyenas are disappearing from the landscape, and that disheartening observation has led to Prabhat’s latest endeavor, a farmer led Wolf Sanctuary project. And, like everything else Prabhat does, it is astonishing. Please listen and share. LINKS: https://manndeshichampions.org/ Reshma's video: Buffalo harder to a marathon runner: https://youtu.be/FLt81c7I3VM Mann Deshi Youth Development Center: https://youtu.be/sBVD27bzep8 Plant a tree play sports program: https://youtu.be/4Eb6plDCzfQ Reshma: https://youtu.be/apmfmWr1qJE Travel Coach Program: https://youtu.be/GHjMFogkhI8 Paradhi: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43r1tUB6jm0&t=4s Mumtaj: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLPN3M1_1ag&t=1s NPR: https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/12/31/949601710/why-a-field-hockey-champ-in-india-is-now-harvesting-onions-and-herding-goats Mann Deshi Champions: https://www.delawarepublic.org/npr-headlines/2020-12-3
S8 E23 · Wed, November 16, 2022
Dr. K. Ullas Karanth: Among Tigers
“India has done more than any other country for recovering its tigers. Nobody can deny that. But still, we could do so much more than being satisfied with what we have done. There's so much complacency and crowing about these 3000 tigers we have, and I find it very sad.” Ullas Karanth Dr. K. Ullas Karanth is emeritus scientist at the Centre for Wildlife Studies in Bangalore. Previously he led one of the longest-running (1986–2017) tiger conservation programs in the world for the Wildlife Conservation Society . Along the way has conducted cutting-edge research, which gained crucial new knowledge for bringing tigers back. He was the first wildlife biologist in India to catch and radio collar tigers and the first to use camera traps to identify individuals. He has also engaged deeply with researchers, wildlife managers, social leaders, and local communities that live next to tigers. His efforts have effectively stopped poachers, mitigated human-tiger conflicts and helped forest families to happily resettle away from tiger habitats. Dr. Karanth’s latest book, Among Tigers: Fighting to Bring Back Asia's Big Cats was released on November 1 st . It’s the story of his 50-year journey to becoming one of the world’s most important tiger biologists. His quest to save India’s tigers was not an easy one and the book takes us through all of it: the adventures, the hardships, the politics and the successes. It’s also an education in tiger biology. I read it in a day, because it is that good. Please listen, share and then go read Among Tigers . Links Centre for Wildlife Studies Among Tigers
S8 E22 · Wed, November 09, 2022
Albert Tseng: Plant-Based China
“The resource allocation of global attention on China is not commiserate with the size and scale of the problem that China represents.” Albert Tseng Albert Tseng is co-founder of Dao Foods , an impact-oriented investment firm that invests in plant-based and alternative protein companies based in mainland China and focused on the Chinese market. With rapidly rising incomes and increasing meat consumption in China, Dao Foods’ aim is to introduce alternative products into the China market to reduce the consumer demand for animal products which has had growing negative climate, environmental, food safety and health impact. “T he average American eats about 120 kilograms of meat per year. Back in 1990, that number was about 20 kilograms per capita in China. In 2017 that has gone up to 60 kilograms. Still only half as much of an average North American. But you can see the trend that we went from 20 kilograms to 60 kilograms, and just that tracks to income growth. So, if we start to reach parity of animal protein consumption in China with a population of 1.4 billion people, then then we're going to have all sorts of acceleration of all the global problems that we have.” - Albert Tseng Links: https://www.daofoods.com/ albert@daofoods.com
S8 E21 · Wed, November 02, 2022
Dr. Krithi Karanth: Rewilding India
“One of the things that we've noticed is when these animals repeatedly show up, that's when people really get frustrated, up to a point where they may leave loose electrical wires in their field. And when the herd or the animal comes back the next day, they get electrocuted. So you want to keep people from flipping out and doing something crazy, right?” - Krithi Karanth Dr. Krithi Karanth is Chief Conservation Scientist and Director at the Centre for Wildlife Studies , in Bangalore, India and is Adjunct Faculty at Duke University and National Centre for Biological Sciences. She has spent the past 24 years doing research in India and Asia, much of which has focused on the many issues in the surrounding the human side of wildlife conservation. Krithi has served as editor for Conservation Biology, Conservation Letters and currently Chief Editor for Frontiers in Ecology and Environment- Conservation Section. Her conservation and research work has been featured in 3 award-winning BBC Series - The Hunt, Big Cats and Dynasties, and documentaries by CBC and PBS. I have co-produced 4 documentaries Wild Seve, Humane Highways, Wild Shaale and Flying Elephants. In 2020 I co-starred in Save This Rhino: India by Disney Hotstar and National Geographic. The work that Krithi and her colleagues at the Centre for Wildlife Studies are doing is changing everything for the animals and the humans with whom they share land throughout rural India. We in the US could (and should) learn a thing or two from their work, especially when it comes to building tolerance for wild animals like wolves and creating solutions for sharing the land. Please listen and share. Links: https://cwsindia.org/ https://www.instagram.com/cwsindia/ https://www.facebook.com/cwsindia/ https://twitter.com/cwsindia
S8 E20 · Wed, October 26, 2022
Dr. Heather Rally: Superhero by Day
“We sat down and we ordered omakase, which is essentially the chef's specialties, and they just keep bringing food out until you say I'm done. So we ate and ate and ate everything you can imagine for the better part of 3 hours before we even dared to do order whale” – Heather Rally Dr. Heather Rally spent the last decade at the PETA Foundation as a supervising veterinarian for captive animal law enforcement. What that means is she's led investigative and enforcement actions in cases of abuse of animals in roadside zoos, circuses and pretty much anywhere captive animal are on exhibit in the US. And, sadly, there are a lot of these places. Heather’s training is in marine mammals. For seven years, she worked with the Oceanic Preservation Society to document and expose environmental crimes and animal welfare violations across the world by doing undercover investigations for the documentary film, Racing Extinction. In that time, she helped expose and put an end to the illegal sale of endangered species and brought global attention to the exponential rate of extinction that’s happening all over the planet. Heather truly is a superhero. Listen to her episode and I think you’ll agree. Links: PETA Prime: https://prime.peta.org/news/dr-heather-rally-my-adventures-as-petas-chief-veterinarian/ Whale Sanctuary Project: https://whalesanctuaryproject.org/people/heather-rally/ Racing Extinction: https://www.opsociety.org/our-work/films/racing-extinction/?gclid=Cj0KCQjwkt6aBhDKARIsAAyeLJ3Q4AjM5RfUfeNdHMiYvKyiquwzOk-lW0LceMku-O5H6ChjT03tmjgaArrMEALw_wcB
S8 E19 · Wed, October 19, 2022
Claudia Pievani: Fashion Without Victims
“We talk very badly nowadays about fashion, right? Because of the environmental impact and so on. But at the same time, there is also value in fashion. If not, we wouldn't be so obsessed. It’s inspirational, it makes you dream… Let's keep the good thing, the positive thing that gives you a good feeling and toss away and eliminate the bad things. It can be done.” Claudia Pievani Claudia Pievani is the founder of Miomojo , the cruelty-free and sustainable Italian fashion brand that is making some of the most beautiful bags I’ve ever seen. They are recycled and up-cycled and – use the entire range of incredibly innovative, next-generation materials – derived from plant-based resources, including apples, corn, cactus and pineapple. “Over time, we have proved that a beautiful object doesn’t have to come at the expenses of other living beings or our planet. With creativity and compassion, we have proved that it is possible to have fashion without fashion victims.” – Claudia Pievani https://www.miomojo.com/en/
S8 E18 · Wed, October 12, 2022
Josh Whiton: Make Soil
“And I'm just having this urban, agrarian, techie renaissance thing with my hipster neighbors and it's just so rich. And I think to myself, ‘wow, we've have to share this experience. How do we spread this?’ – Josh Whiton Josh Whiton is an eco tech entrepreneur and a social innovator who is helping to repair the Earth. When Josh was 23, he founded the transit tech company, TransLoc., for which he was named a champion of change by the White House and Trans Loc was later acquired by Ford. His latest innovation is called Make Soil . Make Soil matches people who compost with people who want to learn how to compost, kind of like a Tinder for composters. It's already being used in 53 countries and growing really fast. Please listen and share and then, go make some soil. Makesoil.org
S8 E17 · Wed, October 05, 2022
Stephanie Downs: Revolutionizing the Leather Industry
“One day I was leaving the animal shelter and I would always go and have lunch at this restaurant down the street and I'd get this pork barbecue sandwich. I remember it so vividly. I can remember the booth I was sitting in. I can picture the place. And I just remember thinking, I spent all day helping this one animal and now I'm eating another animal.” - Stephanie Downs on the moment everything changed Stephanie Downs is the CEO and co-founder of Uncaged Innovations . Uncaged is a biomaterials company that combines nature and technology to reimagine leather. After two years in stealth mode, they have launched a bio leather (made from many plants) that will transform the fashion, automotive and home goods industries. It has the same quality and durability of leather without the use of any animals. It’s sustainable, scalable and it’s stunning (I’ve seen it in person). Stephanie has been working to get animals out of the food and materials system for decades. She’s worked with animal welfare organizations to create enormous change in the food, fashion and automotive industries and she is a co-founder of the Material Innovation Initiative and a co-founder of Good Dot, the largest plant-based meat company in India. Solutions are what is going to change the world for animals. We can (and should) scream about the horrors of the meat, dairy, leather and wool industries all day long but we need solutions. Uncaged is a big one. https://www.uncagedinnovations.com/
S8 E16 · Wed, September 21, 2022
Devan Schowe: Captivity Sucks
“The pets tend to be the most behaviorally disturbed, I would say. They have the hardest transition most of the time into kind of sanctuary life, because with the pet trade, infants are usually taken from their mothers within a few days or a few weeks after they're born. And most primate species in the wild will stay with their mothers for at least a couple of years, if not for most of their life. So that's incredibly damaging right off the bat, because that separation is very traumatizing.” – Devan Schowe Devan Schowe is the Campaigns Associate for Born Free USA, a nonprofit wildlife organization with the largest primate sanctuary in the country. Born Free recently release and report on the extensive suffering of giraffe in zoos. I read the report and wanted to talk to Devan about giraffes but also to get her expert perspective on captivity and why it’s so harmful to all animals, particularly in zoos. It completely baffles me that in 2022, most people have no issue with zoos. Maybe they don’t know that no matter how “nice” the zoo is, it’s still a prison for animals. Born Free USA https://www.bornfreeusa.org/
S8 E15 · Wed, September 07, 2022
Lori Gruen and Alice Crary: Animal Crisis
“We have to look at those structures. If we don't look at those structures, if we don't look at the economic structures and we don't look at the instrumentalization of animals, the use of animals, the devaluation, the lack of dignity that's given to animals, we're just going to perpetuate our sort of grotesque use of these creatures.” – Lori Gruen Philosophers, Alice Crary and Laurie Gruen co-wrote the recently released book, Animal Crisis: A New Critical Theory . The book is a deep dive into the many systems that are failing both animals and humans and makes the case that there can be no animal liberation without human emancipation. “What we're doing is bringing out the possibility, making it possible to recognize that some of the structures that harm human beings also harm animals… and to show that that these ties aren't accidental.” – Alice Crary Alice Crary is University Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the New School, where she's a co-founder and steering committee member of the Collaborative for Climate Futures. Laurie Gruen is the William Griffin professor of Philosophy at Wesleyan University, where she coordinates Wesleyan Animal Studies. Lori has been on the podcast before , and I am very happy and honored to have her back. Links: Animal Crisis: https://www.amazon.com/Animal-Crisis-New-Critical-Theory/dp/1509549684 Lori Gruen: https://www.lorigruen.com/ Alice Crary https://alicecrary.com/
S8 E14 · Thu, September 01, 2022
Dr. Hope Ferdowsian and Dr. Syd Johnson: Primates and Medical Research A Matter of Convenience, Not Sound Science
“We have this this sort of human exceptionalism or human supremacy that that is used as the kind of baseline foundational justification for exploiting animals, that humans are just more important and we're more special in some way.” – Dr. Syd Johnson Dr. Hope Ferdowsian and Dr. Syd Johnson recently published an essay in the Hastings Center Bioethics Forum called, Primates and Medical Research A Matter of Convenience, Not Sound Science. I read the essay and quickly realized how much there was that I didn’t know about animal testing and research (and I thought I knew a lot). The essay begins with one rhesus macaque who will spend her life in a cage as part of an Alzheimer's disease experiment. They tell the story not only of this individual primate, but of animal research as whole, how and when it started all the way up to where we are now, and also what an enormous failure most of it has been. Around 90 percent of drugs that pass in animal testing fail on humans. With numbers like that, in any other industry I’m pretty sure that we’d have given up by now. Not only is animal testing insanely cruel, but it's incredibly ineffective. So, why are we still testing on tens of millions of animals and spending billions of dollars on mostly bad research year after year? Money and because we’ve “always done it this way,” (and we have, since 6 BCE). All systems that exploit, torture and abuse animals desperately need to change and the thing is, all of these systems can change. We have solutions. They exist and are getting bigger and better by the day. There are solutions to replace animals in the food system, in fashion, in entertainment and in medical research. But the money train that goes into using animals in research isn’t slowing down, and not enough of us are demanding otherwise (and we are who is paying for it). I think in part, because not enough of us are aware of the cruelty and the inefficiency that is animal testing. We are paying the bill simply because this is how it’s always been done. But it’s not how it should be done.
S8 E13 · Wed, August 24, 2022
Keith Cooper: The Stingray Whisperer
“The number one thing is to respect us as a country and a lot of people are not - people who feel privileged in their life, they own a very nice yacht, they have money, they're wealthy, they live in Florida, they live the golden life, they live a grand life. I'm not saying there's anything bad about that, I want to be that way too. But at the same time they have a responsibility to be respectful of our laws and they have to respect our marine life. They should follow [the law] and not try to hurt things that are native to our country and just do whatever they think is arbitrarily good for their own spirit and their own soul, which is damaging our livelihood. And they should learn and work with the Bahamian people. Let us teach you.” - Keith Cooper Keith Cooper is the founder of the Bahamian based West End Ecology Tours on Grand Bahama Island. Over the past 16 years, Keith has formed a bond with many of the stingrays in the Bahamian waters, earning him the name, The Stingray Whisperer throughout the island. I went down to Grand Bahama to a couple of weeks ago to meet Keith and some of his stingray friends and to learn more about the horrible situation that many of these stingrays and lemon sharks (that live in the same waters) are in. An enormous amount of them have been getting hooked, meaning that people are fishing them, the lines break and the sharks and rays are left with enormous metal hooks in their mouths. I learned from Keith that much of this cruelty is being caused by boaters that are coming to the Bahamas from Florida and are doing it “because it’s fun.” I spent a couple of days with Keith and we swam with the stingrays and the lemon sharks and swam very close to them so that we could easily see the gigantic metal hooks in many of their mouths. Something that should have been absolutely magical was instead, devastating.
S8 E12 · Thu, August 18, 2022
Roy Afflerbach, Jo-Anne Basile, Roland Halpern and Allie Taylor: A Better Future for Animals
“If a bill has been passed in another state, then you know who the opposition was, you know who the supporters were. And it really helps grease the skids for another state to get something through. It builds and then eventually you get a critical mass. And then hopefully at that point, Congress takes a look at it and passes something nationwide.” – Roland Halpern Last week, Allie Taylor was on the podcast. She runs New York Voters for Animal Rights. Allie and I spoke about how real change happens for animals in the US and that much of it happens at the local level. The problem is that many people just don't know where to start or how to get involved so that they can actually affect said change. So, Allie and I agreed that it’d be a good idea to bring on some other people running organizations that are similar to hers from other states. So that is what we did. This conversation is again with Allie Taylor from Voters for Animal Rights of New York, Roy Afflerbach of Pennsylvania, Roland Halpern from Colorado, and Jo-Anne Basile of Connecticut. It's a conversation about how and where change happens. LINKS: New York: https://vfar.org/ Colorado: https://covotersforanimals.org/ Connecticut: https://www.ctvotesforanimals.org/ Pennsylvania: https://humane-pa.org/about-us/about/senator-roy-afflerbach-ret/
S8 E11 · Wed, August 10, 2022
Allie Feldman Taylor: Voters for Animal Rights
“We didn't do any type of advertising. We didn't do any press around it. We just did what we do well, we quietly lobbied the city council and worked until we had a majority of the council co-sponsoring the bill. And then we said, okay, now it's time to actually move this, we need a hearing, we need to bring this up for a vote. So by the time the foie gras industry realized what we had done, it was too late.” Allie Feldman Taylor Allie Feldman Taylor is the founder and president of Voters for Animal Rights in New York, also known as VFAR. Allie founded VFAR in 2016, and in 2020 she ran VFAR candidate endorsement process for more than 50 animal rights candidates for the New York State Senate and Assembly. In 2019, she led the campaign to ban foie gras in New York City. She's also helped pass New York City laws making it a crime to steal wild birds and to ban wild animals in the circus. I asked Allie to come on the podcast because I really wanted her to explain how everyday citizens can influence and change laws to help create a better country for animals. Even though it feels like a hopeless time and like a lot of our political actions are meaningless, the local level is where they can be super meaningful. LINKS: VFAR https://vfar.org/ Facebook https://www.facebook.com/votersforanimalrights/ Instagram https://www.instagram.com/votersforanimalrights/ Twitter https://twitter.com/theanimalvoters
S8 E10 · Wed, August 03, 2022
David Yeung: Omni Presence
“The planet is sustaining way more than just 8 billion human beings because we are consuming second-hand protein. We could have just directly, you know, eat plant-based protein. And again, if there's still any argument that, oh, we're not going to get enough strength, get enough nutrition, I mean, come on. Where do animals get their protein to start with? Right. I mean, come on. I mean, they eat plants.” David Yeung David is the co-founder and CEO of Green Monday , a movement to educate and encourage the public to give up meat one day a week. They just celebrated their ten-year anniversary, and what they've accomplished in one decade is unbelievable. 40 percent of Hong Kong participates in Green Monday, for real. David is also the CEO of OmniFoods , a food innovation company that makes plant-based pork and plant-based seafood. They launched in 2018 and have already taken Asia and many other parts of the world by storm. There is a reason for that – Omni products are probably the best tasting plant-based pork and seafood on the planet. They’ve just entered the US market. You can find OmniFoods in the US here . LINKS: Green Monday: https://greenmonday.org/en/ OmniFoods: https://omnifoods.co/us
S8 E9 · Wed, July 27, 2022
Katie Cantrell: Greener by Default
“If you saw a celiac bowl on a menu, you would never order that unless you have celiac disease and you're gluten free. But if you see a Thai peanut rice noodle bowl, that sounds delicious. You're not even thinking about the fact that it's gluten free. It’s the same thing with vegan for a lot of people. They think, “oh, that is only for vegans, if I'm not a vegan, that's not for me.’” - Katie Cantrell Katie Cantrell is the Director of Corporate Outreach for the Better Food Foundation and Co-Director of Greener by Default . Greener by Default makes plant-based food the default option in businesses, universities, conferences, and many other places where people eat, while it still gives people the choice to opt into meat or dairy. It's seriously one of the smartest projects that I've ever heard of. Katie also founded the Factory Farming Awareness Coalition where she spent a decade leading food policy workshops at universities, government agencies, and Fortune 500 corporations. If you want Greener by Default to come to your business, contact Katie: katie@betterfoodfoundation.org Greener by Default: www.greenerbydefault.com Better Food Foundation: https://www.betterfoodfoundation.org/ Factory Farming Awareness Coalition https://ffacoalition.org/
S8 E8 · Thu, July 21, 2022
Sydney Gladman and Ranjani Theregowda: Next-Gen Materials
“We need to move away from animal derived materials, but we also need to move away from petroleum based traditional materials. So what is out there, what can we do? That demand is strong and supply is where the issue is.” - Sydney Gladman On June 12 th the New York Times put out an article titled, How Fashion Giants Recast Plastic as Good for the Planet . The article, written by Hiroko Takeuchi, caused quite a stir within the Species Unite and I'm sure many other vegan communities. It criticizes something called the Higg Index, a suite of tools that assesses social and environmental impacts of products, including animal based and synthetic materials. The article left many people confused and I received a lot of emails asking me, “should we even be wearing vegan leather?” (The answer is yes.) In order to be better able to explain what the article was really about, I needed some help. So, I reached out to my friend Nicole Rawling, the executive director at the Material Innovation Initiative (MII), the non-profit that’s advancing next gen materials. Next gen materials are high performance, animal free and more sustainable for fashion, automotive and home goods. MII provides expertise while bringing all the key players together to get these materials from concept to commercialization. Nicole introduced me to Sydney Gladman, the chief scientific officer at MII and Ranjani Theregowda, MII’s environmental data scientist, so that they could answer my many questions about the article, about the future of materials as well as our current situation. I have been excited about next gen materials for a long time, but I’m even more so after speaking with them. It’s happening - we’re on the way and to a future that no longer uses animals for fashion, autos, and home goods. And, MII is doing everything that they can to speed that future up. LINKS: https://www.materialinnovation.org/ Instagram https://www.instagram.com/materialinnovation/ Facebook https://www.facebook.com/MaterialInnovation/
S8 E7 · Wed, July 13, 2022
Ingrid Newkirk: Free the Animals
“The fear factor is probably one of the worst. I mean, if you've ever been deeply afraid, or had a near accident or had somebody pursuing you, if you've ever been really afraid, that's their life 24 hours a day, except when they are able to sleep. And, how they are able to sleep on metal slats with nothing that's comforting, no ability to control the temperature ever, whether it's very hot to very cold, no freedom. And studies show that when the knob on the door turns in the room they're in or the door starts to open, their blood pressure goes through the roof, their hearts start pounding in their chests, their adrenaline soars. So, here's your research subject who is in a state of absolute catatonic fear.” -Ingrid Newkirk “The fear factor is probably one of the worst. I mean, if you've ever been deeply afraid, or had a near accident or had somebody pursuing you, if you've ever been really afraid, that's their life 24 hours a day, except when they are able to sleep. And, how they are able to sleep on metal slats with nothing that's comforting, no ability to control the temperature ever, whether it's very hot to very cold, no freedom. And studies show that when the knob on the door turns in the room they're in or the door starts to open, their blood pressure goes through the roof, their hearts start pounding in their chests, their adrenaline soars. So, here's your research subject who is in a state of absolute catatonic fear.” -Ingrid Newkirk Ingrid Newkirk cofounded PETA in1980. I don’t there has been a single day in the past 40 years that she has not fought against injustice toward animals. She is a hero for animals, for people, and for showing all of us how to make change happen. Ingrid came on the show to talk about her book, Free the Animals . She wrote it in 1992 and it was just rereleased for its 30-year anniversary. It's about the beginnings of the Animal Liberation Front in America and it’s about animal testing. There is a chapter in the book that starts with a quote by Nicholas Chamfort, “ Do you think that revolutions are made with rosewater?” That quote makes me think about everything that Ingrid and PETA and the ALF have accomplished in the past 40 years. It also makes me think about what's happening in this country right now. The fight against injustice toward animals only becomes more difficult as people in this country lose more rights. It’s all connected. We’re all connected. How we treat animals is very much connected to how we treat humans and at the moment, we’re not treating anyone very well. So, please listen, share and then go start a revolution. LINKS: Free the Animals: https://www.am
S8 E6 · Thu, July 07, 2022
Drew Pendergrass: Half Earth Socialism
“Animal agriculture can be gone tomorrow. it's not foundational. That’s why I find it very puzzling, the amount of pushback because it seems to be the actual… low hanging fruit. You write a book about socialism and no problem at all, people are like. “yeah, sure get rid of capitalism. No problem.” Get rid of animal agriculture, they get very mad.” -Drew Pendergrass Drew is a PhD student in environmental engineering at Harvard. He is also the co-author with Troy Vettessee of Half Earth Socialism A Plan to Save the Future from Extinction, Climate Change and Pandemics . In order to save the planet while at the same time, make life better for all beings on the planet, Drew and Troy have come up with a plan, that includes: Rewilding half the earth to absorb carbon emissions and restore biodiversity A rapid transition to renewable energy, paired with drastic cuts in consumption by the world’s wealthiest Global veganism to cut down on energy and land use Worldwide socialist planning to efficiently and equitably manage production The involvement of everyone The authors also collaborated with designers from the Jain Family Institute and Trust to create a video game based on the book, at play.half.earth . Check it out, it’s pretty awesome. LINKS: Drew Pendergrass: http://www.drewpendergrass.com/ Half Earth Socialism: https://www.versobooks.com/books/3818-half-earth-socialism Amazon https://www.amazon.com/Half-Earth-Socialism-Extinction-Climate-Pandemics/dp/B09RYSRQT9/ref=sr_1_1?gclid=CjwKCAjwwo-WBhAMEiwAV4dybYXDPoin0LESVXaEvZYEfSwJiNMy_sYbybG0fVxHXjbY1vRZPdQfpBoC2Y8QAvD_BwE&hvadid=604540475728&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=9004347&hvnetw=g&hvqmt=e&hvrand=20350736513252476&hvtargid=kwd-1546784652895&hydadcr=7668_13469272&keywords=half+earth+socialism&qid=1657027341&sr=8-1
S8 E5 · Wed, June 29, 2022
Suzanne Asha Stone: Coexistence
"We are fed things like Little Red Riding Hood and the Three Little Pigs and, you know, we grow up on this stuff, that the wolf is the big, bad character. And what the real wolf is like is so totally different." - Suzanne Asha Stone A couple of months ago, we did a series on wolves. The episodes focused on the massacre of entire wolf populations in Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming. At the time, I said that we did enough wolf episodes. But the truth is we didn't do enough because wolves are still not on the endangered species list in those states. Until they are, I don't think I can shut up about what we're doing to wolves, its egregious and its devastating. Suzanne Stone has been on the front lines of wolf restoration in the Western USA for her entire career, since 1988. In 2008 she founded the Wood River Wolf Project to demonstrate that wolves can coexist with sheep operations on national forests when adequate nonlethal deterrents are consistently applied. She is a member of the IUCN Canid Specialist Task Force, the world’s chief body of scientific and practical expertise on the status and conservation of all canid species and is also the Executive Director of the International Wildlife Coexistence Network where she is now helping to protect wolves and other imperiled wildlife with communities around the world. Suzanne has proven many times over many years that proactive non-lethal coexistence methods work. Yet for some inane reason, the slaughter continues. “If we keep going, if this is allowed to keep going, eventually we will have zero wolves. There's no way that this can be sustained. It's just brutal.” – Suzanne Asha Stone LINKS: Wood River Wolf Project https://www.woodriverwolfproject.org/ International Wildlife Coexistence Network https://wildlifecoexistence.org/
S8 E4 · Thu, June 23, 2022
Tina Bhojwani: They Don’t Look Vegan
“The idea is that we take and take and take from the planet. And we've been taking and there's all this talk about how can we get to neutral? And our company wanted to do something a little bit differently. We wanted to give back more than we were taking.” – Tina Bhojwani Tina Bhojwani is the co-founder and CEO of AERA , a luxury vegan footwear brand. In a past life, she held key leadership roles at global brands including Donna Karan, Theory and was President of Dolce & Gabbana North America. Having spent over two decades in the fashion world, Tina's had front row seats to fashion's impact on the planet as well as on people and animals. AERA is her answer to how the fashion world (and those of us who frequent it) can do better. All of AERA’s components are made from non-animal ingredients, they use as many eco-friendly materials as possible, ensuring that the end result is of the highest quality, and are committed to evolving their materials, with the ultimate goal to one day be able to create a shoe with zero environmental impact. “Our shoes are certified Vegan. We went to great lengths to ensure that all components are made from non-animal ingredients, yet still maintain the quality and style expected from a luxury shoe.” - Tina Bhojwani They’re also stunning, insanely comfortable and, as Tina likes to point out, "they don’t look vegan." Please listen and share and check out AERA’s shoes. AERA https://aeranewyork.com/ Instagram https://www.instagram.com/aeranewyork/ Facebook https://www.facebook.com/aeranewyork
S8 E3 · Thu, June 16, 2022
Gordon Meade: Zoospeak
Brown Bear, Germany, 2008 I'm aware of what you are and I'm also aware of what you're thinking. You're a human being I'm aware of what you are and I'm also aware of what you're thinking. You're a human being and you are thinking I am something else I'm aware of what you are and I'm also aware of what you're thinking. You're a human being and you are thinking I am something else put here for your entertainment. I'm aware of what you are and I'm also aware of what you're thinking. You're a human being and you are thinking I am something else put here for your entertainment, that makes it easier for you to ignore me. I'm aware of what you are and I'm also aware of what you're thinking. You're a human being and you are thinking I am something else put here for your entertainment, that makes it easier for you to ignore me and the wire mesh that surrounds me. I'm aware of what you are and I'm also aware of what you're thinking. You're a human being and you are thinking I am something else put here for your entertainment, that makes it easier for you to ignore me and the wire mesh that surrounds me; the wire mesh that separates us. I'm aware of what you are and I'm also aware of what you're thinking. You're a human being and you are thinking I am something else put here for your entertainment, that makes it easier for you to ignore me and the wire mesh that surrounds me; the wire mesh that separates us, and your way of thinking from mine. Gordon Meade Gordon Meade is a Scottish poet and animal advocate. His 10th book of poetry is called Zoo Speak . It’s about the inhumane and appalling conditions for animal who live in zoos and other terrible places. He wrote it to accompany the photographs in Jo-Anne McArthur’s, Captive a haunting book of photographs featuring animals in captivity. If you are unfamiliar with Jo-Anne’s work, go to We Animals Media and take a look. It will change you. I read/looked at Captive years ago and I truly did not think it could get more powerful or feel more devastating then it felt right then, and then I came across Gordon’s poetry. It offers an entirely new dimension to the photos, one that makes you look at the animals and really see and feel their perspective on the situation. It floored me. Please listen and share and then, read Gordon’s poems. LINKS <a href= "https://www.yout
S8 E2 · Wed, June 08, 2022
Yaakov Koby Nahmias: Future Meat
“You see, most of the people in the cultured meat world are usually either biologists that are excited about the biology or physicians that work with stem cells and regenerative medicine. They're asking, “can we make a steak? Can we make a muscle?” They are not asking what is the cheapest way of making this? They're assuming somebody else is going to come and solve it. The difference between them and us is that I am an engineer. So that, yeah, I can make a muscle. I made a muscle back then. I'm pretty certain that the biology is simple. The big question is, should I? And then how much does it cost?” – Koby Nahmias Yaakov Koby Nahmias is the founder of Future Meat Technologies. Future Meat is a cultured meat company, meaning they make meat from animal cells without having to raise, harm or slaughter any animals. They are based in Israel but are coming to the US next year. Future Meat’s technology is different than many other cultivated meat companies, which allows their products to be cost-effective, sustainable, and scalable. They are the first cultivated meat company to break the $5 cost barrier. They are making cultured meat for a $1.70 per pound. Their meat is made entirely from animal fibroblasts that grow in stainless steel fermenters and provides the same texture and taste as farm-raised meat. Future Meat will play a big role in the agricultural revolution that is going to allow future generations to live in a world with fewer greenhouse emissions, less land and water use, and far less cruelty to non-human animals. LINKS: https://future-meat.com/ twitter https://twitter.com/FutureMeat1
S8 E1 · Thu, June 02, 2022
Gemunu de Silva: Vampire Blood Farms
“I mean this is the crazy thing about it, in 35 years of doing animal protection investigations I didn't know this existed. It wasn't even a thing, because it sounds it sounds too crazy to actually believe - that you'd get blood from pregnant horses and then it helps productivity in pigs.” – Gemunu de Silva Gemunu de Silva is the co-founder of Tracks Investigations . He is a filmmaker and an activist who's been investigating and documenting animal rights abuses since the 1980s. Tracks has completed over 260 investigations. 35 animal rights and protection organizations have benefited from their work in 57 countries. Gem has been on the podcast before - - in fact, he's becoming a regular. This time is is here to talk about one of Tracks most recent investigations, horse blood farms in Iceland. Yes, it's as horrific as it sounds: Semi-wild pregnant horses are corralled into restraint boxes to have their blood taken, for the hormone, Pregnant Mare Serum Gonadotropin (PMSG). The PMSG is then converted into powder and shipped to factory farms in the US, UK, and EU. It's used in pigs (mostly), to increase reproduction. We do an astonishing number of terrible things to non-human animals all over the planet, but this one really shocked me. Not only is this industry incredibly cruel but it's also really creepy. Not many people know that this industry even exists. After Track's investigation was released in Iceland, much of the country went into an uproar. It was an absolute honor to have Gem back on the show to kick of Season 8! Learn More About Tracks Investigations Follow Tracks on Instagram
S3 E4 · Thu, May 26, 2022
Jo-Anne McArthur: What We Can’t Un-See
Species Unite will be back next week, June 2nd, with a brand new season. Until then, we are re-sharing some of our favorite episodes. Today's is a conversation with Jo-Anne McArthur. Jo-Anne McArthur is an award winning photojournalist and the founder of We Animals Media . For 20 years she has been photographing and bearing witness to our complex relationship with animals. She’s worked in over 60 countries in just about every industry one can imagine - including: fur farms, factory farms, bear bile farms, zoos, rodeos, circuses, and marine parks with the mission to make the lives of these invisible animals visible. Her images tell the stories of unseen suffering, the stories of what happens when we stop paying attention, of what hopelessness looks like, and of thousands of little lives that would have otherwise gone unnoticed. She is also co-founder of the Unbound Project and the author of two books, We Animals and Captive . And, she was the subject of Liz Marshall’s acclaimed documentary, The Ghosts in Our Machine . I have been a super-fan of Jo-Anne’s for years, so it felt like a real honor to be able to spend this time with her. I learned a lot in this conversation, about suffering, about empathy, and mostly, about grace. I hope that you will be as moved by Jo-Anne and her work as I am. Learn More About We Animals Media Learn More About The Unbound Project Jo Anne’s Books: We Animals Captive Liz Marshall’s Documentary, The Ghosts in Our Machine
S5 E8 · Wed, May 18, 2022
Lori Marino: Intelligent Life On Earth
Species Unite will be back on June 2nd with a brand new season. Until then, we are re-sharing some of our favorite episodes. This week’s is a conversation with Lori Marino. “In a natural setting, these animals would be swimming maybe a hundred miles a day, diving deep. They have their social lives, their social networks, roles to play in very tightly-knit family groups. They raise their children. They have cultures, different ways of doing things in different populations. They can explore and play and come together. None of that is available in the concrete tank. None of it. They don't have any place to go. They don't have any place to dive… what you see is a lot of mortality, a lot of sickness, a lot of behavioral abnormalities. Everything that makes life worth living for a dolphin or whale is absent in marine parks and concrete tanks. None of it is available.” – Lori Marino Lori Marino is a neuroscientist and an expert in animal behavior and intelligence. Much of her work is focused on whales and dolphins. She's currently the president of the Whale Sanctuary Project , which will be a seaside sanctuary for former performing orcas and belugas that have spent their entire lives in concrete tanks. Lori is also the founder and Executive Director of the Kimmela Center for Animal Advocacy , an organization that bridges the gap between academic research and on the ground animal advocacy efforts. She has appeared in several films and television programs, including the documentaries Blackfish, Unlocking the Cage, and Long Gone Wild, which is a 2019 documentary that picks up where Black Fish left off, and is also where the Whale Sanctuary Project begins. The Whale Sanctuary Project is going to change the world for the lucky orcas and belugas that will end up there. They will also be a model for future sanctuaries for cetaceans – as we need a ton of them, there are way too many of these animals living in captivity. It stuns me that even after documentaries like Blackfish, people all over the world (including many in the US) still visit marine mammal parks. Mostly, people go because they don’t know. They don’t know how miserable life is for the whales and dolphins and they don’t know how intelligent and emotionally complex these animals are. Keeping them in tanks is cruel, inhumane, unjust, and it needs to stop. Lori has made it her life’s work to not only study their intelligence but to advocate and fight for their lives. This conversation is an important one, after listening to Lori, I think it’d be very difficult for anyone to give another dollar to a marine park anywhere on Earth. I hope that yo
S4 E8 · Wed, May 11, 2022
Aaron Gross: How To Change The Story Around How And What We Eat
Species Unite will be back on June 2nd with a new season. Until then, we are re-sharing some of our favorite episodes. This week’s is a conversation with Aaron Gross. We all have a food story; the story that we tell ourselves about what we eat and why we eat it. It’s that story that runs the show when it comes to how we shop, cook, and feed our children. It was most often taught to us by our parents and their parents, most who thought they were passing on good values and deep traditions and were only doing what was best for their kids. But our food story is more than that. It was also passed on to our parents and to us from advertisers, marketers and a food industry that uses words like values and traditions to get us to buy into a narrative that has damaged our health, destroyed the planet, and caused endless suffering to billions of animals. But once we come to terms with the fact that it’s just a story and not something that we can’t change, there’s a whole new world waiting. And, like in so many other industries that are inherently broken in America and around the globe, the pandemic has exposed the gaping holes in our food system. But it’s also given us the opportunity to take a deeper look into what and how we eat and decide that we can change the story. Aaron Gross is a professor of theology and religious studies at the University of San Diego, and he's the CEO and founder of Farm Forward . Farm Forward was founded as the nation's first nonprofit devoted exclusively to ending factory farming. Recently, Aaron and the writer, Jonathan Safran Foer published a piece in the Guardian called, We Have to Wake Up: Factory Farms are Breeding Grounds for Pandemics . There's a paragraph in there that says, "The link between factory farming and increasing pandemic risk is well established scientifically, but the political will to curtail that risk has, in the past, been absent. Now is the time to build that will. It really does matter if we talk about this, share our concerns with our friends, explain these issues to our children, wonder together about how we should eat differently, call on our political leaders, and support advocacy organizations fighting factory farming. Leaders are listening. Changing the most powerful industrial complex in the world – the factory farm – could not possibly be easy, but in this moment with these stakes it is, maybe for the first time in our lifetimes, possible.” Aaron graciously joined me from his quarantine in San Diego to talk about
S5 E6 · Thu, May 05, 2022
Melanie Joy: Why We (Still) Love Dogs, Eat Pigs And, Wear Cows
Species Unite will return in a few weeks with Season 8. Until then, we are re-sharing some of our favorite episodes. Today's is a conversation with Melanie Joy. Melanie Joy is a Harvard-educated psychologist, specializing in the psychology of eating animals, social transformation, and relationships. She is the award-winning author of six books, including the best-selling, Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows . She is the founder of the non-profit, Beyond Carnism, dedicated to exposing and transforming carnism, the invisible belief system that conditions people to eat certain animals. Melanie is a recipient of the Ahimsa award for her work on global nonviolence. This award was previously given to the Dalai Lama and Nelson Mandela. She also received both the Peter Singer Prize and the Empty Cages Prize for her work developing strategies to reduce the suffering of animals. Melanie’s TEDx talk called, Toward Rational Authentic Food Choices has received over 800,000 views. No matter what your diet consists of, I hope that this conversation will inspire you to delve a little deeper into the systems and beliefs that quietly run the show when it comes to the psychology of what (and who) we eat. Learn More About Melanie Joy Learn More About Beyond Carnism Follow Beyond Carnism of Facebook Follow Beyond Carnism on Instagram
S7 E23 · Thu, April 28, 2022
Warren Ellis: Ellis Park
“It's funny because with art, with literature, with music, we are all connected. It's emotion. You know, like if I say, “have you read this or that,” or… “do you know Alice Coltrane? Do you know John Coltrane?” Whatever it is you've got a language and there's a connection going on. And, we should have that with the world. We should have that feeling of like an artistic sensibility to the world. We do have that with other things. People can talk about movies and they feel connected in a way. Religions connect people… we should be all connected by the Earth.” – Warren Ellis Musician and composer, Warren Ellis of the Dirty Three and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds had an extremely productive pandemic. Not only did he release two albums, two film scores and a book, but he also opened a wildlife sanctuary in Indonesia. Last spring, Warren co-founded Ellis Park , a forever home for disabled wildlife in South Sumatra. It’s a haven for animals who have been rescued from wildlife trafficking who are either too traumatized or too handicapped to be returned to the wild. Ellis Park will also be used as a hub to educate the public, locals and visitors to the park about the negative impacts on wildlife used in the tourism industry and those saved from the illegal pet trade and wildlife smuggling. Last fall, Warren published his first book, Nina Simone's Gum . It’s about a piece of gum that Nina Simone was chewing during her final concert in London. As she left the stage, she placed the chewed gum on her piano. Warren noticed and quickly snatched the gum. He kept it for over two decades… until a few years ago, when the gum took on a life of its own. The book is about meaning and connection and trusting intuition when it calls on you to follow a thread, and it’s about the love and the magic that we humans are capable of. I n many ways Ellis Park has a very similar story. Links: Ellis Park: https://www.ellispark.org/ Ellis Park Instagram https://www.instagram.com/ellisparksumatra/ Ellis Park facebook: https://www.facebo
S6 E14 · Thu, April 21, 2022
Damien Mander: How to be a Superhero
Damien Mander is the founder and CEO of the International Anti-Poaching Foundation (IAPF). He is a former Australian Royal Navy clearance diver and a special operations military sniper who became an anti-poaching crusader and an environmental and animal welfare activist. In 2009, while traveling through Africa, he was inspired by the work of rangers and the plight of wildlife. He liquidated his life savings and established the International Anti-Poaching Foundation. Over the past decade, the IAPF has scaled to train and support rangers which now help protect over 20 million acres of African wilderness. In 2017 Damien founded ‘Akashinga - Nature Protected by Women,’ an IAPF program that has already grown to over 240 employees with 7 nature reserves in the portfolio. They are the only group of nature reserves in the world to be protected by women. And, these women are changing the game in terms of what it means to fight poaching. Damien was featured in the James Cameron documentary The Game Changers and has now released another documentary with James Cameron and National Geographic about his work with the women of Akashinga – “The Brave One’s .” He is a resident of the National Geographic Speakers Bureau, has spoken at the United Nations, is featured in June 2019’s National Geographic Magazine, and has been featured three times on 60 Minutes. And, if you haven’t seen it, watch his TEDx Talk at the Sidney Oprah House, it’s just awesome. It was an honor to spend time with Damien. He is a warrior, a hero, and a man who understands what it means to never stop evolving.
S7 E22 · Thu, April 14, 2022
Maggie Howell: Relist Wolves
“This is their second chance. They were rendered extinct in the wild. And so now this is our second chance to get it right. We killed them off and hopefully they have enough of what they need that they can take the second chance and run with it.” – Maggie Howell This is the last episode in a series that we are doing on wolves. It's probably not the final episode because I'm not going to shut up about wolves until they're all back on the endangered species list. But for the moment, it's the last. It's a conversation with Maggie Howell. Maggie is the executive director of the Wolf Conservation Center , an organization that is working to protect and preserve wolves in North America. And they do it through science-based education, advocacy, and they participate in the federal recovery and release program for two critically endangered wolf species, the Mexican gray wolf and red wolves. Maggie is also a founding member of Relist Wolves , a campaign to put all wolves back on the endangered species list. Please listen and share and quickly go to Relist Wolves to help get ALL of these remarkable animals back on the endangered species list. Wolf Conservation Center https://nywolf.org/ Relist Wolves https://www.relistwolves.org/
S7 E21 · Thu, April 07, 2022
Carter Niemeyer: Wolfer
“Packs that are continuously trapped and snared and hunted, the packs are smaller and things are a lot more chaotic in the pack because you're killing uncle, you're killing dad, you're killing mom. The pups may get good leadership training and learn how to hunt or the family could be broken up and the puppies never fully learn how to hunt. And so all this hunting and trapping lowers the pack size, fragments them often and might cause a pack to break up, and those broken packs can actually send out more wolves in more places. So, all this intense wolf killing, in my opinion, it's not justified and it's unnecessary because what it's creating now, instead of biological carrying capacity, they're managed politically on social carrying capacity. How many wolves will people tolerate?” - Carter Niemeyer Carter Niemeyer is a wildlife biologist who has been working with wolves since the 1980s. Afetr decades as a trapper of wolves (and many other predators) he transformed into one of their biggest champions. He worked as a state trapper and conducted wildlife studies for the US Fish and Wildlife Service and by 1990, he was a full-time wolf specialist, negotiating situations where wolves were in conflict with people. In the mid 90s, he became a core member of the Wolf Capture Team in Canada. They were there to capture and bring wolves back to the US for the Federal Wolf Reintroduction Program. Carter’s stories are seriously astonishing stories and span more than five decades of work with large predators. He’s been a naturalist since he could walk and his love of nature and the outdoors are at the core of his very being. I spent the afternoon with him at his house in Idaho. I wanted to better understand the wolf hatred and hysteria that’s been going in Idaho, Wyoming and Montana for centuries - but currently seems to be at an all-time high. I wanted to hear Carters perspective, the thoughts of a former trapper on the wolf massacre that’s taking place today in the Northern Rockies and, also to ask him if there’s anything that we can do to stop it. LINKS: www.carterniemeyer.com
S7 E20 · Thu, March 31, 2022
Jim and Jamie Dutcher: Living with Wolves
“ The alpha female dug a den and had puppies. And we got there as they were squealing in the pack. And what was just amazing is to see how the pack reacted to this. They were so excited. Even when she started digging the den, the other wolves start digging other holes… they weren't helping at all, they were just caught up in it.” – Jim Dutcher I've talked about this before and I'm going to talk about it a whole lot more, there is a mass slaughter of wolves taking place in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. This is the first episode in a series that will hopefully get a whole lot more of us to care and then do something to stop this madness before it's too late. And, as you will hear in this conversation, there are real things that we can do. But first, wolves need as many of us as they can get on their team, and they need us to fight like crazy for them, or in the very near future, they'll be gone. This conversation is with the two people that have made humans care about wolves more than anyone that I know of. Jim and Jamie Dutcher spent six years in the nineties living with and filming a pack of wolves called the Sawtooth. And since then, they've focused their lives on the study and documentation of wolf social behavior, their photographs, books, and Emmy Award winning films Documenting the lives of these remarkable animals have changed the way that many people see these deeply social and family oriented animals. Links: https://www.livingwithwolves.org/ https://www.livingwithwolves.org/wolf-issues/how-you-can-help/ https://www.instagram.com/living_w_wolves/ https://www.facebook.com/LwWolves/ https://twitter.com/LWWolves
S7 E19 · Thu, March 24, 2022
Alexandra Horowitz: The World According To Your Dog
Today we are re-sharing one of our favorite episodes, a conversation with Alexandra Horowitz. “I can drive my car off a cliff and just leave it where it lay, the most I'll get is a littering fine, and if you throw your dog off the cliff the punishment is actually pretty similar. That's because they're the same type of thing to the law. So, unless you change that status, and you have people of course, who are thinking that there should be a status of kind of living property that might give them more attributes than my car has or my chair has; and then there are individuals who think they should be given the status of legal persons, which isn’t to say being people, but having rights of some sort. I think both of those are pretty intriguing offers. I think we're a little way off from doing that, but boy, either of those would be a massive improvement in our societal treatment of these creatures. “And of course, I don't think it's just restricted to dogs… It's been terrific to work with dogs for all these years, but I think this way about lots of non-human animals that we interact with, where we kind of get to use them sort of, for our sake. I would love to see some kind of sea change in thinking such that we don't get to use animals in the ways we do now, which are really abuses of animals.” – Alexandra Horowitz If you have any questions for your dog, Alexandra Horowitz is a pretty good place to start. She’s spent much of her life researching and writing about what it’s like to be a dog. She is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Inside of a Dog: What Dogs See, Smell, and Know; Our Dogs, Ourselves ; Being a Dog: Following the Dog Into a World of Smell; and On Looking. She is a professor at Barnard College, Columbia University, where she teaches seminars in canine cognition, creative nonfiction writing, and audio storytelling. As Senior Research Fellow, she heads the Dog Cognition Lab at Barnard. I wish this conversation had lasted all day long as I had about five thousand more questions for Alexandra - mostly, everything I’ve ever wanted to ask my dog. The time that we did have together was pretty amazing and felt like an absolute gift. Visit Alexandra’s Website Learn More About The Dog Cognition Lab at Barnard College Alexandra’s Books: Inside of A Dog Our Dogs, Ourselves <a href="https://alexandrahorowitz.net/Being-a-Dog" targe
S7 E19 · Thu, March 17, 2022
C.J. Dirago: Song Dogs
“Let's say I own a gun shop, and I want to drum up business, right? I can host a coyote killing contest, which they'll call predator hunting, where cash prizes of let's say $1000 goes to whomever kills the most coyotes in a 24 hour period. You might have 500 people show up from my state and out of state, and through any means necessary thermal scopes at night, any technology, electronic game calls to lure them in, hunting over bait... The competitive killing of coyotes happens for cash prizes all over the United States, today.” – C.J. Dirago The most persecuted carnivore in North America is the coyote, their poisoned, they're trapped, their aerial gunned, and killed for bounties and contests constantly. Over half a million coyotes are slaughtered in the U.S. every year. I'm a little embarrassed to say that I really haven't thought about coyotes all that much. They just haven't really come into my radar until recently, when I met C.J. Dirago. C.J. knows a ton about coyotes and is doing everything he can to protect them and give them a better rap. He's the founder of Bombazine, an organization seeking to protect wildlife and habitat in reciprocity with nature. Their inaugural project is called Song Dogs. It's an NFT collection of trail camera photography, with all proceeds funding coyote conservation.
S7 E18 · Thu, March 10, 2022
Shely Aronov: Google Translate for Plants
“Our entire food supply is completely dependent on chemicals and completely dependent on four to eight companies around the world to produce all these products.” – Shely Aronov Shelly Aronov is the founder and CEO of InnerPlant . InnerPlant is kind of like Google Translate for plants. They’re bioengineering plant genes so that crops can send messages to farmers, and the farmers will literally be able to understand what's going wrong with the crops. So that when they're under attack, the farmers will know much earlier than they do now. The reason I'm so excited about what Shelly and InnerPlant are doing is because once they're launched and scaled, this will greatly reduce the use of pesticides in farming. And the faster we move away from pesticides the better as they are destroying everything in their wake. “Plants communicate all the time, sending chemical signals to warn each other about threats. InnerPlant makes it possible to understand what plants are saying.” InnerPlant “How do you increase biodiversity and how do you increase the microbial density of the soil? You just stop killing everything out there. Right, if we stop killing every single weed, if we stop putting a ton of chemicals that are really toxic on the soil, then everything's going to bounce back and nature is really good at bouncing back.” – Shely Aronov
S7 E17 · Thu, March 03, 2022
Kym Canter: House of Fluff
“ I put on the coat, I looked at myself in the mirror, I was going to a party in Brooklyn and I just thought, ‘you cannot go to this party like this, you will be shunned and you don't want to be this person.” And I took off the coat and I never looked back.” – Kym Canter Kym Canter is the founder and creative director at House of Fluff , a New York City-based, animal free, material innovation studio and outerwear brand. They also happen to make some of my favorite faux fur coats on the planet. All of their products are made from cruelty-free sources. Their fur products are also vegan, because in addition to not using animal fur or leather, their furs do not contain wool or silk. Most faux furs contain non-biodegradable fibers such as polyester and acrylic, so when using recycled fibers made from these virgin synthetics, House of Fluff makes sure that they meet the Global Recycled Standards (GRS) and are sourced from post consumer waste. And, to begin solving for virgin synthetics, House of Fluff launched the first of their BIOFUR™ innovations in November 2020. All textiles in their BIOFUR™ collection are recyclable and made from either plant-based or 100% recycled materials. Back in the day, in another lifetime, Kym was the creative director at J. Mendel, a global luxury brand known for its animal furs. Kym's transformation is one of the best stories I've heard in a long time. Links: House of Fluff https://houseoffluff.com/ Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hofnyc/ Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hofnyc
S7 E16 · Thu, February 24, 2022
Jonathan Balcombe: What A Fish Knows
This week we are re-sharing one of our favorite episodes, a conversation with Jonathan Balcombe. “…gazing up to the night sky saying, ‘are we alone?’ …well, wait a minute, look around, there's tons of fascinating life forms. We're so lucky to have all this amazing panoply of life on the planet. I get the question… are there other humanoids out there? Or, are there other conscious beings? But we ought to be pretty grateful for what we have on this planet… there's a lot of amazing creatures and phenomena that we get to enjoy living with, if we can.” - Jonathan Balcombe Jonathan Balcombe is a biologist with a Ph.D. in ethology, the study of animal behavior. He is the author of four books on the inner lives of animals, including the New York Times bestseller, What a Fish Knows . He has published over 60 scientific papers and book chapters on animal behavior and animal protection. Jonathan has spent his life studying animals, how they think and feel, and why they matter. Quite often, he focuses on the ones that most of us tend not to think about very much, like fish and in his newest book, flies – Super Fly comes out in May. I thought I knew a little bit about fish, but after reading Jonathan’s book and after this time spent with him, I realized that I knew very little. There are 33,000 species of fish and what many of them are capable of is absolutely mind-blowing . For eons, we have categorized species by who we deem worthy and who we don’t. Fish are almost always very near or at the bottom of that list. Clearly, that is because most of us know so little about them. Jonathan knows a lot. If you haven’t read his book, read it. It will astonish you. Jonathan can most recently be seen in the Netflix documentary, Seaspiracy. Visit Jonathan’s Website Read Jonathan’s Books Follow Jonathan on Twitter Like Jonathan on Facebook <div id="yui_3_17_2_1_1645632310206_76" class= "image-block-ou
S7 E16 · Thu, February 17, 2022
Chef GW Chew: Something Better
“We make everything from a vegan rib, so we got a rib that'll blow your mind. Looks like a rib, tastes like a rib, but guess what? It ain't a rib… it can go on the grill, you can smoke it, you can literally barbecue it and it comes out like mama's ribs that you ate when you grew up.” – Chef Chew GW Chew, aka Chef Chew, is a vegan food inventor and restaurateur on a mission is to change lives and to bring holistic solutions to urban communities. He’s developed a of plant protein called Better Chew , which helps meat-eaters transition into a vegan lifestyle. He grew up in rural Southern Maryland to a family of devoted carnivores, and experienced the tragedy of losing close relatives due to diet-related diseases (diabetes, cancer). When he was 18, he decided to go vegan in pursuit of a healthier lifestyle, but found that many plant-based foods at the time were less than palatable. After nearly 20 years of experimenting with literally thousands of ingredients and cooking techniques, and three vegan restaurants, Chef Chew found the secret to the most authentic plant-based versions of his favorite ethnic and comfort foods and Better Chew entered the plant-based food scene. And he’s done all of this with the goal of democratizing access to healthy, plant-based foods by making them affordable and accessible to all people. LINKS: Better Chew: https://eatbetterchew.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/betterchew Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/betterchew/
S7 E15 · Thu, February 10, 2022
David Benzaquen: Mission Plant
“One percent of the U.S. is vegan, about five percent is vegetarian… And so if I'm thinking about where can I make the most money, it's not going after the vegans. And if I'm thinking about where can I make the greatest impact, getting a plant based person to switch from one plant based burger to another does zip. And so our focus is how can we help people move the needle with those who aren't on board yet?” David Benzaquen is one of the world’s leading experts in the plant-based food industry and he’s the founder of Mission: Plant , a holding company advancing the plant-based sector with strategic investments and consulting services. He has been a part of the plant-based food scene since it really started to take off, and a few months ago he launched an entirely vegan online grocery store called Plant Belly – its stocked with all of his (and my) favorite plant-based foods. It’s absolutely awesome. David is one of the stars of the plant-based movement and I’m extremely grateful to him for making it grow. www.missionplant.com www.moonshotcollaborative.com www.plantbelly.com
S7 E14 · Thu, February 03, 2022
Barbara King Makes Us Care
“ As we were driving from Jackson, Wyoming, towards the entrance of the park, I was in the passenger seat, Charlie was driving and I saw a bison and I'll never forget it. I grabbed him so hard on the arm and I screeched, “BISON!” It was the first bison I'd ever seen in the wild. We stopped the car and we were a good distance from the bison. But we could see it unimpeded with the windshield and just let it walk and do what he was doing. And I don't know, something in my heart turned over.” – Barbara King Barbara King is emerita professor of anthropology at William & Mary and a freelance science writer and public speaker and the author of seven books. She is an expert on animal cognition and emotion. Barbara has been on the podcast before to talk about how animals grieve and love. If you haven’t heard that episode, take a listen . She is back to talk about her 7 th book, Animals’ Best Friends: Putting Compassion to Work for Animals in Captivity and in the Wild. There are many reasons that I love this book, but mostly because Barbara delves into and shares how we can be better humans to all other animals on this planet. Her work helps us better understand and advocate for the rights of animals. The more that humans know about animal’s intelligence and emotional lives, the harder it becomes to harm them. Barbara is a storyteller and through the stories of the individual animals as well as her own personal accounts, she makes us care.
S5 E21 · Thu, January 27, 2022
Helena Husseini: Like It’s Going To Be The Last Day
Today we are re-sharing one of our favorite episodes, a conversation with Helena Husseini. I usually live day by day. I always live every day like it's going to be the last day. We learned that during the war. We don't know when we're going to die. So, you live every day like it's going to be the last day. That's what I do.” – Helena Husseini Helena Husseini is the vice-president of BETA, Beirut Ethical Treatment for Animals. BETA is the first and largest shelter in Lebanon with 850 dogs, many cats, a few horses, and a couple of monkeys. Helena is also an architect. She has been with BETA since 2006, a few months before the Lebanon War started. As bombs dropped nearby, she drove around in her Jeep saving the injured and abandoned dogs that had been left behind. Since then, she has been rescuing animals during the too many crises and catastrophes that have plagued Lebanon, including the 2019 financial collapse, the riots, COVID-19, and the blast that decimated Beirut. This conversation is really one that's about resilience, about grit, about what it means to show up every day, even when bombs are dropping, when there's no access to money, when people are starving, and no one knows what tomorrow will look like. It's a conversation about what it means to choose the meaningful life. I hope that you are as completely floored by Helena and her stories as I was. Learn More About BETA Like BETA on Facebook Follow BETA on Youtube Support BETA’s "Surviving in Lebanon" fundraiser to provide shelter to their hundreds of rescue animals before they are left without a refuge.
S7 E13 · Thu, January 20, 2022
Rich Hardy: No Blood, No Bones, No Sh*t
Rich Hardy is a former undercover investigator. He spent 20 years doing over 100 assignments in 30 countries. He's been on the podcast before to talk about his time undercover. If you haven't heard that episode, you should go back and listen . He is back today to talk about his latest adventure. After a couple of decades of incredibly intense investigative work, and living a double life, Rich decided that he needed a massive change. Instead of campaigning against the horrors of animal agriculture, he and his partner Pru are now campaigning for solutions. Last year they started Lazy Meadows Farm and became a couple of vegan farmers. I didn't even know that vegan farming was a thing until Rich filled me in on it. And what surprised me even more, was learning that almost all fruit and vegetable farming everywhere isn't vegan. LINKS: Lazy Meadow Farm: https://www.lazymeadowfarm.com/ Rich on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/notasnatureintended/?hl=en Rich’s book: https://www.bookdepository.com/Not-Nature-Intended-Rich-Hardy/9781789650631?ref=grid-view&qid=1614899278046&sr=1-1
S7 E12 · Thu, January 13, 2022
Steven Wise: The Most Important Animal-Rights Case of the 21st Century
“The reason that you should accept our client as having rights is because we're showing what an extraordinary being she is. These beings have mirror self-recognition, they know that they are elephants. In fact, we listed 42 different, highly complex cognitive abilities that elephants have. If you didn't know it was an elephant, you’d think [I was] talking about what a human being does.” - Steven Wise There is an elephant who lives all by herself in a small enclosure at the Bronx Zoo. Her name is Happy. She arrived at the zoo in 1977, a few years after she’d been kidnapped from the wild in Thailand. The Bronx Zoo claims that Happy is Happy. The best elephant cognition scientist in the world have argued that she's anything but. And most of us regular human beings can see that an isolated elephant in a tiny enclosure is not living a good life. Steven Wise is the founder and president of the Nonhuman Rights Project . In 2018, the Nonhuman Rights Project brought a petition for writ of habeas corpus on Happy’s behalf. Habeas corpus is a common law right that protects against unlawful and indefinite imprisonment. In Happy’s case, the NhRP are seeking recognition of her fundamental right to bodily liberty and transfer to an elephant sanctuary. Last spring, the New York court of appeals, the highest court in the state of New York, agreed to hear Happy’s case. This is the first time in history that the highest court of any English-speaking jurisdiction will hear a habeas corpus case brought on behalf of someone other than a human being. In a story for the Atlantic , Jill Lepore called Happy’s case, “the most important animal-rights case of the 21st Century.” Steven Wise has been working toward this since 1980. LINKS: The Nonhuman Rights Project https://www.nonhumanrights.org/ Instagram https://www.instagram.com/nonhuman.rights.project/ Twitter https://twitter.com/nonhumanrights FB https://www.facebook.com/NonhumanRights Steven’s TED Talk https://www.ted.com/speakers/steven_wise
S7 E11 · Thu, January 06, 2022
Adam Weiss: Vegan 2.0
“Vegan 1.0 Didn't get us where we needed to go. It didn't turn enough of the country on, it didn't turn enough young people on, didn't make it into… the mainstream in the way they wanted it to. …it was kind of pushed to the edge and marginalized and it was weird, the food was good, but not great and not accessible or kid-friendly. … I didn't think that was the way to capture the 97% of the world or the country that doesn't identify as vegan who would otherwise, maybe try it once in a while, but not really make a change. Where Vegan 2.0 is specifically designed to expand the tent to the 97%..” – Adam Weiss Adam Weiss is the CEO and director of Honeybee Burger , a plant-based fast-food restaurant with locations in Southern California, and more coming soon to other parts of the country, including New York City (hooray!). Honeybee’s mission is to promote the benefits of plant-based food on the environment, the planet, and the animals with the most delicious food and the best plant-based proteins on the market. And, it’s working - they were just named the best vegan burger in Los Angeles by Veg News. Before entering the plant-based space, Adam had a long career in finance, and I was very curious to know how he went from hedge fund guy to vegan restaurant guy. “When people come in and they're going to get a cheeseburger, fries and a shake, which is our most common order, it’s not so much that they don't care about their health, but they know, “okay I'm about to indulge here.” We just give them a tiny bit of good feeling, like, you know what, “you're indulging, you’re going to pack on some calories, but no animals will die, you're making an impact on the future, and ultimately it's probably better for the environment than if you didn't do it…” And that resonates with consumers today unlike any time in history.” – Adam Weiss Links: Honeybee Burger https://honeybeeburger.com/ Instagram https://www.instagram.com/honeybeeburger/
S7 E10 · Thu, December 30, 2021
Sarah Kite: Humans Can Do Better Than This
“Historically some of the leading airlines in the world were responsible for transporting these monkeys. So, you had national flag carrier airlines, such as such as British Airways, American Airlines - all of these big airlines were involved in transporting these monkeys in the hundreds and thousands every year on commercial passenger airlines. And, rightly the public were very concerned, there was a growing swell of, public opinion that was opposed to not just non-human primates being transported by airlines, but other animals as well. So there has certainly been a big move away from passenger airlines transporting monkeys, which has caused problems for the research industry in being able to obtain the monkeys.” – Sarah Kite Sarah Kite is co-founder of Action for Primates , they campaign on behalf of non-human primates globally. Despite their status as our closest living biological relatives, non-human primates continue to suffer and be exploited by people across the globe, whether in their native habitat, in trade and transportation, in research laboratories, in private homes, in zoos, as entertainment, or as food and body parts. Sarah has been doing this work since the 80s and although much has changed since then – we no longer test on chimpanzees, much hasn’t changed. According to PETA , in the US, more than 100,000 nonhuman primates (mostly monkeys) are used in research laboratories every year. These are highly intelligent, social animals and we know and have known for decades that almost every single bit of this research fails in human trials. A report from Faunalytics shows that,“approximately 100 vaccines have shown effectiveness against HIV-like animal viruses, but none prevent HIV in humans. Up to 1,000 drugs have shown effectiveness for neuroprotection in animals, but none for humans. While the biomedical research industry is quick to claim victories, the reality is less glamourous: nine out of ten drugs fail in clinical studies because they cannot predict how they will behave in people; only 8% of drugs tested on animals are deemed fit for human use; one meta-study found that animal trials overestimate the likelihood that a treatment works by 30% because negative results often go unpublished. Fortunately, using animals in scientific research is not a foregone conclusion. On the contrary, there is a burgeoning field of alternatives to animal research, and many such alternatives are already in use today.” Not only are we breeding thousands of non-human primates in labs, for testing here in the USA, but we also import them from Asia and Africa by the planeload, meaning t
S7 E9 · Thu, December 23, 2021
Olivia Swaak-Goldman: Taking Down the King Pins of Wildlife Trafficking
“It’s really about bringing the skills and the tools and the techniques that we've already developed and addressing other forms of transnational or international crimes - and applying them to this area that had long been forgotten.” – Olivia Swaat-Goldman Olivia Swaak-Goldman is the executive director of the Wildlife Justice Commission , an organization that goes around the world fighting transnational organized crime against wildlife — like an animal-focused justice league, with a mission to disrupt and help dismantle organized transnational criminal networks that are trading in wildlife, timber, and fish. Wildlife trafficking is the fourth largest illegal trade globally, after drugs, humans, and arms. Before the Wildlife Justice Commission was formed, governments were not focused on going after the heads of these trafficking organizations. There was a lack of prioritization on wildlife crime. And since they formed in 2015, the Wildlife Justice Commission has helped to secure the arrests of 155 wildlife criminals and taken down 35 criminal networks. The Wildlife Justice Commission’s work is more important now then ever, as we are losing species at alarming rates and there are so many more at risk of extinction within our lifetimes. “The Wildlife Justice Commission was created in order to go after high-level criminals. It's the same thing with drugs in a way, if you just go after the dealer on the corner, you're not going to be tremendously successful. You’ve got to do that but you need to go after the masterminds of the networks in order to get them arrested and successfully prosecuted and, also important… a seizure of assets… make it hurt, make them feel it. Then they're going to think twice about doing this, especially in an area where we are losing so many species and at risk of losing so many. The quicker we can get them to be doing something else, that the more biodiversity we can save.” – Olivia Swaak-Goldman LINKS: Wildlife Justice Commission: https://wildlifejustice.org/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WildlifeJusticeCommission/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/WJCommission
S7 E8 · Thu, December 16, 2021
Sonalie Figueiras: Green Queen
“I think we we've prioritized certain things in education and in culture, but we're really deprioritizing curiosity. The joy of going into a research hole and just digging… I still do that every day.” – Sonalie Figueiras Sonalie Figueiras is the founder and chief of Green Queen , the award-winning media impact platform advocating for social and environmental change. Green Queen started as a blog in 2011 and now it's Asia's largest plant-based media platform. She is also creating a marketplace to source organic and natural foods. She’s the founder of Ekowarehouse, a global sourcing platform for certified organic products, with a mission to make safe, quality food accessible and affordable for the whole planet. I’ve been following Sonalie and Green Queen for years, it’s one of our go-to sources for information and breaking news for all things related to the future of food. Green Queen: https://www.greenqueen.com.hk/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/GreenQueenHK Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/greenqueenhk/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/GreenQueenHK/ Eko Warehouse: https://www.ekowarehouse.com/
S7 E7 · Thu, December 09, 2021
Natalie Rubio is the First Person in the World to Complete a PhD in Cellular Agriculture
“… a lot of the platform technologies do not make sense from a food perspective, and there's just never been a reason to do things a different way. So, for example, cell culture is very expensive and very resource intensive because the medical field doesn't really need those things to be done in a very cost-effective manner - because people, have a high cost thresh hold when it comes to paying for their own healthcare and drugs… But it's totally different when we're thinking about food.” – Natalie Rubio - Natalie Rubio Natalie Rubio recently made history as the first person on the planet to complete a PhD in cellular agriculture, which is the production of animal-sourced foods from cell culture or meat that is grown in a lab without using animals. Her thesis: Entomoculture: Insect Cell Cultivation for Cellular Agriculture, makes the case for growing meat from insect cells. (Natalie also coined the term "entomoculture.") All of the above is beyond exciting for 8 million reasons, for Natalie and for all of humanity. Every milestone in the world of cellular agriculture, academically or as an industry, is a massive step toward building a food system that is sustainable and humane, a food system that does not involve factory farms, slaughterhouses, cruelty, and suffering.
S7 E6 · Thu, December 02, 2021
Casey Dworkin: Apple Leather Boots
“When you talk to the vegan community, you know, it's people who know exactly why they should or shouldn't purchase something. But being able to reach people through design… like why couldn't someone test veganism through fashion before they started with their diet? That's kind of my story.” - Casey Dworkin Casey Dworkin is the founder and designer of plant-based luxury footwear brand Sylven NY . When I first discovered Casey's boots and shoes, they were half vegan and half animal leather, meaning half their shoes were made from animal leather and then the exact same pairs were available in apple leather. A couple of years after that, I noticed that all the animal leather shoes and boots were gone, Sylven was now a straight vegan brand. Not only did I want to know what happened and how it happened, but I also really love Sylvan's boots. So I called Casey and asked her to share her story. “For me, it started with vegan for the environment… I was already working with these plant-based, vegan leathers and wanting to make sure I can lessen my environmental impact through my shoe production. And so I was like, well, why don't I try to reduce the amount of meat and dairy that I consume? And then through that process, I was like, well, why am I consuming any meat or dairy? Why am I producing with anything leather? And, it brought me down this very positive rabbit hole.” – Casey Dworkin
S4 E4 · Thu, November 25, 2021
Monica Chen: Teaching Your Children Well
“So, you really want the kids to drink the cow's milk because that's the liquid that's available to them if they're thirsty. And we were also told that yeah, you really should be having the kids open up their cow’s milk. I went down through all the tables and said, “open up your milk, open up your milk.” Or, I was told, we just won't get our funding because this was a school that was a turnaround school, all the kids are on free lunch. And, so this is how we got our funding as a school. – Monica Chen Monica Chen is the executive director of the Factory Farming Awareness Coalition , an organization that educates and empowers individuals and communities to support just and sustainable food systems. Meaning they go into schools, colleges and universities and the truth about where their food comes from. By educating young people about factory farming and equipping them with the tools to oppose it, Factory Farming Awareness Coalition builds both an inclusive consumer base as well as an informed citizenry that supports cultural and legislative change for the benefit of all. To date, FFAC has reached over 220,000 students are building an army of kids with a mission to change food systems all over the country.
S7 E4 · Thu, November 18, 2021
Gemunu de Silva: The Power of Undercover Investigations
“Within a month of our investigation’s release, we had some amazing news. The French government passed legislation to ban fur farms in France. In 2017, it was an issue which was not really on the public agenda, but within four years we have stopped an industry in France. Hundreds of thousands of animals don't have to be killed each year, don’t have to live in these small cages going crazy each year. It's a success and it's something that we feel proud to have been part of.” - Gemunu de Silva Gem is back! Gemunu de Silva is the co-founder of Tracks Investigations . He is filmmaker and an activist who's been investigating and documenting animal rights abuses since the 1980s. Tracks has just completed over 260 investigative film projects. That is an astonishing number of investigations. 35 animal rights and protection organizations have benefited from their work in 57 countries. Gem has been on the podcast before. I asked him to come back to talk about some of Track's most recent successes. There are many. The work that Gem has done for the past three and a half decades has changed laws, minds and the world for millions of animals.
S7 E3 · Thu, November 11, 2021
Amy Jones and Paul Healy: Moving Animals
“I think every time we release a story, there's this sense of like almost like legal danger, the legal implications that can come from releasing stories. We've had times wherea story has been released and we haven't slept that night because we're scared of what the repercussions are going to be.” - Amy Jones, Moving Animals Amy Jones and Paul Healey are the founders of Moving Animals , a photojournalism and media project that connects the world to animals stories through photography, film, and journalism. Amy is a photojournalist and writer. Paul is a journalist and he’s responsible for Moving Animals’ video content. Their work has allowed people to see for themselves animal and human rights injustices that are happening globally. Only when people are made aware of injustice, do they take action to stop it. Amy and Paul have brought massive awareness to the masses who have in turn, fought injustice all over the world. What they do is not only a powerful agent for change, it’s an essential one. Amy and Paul are a very essential part of the team at Species Unite. Paul is our news editor and Amy is a writer, editor, campaign manager, tech person, social media person, and any other person who we need in that moment. She wears many hats. I’m grateful every single day to have Amy and Paul on the team. There are also two of the kindest human beings that I've ever had the privilege to know.
S7 E2 · Thu, November 04, 2021
Jane Velez-Mitchell: Jane UnChained
Jane Velez Mitchell the founder of Jane Unchained , a media platform for vegan and animal rights news. Her decades long career as a broadcast journalist has focused on bringing animal rights issues to the forefront. For six years she hosted her own show on CNN Headline News, where she ran a weekly segment on animal issues. Previously, Velez-Mitchell reported for the nationally syndicated Warner Brothers/Telepictures show Celebrity Justice, where she did numerous stories on animal issues championed by celebrities. Jane’s also an author of four books and a producer of the award-winning documentary Countdown to Year Zero and the vegan cooking series New Day, New Chef. Mainstream media has always skirted around animal rights issues and I wanted to hear how Jane brought them mainstream at a time when it wasn’t as popular to do so. And I wanted to know what she thinks about where we’re headed in the future.
S7 E1 · Thu, October 28, 2021
Jenny Desmond: Chimpanzees Forever
“We didn't want to start a Chimp sanctuary. I mean, it's the most extreme really… they're the most, at least in my mind, they're just so socially complex and their needs are so complex and they don't really go back to the wild - ever. And they live, to 50 or 60 years old and they have very complicated social groups. It's a lot. It's a lifetime… So, we were like, that's not what we want to do. So here we are. That's what we did.” Jenny Desmond Jenny’s interest in wildlife rescue and protection was sparked during a trip around the world at an orangutan sanctuary in Indonesia. Since then, she and Jimmy have lived in many countries throughout Africa and Asia and have worked with monkeys, gorillas, orangutans, and chimpanzees. And, until they lost her this past year, their dog, Princess worked right alongside them. In 2015, the Desmonds got a call from the Humane Society of the US, that 66 former laboratory research chimps had been abandoned on some islands in Liberia — could they help? Soon after they arrived (and helped), it became very clear to them that there was a much bigger chimpanzee problem happening throughout Liberia. Currently the Liberia Chimp Rescue and Protection is home to 73 orphaned chimps and not only are the Desmonds and their incredible team mothering and caring for 73 babies, they are also working to end the bushmeat and pet trades that are creating so many orphans in the first place. Western Chimpanzees are on the critically endangered list. Their population has declined by 80 percent is the past 24 years. At this rate, they will soon be gone. And, it’s not just the bushmeat and pet trades pushing the chimps toward the extinction list – it’s the fact that their habitat is getting smaller by the day. With much grace and humor, Jenny shares what it means to ensure that the chimpanzees in her care thrive, and what we need to do to get behind her so that these animals don’t disappear.
S4 E10 · Thu, October 21, 2021
Josh Balk: How To Change America’s Cruelest Industry
Species Unite will be back with a brand new season next Thursday the 28th. Until then, we are re-sharing one of our favorite episodes, a conversation with Josh Balk. “The time to begin phasing out the intensive confinement systems in which we raise billions of animals is now. We need to accelerate society’s direction of reducing demand for meat from animal factory farms and shift instead to more of an emphasis on healthier — and safer — plant-based foods. As our population grows, plant-based foods are also more sustainable and affordable for societies globally. Unless we — especially legislators and the food industry — make changes immediately, the concerning practices in animal agribusiness will remain. Only in transforming our food system can we eliminate the tinderbox ready to explode in our country. We can’t afford to wait.” - Josh Balk and Dr. Shivam Yoshi, Pandemic on Our Plates Social distancing is the key to slowing the spread of COVID-19. We know this. It has worked and is still working. But, we also know that in this unsettling time, a time where we are fully aware that staying apart does indeed save lives, just the opposite is taking place at factory farms and meat processing plants all across America. Slaughterhouses are being forced to stay open and their workers must remain in close proximity to one another to be able to get their jobs done. And, they are getting sick and they are dying. And, on factory farms, billions of animals are “living” in cramped, filthy, overcrowded spaces with almost no room to move their antibiotic-fueled bodies - conditions that are creating a perfect storm for the next zoonotic disease to emerge and spread. This threat is nothing new, as diseases have already come from factory farms - we’ve just gotten lucky in terms of their spread. But the clock is ticking. Josh Balk has been a global leader in animal protection for the past 20 years. He is the Vice President of Farm Animal Protection for the Humane Society of the United States , and he’s the co-founder of plant-based, food manufacturing company, JUST , as in JUST Mayo and my favorite invention of the 21st century, JUST Egg. Josh has spent a couple of decades focusing on and fighting against extreme confinement on America’s factory farms: confinement practices like cramming many chickens into small battery cages for their entire lives, and days old calves in tiny veal crates where they can barely move, and keeping mother pigs in gestation crates (small metal cages that fit around the
S5 E1 · Thu, October 14, 2021
Liza Heavener: The Game Changer
Species Unite will be back with a brand new season on October 28th. For now, we are re-sharing one of our favorite episodes, a conversation with Liza Heavener. “There would be some mornings that the indigenous tribal leaders would take us out into virgin rainforest… [I was] like, “no human has ever stood here before.” And it was alive with, I mean, you name the animal… and it was loud full and of life. And they would take us out the very next day and it was just smoldering because it had been slashed and burned illegally in the middle of the night. And it was just completely quiet except for what was left of the fire. And that that changes you.” - Liza Heavener Liza’s story is one of my favorites. She spent a decade working in federal politics, grassroots and campaign strategy and with the United States Congress. Liza was a healthcare lobbyist for a large membership organization, running their national advocacy program to engage hundreds of thousands of advocates across the country. Then, she won a contest to work on a documentary and tv series in Borneo. Liza went there for what she thought would be 100 days, but ended up staying for the next year. While she was there, her world turned upside down. And what came out of it is this force of a woman who has dedicated herself to creating a better planet for everyone who lives on it, not just the humans. Liza is the Chief Operating Officer at NEXUS Global and she chairs the Nexus Working Group on Animal Welfare and Biodiversity Conservation, which is dedicated to educating, empowering and connecting Next-Gen impact investors, philanthropists, and social entrepreneurs. She also serves as an Advisor to the Millennial Action Project and as a Vice Chair of the Alumni Council for Eastern Mennonite University. Liza had a feature role in the internationally-acclaimed documentary and tv series, “Rise of the Eco-Warrior,” and has spoken at conferences across the country.
S4 E20 · Thu, October 07, 2021
Milo Runkle: Widening The Circle Of Compassion
Species Unite will be back with a brand new season on October 28th. Today, we are re-sharing one of our favorite episodes, a conversation with Milo Runkle. The only way to help animals is to help people. It’s humans that need to change, not animals. And I think it's the same way when we're talking about other issues in our society. It's about healing those who are causing violence, and it oftentimes can be easy to judge and persecute and sort of push aside people that are causing harm. It's more challenging to love them and to lead by example and to believe that everyone is doing the best that they can with what they have and what they know in that moment. - Milo Runkle Some humans come out of the womb with a mission imprinted into their very being. Not often, but it happens. Milo Runkle is one of those humans. He was born in rural Ohio, delivered by his veterinarian father, and from the very earliest of his days, he knew he would change the world for animals. He was one of those kids who had a deep empathy for any creature that he encountered, an empathy that I think most of us have as children, but sadly are talked out of by well-meaning (and very well-conditioned) adults. Instead of being talked out of anything, Milo held on tightly, and rather than experiencing the slow, albeit unconscious, leak of animal-connected compassion that too many humans experience, his only grew. He became vegetarian at 11, and vegan at 15, which was the same year that he founded Mercy for Animals ; which would later become the world’s largest farm animal and vegan advocacy organization, an international powerhouse that has indeed changed the world for millions of cows, pigs, chickens, turkeys, and fish. It all started because of an animal abuse case at his local high school. He saw abuse and injustice, and did something about it. Milo ran Mercy for Animals for nearly two decades, and is still involved - he is the Board Chair. Since leaving his role as the President, he has started a new chapter: one that involves deep exploration - of the planet, of himself, and of what it means to live a life of service that is rooted in joy, love, and compassion. He is also the cofounder of the Good Food Institute , an organization that works to build a sustainable food system by supporting the development and adoption of plant and cell based proteins. And, he is the author of Mercy for Animals. One Man's Quest to Inspire Compassion and Improve the Lives of Farm Animals. Milo and I spoke about what it was like to sustain decades of activism on the
S6 E23 · Thu, September 30, 2021
Toni Okamoto: Plant-Based on a Budget
“My family was really suffering from all types of diet related health issues. I had an aunt who had multiple amputations before it took her life because of type two diabetes. I had a 40-year-old uncle who had a heart attack. My grandpa, who helped raise me, died of complications in a triple bypass surgery. All over the place there was suffering and it's really hard to, not feel like you have not the answer, but the direction to go in to reclaim your health, and not be taken seriously.” – Toni Okamoto Species unite is starting our 30 Day Vegan Challenge tomorrow. So, if you haven't signed up for it, sign up (you can actually sign up any time during October and it will start you at day one). It's 30 days of recipes, tips, information on all things plant-based and if you're already vegan sign up anyway, because there’s really good information and recipe ideas. If you have no interest in ever being vegan, sign up and do it for 10 days. See what it's like. To kick off the 30 Day Vegan Challenge, we couldn’t think of a better guest than Toni Okamoto. She is the founder of Plant-Based on a Budget , the website and meal plan that shows you how to save money while eating plant-based. Check it out, there are close to a thousand incredible recipes and delicious weekly meal-plans that will make the Vegan Challenge a whole lot less challenging. Toni is also the author of the Plant-Based on a Budget cookbook and the coauthor of the Friendly Vegan Cookbook with Michelle Kane. She and Michelle also hosts the Plant Powered People Podcast . Toni is a regular on local and national morning shows across the country, where she teaches viewers how to break their meat habit without breaking their budget. She was also featured in the popular documentary What the Health .
S6 E22 · Thu, September 23, 2021
Erik Molvar: America's War on Wolves
“Let me tell you, there were no bounties when wildlife management became a discipline and it's never been a part of wildlife management, but, but these are the crazy kooks at the absolute extreme of the hunting spectrum. And they got together and held fundraisers and started giving out thousand-dollar bounties on wolves.” – Erik Molvar Eric Molvar is the executive director of the Western Watersheds Project. He was on the podcast recently to talk about the wild horse crisis in the American West. Today, he is back to talk about wolves and the wolf wars that are happening in the West, especially in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. Eric and the Western watersheds project recently authored a petition to the U S Fish and Wildlife service that was jointly submitted by 70 conservation and wildlife groups, to relist wolves back on the endangered species list. And, it made it through the first pass – meaning Fish and Wildlife will initiate a comprehensive status review, but it could last a year or more. Let’s hope it passes because in the meanwhile its open season on wolves in the West….
S6 E21 · Thu, September 16, 2021
Shannon Falconer: Lab Grown Mouse Cookies For Your Cat
“So, the irony is that meat that people are so obsessed about their cat needing… Yeah, in the wild cats needs meat because in the wild, that meat is a source of the nutrients that a cat needs. But on a commercial bag of pet food, those nutrients, those core key nutrients that the cat needs, they're not coming from the meat, they're coming from the pre-mix that is largely a synthetic mix of vitamins and minerals that have been lost from the meat.” – Shannon Falconer Shannon Falconer is the CEO and co-founder of Because, Animals , a pet food company that is making cultured meat for our cats and dogs. Their first cultured meat product, Harmless Hunt Mouse Cookies for Cats , will be on the market in 2022. They are made with real mouse meat that is grown in a lab. No mice are hurt in the process. In fact, the cells that were used to make these cookies and all mouse treats at Because, Animals going forward are the only cells that they will ever need. The original mice are happily living as pets with one of the Because, Animal’s scientists. Cats and dogs eat more than 25 percent of the meat consumed in the US; which also means that petfood is responsible for more than quarter of the environmental impact caused by animal agriculture. There are plant-based pets foods but most American pets eat commercial dog and cat food, which often and mostly uses byproduct - meaning the parts of animals that people don’t want, the heads, the bones, the blood or they use the meat that can’t legally be sold for human consumption because the animal was dying or diseased. Because, Animals is going to change all of that one product at a time. Their mouse cookies are just the beginning. Nothing excites me more than cellular agriculture. And, it might take longer than most of us would like, but it’s happening… Eat Just’s chicken nuggets are being sold in Singapore and now, here comes the pet food. It’s the very beginning of a whole new food system, one that will eventually take down every last factory farm and slaughterhouse on Earth. Here we go…
S6 E20 · Thu, September 09, 2021
Isha Datar: Cellular Agriculture will Disrupt Everything it Touches
“…because animal advocacy has now escaped advocacy and is entering different types of work, really science-oriented work… maybe that was all it took in the first place. We just had such limited roles in the traditional sense of animal advocacy before. Because it was so communications driven… And so that's another reason why I'm so proud of how this field has developed is I think we've turned people into animal advocates by creating jobs that let that happen. It's such a special thing to be part of.” Isha Datar Isha Datar is the executive director of New Harvest , the global nonprofit that Isha is executive director of New Harvest, a nonprofit research institute that funds open, public cultured meat research. In 2010 while still an undergrad, Isha wrote a paper called “Possibilities for an in vitro meat production system.” This was among the few papers to ever discuss cultured meat in academic literature and a few years before anyone had tasted the world’s first cultivated meat ball. It was the beginning of Isha's quest to establish the field of animal products made without using any animals. Isha has been executive director of New Harvest since 2013. She’s also co-founded Muufri (now Perfect Day Foods), where they make milk without cows and Clara Foods, where they make eggs without chicken. In 2015, Isha coined the term "cellular agriculture" — officially creating a category for agriculture products produced from cell cultures rather than whole plants or animals. Cellular agriculture is the future of food and Isha is one of its greatest pioneers.
S6 E19 · Thu, September 02, 2021
Underwater Photography Legend Brian Skerry
“…based on my personal experience and having worked with scientists and researchers most of my life, I would say that it's not too late. There are some things that are probably gone. There are places where only pockets of biodiversity may remain in the time ahead, but that doesn't mean we can't still have a healthy future. It may not be what it once was, but it's like the old saying - when's the best day to quit smoking cigarettes? Today - if you don’t quit today, when's the next best day? Tomorrow. So, it's not too late. We may have lost 50% of the world's coral reefs, but that means there's 50% left. We may have taken 90% of the big fish in the ocean, but maybe there's 10% left. We don't have to kill 100 million sharks every year. We don't have to rollback legislation that determines how much carbon we pump into the atmosphere. We can speak out against that and tell our elected leaders that we care. The ocean doesn't have to turn acidic because we're dumping so much carbon into it that its chemistry is changing. These are things that we can change and can control. So, I do remain cautiously optimistic. I realize that the battle lines are drawn and we have to fight hard, but I do think that it's worth fighting for. It's not too late. And we can see a reversal in the places that have been protected. You do see that resilience. The ocean does know how to take care of itself. We just need to leave it alone…” -Brian Skerry Since it’s the last week of summer, not officially but for most of us, we are re-sharing this very important and compelling conversation with Brian Skerry. Brian Skerry is one of the world's greatest and most accomplished underwater and marine wildlife photographers. He’s also one of the most prolific: he’s been a contract photographer for National Geographic since 1998, his work has been featured in scores of publications including Sports Illustrated, The New York Times and BBC Wildlife, and he’s the author of 11 books including the acclaimed monographs Ocean Soul and Shark . In that time he’s won so many awards that it would take a second email to list them all, but particular highpoints include Brian becoming an 11-time award winner in the prestigious Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition, and when National Geographic magazine named one of his images among their 50 Greatest Photographs Of All Time . In his four decades exploring the world's oceans, Brian has experienced things that very few humans will ever get to experience, like diving with a population of southern right wh
S6 E19 · Thu, August 26, 2021
Carl Safina: Becoming Wild
This week we are re-sharing one of our favorite episodes - a conversation with Carl Safina about beauty, wonder and why animals matter. "Beings who've succeeded on earth for millions of years, don’t seek, and should not require, our approval. They belong as well as we do. We do ourselves no favors by asking whether their existence is worth our while. We are hardly in a position to judge, hurdling and lurching along as we are with no goal, no plan except: bigger, faster, more. If we had the courage to be honest about it, we would have to admit that whales and birds and apes and all the rest live fully up to everything of which they are capable. And we, regrettably, fall short of doing that. For them, to be is enough. For us in the isolating alienation of our title retreat from Life, nothing is enough. It is strange how dissatisfied we insist on being, when there is so much of the world to know and love." Carl Safina, Becoming Wild Carl Safina grew up raising pigeons on a rooftop in Brooklyn and hasn’t stopped interacting with the wild since. He is an ecologist and author who writes extensively about our human relationship with the natural world and what we can do to make it better. First step: we need to care. Carl’s books make us care. He advocates for every living creature out there, and is always graciously pointing out why animals matter, not only why they matter to us, but why they matter to themselves - something I’m pretty certain that most humans don’t think about often enough. In his most recent book Becoming Wild, How Animal Cultures Raise Families, Create Beauty and Achieve Peace , Carl travels around the planet, exploring the cultures of chimpanzees in Uganda, sperm whales in the Caribbean, and Scarlet macaws in Peru. He shows us how other species teach and learn, and what life looks like in their animal societies, which is often as astonishing as it is spectacularly beautiful. His writing has won several awards, including a MacArthur Genius Prize, Pew and Guggenheim fellowships, and the John Burrows, James Beard, and George Rabb metals. He is the first Endowed Professor for Nature and Humanity at Stony Brook University and the founding president of the not for profit, Safina Center . He also hosted the PBS series, Saving the Ocean.
S6 E19 · Thu, August 19, 2021
Jamal Galves: Manatee Man
“It made me feel like I wished that I had some sort of a super power, so that I could just picked them up and take them somewhere safe. But unfortunately, I'm not strong enough to have done that. So what I did was decide, at 11 years old, that I was going to commit my life to safeguarding the species… that I'll do everything in my power.” – Jamal Galves Jamal Galves grew up in a small village in Belize that's famous for its Manatee population. When he was 11 years old, he saw a research boat near his home and got curious. He asked the scientists if he could tag along on their expedition, and for some reason they said yes. And, they let him come back the next day and again and again for next five years, until finally, when he was 16, they gave him a job. Now, 20 years later, he is the program coordinator for the Belize Manatee Conservation Program at the Clearwater Marine Aquarium Research Institute. Jamal sees it as his life's mission to protect and save these gentle giants. Antillean manatees are a vulnerable species and their population is dwindling. They face numerous threats, from habitat loss, hunting, boat collisions, fishing gear, and natural disasters. Jamal’s work provides science and education to conserve them and provides the data for establishing sanctuaries, reducing watercraft speed limits, and fighting poaching. Jamal made a promise to the manatees when he was a little kid and not a day has passed since that he hasn’t lived up to it.
S6 E18 · Thu, August 12, 2021
Paul Shapiro: Better Meat
“It's kind of like light… you flick a light switch on in the room and when you flip that switch, what you want is the experience of a lit room. You're not thinking about whether it comes from renewable energy or fossil fuels. You just want light. Well, I think most people just want meat. They don't care if animals are slaughtered. In fact, they probably would prefer that they not be slaughtered for it.” – Paul Shapiro Paul is the founder and CEO of the Better Meat Co. , an alternative protein company that is replacing animals in our food supply. He’s also the author of, Clean Meat: How Growing Meat Without Animals Will Revolutionize Dinner and the World . Paul spent the first two-plus decades of his career in animal protection. First, he founded and ran the animal protection organization, Compassion Over Killing, which is now called Animal Outlook, and then he spent 13 years at the Humane Society of the United States, working to give farmed animals better lives. He changed laws and the world for massive amounts of animals across this county. And then he had a realization… that food technology would save far more lives than anything else possibly ever could.
S6 E17 · Wed, August 04, 2021
Beverly And Dereck Joubert: Are We Being The Best Version Of Ourselves?
Tuesday, August 10th is World Lion Day, so we are re-sharing this conversation with Beverly and Derek Joubert. "When we were born, there were 450,000 lions, and today there are 20,000 lines. So that's a ninety-five percent decline. There were 750,000 leopards, and now maybe 45,000 leopards left. Cheetah numbers have dropped below 7,000. Tigers have had a little bit of a resurgence, but still under 5,000 and that's really worrying. We could lose a lot of these animals in the next 10 or 15 years" - Derek Joubert Are we being the best version of ourselves? That’s a question that Beverly and Dereck Joubert asked quite often during this conversation and also one that they seem to live by. It’s embedded into their work, their lives, their relationships - with each other, the wilderness, and the planet; as if the question floats above their heads as a gentle reminder of who they want to be in the world. And, the continual asking of that question shows in everything that they do, fight for, love, and are actively trying to save. They are award-winning filmmakers, National Geographic Explorers-in-Residence, and wildlife conservationists who have made over 30 films while researching, exploring, and doing vital conservation work throughout Africa for nearly four decades. They also happen to have what could possibly be the best love story of our time. They have been together for nearly 40 years and the great majority of it has been spent living in the bush in Botswana, making films, doing research, and fighting to save what’s left of the African wilderness and the large predators who inhabit it. For months and years at a time they’ve lived without electricity, without much human interaction, without many comforts, nor personal space – things that most couples have a difficult time managing over a week long glamping trip. They’ve been doing it for 38 years. Living in the bush for decades has included many death defying close calls, including what they simply refer to as the “incident” with a wounded (therefore angry) cape buffalo that nearly ended it all. Fortunately, everyone survived and after an 8 month stint in the hospital for Beverly, they returned to the bush and began filming again – at the exact place where the attack occurred. Did I mention that they are a little tougher than most of us? Their love story, like all of the good ones, is about something much bigger than themselves. It’s a story about Africa, the wilderness, the wild animals who live there, and it’s about fighting the biggest fight of our time, to save what’s left of this majestic planet. In the last 50 years, Africa has lost 90 to 95 percent of its large predators. We could very well witness the end of wild lions, cheetahs and other big cats in a decade or two. It’s that urgent and we are in that much trouble. If we want to live
S6 E17 · Thu, July 29, 2021
Erik Molvar: The American Wild Horse Crisis
“It is not hyperbole to say that livestock grazing on Western public lands is the single biggest and most important environmental impact that does the most damage. And, also causes the most widespread impact of any of the things that damage public lands, including oil and gas development, including strip mining and mountaintop removal, including, damming, the rivers. Livestock raising is the most pervasive and the most ecologically harmful - and it's everywhere.” - Erik Molvar In the United States, we have around 80,000 wild horses living on Western public lands. For decades, there's been a battle between the people who want these horses to stay and roam freely and the people who want them gone. Many of the people who want them gone are either a part of, or connected to the cattle industry.And, the agency that makes these decisions, whether the horses stay or go, is the Bureau of Land Management, the BLM. There are herds living on public lands throughout the Western United States. And one of, or maybe the most, beloved herd is the Onaqui. They live in Utah, around 60 miles from Salt Lake City. Because they're close to a city, people visit them often. The horses have become accustomed to a human audience, so they don't flee when they see humans. They trust them. Or at least they did until a couple of weeks ago when 435 of these majestic and very free horses were rounded up with helicopters by the BLM. 124 of them will become part of a birth control program and be released to the wild. But the other 300 will be put in a government holding facility. Eventually some might get adopted, but many will remain and holding for years. These roundups happen all the time, but the Onaqui roundup got a lot of publicity because these horses were so adored. The BLM’s reason for rounding up our horses is that they degrade public lands when the herds get too large. Now these same lands are rented for use for millions and millions of cattle and sheep. The horses are a teeny tiny fraction of animals that live on that land. Today's conversation is with Eric Molvar. He is not a wild horse advocate. He's a wildlife biologist and the executive director of the Western Watersheds Project, a nonprofit conservation group dedicated to protecting and restoring wildlife and watersheds across the American West. I asked Eric to come onto the show so that I could better understand how and why these roundups continue to happen.
S6 E16 · Thu, July 22, 2021
Nina Jackel: Lady Freethinker
“You can't get to a point where you're so sensitive that you don't call out cruelty and torture when you see it, whether it's to a human being or to the planet or to an animal, you can't just stay silent, but you have to approach in the right way.” N -Nina Jackel Nina Jackel is an activist and journalist and the founder and president of Lady Freethinker , a media organization that provides news and grassroots action for a free and compassionate world - for every species. In 2013 Lady Freethinker was a blog written by Nina for a handful of readers. Those readers soon multiplied and today, Lady Freethinker is a media and news organization with a team of writers and millions of readers. Their investigations and campaigns have led to major animal cruelty victories across the globe. Nina is a relentless force in the fight for justice for animals but she also has huge empathy for humans and the sometimes slow process it can be for them to get fully on board.
S6 E15 · Thu, July 15, 2021
Justin Barker: Bear Boy
“And then a letter arrived in the mail. It was from a woman who had heard about my work to help zoo animals. She said, ‘there's these two bears living in a cage in the town near my house. It's on a creek that floods every year. It's horrible conditions. I have no idea what to do. Can you help?’ I don't think she knew that I was a 13-year-old.” – Justin Barker Justin is an activist, a director, a producer, and the author of Bear Boy, The True Story of a Boy, Two Bears and the Fight to Be Free . When Justin was 13 years old, he started an organization called Citizens Lobbying for Animals in Zoos. And at 13, he created real change for captive animals, and not long after someone contacted him about two bears living in a wretched conditions in Northern California. Justin spent the next three years fighting to save these bears. Although his book is a young adult novel, it is a book that I think everyone should read. Justin is an example and inspiration of how one person can create enormous impact. And the fact that that person was 13 years old is all the more compelling.
S6 E14 · Thu, July 08, 2021
Damien Mander: How to be a Superhero
“So, we had 87 women come in for what we call pre-selection, the interviews... And I can say that after all the shit that I've been through in my life, that was some of the hardest two days of my life, listening to those stories. And, it was hard in a way because they were genuinely tough stories, but it was also hard in a way to know that even though I hadn't done anything directly to these women, I was part of a culture that had kept women just like this oppressed, the boys club, the macho club, all that sort of thing. And just part of, I suppose, this macho culture.” - Damien Mander Damien was on the show in December and the sound was horrendous. He was in the bush in Zimbabwe and I was in NYC and our connection was bad. We redid the interview last week, in person, in NYC - and it’s sounds like a dream… Damien Mander is the founder and CEO of the International Anti-Poaching Foundation (IAPF). He is a former Australian Royal Navy clearance diver and a special operations military sniper who became an anti-poaching crusader and an environmental and animal welfare activist. In 2009, while travelling through Africa, he was inspired by the work of rangers and the plight of wildlife. He liquidated his life savings and established the International Anti-Poaching Foundation. Over the past decade the IAPF has scaled to train and support rangers which now help protect over 20 million acres of African wilderness. In 2017 Damien founded ‘Akashinga - Nature Protected by Women,’ an IAPF program that has already grown to over 240 employees with 7 nature reserves in the portfolio. They are the only group of nature reserves in the world to be protected by women. And, these women are changing the game in terms of what it means to fight poaching. Damien was featured in the James Cameron documentary The Game Changers and has now released another documentary with James Cameron and National Geographic about his work with the women of Akashinga – “The Brave One’s .” He is a resident on the National Geographic Speakers Bureau, has spoken at the United Nations, featured in June 2019’s National Geographic Magazine, and has been featured three times on 60 Minutes. And, if you haven’t seen it, watch his TEDx Talk at the Sidney Oprah House, it
S4 E17 · Thu, July 01, 2021
Eric Adams: Planted. Not Buried
Planted. Not Buried. That is how Eric Adams has chosen to see himself through the darkest moments of his life. The first occurred at age 15, when he and his brother were beaten by the police. Four years later he became a police officer and spent the next 22 years on the force, working to help reform NYC policing from the inside. He retired as a captain and now he serves as the President of the Borough that I call home - Brooklyn. Yes, Brooklyn has a President , an incredibly busy and very much in demand President. Eric has spent most of 2020 on the frontlines; most recently the frontlines of the protests against police brutality and systemic racism and, during the months that Brooklyn was a COVID-19 hotspot, he spent his days handing out PPE to hospital workers and plant based meals to residents in need of a meal. Plant based because he has personally experienced the health benefits of a vegan diet. In 2016, he cured his own diabetes and partial blindness by making the switch. Since then he's been on a mission to implement plant based diets and nutrition in hospitals , schools , prisons , and communities all over New York City. Eric is a man who gives much more to the world than he takes from it. After my brief time with him, I found myself wanting to be and do much better. His graciousness, generosity, and desire to look for the opportunities are qualities that this world could use a whole lot more of. As a resident of Brooklyn, I feel extremely lucky and proud to have Eric running the show around here.
S6 E13 · Thu, June 24, 2021
Max Rye: The End of Dairy
“…by the way, today, there might be an ick factor associated with it, but there might come a day that people will wonder, why are we drinking other species milks… If you have access to the real thing or the stuff that's in the real thing. I mean, it's these special proteins… these amazing different complex sugars and proteins that are found in human milk that are super valuable.” - Max Rye Max Rye spent more than 15 years helping businesses scale with technology. He was the CEO of a Silicon Valley tech company and at the time, had no plans to nor thoughts of being at be at the forefront of transforming the entire global dairy industry. But, that’s what happened… He was speaking at Google headquarters in Singapore, when someone from the audience said to him, “I’m looking for milk that doesn’t come from cows and I know that people in San Francisco are making things with cells, why not milk?” That someone was Fengru Lin and she and Max are now the co-founders of Turtle Tree Labs . Turtle Tree labs is using cell-based technology to create all kinds of milk, from snow leopard and elephant milk to cow and human milk. And they have big plans for the human milk, bigger than just infant formula. As you can imagine, human milk is like a superfood with a lot of special proteins and complex sugars that just can’t be found anywhere else. And Turtle Tree Labs is working around the clock to put it on the market. The future is here and it’s getting kinder by the day.
S6 E12 · Thu, June 17, 2021
Edwina Von Gal: For the Birds
Edwina Von Gal is a landscape designer and an indomitable steward of the planet. She spent her career designing landscapes for the rich and famous and collaborating with architects and artists like Maya Lin, Richard Serra, and Frank Gehry. A little over a decade ago, Edwina had an epiphany about the chemicals that we are pouring into our lawns, landscapes, and backyards. She decided right then that it would become her life’s mission to change the way that we treat our land and founded the Perfect Earth Project , a nonprofit that promotes toxin-free lawns and landscapes. A few years ago, she expanded the mission. We are losing our birds at an alarming rate. Since the seventies, the United States has lost a third of our bird population. So, to combat the great bird decline, Edwina started Two-Thirds for the Birds , a campaign to bring our birds back. And the way to do that is to dedicate two thirds of all plantings to native plants and to commit to going toxin free. This conversation took place at Edwina’s spectacular home that sits on stilts atop a salt marsh. It was a gift to speak with Edwina about her mission, to learn about the history of chemicals and what we’ve done to our land, and to hear her remarkable stories, all while being surrounded by many many birds.
S6 E11 · Thu, June 10, 2021
Derek Sarno: Wicked Healthy
Derek Sarno is a chef and a rockstar in the vegan world and he’s on a mission to inspire you to cook and eat more plants. He’s the Director of Plant-Based Innovation for Tesco PLC, and the Developer/Co-Founder of Wicked Kitchen. He helps lead Tesco’s plant-based team and the initiative to bring delicious, unpretentious plant-based foods to mainstream market. Derek and his brother Chad are the founders of Wicked Healthy, LLC., Wicked Foods inc. and Good Catch Foods. Prior to Tesco, Derek served as the Senior Global Executive Chef for Whole Foods Market, where he oversaw global recipe development for the company’s healthy eating initiative, worked with suppliers and leadership to develop and promote plant-based foods across the organization, and served as Culinary Director for the Whole Foods Academy for Conscious Leadership. Derek is a serial entrepreneur, founding several award-winning restaurants and food service companies in the United States. Derek is the co-author of the Whole Foods cookbook, and the Wicked Healthy Cookbook. His journey has been fueled by curiosity and compassion, some of which he gained while living in a Buddhist monastery in Upstate New York, where he served as resident Chef & Gardener. Derek’s story is all about expansion and his life is an example of what it means to never stop evolving.
S6 E10 · Thu, June 03, 2021
Michael Pellman Rowland: The Oatly IPO, The Magic of Mushrooms, and The Future of the Protein Market Place
“If we fast forward, let's say to 2025, I think you're going to see a lot of companies in the marketplace using mushroom-based products to create alternatives to things like meat and chicken and within food. And then also alternatives within textiles to things like silk, leather and packaging for things like Styrofoam and plastic and so on. So, I’m very much a… what do you call it? Maybe, a fungo fanatic. I don’t know if there’s a phrase for that, but I am totally a believer in all things fungi.” -Michael Pellman Rowland Michael Pellman Rowland is a financial advisor. He’s made many appearances on Species Unite - this was his fourth time coming on the show. He and I spoke about the Oatley IPO - amongst many other enormous wins in the plant, cell, and mushroom-based worlds. Swedish vegan company, Oatly went public on May 20th. The company’s initial public offering (IPO) raised $1.4 billion and its share prices (which were initially set at $17 per share) spiked by 30 percent on the first day of trading. This is the second milestone for plant-based companies going public, after Beyond Meat a few years ago. The future of food is already here and fortunately, it’s happening much faster than many predicted. Michael is our go-to guru when it comes to the big wins for meat and dairy alternatives. He’s a wealth of knowledge and information and he’s a stellar human being. I learned a ton in this conversation, I hope that you do too.
S6 E9 · Wed, May 26, 2021
Sharon Guynup: Where Are They Now? The Fallen Stars of Tiger King
“During the time he was on the run, Stark did this Facebook live where he railed against the judges, officials, animal rights, activists. He claimed that together, all of these people had conspired to deny him the right to own and breed exotic animals. He taunted law enforcement. He waved a hand grenade in front of his phone. Keep in mind, he's driving down the highway during this hour-long Facebook live. And he was also saying that he was willing to die for what he believed in.” – Sharon Guynup Sharon Guynup is a journalist, author and a National Geographic Explorer. Her most recent article in National Geographic, ‘ Tiger King’ stars’ legal woes could transform cub-petting industry , focuses on the five stars of the docu-series, The Tiger King and what’s happened to them since the show premiered last March. Sharon’s been on the podcast before, the last time was a couple of months before the pandemic and before the Tiger King took over the world. She and her partner, photographer, Steve Winter had spent two years investigating tigers in the United States, for a 30 page piece called, The Tiger Next Door , for December 2019’s issue of National Geographic. It involves the criminal underworld, wildlife trafficking, murder, and thousands of captive tigers living sad pathetic lives all over the USA. America has a serious problem with captive wildlife, and what we’ve done to tigers is cruel, dangerous, and absolutely unnecessary. Since then, and since the Tiger King, much has changed, not only for tigers in the US, but for the majority of the stars of the show. Most of them are either in court, prison, or have had their animals seized or are dealing with a combination of all three. Sharon is a hero for tigers. She has been reporting on them for years, mostly tigers in the wild, until 2016, when her investigation into the famed Thai Tiger Temple for National Geographic published strong allegations of illegal wildlife trade, causing Thai officials to confiscate the 147 tigers living at the temple and shut the operation down. From there, she moved onto to the tiger disaster in the US. Every time one of these owners of roadside zoos and tiger petting attractions go down, the future looks better for tigers, but it’s not over. There are ways to combat the crisis right now. The first is to not participate in any wildlife tourism that includes selfies with wildlife or any type of handling of wild animals, and the second is to get behind and support The Big Cat Safety Act.
S6 E8 · Thu, May 20, 2021
Michael Selden: Making Fish Without the Fish
“There isn't going to be chicken farming on the moon or on Mars, but there could be cellular agriculture. And, so if people are going to eat meat in space, it's going to be produced like this…” – Michael Selden Michael Selden is the CEO and co-founder of Finless Foods , the world's first cellular agriculture company. Meaning they make fish without the fish and without the mercury, plastic, herbicides, ocean habitat destruction and cruelty. Finless Foods grows fish and other seafood products from cells. In 2017 they produced the first fish ever that was grown outside of a fish and eaten. Since then, they have produced 13 other types of fish, including bluefin tuna - with the goal to make bluefin that’s healthier, better tasting, more affordable, more sustainable, much more ethical and will allow the bluefin to stay in the ocean and not go extinct. The goings on at Finless are astonishing. They are creating the future of seafood, and it’s a future that will be better for the animals, for the planet and for all of us.
S6 E7 · Thu, May 13, 2021
Alexandra Horowitz: The World According to Your Dog
“I can drive my car off a cliff and just leave it where it lay, the most I'll get is a littering fine, and if you throw your dog off the cliff the punishment is actually pretty similar. That's because they're the same type of thing to the law. So, unless you change that status, and you have people of course, who are thinking that there should be a status of kind of living property that might give them more attributes than my car has or my chair has; and then there are individuals who think they should be given the status of legal persons, which isn’t to say being people, but having rights of some sort. I think both of those are pretty intriguing offers. I think we're a little ways off from doing that, but boy, either of those would be a massive improvement in our societal treatment of these creatures. And of course, I don't think it's just restricted to dogs… It's been terrific to work with dogs for all these years, but I think this way about lots of non-human animals that we interact with, were we kind of get to use them sort of, for our sake. I would love to see some kind of sea change in thinking such that we don't get to use animals in the ways we do now, which are really abuses of animals.” – Alexandra Horowitz If you have any questions for your dog, Alexandra Horowitz is a pretty good place to start. She’s spent much of her life researching and writing about what it’s like to be a dog. She is the #1 New York times bestselling author of Inside of a Dog: What Dogs See, Smell, and Know; Our Dogs, Ourselves , Being a Dog: Following the Dog Into a World of Smell; and On Looking. She is a professor at Barnard College, Columbia University, where she teaches seminars in canine cognition, creative nonfiction writing, and audio storytelling. As Senior Research Fellow, she heads the Dog Cognition Lab at Barnard. I wish this conversation had lasted all day long as I had about 5 thousand more questions for Alexandra - mostly, everything I’ve ever wanted to ask my dog. Although, the time we did have together was pretty amazing and felt like an absolute gift.
S6 E6 · Thu, May 06, 2021
Jo Anderson: How to Create Real Change
“…there's this disconnect between our beliefs and our behavior and part of what can be useful for overcoming that is to change the behavior first, which sounds really counterintuitive.” - Jo Anderson Jo Anderson is the Research Director at Faunalytics , an organization that empower animal advocates with access to research, analysis, strategies, and messages that maximize their effectiveness to reduce animal suffering. Jo is an advocate for animals and empirical research. For over ten years, Jo has investigated key social psychological issues such as persuasion, judgment, and decision-making, exploring how these concepts can be used to make the world a better place for humans and animals. That is what happens at Faunalytics, they do the research and enable real change. I learned a lot from Jo – mostly, that research changes the story and so often, reveals that the opposite of what seems obvious is in fact the truth.
S6 E5 · Thu, April 29, 2021
Michelle Egger: Human Breast Milk Made in a Lab
“We see 84% of moms in the U S convert to infant formula partially or entirely in that first six months of life before the recommended period of exclusive breastfeeding ends. We see two thirds of moms express extreme shame and guilt and stigma for the way they feed their children. And, we continue to see that the infant formula industry in general has really pillaged and plundered in a lot of ways on parents wanting to do what's best for their child, but really not having better options and having very little innovation to really think about how to better nourish a child.” Michelle Egger Michelle Egger is a food scientist and the CEO and co-founder of BIOMILQ , a woman-owned, science-led, mother-centered startup that is creating human breast milk in a lab, by culturing mammary cells. This has the potential for disrupting the infant formula industry forever; and will give families a more nutritious option for feeding their babies. Michelle founded BIOMILQ with cell biologist Lelia Strickland in January 2020, and soon after they received $3.5 million in funding from Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Bill Gates' investment firm. I’m beyond excited that BIOMILQ exists. They are creating a revolutionary product that will one day be on grocery store shelves across the world. It will be a game changer for mothers who struggle with breastfeeding, for the planet and for a whole lot of cows.
S6 E3 · Thu, April 22, 2021
Jonathan Balcombe: What A Fish Knows
“…gazing up to the night sky saying, ‘are we alone?’ …well, wait a minute, look around, there's tons of fascinating life forms. We're so lucky to have all this amazing panoply of life on the planet. I get the question… are there other humanoids out there? Or, are there other conscious beings? But we ought to be pretty grateful for what we have on this planet… there's a lot of amazing creatures and phenomena that we get to enjoy living with, if we can.” - Jonathan Balcombe Jonathan Balcombe is a biologist with a PhD in ethology, the study of animal behavior. He is the author of four books on the inner lives of animals, including the New York Times bestseller, What a Fish Knows . He has published over 60 scientific papers and book chapters on animal behavior and animal protection. Jonathan has spent his life studying animals, how they think and feel and why they matter. Quite often, he focuses on the ones that most of us tend not to think about very much, like fish and in his newest book, Super Fly , flies – it comes out in May. I thought I knew a little bit about fish, but after reading Jonathan’s book and after this time spent with him, I realized that I knew very little. There are 33,000 species of fish and what many of them are capable of is absolutely mind blowing . For eons, we have categorized species by who we deem worthy and who we don’t. Fish are almost always very near or at the bottom of that list. Clearly, that is because most of us know so little about them. Jonathan knows a lot. If you haven’t read his book, read it. It will astonish you. Jonathan can most recently be seen in the Netflix documentary, Seaspiracy.
S6 E3 · Thu, April 15, 2021
Hakeem Jimo: Veggie Victory
“A friend of mine in Germany is called Dr. Tofu. He was the first who did tofu on a commercial scale, in the eighties. They arrested him… for cooking something suspicious… He was arrested a couple of times. So, when it started in Nigeria and we opened the first vegan restaurant and there were also no vegetarian restaurants, people were saying, that's crazy. Why do you do that? But I knew kind of that time was on our side. - Hakeem Jimo Hakeem Jimo is the co-founder of Veggie Victory , Nigeria’s first plant-based food tech company. Hakeem and his partner, Bola Adeyanju also founded V Café, Nigeria’s first vegan restaurant in 2013. V Café is in Lagos and serves veganized Nigerian culinary delicacies to vegans, meat eaters and everyone in between. A few years after opening the restaurant, Hakeem and Bola began producing VChunks, a seitan-based meat alternative that was created to pair beautifully with most Nigerian cuisine. VChunks are dehydrated so that they can be kept on shelves for months and do not need refrigeration, which is not an option for many in parts of Nigeria. Hakeem is Nigerian-German, was born and raised in Germany and has lived in West Africa for the past 27 years. Before becoming a vegan food and tech entrepreneur, he worked in journalism and public relations.
S6 E2 · Thu, April 08, 2021
Carrie Packwood Freeman How We Talk About Animals
“We're all just participating in a culture that really isn't of our choice… we just grew up in this culture, but we can start questioning things and just not be afraid to say that we love other animals that they're astounding, and that we care about the environment and we want to be less impactful… you just have to be willing to say things that maybe other people haven't heard you say yet.” -Carrie P. Freeman Carrie Packwood Freeman is an associate professor of communications at Georgia State University. She's a critical cultural studies media researcher and has published in over 20 scholarly books and journals. She's also the co-author of Animals and Media , a style guideline web resource for media professionals. Animals and Media and In Defense of Animals recently partnered to call for an update to the Associated Press Stylebook’s recommendation on the use of personal pronouns for nonhuman animals, so that animals in news stories would be identified as, "she/her/hers and he/him/his when their sex is known, regardless of species, and the gender-neutral they, or he/she, or his/hers when their sex is unknown." The letter is signed by Jane Goodall as well as 80 other leaders, scholars, and advocates fighting for a better world for animals. Carrie is here to talk about why it's so important that we change the way that we talk about animals in the media, in entertainment and in regular everyday conversation.
S6 E1 · Thu, April 01, 2021
Eloísa Trinidad and Power Malu: Overthrow Community Fridge
We're creating a new system. When you look at it in that way, that's activism in itself. And that's actually fighting against a system that has billions of dollars, that has been spending billions of dollars, and not even asking people what they like to eat. They're not even considering the health. We're in the middle of a pandemic and who gets hit the hardest, black and brown communities with underlying conditions. Those underlying conditions stem from what they're eating. I get to go into these people's apartments, look in their fridge and then look at their medicine cabinet and see all of these drugs that they're taking because of ailments that they got from food. Meanwhile, if they were to change up how they eat, we were able to reintroduce that in a public sense, because with the fridge it’s like we're telling people, listen you deserve to have access to this.” -Power Malu Power Malu and Eloísa Trinidad are the team behind Overthrow Community Fridge , New York City's first plant-based community fridge that sits outside of Overthrow Boxing Club. A community fridge is a form of mutual aid to address food insecurity. They supply food to people who have limited access to fresh groceries, and since the pandemic began, people have even less access – especially to nutritious food. In addition to being a longtime community organizer and activist, Power is also the Director of Community Affairs & Special Events at the Overthrow Boxing Club. Eloísa is the executive director of Chillis on Wheels, a nonprofit that focus on making veganism accessible to communities in need. She’s also the executive director of the Vegan Activist Alliance, a New York organization that fights to end animal exploitation.
Thu, March 04, 2021
Uma Valeti: The Man Who Will Change the World
“I was doing really well in cardiology. I loved my role. I loved the work I was doing. I'd say except for two or three people, everybody said, ‘this is crazy, why are you giving up a career that is on an upward trajectory and that you're doing really well in?’ The two or three people who heard me, they said, ‘Uma don't look back. If you have even a fraction of the impact of what you're thinking of having, that'll be a million-fold more impactful than what you could do as a cardiologist for the next 30 years in practice.’ Essentially, even if I had continued in practice for the next 30 years I would have probably saved about two or three thousand lives. But if the innovation that we're working on becomes mainstream or even a fraction of mainstream, we're literally talking about trillions of animal lives, but also billions of human lives…” - Uma Valeti Uma Valeti is a cardiologist, entrepreneur, and the CEO and co-founder of Memphis Meats , the world’s leading clean meat company - meaning they produce meat directly from animal cells. There is no slaughter involved. Uma’s mission is to feed the world’s growing population with meat that is delicious, affordable and sustainable. Memphis Meats has already pioneered the world’s first multi-species cell-based meat platform and made history by unveiling chicken, duck and beef grown directly from animal cells. I think it’s the most exciting thing to happen on the planet in my lifetime. Uma is quite possibly going to go down in history as the man who changed the way the world eats forever. As soon as cell-based meat is regulated, scaled, and available in restaurants and grocery stores (which is coming sooner than you think), the demand to slaughter of billions of animals year after year will diminish and at some point, it will be gone forever.
S5 E22 · Thu, February 25, 2021
Jim Greenbaum: Giving it All Away
“I sat down, did some number questing and said, okay, 85% is going to be given away during my lifetime and the rest of thereafter. I sleep much better at nights. I do live comfortably, but there's a limit. I'd rather that money go to save lives.” - Jim Greenbaum Jim Greenbaum is the Founder and Managing Director of The Greenbaum Foundation . After college, Jim entered the workforce with one goal in mind - to make as much money as quickly as possible in order to use those funds to help make the world a better place. In 1985, Jim founded and became CEO of Access Long Distance. Less than a decade later he made the decision that he would leave the corporate world at the age of 40. Keeping true to the plan, he sold the company in 1999. Jim has committed to contributing in excess of 85% of his assets to charitable projects ending human and non-human suffering during his lifetime, and the remainder of his estate soon thereafter. The foundation’s assets will also be spent down during his lifetime. The Greenbaum Foundation focuses funding on effective and efficient projects working to bring about the end of human and non-human suffering in areas of the highest need and where they the most impact. During the early years the foundation focused solely on human rights, but have since shifted their efforts toward non-humans, and toward moving the world to whole foods plant-based diets and ending factory farming. Their portfolio also includes projects aimed at increasing the awareness, protection and improvement of the lives of all animals. Jim is also an Executive Producer of several documentaries, including “The Game Changers,” “What The Health,” "Cowspiracy," and "Not My Life." "Being a bystander to suffering is not an option." – Jim Greenbaum
S5 E21 · Thu, February 18, 2021
Helena Husseini: Like it’s Going to be the Last Day
“I usually live day by day. I always live every day like it's going to be the last day. We learned that during the war. We don't know when we're going to die. So, you live every day like it's going to be the last day. That's what I do.” – Helena Husseini Helena Husseini is the vice-president of BETA, Beirut Ethical Treatment for Animals. BETA is the first and largest shelter in Lebanon with 850 dogs, many cats, a few horses, and a couple of monkeys. Helena is also an architect. She has been with BETA since 2006, a few months before the Lebanon War started. As bombs dropped nearby, she drove around in her Jeep saving the injured and abandoned dogs throughout the city. Since then, she has been rescuing animals during the too many crises and catastrophes that have plagued Lebanon, including the 2019 financial collapse, the riots, COVID 19, and the blast that decimated Beirut. This conversation is really one that's about resilience, about grit, about what it means to show up every day, even when bombs are dropping, when there's no access to money, when people are starving, and no one knows what tomorrow will look like. It's a conversation about what it means to choose the meaningful life.
S5 E20 · Thu, February 11, 2021
Jill Robinson: Ending One of the Darkest Trades on Earth
“…I just remember walking around this room in total shock and then backing into a cage and feeling something touch my shoulder and realizing, ‘Oh my gosh, you know, I’ve come too close,’ and thinking I was going to be hurt. Then, as I turned around [I saw] what had touched me was the bears paw through the bars of the cage. She just had her paw there and was holding it out. And I did something ridiculously stupid. I took her paw, because it was there, reaching out and she just squeezed my fingers. That's all she did. She just rhythmically squeezed my fingers. And I just looked into her eyes and I just knew it was one of those amazing moments that you can hardly describe. Because you just know at that point, everything in your life is going to change. Well, indeed, that’s exactly what happened.” - Jill Robinson Jill Robinson has spent nearly 30 years of her life fighting to end bear bile farming, one of the world’s darkest industries that most people have never heard of. She is widely recognized as the world’s leading authority on bear bile farming and is the founder and CEO of Animals Asia, an organization that has been rescuing bears since 1994 and is devoted to ending the entire bear bile industry. They are one of the few organizations in the world that is close to reaching the goal that they originally set out to achieve.
S5 E19 · Thu, February 04, 2021
Bernat Añaños: Foods For Tomorrow
“…people were treating us like two crazy guys from Spain that were trying to change something in a country that loves meat... And now we see in these supermarkets, our product there… it’s crazy. I get very emotional when I think about that day that with Marc. We were working in a library for free because we did not have money to pay for an office. We just had this idea. We had these first prototypes for a product… let's try to sell it in few shops and let's see the feedback. And now we are in more than 3000 points of sale, more than 10 countries. And, what's coming is big. It's huge.” – Bernat Añaños Bernat Añaños is the co-founder of the Spanish plant-based startup, Heura by Foods for Tomorrow . Bernat and Marc Coloma founded Heura in 2017 with the goal of disrupting the unsustainable food system by bringing a solution that will accelerate the shift to a world where the animals are out of the meat production equation. Since they launched, Heura has become the fastest growing European startup in the plant-based industry, with 450% growth this year despite the pandemic. 4 years ago, Bernat and Marc could not get their products into supermarkets. That’s because people were unwilling to believe that meat loving Spain would ever embrace plant-based products. But, like in every other country where it was assumed that the public would be resistant to plant-based foods, especially in chain restaurants and grocery stores, the assumptions were wrong. Heura’s products are now sold at over 3000 locations (grocery stores, restaurants, and online) and they’ve expanded into ten other countries with many more coming. “I'm seeing a huge change. And the good thing is that it's not just in Barcelona and Madrid. It's also happening in villages and small cities. …my grandma, for example, she does not even eat meat anymore and she is using Facebook to introduce Heura to her 80 year old friends… and the response of these 80 year old friends of my grandma, it's crazy… I think we are on the right path… We were and we still are a meat lover’s country, but maybe… it's a plant-based meat lover’s country in very few years. “ - Bernat Añaños
S5 E18 · Thu, January 28, 2021
Kim and Frohman Anderson: Plant Powered Family
“… it was quite a big change… when I was growing up, I even used to like hunt and fish, to be honest. I mean, that was part of our family tradition through generations, I made friends through those sorts of activities. My father and I used to do those things and my grandfather [too]. So, growing up around animal cruelty… it was very natural for me. …saying, “no, I'm not going to continue to participate in those sorts of things,” was actually quite a big transition and a scarry one. I didn't know what that meant for my relationship with my family.” - Frohman Anderson “You know, he's a very wise young man and he knew exactly how to get us, which was through education… for Christmas, he actually said, “I don't want any gifts. I don't want any presents. I just want you to watch these movies and give me the time to talk about them.” …my husband and I watched Forks over Knives and Cowspiracy. And if you told me that morning that I would have been vegetarian, I probably would have said no. And then the next morning it was, it was just so obvious.” - Kim Anderson Kim and Frohman Anderson are partners in Everhope Capitol , a fund that invests in entrepreneurs and businesses that replace animals in the supply chain. Kim is also the creator and co-founder of Plant City , the world’s first and largest vegan food hall. It’s located in Providence, Rhode Island. Kim is Frohman’s mother. Frohman went vegan in college and his family soon followed suit. Soon after, the family business became a plant-based investment fund, and Kim founded Plant City with Matthew Kenney, one of the top plant-based chefs in the world. In their first year they served 450 thousand guests. This is the story of the power of one family, and how that one family is changing the future around how and what we eat.
S5 E16 · Thu, January 21, 2021
Jennifer Stojkavic: Vegan Women Rule
“We're not even talking about the barriers of having a plant-based company. There are still so many countries that they don't even support plant-based innovation, for every Israel and Singapore that’s making leaps and bounds, there's a France that's trying to push a meat diet. So, to be in an industry that is here to disrupt the mainstream and is here to disrupt a lot of what people hold dear, that’s a lonely journey. We need to make the effort to drive the conversation in the direction that we want it to go, because if we're not actually making the effort to build this path in this direction, it's going to default to the status quo and we know what the status quo is. So, we need to push against that.” – Jennifer Stojkavic Jennifer Stojkovic is the founder of Vegan Women’s Summit (VWS). Jennifer built her career as a community relations leader for the world’s largest tech companies in San Francisco. During her career in tech, Jennifer became increasingly interested in blending her passion for change in the food system with her experience and network in Silicon Valley. In early 2018, Jennifer launched a “Future of Food” series of partnerships bringing together CEOs and founders from leading tech brands, including WeWork and Airbnb, with emerging CEOs from the burgeoning food tech industry to establish food as the “Tech 2.0”. Quickly, Jennifer became aware of the inequities facing female founders in the food tech industry — and the unfortunate parallels drawn from the same experiences she has combatted in her career as a woman at the intersection of tech and politics in the Valley. Drawing on these experiences, Jennifer launched VWS in early 2020 with a sold-out global conference, the Vegan Women Summit. Focused on building equitable and diverse representation of women leaders from around the world and partnering with major tech brands, VWS is the world’s first events and media organization dedicated to empowering, educating, and inspiring women to bring compassion to their careers. With a thriving, fast-growing community of energetic female leaders around the world, VWS features programming with the world’s leading vegan CEOs, celebrities, investors, Olympians, and more. In December, VWS launched VWS Pathfinder , the world’s first female founder summit and pitch competition dedicated exclusively to plant-based innovation.
S5 E16 · Thu, January 14, 2021
Chris Kerr: The Godfather of Vegan Venture Capital
“We spent 50 years fighting industry and I mean, fighting industry. And we were poking a bear and poking a bear and poking a bear. And then one day that bear came up and just nuzzled us under the neck and said, “okay, we're interested.” …It was industry, it was the big players that came in and said, “why are we fighting this? If consumers are asking for plant-based, we can sell plant-based.’” – Chris Kerr Chris Kerr is on a mission to upend the entire food industry. Chris is the Chief Investment Officer at Unovis/New Crop Capital , a venture capital fund that invests in entrepreneurs whose products or services replace foods derived from animal agriculture. He is also the co-founder and CEO of Gathered Foods, known for its Good Catch plant-based seafood products, the co-founder and Director of Wicked Foods, and the director of Cultivated Food Labs. Chris is one of the first people that helped direct early-stage investments for plant-based food companies. He’s been focused on impact investing with a concentration on the plant-based food sector since 2007, when he worked with the Humane Society of the United States to manage their investments into the plant-based food industry and played a key role in helping Daiya cheese secure distribution in Whole Foods Market. “ You can't rescue your way out of the animal protection world, you just can’t. So, what can we do to actually do to change it at its base? If we can change people's opinion about eating plants, eating something other than animals, then maybe we wouldn't have to keep hitting them over the head with the ethical and moral baseball bat.” – Chris Kerr Chris is helping some of the top plant-based companies through investment funding and mentorship, all with the goal of accelerating the plant-based food industry and moving the world away from eating animals. I hope that you learn as much as I did from Chris and are as excited about what’s happening with the future of food. Please listen and share.
S5 E15 · Thu, January 07, 2021
Leah Garcés and Michael Pellman Rowland: Transfarmation
“There's $5 billion of debt collectively from contract chicken farmers. It's enormous. You're just treading water. You're just paying the bills and it starts off great, in the sense that you think you're going to make enough money. But you end up just paying bills and never getting ahead. And that's very typical.” – Leah Garcés Over the past few decades, people have become increasingly aware of the that factory farming is destroying the planet and most know that its abhorrently cruel and inhumane for animals. But most people still don’t realize that many farmers are also exploited, in massive debt and living far below the poverty line because of it. The Transfarmation Project aims to change that by freeing farmers from the confines of factory farming and the cycle of debt by helping them transition to plant-based farming. “The project is about creating constructive solutions, where we come in and work with communities, with farmers, finding alternatives. Especially alternative economies or alternative ways of farming that move farmers away from factory farming to something that's regenerative and sustainable and is creating a compassionate food system.” – Leah Garces Leah Garcés, the President of Mercy for Animals and Michael Pellman Rowland, a financial advisor and a Mercy for Animals Board Member spoke with me about Transfarmation at a live event in December. Please listen and share - this project is going to change the world for millions of animals and for farmers across the planet.
S5 E14 · Thu, December 31, 2020
Daniel Fox: Feel the Wild
“Scientists have made this study and experiment… people would actually feel bad for the butterfly because now it's ready to come out of its cocoon, so they would open the cocoon for it. They would slice it open to make it easier for the butterfly to come out. And it turns out that even doing that weakens the butterfly, because that effort of breaking the cocoon and spreading your wings is a necessity to become more resilient and stronger in life” – Daniel Fox Daniel Fox is a photographer, solo wilderness explorer, author of FEEL THE WILD , founder of Feel the Wild VR, a LEXUS ambassador, SANDISK Extreme Team member, SENNHEISER Artist, publisher of the Proust Nature Questionnaire, and founder/mentor of WILD.ECO, a non-profit with a mission to foster resilient, empowered, adaptable, curious, and empathetic students of life, using Nature as a framework for personal transformation. Daniel and I spoke early in the pandemic – mostly about nature: how it heals, how it teaches, and why we so desperately need it right now. On this very last day of this very strange year, this episode serves as a reminder to connect. To connect with ourselves, with one another and with nature. Because in nature we can heal, start over, and remember who we are and why we’re here. In nature we can remember that we are all one.Happy New Year! Let’s hope for a better one.
S5 E13 · Thu, December 24, 2020
Thomas King: Plant-based Wunderkind
“…From everything that I'd learned and from everything that I'd seen, I came to realize that our food and how we produce it, particularly products of industrial animal agriculture links to almost every issue I'd worked on from biodiversity loss to climate change to food insecurity.” – Thomas King Thomas King is the founder and CEO of Food Frontier, a food innovation think tank dedicated to diversifying the world's food supply through the development of alternatives proteins. For the last decade Thomas has driven food systems and environmental and poverty alleviation initiatives across five continents. Thomas is 24 years old. At 13, he launched an awareness campaign about deforestation caused by unsustainable palm oil production, which catapulted him right into the deep end of advocacy where he has lived ever since. At 18, he was named Victoria's Young Australian of the year for his environmental and humanitarian work.
S5 E12 · Wed, December 16, 2020
Aryenish Birdie: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Animal Protection
“I think that when the animal protection movement really started gaining hold in the seventies... in the United States at least, I think there was a lot of harm done in the ways that we messaged the connections between humans in marginalized communities and animals. And I think that there's also a dynamic where… communities of color are often struggling for basic rights, basic needs to be met. And so, fighting for others is kind of a nice to have.” - Aryenish Birdie Aryenish Birdie is founder and Executive Director of Encompass , an organization that is fighting to increase effectiveness in the animal protection movement by fostering greater racial diversity, equity, and inclusion while empowering advocates of color. Before founding Encompass, Aryenish was a federal lobbyist at the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. She was part of a four-woman team instrumental in reforming the Toxic Substances Control Act to ensure that animal protection language was integrated into the law. Thank you, Elizabeth Novogratz
S5 E11 · Thu, December 10, 2020
Damien Mander: The Anti-Poaching Crusader
“Even the first morning we saw a toughness, a certain toughness that I hadn't been experienced to. What we didn't realize with selection criteria that we're putting out there, is that we're actually getting the toughest in those communities. Not only in these communities, I mean, you're talking about one of our poorest places in one of the harshest areas on the planet, The Zambezi Valley and the life of a woman in rural Zimbabwe in the Zambezi Valley is it's not an easy one. And so we thought, with all this military selection, we were going to put them through what we perceived to be torture - putting them through the, what we in the military term, the four pillars of misery: to be hungry, cold, tired, and wet for extended periods of time and physical and mental strain. The thing is, the harder we pushed these women the more they smiled.” Damien Mander Damien Mander is the founder and CEO of the International Anti-Poaching Foundation (IAPF). He is a former Australian Royal Navy clearance diver and a special operations military sniper who became an anti-poaching crusader and an environmental and animal welfare activist. In 2009, while traveling through Africa, he was inspired by the work of rangers and the plight of wildlife. He liquidated his life savings and established the International Anti-Poaching Foundation. Over the past decade the IAPF has scaled to train and support rangers which now help protect over 20 million acres of African wilderness. In 2017 Damien founded ‘Akashinga - Nature Protected by Women,’ an IAPF program that has already grown to over 240 employees with 7 nature reserves in the portfolio. They are the only group of nature reserves in the world to be protected by women. And, these women are changing the game in terms of what it means to fight poaching. Damien was featured in the James Cameron documentary The Game Changers and has now released another documentary with James Cameron and National Geographic about his work with the women of Akashinga – “The Brave One’s .” He is a resident on the National Geographic Speakers Bureau, has spoken at the United Nations, featured in June 2019’s National Geographic Magazine, and has been featured three times on 60 Minutes. And, if you haven’t seen it, watch his TEDx Talk at the Sidney Oprah House, it’s just awesome. It was an honor to spend time with Damien. He is a warrior, a hero and a man who understands what it means to never stop evolving
S5 E10 · Thu, December 03, 2020
Nicole Rawling: Lab Grown Animal Leather is Happening
Nicole Rawling is the co-founder and executive director of the Material Innovation Initiative (MII) , a game-changing non-profit that is helping to remove and replace animal materials with high-tech, near-identical materials that are all made without harming an animal. The goal of the initiative is to remove the farmed animal from materials such as leather, wool, silk, down, fur, and exotic skins - and instead use cutting-edge tech like cultivated and lab-grown cells to make kinder and more sustainable alternatives. Growing next gen materials like this is going to change the world – for animals, humans, and the planet. And by partnering with scientists, start-ups, and retailers, the institute is at the forefront of bringing these critical innovations to market. The future is here and the hope is that in the next decade, animals will no longer be used in materials in the fashion, automotive, and home goods industries. And, Nicole and MII are making this happen fast.
S5 E9 · Thu, November 26, 2020
Kelly Guerin: Love Begets Love
“… we are trying to make something watchable that is just unwatchable. I don't want to be here and I don't want to see this. And every part of me wants to turn away, but you have to engage with it, and you have to come out the other end with something that hopefully can encourage other people to stick with long enough to have it land.” - Kelly Guerin How we treat animals is how we treat humans. Kelly Guerin is a documentary filmmaker who has been making that connection for as long as she’s been making films. She is a part of the extraordinary We Animals Media Team and has worked independently as well as alongside NGO’s to direct, film, and edit dozens of short films spanning topics of animal protection, environmental justice, and human rights throughout the world. Her debut feature length documentary, Nations of Their Own is set to be released in 2021. The film takes place in occupied Palestine and follows an unexpected group of activists who are on a mission to rescue their country from the effects of decades of military occupation, starting with its animals.
S5 E8 · Thu, November 19, 2020
Lori Marino: Intelligent Life on Earth
“In a natural setting, these animals would be swimming maybe a hundred miles a day, diving deep. They have their social lives, their social networks, roles to play in very tightly-knit family groups. They raise their children. They have cultures, different ways of doing things in different populations. They can explore and play and come together. None of that is available in the concrete tank. None of it. They don't have any place to go. They don't have any place to dive… what you see is a lot of mortality, a lot of sickness, a lot of behavioral abnormalities. Everything that makes life worth living for a dolphin or whale is absent in marine parks and concrete tanks. None of it is available.” – Lori Marino Lori Marino is a neuroscientist and an expert in animal behavior and intelligence. Much of her work is focused on whales and dolphins. She's currently the president of the Whale Sanctuary Project , which will be a seaside sanctuary for former performing orcas and belugas that have spent their entire lives in concrete tanks. Lori is also the founder and Executive Director of the Kimmela Center for Animal Advocacy , an organization that bridges the gap between academic research and on the ground animal advocacy efforts. She has appeared in several film and television programs, including the documentaries Blackfish, Unlocking the Cage, and Long Gone Wild, which is a 2019 documentary that picks up where Black Fish left off, and is also where the Whale Sanctuary Project begins. The Whale Sanctuary Project is going to change the world for the lucky orcas and belugas that will end up there. They will also be a model for future sanctuaries for cetaceans – as we need a ton of them, there are way too many of these animals living in captivity. It stuns me that even after documentaries like Blackfish, people all over the world (including many in the US) still visit marine mammal parks. Mostly, people go because they don’t know. They don’t know how miserable life is for the whales and dolphins and they don’t know how intelligent and emotionally complex these animals are. Keeping them in tanks is cruel, inhumane, and unjust and it needs to stop. Lori has made it her life’s work to not only study their intelligence, but to advocate and fight for their lives. This conversation is an important one, after listening to Lori, I think it’d be very difficult for anyone to give another dollar to a marine park anywhere on Earth.
S5 E7 · Thu, November 12, 2020
Amanda Hearst: A Better World for All Beings
“Because we're told of so many problems and issues around the world, we get overwhelmed. And if you tell someone, okay, this is what's going on and this is what you can do. That's a bit different, people are like, okay, that's actionable.” - Amanda Hearst Amanda Hearst is co-founder of Well Beings , an organization that unites animal welfare and environmental protection throughout the globe - from closing down puppy mills in the American South to stopping deforestation in South America. Their most recent campaign is to stop the fires in the Bolivian Amazon; and because of COVID-19, they’ve also been campaigning to stop the next pandemic by preventing wildlife trafficking in the rainforests - which has been linked to the spread of similar coronaviruses. Amanda is also co-founder of the luxury, sustainable, fashion retailer Maison de Mode . Check out their cruelty-free edit – it’s absolutely stunning.
Thu, November 05, 2020
Melanie Joy: Why We (Still) Love Dogs, Eat Pigs and Wear Cows
“The core of this problem in the world in many ways. is the consciousness that we bring to the world. When we think of others in the world or ourselves as being more or less worthy of being treated with respect, that very thinking is what drives many of the social problems we see in the world.” – Dr. Melanie Joy Melanie Joy is a Harvard educated psychologist, specializing in the psychology of eating animals, social transformation and relationships. She is the award-winning author of six books, including the best-selling, Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs and Wear Cows . She is the founder of the non-profit, Beyond Carnism, dedicated to exposing and transforming carnism, the invisible belief system that conditions people to eat certain animals. Melanie is a recipient of the Ahimsa award for her work on global nonviolence. This award was previously given to the Dalai Lama and Nelson Mandela. She also received both the Peter Singer Prize and the Empty Cages Prize for her work developing strategies to reduce the suffering of animals. Melanie’s TEDx talk called, Toward Rational Authentic Food Choices has received over 800,000 views. No matter what your diet consists of, I hope that this conversation will inspire you to delve a little deeper into the systems and beliefs that quietly run the show when it comes to the psychology behind what (and who) we eat.
S5 E5 · Thu, October 29, 2020
Dan Mathews: Like Crazy
“When I moved my mom in, I certainly felt, okay, now I'm off the market. I've got a broken-down house, a crazy mother, a high-pressure job being a vegan activist at PETA… this is not really a good resume for finding Mr. Right.” – Dan Mathews Dan Mathews is the Director of Campaigns at PETA. He’s been there since the 80s when he was hired as a receptionist right after college. Dan’s responsible for PETAs most controversial and outlandish campaigns including the "I'd Rather Go Naked Than Wear Fur" ads. He’s been arrested more than 20 times, but all for good reason - having changed the world for millions of animals. He is also the author of two books, Committed and most recently, Like Crazy: Life with My Mother and Her Invisible Friends , a darkly funny memoir about the hardships and rewards of taking in a mentally and physically fragile parent. It shows the spectacular amount of expansion and growth that result from to choosing to do the right thing over the easy thing, from choosing the more beautiful life. Dan is brilliant, extremely funny, and a gift to humans and animals everywhere.
S5 E4 · Thu, October 22, 2020
Ryan Bethencourt: This is the Future of Dog Food
"…when I say people had no idea, these were investors, right? These were people who thought they had a crystal ball on the future. And I was like, look, our world has to change for so many reasons. The fact that we're slaughtering animals and doing so in really horrific ways, that is not the future. And so, if that is not the future, what is? It's embracing biotech, it's embracing food science, it's embracing the things that will remove these animals and the environmental impact of this out of the system." - Ryan Bethencourt 30 percent of the meat consumed in the United States is eaten by our pets. That is a staggering number. Ryan Bethencourt thought so too, which is why is doing something about it. Ryan is the founder and CEO of Wild Earth , a sustainable, meat-free alternative to dog food. It’s the Beyond Meat for dogs. You may have seen Ryan pitch it on Shark Tank – not only did the Sharks taste his dog treats, Mark Cuban invested. Ryan is a scientist, entrepreneur, and a biotech investor. He has led, built and advised more than 80 companies, including: Shiok Meats , Memphis Meats , Geltor , New Wave Foods , Clara Foods , and Finless Foods . He co-founded IndieBio , the world's leading biotech accelerator and was head of Sciences for the XPRIZE Foundation . He's currently a partner at Babel Ventures , a consumer biotech fund. Ryan believes that using biology as technology will solve some of the world's most intractable problems.
S5 E3 · Thu, October 15, 2020
James Arbib: Rethinking Humanity
We are on the cusp of the fastest, deepest, most consequential transformation of human civilization in history, a transformation every bit as significant as the move from foraging to cities and agriculture 10,000 years ago. James Arbib and Tony Seba, Rethinking Humanity James Arbib is co-founder of RethinkX, a nonprofit think tank that explores how technology will shape the future and disrupt all levels of society, including information energy, materials, transportation, and my favorite, food – food that will not come from slaughtered animals. Jamie and RethinkX cofounder, Tony Seba are the authors of Rethinking Humanity: Five Foundational Sector Disruptions, the Lifecycle of Civilizations, and the Coming Age of Freedom . They predict that new technologies could wipe out poverty and solve climate change in the next 10-15 years, and bring in a new "Age of Freedom.” Which sounds pretty phenomenal, but they also warn that it could pose huge challenges for a a world that still clings to outdated concepts such as democracy, capitalism and the nation state.
S5 E2 · Thu, October 08, 2020
April Tam Smith: Radical Generosity
…not everyone can afford to donate a certain percentage of their money, not everyone can afford to volunteer their time because they're working so much. If you can, this is your generosity to the world, this is your generosity to all the people that cannot. And I think that's kind of our duty and our privilege. What is the max generosity that you can live with, with your food choices, with your time, with your money choices. - April Tam Smith April Tam Smith is the co-founder of PS Kitchen, a plant-based restaurant in the Theater District in New York City that gives away all of its profits and hires people in need of a second chance. By day, April is a managing director at a large New York City investment firm. While spending her days on Wall Street and nights at the restaurant, she still somehow finds an amazing amount of time to give to and serve in other communities throughout New York City, as well as around the world. April and I sat down at PS Kitchen to talk about what it means to give, to be radically generous, to live a life of service, and the insane amounts of energy that she has - not only to do all of the above, but to do it with grace, joy, and a boundless love of life. April is an inspiration. After hearing her story I couldn’t help but rethink about what it means to be a human walking around on this planet and how we all can be doing it a little bit better.
S5 E1 · Thu, October 01, 2020
Liza Heavener: The Game Changer
There would be some mornings that the indigenous tribal leaders would take us out into virgin rainforest… [I was] like, “no human has ever stood here before.” And it was alive with, I mean, you name the animal… and it was loud full and of life. And they would take us out the very next day and it was just smoldering because it had been slashed and burned illegally in the middle of the night. And it was just completely quiet except for what was left of the fire. And that that changes you. Liza Heavener Liza’s story is one of my favorites. She spent a decade working in federal politics, grassroots and campaign strategy and with the United States Congress. Liza was a healthcare lobbyist for a large membership organization, running their national advocacy program to engage hundreds of thousands of advocates across the country. Then… she won a contest to work a documentary and tv series in Borneo. Liza went there for what she thought would be 100 days… but ended up staying for the next year. While she was there, her world turned upside down. And what came out of it is this force of a woman who has dedicated herself to creating a better planet for everyone who lives on it, not just the humans. Liza is the Chief Operating Officer at NEXUS Global and she chairs the Nexus Working Group on Animal Welfare and Biodiversity Conservation, which is dedicated to educating, empowering and connecting Next-Gen impact investors, philanthropists, and social entrepreneurs. She also serves as an Advisor to the Millennial Action Project and as a Vice Chair of the Alumni Council for Eastern Mennonite University. Liza had a feature role in the internationally-acclaimed documentary and tv series, “Rise of the Eco-Warrior,” and has spoken at conferences across the country.
S4 E23 · Thu, September 03, 2020
Gemunu de Silva: The Quiet Man Speaks
“Bearing witness is difficult. It does hit your emotions... I think you've got to remember, these images that you take are not yours to keep… it's your duty to put them out there or let organizations get them out there. I think that's how you cope - it’s thinking, okay these aren't going to stay in my head. These are actually going to go out into the world and are going to create change.” - Gemunu de Silva Today’s episode is a special one. It’s with Gemunu de Silva. Gem is a filmmaker and an activist who has been investigating and documenting animal rights abuses since the eighties, before there was even such a thing as a camcorder, instead he covertly filmed inside of factory farms with a video camera and a VHS recorder attached to his back. He was the first person in the UK to film in and expose the atrocities that happen every day on industrial farms. He directed and produced programs for UK national television, including the documentary, Meathead . Watch it – it’s absolutely spectacular. He left the film and television world to set up and run the Investigations Unit at Compassion in World Farming. Gem also lead the unit’s pioneering work on long distance animal transport. In the early 2000’s, Gem went to work as the Director of Research and Investigations at Cruelty Free International, where he specialized in exposing the vile international trade of primates for research. In 2006, Gem co-founded Tracks Investigations . They have just completed their 250th investigative film project. That is an enormous number of investigations. 35 animal rights and protection organizations have benefited from their work in 57 countries. The work that Gem has done for the past three and a half decades has changed laws, minds and the world for millions of animals. For most of that time, he has laid low and stayed under the radar and has not done any media in decades. It was an absolute honor to have Gem on the show to tell his story.
S4 E22 · Thu, August 27, 2020
Michael Pellman Rowland: The Next Big Plant Based IPO
What's allowed the Beyonds and Impossibles and JUSTs of the world to do what they're doing was not subsidies, it was investment that they put into science and technology that allowed them to create things that weren't creatable before, because they just hadn't been tried before. - Michael Pellman Rowland Michael Pellman Rowland is back. He was on the podcast in the early days of the pandemic to talk about the happenings in the alternative protein space and to explain the Beyond Meat IPO – the most successful IPO since 2001. Since then, I have heard from a lot of you, asking who is next? So, I asked Michael to come back and talk about the next five plant-based companies that will most likely go public in the near and not as near future. He graciously gave me an in depth look at the companies that are on the verge of exploding as well as a couple that you might not have ever heard of. Michael knows and loves this space. He has been writing about it for years, primarily for Forbes . His articles are about the future of food, sustainable food startups and technologies, and all of the happenings in the plant-based food.
S4 E21 · Thu, August 13, 2020
Nate Salpeter: Goat-2-Meeting and the Future of Food
"We kept going through this logical exercise of how do we help more and more animals. And every single time the logical end point was - it's not dogs and cats, it's animals in the food system. It’s not a matter of tens of millions of animals. It's a matter of tens of billions of animals and hundreds of billions of fish." - Nate Salpeter What do you get when two tech geniuses start an animal sanctuary? The first non-profit sanctuary in the world to address the global impacts of factory farming across animals, the plants and the planet. Nate Salpeter and Anna Sweet are the founders of Sweet Farm , an animal sanctuary in Half Moon Bay, California, that links veganic agriculture, farm-animal rescue, and technology that is revolutionizing food and agriculture production. The technology initiatives that are happening at Sweet Farm are going to change the way that we eat forever. It’s the future of food. Everything that is going on at Sweet Farm is pretty astounding, but not terribly surprising when you learn that by day, Nate is a nuclear engineer and Anna is a computer scientist and the CEO of Bad Robot, JJ Abrams gaming company. Sweet Farm is also the home of Goat-2-Meeting , which Nate and Anna started when the sanctuary had to close to visitors because of the pandemic. Instead of going in person, people can invite the farm animals into their video conferences. Llamas, goats, cows, and others are still making appearances at meetings all over the planet.
S4 E20 · Thu, August 06, 2020
Milo Runkle: Widening Our Circle of Compassion
The only way to help animals is to help people. Its humans that need to change, not animals. And I think it's the same way when we're talking about other issues in our society. It's about healing those who are causing violence, and it oftentimes can be easy to judge and persecute and sort of push aside people that are causing harm. It's more challenging to love them and to lead by example and to believe that everyone is doing the best that they can with what they have and what they know in that moment. - Milo Runkle . Some humans come out of the womb with a mission imprinted into their very being. Not often, but it happens. Milo Runkle is one of those humans. He was born in rural Ohio, delivered by his veterinarian father, and from the very earliest of his days, he knew he would change the word for animals. He was one of those kids who had a deep empathy for any creature that he encountered, an empathy that I think most of us have as children, but sadly are talked out of by well meaning (and very well conditioned) adults. Instead of being talked out of anything, Milo held on tightly, and rather than experiencing the slow, albeit unconscious, leak of animal-connected compassion that too many humans experience, his only grew. He became vegetarian at 11, and vegan at 15, which was the same year that he founded Mercy for Animals ; which would later become the world’s largest farm animal and vegan advocacy organization, an international powerhouse that has indeed changed the world for millions of cows, pigs, chickens, turkeys, and fish. It all started because of an animal abuse case at his local high school. He saw abuse and injustice and did something. Milo ran Mercy for Animals for nearly two decades, and is still involved - he is the Board Chair, but since he left his role as President, he’s started a new chapter, one that involves deep exploration – of the planet, of himself, and of what it means to live a life of service – one that is deep rooted in joy, love, and compassion. He is also the cofounder of the Good Food Institute , an organization that works to build a sustainable food system by supporting the development and adoption of plant and cell based proteins. And, he is the author of Mercy for Animals. One Man's Quest to Inspire Compassion and Improve the Lives of Farm Animals. Milo and I spoke a few weeks ago about what it was like to sustain decades of activism on the frontlines and what his life has looked like since - the expansion, exploration, and his ever widening circle of compassion. Milo’s love for the world and ALL who inhabit it radiates through his entire being, so much so that it’s contagious.
S4 E19 · Thu, July 30, 2020
Carl Safina: Becoming Wild
Beings who've succeeded on earth for millions of years, don’t seek, and should not require, our approval. They belong as well as we do. We do ourselves no favors by asking whether their existence is worth our while. We are hardly in a position to judge, hurdling and lurching along as we are with no goal, no plan except: bigger, faster, more. If we had the courage to be honest about it, we would have to admit that whales and birds and apes and all the rest live fully up to everything of which they are capable. And we, regrettably, fall short of doing that. For them, to be is enough. For us in the isolating alienation of our title retreat from Life, nothing is enough. It is strange how dissatisfied we insist on being, when there is so much of the world to know and love. Carl Safina, Becoming Wild Carl Safina grew up raising pigeons on a rooftop in Brooklyn and hasn’t stopped interacting with the wild since. He is an ecologist and author who writes extensively about our human relationship with the natural world and what we can do to make it better. First step: we need to care. Carl’s books make us care. He advocates for every living creature out there, and is always graciously pointing out why animals matter, not only why they matter to us, but why they matter to themselves - something I’m pretty certain that most humans don’t think about often enough. In his most recent book Becoming Wild, How Animal Cultures Raise Families, Create Beauty and Achieve Peace , Carl travels around the planet, exploring the cultures of chimpanzees in Uganda, sperm whales in the Caribbean, and Scarlet macaws in Peru. He shows us how other species teach and learn, and what life looks like in their animal societies, which is often as astonishing as it is spectacularly beautiful. His writing has won several awards, including a MacArthur Genius Prize, Pew and Guggenheim fellowships, and the John Burrows, James Beard, and George Rabb metals. He is the first Endowed Professor for Nature and Humanity at Stony Brook University and the founding president of the not for profit, Safina Center . He also hosted the PBS series, Saving the Ocean.
S4 E18 · Thu, July 23, 2020
Beverly and Derek Joubert: Project Ranger
The COVID-19 pandemic’s ripple effects are broad; leaving virtually no industry, economy, or continent immune. As travel and tourism has been brought to a standstill, many wilderness areas are left vacant and workers left with the uncertainty of personal income. This “perfect storm” of conditions is leaving many endangered animals highly vulnerable to wildlife crime. – Beverly and Derek Joubert, Project Ranger In the last 50 years, Africa has lost 90 to 95 percent of its large predators. We could very well witness the end of many iconic species in the next decade or two. It’s that urgent and we are in that much trouble. If we want to live in a world with lions and leopards and elephants and rhinos, then we’ve got to get behind those who are out there on the front lines. Beverly and Derek Joubert have spent their lives on the front lines. They are award-winning filmmakers, National Geographic Explorers-in-Residence, and wildlife conservationists who have made over 30 films while researching, exploring, and doing vital conservation work throughout Africa for nearly four decades. They've been on Species Unite before, and if you haven't heard their episode , go back and listen. Their lives sound like something from an epic film - romance, wild adventures, extreme danger, all fueled by a deep love for the wilderness and one another, and the stories that they tell are absolutely astonishing. But, today's episode is different. There is an urgent situation happening across Africa. Since the pandemic started and tourism shut down, there's been a funding crisis for wildlife rangers across the continent, and without the rangers, there will be no one there to protect the wilderness and the animals who live there. It’s already bad and on the verge of getting much, much worse. To prevent a full on poaching pandemic, Beverly and Derek have started an emergency intervention called, Project Ranger , an emergency fund supporting those on the front lines of conservation. The situation is dire and it's something that we all can behind in one way or another, before it’s too late. So, please listen and share this episode, share the powerful PSAs that the Jouberts have created, and if you are able, donate to Project Ranger .
S4 E16 · Thu, July 09, 2020
Adam Sud: Plant Based Addict
“…I checked into rehab and within 72 hours I was diagnosed with type two diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, erectile dysfunction, bipolar disorder, suicidal depression, anxiety disorder, obsessive compulsive personality disorders, sleep disorder and ADHD.” – Adam Sud There was a point when Adam Sud’s life was completely out of control with food and drug addiction; so much so that he found himself cycling between amphetamine benders and fast food binges until things got so bad that he attempted suicide by drug overdose. Fortunately, he failed and immediately reached out for help. He got sober and transformed everything single thing about his life. He credits a huge amount of his recovery to a plant based diet and the connection he feels with all living things through veganism. Since then, Adam has dedicated his life to helping others transform their lives. He is a diabetes and food addiction coach for Mastering Diabetes , a program that focuses on reversing insulin resistance to master diabetes using low fat, whole food, plant-based nutrition. He is also an international speaker for the plant-based movement and addiction recovery movement. He has worked in recovery centers using plant-based nutrition as a tool for strengthening recovery and relapse prevention. And, he is also the founder of the non-profit, Plant-Based for Positive Change , a program that is dedicated to advancing the research of diet and mental health and addiction and is running the very first research study to investigate the effects of a plant based diet intervention on early addiction recovery outcomes. Adam firmly believes that the simplest change on your fork make the most profound change of your life and that self-love is the root of all recovery. His story is as extraordinary as it is inspiring. I hope that you learn as much as I did. Links – Plant Based for Positive Change https://www.plantbasedforpositivechange.org/ The Infinite Study https://www.plantbasedforpositivechange.org/programs-1 Adam’s Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/plantbasedaddict/?hl=en Adam's Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/plantbasedaddict/ Plant strong - https://plantstrong.com/adam-sud
S4 E15 · Thu, July 02, 2020
Jasmine Leyva: The Invisible Vegan
"What's sad about it is… a lot of people think it's the norm… that's what I thought. Diabetes was something my grandmother had and my mom was pre-diabetic so I thought, oh diabetes and clogged arteries and high cholesterol, they’re just my destiny - that's a normal part of life because that's what I saw happening to everyone around me.” -Jasmine Leyva Heart disease, diabetes, and obesity have been rising at alarming rates all across the country, but the numbers are disproportionately higher in African American communities. There are many reasons that factor into why that is, but the fact that we have an unjust food system is a big one. Food desserts, regions in urban areas where it is difficult to obtain affordable and fresh foods, make it impossible for the people living in those areas to eat healthy and prevent diseases like those mentioned above. Jasmine Leyva is an actress, a filmmaker, and the creator and director of The Invisible Vegan , a full-length independent documentary that delves into the complex issues surrounding the unhealthy dietary patterns in the African American community. The film shows how increased dependence on meat and fast food is rooted in the history of slavery, 20th century socioeconomic inequalities, and the rise of big food. And it explores on the health and wellness possibilities that can be achieved through a plant based diet. The film is packed with information, history, stories of transformation, and interviews with African American vegans ranging from NBA legend, John Salley to Cedric the Entertainer to Stic of Dead Prez. If you haven’t already seen it, watch it. Jasmine is a force of a human being – she’s inspiring, wise, and incredibly thoughtful. I learned a ton from her film and from our conversation. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. Jasmine’s website https://jasmineleyva.com/ Jasmine's instagram https://www.instagram.com/jasmine_c_leyva/?hl=es Jasmine's Twitter https://twitter.com/jasmine_c_leyva The Invisible Vegan https://www.theinvisiblevegan.com/ The Invisible Vegan on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/Invisible-Vegan-Cedric-Entertainer/dp/B07WF9L1JM
S4 E14 · Thu, June 25, 2020
Jemma Bullock: Elephants in the Time of Coronavirus
When the pandemic first hit and tourism all over the world shut down, thousands of captive elephants across Asia went from being very much in demand to being out of work, meaning they are struggling and many of them are in dire situations. Whether these elephants are from places where their lives are really good, like certain sanctuaries, or from places where their lives are incredibly difficult, where they are forced to give rides, perform tricks and spend they rest of the day on horribly small chains, they have all been affected by the pandemic. Jemma Bullock runs a project called ELIE at Elephant Valley Project (EVP) in Eastern Cambodia. EVP is one of the very good places to be an elephant. These elephants live in the forest, eat whatever they want, aren’t ridden or bathed or used as selfie props, they don't have to do anything except be elephants. In normal times, tourist visit EVP but they don’t interfere with the lives of the residents. They go out into the forest and hike with the elephants and watch them in their natural habitat. It's a pretty incredible place. But, like everyone else, EVP shut down to visitors in March and until then, ecotourism was 90 percent of their income. To survive the crisis, they had to shut down their second sanctuary in Thailand, and have been relying on grants and donations. The fact that they can receive grants and donations makes them much more fortunate than most. I spoke with Jemma about life at EVP and what it's been like since the pandemic started. So far, 2020 at EVP has been a lot like many people’s year– unpredictable, difficult, and absolutely insane. Not only have they been navigating the loss of income, tourism, and an entire sanctuary, but they’ve also had some days (and weeks) that they barely survived – including a three-week stint with a wild elephant on the loose, stealing one of their females and sending the humans up into the trees.
S4 E13 · Thu, June 18, 2020
Lauren Ornelas: Food is Power
Lauren Ornelas is the founder and the executive director of the Food Empowerment Project , a nonprofit food justice organization that spotlights the abuse of animals on farms, unfair working conditions for produce workers, and the unavailability of healthy foods in communities of color and low-income areas. She and I spoke earlier in the pandemic. She had just written an article on Medium called, We Are All Connected . It was written back in April, but it could not be more relevant now, with the demonstrations in our streets calling out systemic racism. “As many of us know, COVID-19 has just proven what we know: that racism and inequalities that exist for Black, Indigenous, and Brown people in this country are a barrier to success and living healthy lives. Our communities have been losing lives due to police violence, lack of health care, lack of healthy food, lack of clean drinking water, environmental racism, lack of living wages, and the list goes on; however, what makes COVID-19 even more dangerous is that these problems still exist and in some ways are exacerbated.” – Lauren Ornelas, We Are All Connected Lauren has spent her entire life on the front lines fighting for human and animal rights. She went vegan and became an activist in the 80s, later she founded and ran the animal right’s organization, Viva USA, and in 2007, she started The Food Empowerment Project, an organization that operates from the understanding that we are indeed all connected, humans, animals, and the planet and thus, it only makes sense to fight for the whole package. Later, in that same Medium piece, she writes, “…but I am more determined than ever that we must truly fight the systems that have a role in how we got here.” And that is exactly what Lauren and the Food Empowerment Project are doing.
S4 E12 · Thu, June 11, 2020
Michael Pellman Rowland: Betting On Plant Based Meat
“There’s no question that Beyond Meat IPO was a watershed event. You cannot overstate enough how big of a deal that was, because before then you had a relatively small group of folks, including myself, leading the parade, cheering as loudly as we could, and largely falling on deaf ears outside of small pockets here and there. When that [IPO] happened, everybody on Wall Street started to take notice, not just because it went public, but it was the most successful IPOs since I think 2001 or something like that. And so, Wall Street, for better or worse, looks for where the money is being made and once they started to really look into the growth percent, the numbers in the plant based meat aisle - the success of the IPO, everybody started looking for the next one.” - Michael Pellman Rowland One silver lining that has come from the devastating Coronavirus pandemic has been the rise of the plant based meat industry. Business is booming. Sales of alternatives to animal flesh proteins have soared since the pandemic started and are now outpacing meat sales. This has been in part because of the meat shortage and in part because many more people have now been made aware of just how bad the meat industry is (extremely bad). They are looking for alternatives and, fortunately there are many. So, I asked my friend, Michael Pellman Rowland to explain the latest goings on in the alternative meat space, a space he knows well. He is a financial advisor whose specialty is around sustainability and impact. And, he’s been writing about it for years, primarily for Forbes. His articles are about the future of food, sustainable food startups and technologies, and all of the happenings in the plant based food world from Memphis Meats leading the way to being the first cell-based meat company to bring its product to market to Beyond Meat being offered at Starbucks (although sadly, not in the US (yet)). Michael is particularly excited about companies that offer innovative solutions to reduce the impact that agriculture has on human health, climate change, water scarcity, and the welfare of billions of animals, companies like: Beyond Meat , Impossible Foods , JUST , Ocean Hugger, Califia Farms , and Good Catch . I learned a lot from Michael about many of these
S4 E11 · Mon, June 08, 2020
Underwater Photography Legend: Brian Skerry
“…based on my personal experience and having worked with scientists and researchers most of my life, I would say that it's not too late. There are some things that are probably gone. There are places where only pockets of biodiversity may remain in the time ahead, but that doesn't mean we can't still have a healthy future. It may not be what it once was, but it's like the old saying - when's the best day to quit smoking cigarettes? Today - if you don’t quit today, when's the next best day? Tomorrow. So, it's not too late. We may have lost 50% of the world's coral reefs, but that means there's 50% left. We may have taken 90% of the big fish in the ocean, but maybe there's 10% left. We don't have to kill 100 million sharks every year. We don't have to rollback legislation that determines how much carbon we pump into the atmosphere. We can speak out against that and tell our elected leaders that we care. The ocean doesn't have to turn acidic because we're dumping so much carbon into it that its chemistry is changing. These are things that we can change and can control. So, I do remain cautiously optimistic. I realize that the battle lines are drawn and we have to fight hard, but I do think that it's worth fighting for. It's not too late. And we can see a reversal in the places that have been protected. You do see that resilience. The ocean does know how to take care of itself. We just need to leave it alone…” -Brian Skerry Brian Skerry is one of the worlds most accomplished underwater and marine wildlife photographers and he is one of the greatest. He’s been a contract photographer for National Geographic Magazine since 1998 and his work has been featured in scores of other publications, such as Sports Illustrated, The New York Times, BBC Wildlife, Paris Match, GEO, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Smithsonian, Esquire, Audubon and Men’s Journal. He is also the author of 11 books including the acclaimed monographs Ocean Soul and Shark . In his four decades exploring the world's oceans, Brian has experienced things that very few humans will ever get to experience, like diving with a population of southern right whales who had never before encountered human beings dropping down into their underwater universe. Brian dives eight months of the year, often in extreme conditions - beneath Arctic ice or in shark-infested waters. His work brings us the beauty and the majesty of our oceans, but it also shows us the devastation and the destruction that we've caused them. His stories raise awareness, promote conservation, and ultimately create change. Today, June 8th is <a href= "h
S4 E10 · Thu, May 28, 2020
Josh Balk: How to Change America’s Cruelest Industry
“The time to begin phasing out the intensive confinement systems in which we raise billions of animals is now. We need to accelerate society’s direction of reducing demand for meat from animal factory farms and shift instead to more of an emphasis on healthier — and safer — plant-based foods. As our population grows, plant-based foods are also more sustainable and affordable for societies globally. Unless we — especially legislators and the food industry — make changes immediately, the concerning practices in animal agribusiness will remain. Only in transforming our food system can we eliminate the tinderbox ready to explode in our country. We can’t afford to wait.” Josh Balk and Dr. Shivam Yoshi, Pandemic on Our Plates Social distancing is the key to slowing the spread of COVID-19. We know this. It has worked and is still working. But, we also know that in this absolutely insane time, a time where we are fully aware that staying apart does indeed saves lives, just the opposite is taking place at factory farms and meat processing plants all across America. Slaughterhouses are being forced to stay open and their workers must remain in close proximity to one another to be able to get their jobs done. And, they are getting sick and they are dying. And, on factory farms, billions of animals are “living” in cramped, filthy, overcrowded spaces with almost no room to move their antibiotic-fueled bodies - conditions that are creating a perfect storm for the next zoonotic disease to emerge and spread. This threat is nothing new, diseases have already come from factory farms - we’ve just gotten lucky in terms of their spread. But the clock is ticking. Josh Balk is has been a global leader in animal protection for the past 20 years. He is the Vice President of Farm Animal Protection for the Humane Society of the United States , and he’s the co-founder of plant based, food manufacturing company, JUST , as in JUST Mayo and my favorite invention of the 21st century, JUST Egg. Josh has spent a couple of decades focusing on and fighting against extreme confinement on America’s factory farms, meaning practices like cramming many chickens into small battery cages for their entire lives, and keeping mother pigs in gestation crates, which are small metal cages that fit around their bodies like steel coffins, and days old calves in tiny veal crates where they can barely move. These are some of the cruelest practices on the planet and they are the status quo at factory farms in most American states. Josh and his team have scored huge victories on changing animal welfare policies at some of the worlds largest companies and by changing legislation in many sta
S4 E9 · Thu, May 21, 2020
Rachel Nuwer: On Her Time Inside the Illegal Wildlife Trade
Rachel Nuwer has spent a decade writing about, reporting on, investigating, and going undercover in the illegal wildlife trade. She is a freelance journalist whose work often focuses on wildlife trafficking and poaching and appears in publications like the New York Times and National Geographic. She also wrote the book Poached: Inside the Dark World of Wildlife Trafficking . It’s a book for anyone who is interested in a planet that still has tigers, elephants, rhinos and thousands of other species living on it a couple generations from now. Rachel takes the reader to trafficking hotspots in twelve countries shares an in person account from the frontlines of the trade. Rachel and I met in Brooklyn in January, pre-pandemic, to talk about her book and her time spent reporting on the wildlife trade. She is a wealth of knowledge with a deep understanding of the incredibly complex world of wildlife trafficking.
S4 E8 · Thu, May 14, 2020
Aaron Gross: How To Change the Story Around How and What We Eat
We all have a food story; the story that we tell ourselves about what we eat and why we eat it. It’s that story that runs the show when it comes to how we shop, cook, and feed our children. It was most often taught to us by our parents and their parents, most who thought they were passing on good values and deep traditions and were only doing what was best for their kids. But our food story is more than that. It was also passed on to our parents and to us from advertisers, marketers and a food industry that uses words like values and traditions to get us to buy into a narrative that has damaged our health, destroyed the planet, and caused endless suffering to billions of animals. But once we come to terms with the fact that it’s just a story and not something that we can’t change, there’s a whole new world waiting. And, like in so many other industries that are inherently broken in America and around the globe, the pandemic has exposed the gaping holes in our food system. But it’s also given us the opportunity to take a deeper look into what and how we eat and decide that we can change the story. Aaron Gross is a professor of theology and religious studies at the University of San Diego, and he's the CEO and founder of Farm Forward . Farm forward was founded as the nation's first nonprofit devoted exclusively to ending factory farming. Recently, Aaron and the writer, Jonathan Safran Foer published a piece in the Guardian called, We Have to Wake Up: Factory Farms are Breeding Grounds for Pandemics . There's a paragraph in the article that says, " The link between factory farming and increasing pandemic risk is well established scientifically, but the political will to curtail that risk has, in the past, been absent. Now is the time to build that will. It really does matter if we talk about this, share our concerns with our friends, explain these issues to our children, wonder together about how we should eat differently, call on our political leaders, and support advocacy organizations fighting factory farming. Leaders are listening. Changing the most powerful industrial complex in the world – the factory farm – could not possibly be easy, but in this moment with these stakes it is, maybe for the first time in our lifetimes, possible.” Aaron graciously joined me from his quarantine in San Diego to talk about how we change the story around how and what we eat and ultimately, how we change our food system. Aaron is one of the smartest guys out there and it was beyond a privilege to hear his thoughts and ideas on how we forge ahead. This conversation was enlightening, inspiring, and incredibly informative. I hope that you learn as much as I did. We can change our food industry. As bad as most things across the planet are right n
S4 E7 · Wed, May 06, 2020
Leah Garcés: The Next Pandemic Will Probably Come From A Factory Farm
“…This is not a surprise in many ways and, for decades, not just animal rights activists, but public health experts have been sounding the alarm bells about this kind of risk. And you know, my concern is in many ways people are referring to this as a once in a century event or the black swan or something, but it's like rolling dice and rolling snake eyes once doesn't have any effect on rolling. And in fact, we're rolling the dice even faster now. The main reason is because we are in so much contact with animals through factory farms. So the way to think about pandemics is that we know that emerging zoonotic infections come from places where animals and humans are in close contact. Well, where is that? Live animal markets, we know that. And the other place is industrial animal farms and slaughterhouses. That is the most obvious place for that connection to happen.” – Leah Garces The New Coronavirus has done a superb job at exposing the numerous vulnerabilities and holes in many of our systems and industries, but none are as gaping or dangerous as the chasms in our food system. Our food system is in crisis. We are seeing it right now – meat shortages, mass killings of animals because of shut downs and overflow, workers are getting sick and dying. It’s a fragile system that needs (and has needed for decades) a complete overhaul. By exposing these vulnerabilities, the pandemic is also giving us an opportunity to demand that the system change and, while we are at it, to think about changing the way that we eat. If we don’t, if we ignore the scores of red flags waving from the factory farms and slaughterhouses across the country, then not only will the crisis deepen, but we are also putting the entire globe at risk for another pandemic that could and probably will be much worse than the one we are currently experiencing. Factory farms are breeding grounds for viruses and bacterial resistance. We cram thousands of animals into filthy, confined spaces. Their immune systems are stressed because of their living conditions. This is the perfect environment for viruses to grow and to mutate. And, to transmit to humans – it’s happened before and next time, and, yes, it will happen again, and next time could be much worse. Leah Garcés mission is to end factory farming. She is the President of Mercy for Animals and has spent much of her life leading the animal protection movement in exposing the hidden and horrible worlds of factory farming - and, changing them. Her approach has been usual and it’s created change in a system that in many ways seemed unchangeable. She has worked with whistleblowing farmers to expose industrial chicken farms and has partnered with some of the world's largest food companies to improve conditions for factory-farmed animals. Leah learned that she could make considerable progress by working with her adversaries in the meat industry in
S4 E6 · Thu, April 30, 2020
Rich Hardy: Not As Nature Intended
Rich Hardy is a former undercover investigator who spent two decades working in 28 countries, exposing animal cruelty of many of the worlds worst industries – including fur trapping in North America, monkey breeding farms in Asia, and slaughterhouses and factory farms across the globe. His images and videos have been used by more than 20 international animal organizations helping to change minds and laws about how we treat animals. Most of the industries Rich worked in are hidden from the public, extraordinarily secretive, and often have higher security than Area 51; therefore Rich lived an incredibly risky double life for much of those 20 years. He had to take jobs doing the very thing he was there to expose and many of his assignments involved working with and often befriending those causing harm and suffering to the animals he was fighting to protect. One would think that 20 years of witnessing that kind of mass scale abuse would harden the soul and embitter just about anyone, but Rich is one of the kindest, most thoughtful guys out there. His work only broadened his already enormous capacity for compassion - toward animals but also toward some of the very human beings he worked amongst. He wrote a book about it, called, Not As Nature Intended . It’s based on his journals from his time undercover and somehow, manages to not only show the darkness and devastation of the worlds he had to become a part of, but there’s also light, hope, and enormous heart. It’s a testament of what he saw and of what billions of animals have endured and still endure every minute of the day. He and I spoke last week from our respective quarantines, his in the UK and mine in New York. I was especially interested in his time on factory farms, what he witnessed, the sickness and disease that are an inherent part of the industry, and why he is not at all surprised that we are in the midst of a pandemic that was caused by of our relationship to animals. In order to prevent future pandemics, it’s not just wild animal markets that need to shut down, it’s every industry in which we exploit animals. And factory farming should be right up there on the top of every single human’s list.
S4 E5 · Fri, April 24, 2020
Justin Goodman: Taxpayer Funded Torture
Justin Goodman is the Vice President of Advocacy and Public Policy at White Coat Waste Project , a two and a half million member, taxpayer watchdog group that is working to end twenty billion dollars in taxpayer funded animal experiments. Justin and I met in D C in February, pre-social distancing. And, it just so happened that on the very morning that we met, White Coat had released footage of National Institute of Health experiments that had been going on for decades. It was a gift for me to be with Justin before and after this interview, and to watch his phone blow up from half of Capitol Hill in reaction to the horrifying footage. I felt like I had front row seats to seeing how effective and powerful White Coat Waste Project is. And since we met, they’ve had another huge victory: A couple of weeks ago, White Coat exposed how the National Institutes for Health has spent millions of tax dollars funding dangerous coronavirus animal tests at the controversial Wuhan Institute of Virology and just one week after they released their international exposé –Trump promised he’d end the government’s funding of dangerous, cruel and wasteful animal experiments at the Wuhan Institute of Virology! And, today is World Day for Laboratory Animals – so, please think about them during this (relatively) short stint in quarantine. They are in it for life, in tiny cages, being tested on and tortured, and almost all of them will never know the sun, the wind, the grass, what it feels like to run, explore, adventure, and discover; nor will they experience life with other animals, to be a part of a herd, a troop, a flock, or a family. Count your blessings and please, stop paying for their abuse.
S4 E4 · Mon, April 20, 2020
Peter Knights: The Next Pandemic Is On It’s Way, Unless We Shut Down Wildlife Markets
There’s not much that we can be certain about in such uncertain times but there are a few things. One is that unless we change the way that that we treat animals, the next pandemic is most definitely coming. Only next time, it could be much worse, much more infectious and even more fatal than the current crisis we’re now facing. COVID-19 most likely started at a wild animal market in Wuhan, China and was transmitted to a human from an animal, probably a pangolin. Wild animal markets are breeding grounds for diseases - and in order to stop the transmission of the diseases to humans, we need to shut down the markets, end the global wildlife trade, and change the way that we treat animals across the board. If there’s one upside coming from this pandemic (I certainly hope there’s more than one), it’s that wild animal markets have shut down in China (at least they are closed right now) and hopefully, many other countries will soon follow suit. There’s still much confusion surrounding the wild animal markets in China and elsewhere in terms of what's shut down and what hasn’t. So, I asked Peter Knights the Executive Director of WildAid to explain. Peter has been investigating and working to end illegal wildlife trafficking for the past thirty years. WildAid is different from other conservation organizations, because instead of focusing on fighting the supply side of the illegal wildlife trade, they work to reduce demand and to increase local support for conservation efforts. They’ve been a massive force in the reduction of the demand for ivory, rhino horn, shark fins, and much other illegal wildlife for decades. Their campaigns have changed the world. If you haven’t seen them (although, you probably have and just didn’t know it) take a look at their website . There are two incredible campaigns for pangolins on there, one with Jay Chou and the other with Jackie Chan . Peter and I spoke on Friday from our respective quarantines. He graciously explained the current situation with what’s happening with wild animal markets across the pla
S4 E3 · Thu, April 16, 2020
Pei Su: COVID-19, The Wildlife Trade, and China
Today’s episode was recorded on Wednesday April 15th as a live webinar conversation between Pei Su, the Executive Director and Co-founder of ACTAsia and myself. It’s unedited and somewhat messy sound-wise but we wanted to get it out as soon as possible. There are a lot of rumors and misinformation getting passed around the globe in terms of China’s wildlife trade and markets: what has been banned, what hasn’t, and what all of it means. In today’s conversation, Pei Su answers many of my questions about what’s happening on the ground in China, what the bans actually mean, and where the many loopholes lie. Pei Su has been on the front lines to create a better world for animals for three decades. She is a wealth of knowledge, a force and an inspiration. In 2011, she co-founded ACTAsia – an organization that’s dedicated to creating change in China through humane education. What that means is that they go into schools and train the teachers to teach a 6-year program called Caring for Life Education . The kids are in the program from ages 6 -12 and they learn animal welfare, empathy toward animals, environmental issues, social welfare, and citizenship. To date, 80,000 kids have gone through Caring For Life and 2,000 teachers have been trained. Pei believes that things won’t really change for animals in China until people start to view them differently – and, the best people for that job are the children – as they will create change for generations to come. There is also a ton of good information on what’s happening in China on ACTAsia’s website.
S4 E2 · Thu, April 09, 2020
Lori Gruen: Why Do We Treat Animals Like Animals?
“…but why do we treat animals like “animals”? We shouldn't be treating animals like animals, by which that means devalued under appreciated beings.” – Lori Gruen Lori Gruen is the William Griffin Professor of Philosophy at Wesleyan University and the Coordinator of Wesleyan Animal Studies. She is also the author and editor of 11 books, most recently Critical Terms for Animal Studies and Animaladies . Her work in practical ethics and political philosophy focuses on issues that impact those often overlooked in traditional ethical investigations, e.g. women, people of color, incarcerated people, and non-human animals.
S4 E1 · Thu, April 02, 2020
Joshua Katcher is Doing Fashion Better
When it comes to fashion and good design, Joshua Katcher, the man behind the sustainable luxury fashion label, Brave GentleMan, cares a lot about beauty; but not in the way that most people think about it. He defines beauty not only as the end result - the dapper suit or the stylish boots; instead, he only deems something beautiful when the entire process that has created that something is beautiful, meaning ethical, sustainable, and made with materials and processes that never hurt anyone - human or animal. (And, of course it needs to look good too.) Joshua knows a lot about fashion. He founded the popular men's vegan lifestyle website, The Discerning Brute in 2008. His brand, Brave GentleMan has appeared in Vogue and on the cover of GQ. He's taught at Parsons the New School and L I M College, and has lectured internationally and lobbied in the United States for sustainable and ethical fashion.
S3 E8 · Thu, January 30, 2020
Pei Su: The Pioneer: Promoting Compassion for Animals in Asia through Education
“As children, we learnt respect for our elders and for authority, we learnt etiquette too, but rarely was it suggested that we extend any feelings towards animals, or indeed that animals have feelings. And because of this, many children in Asia grow up assuming animals exist to serve us, feed us, entertain us and clothe us; animals are useful ‘moving objects’, a literal translation of the Chinese word for animal.” - Pei Su Pei Su is truly a pioneer. In the early 90s, she was involved with the forming of Taiwan’s very first animal right’s organization. 30 years later, it still exists and Taiwan’s animal right’s movement is one of the fastest growing in Asia. In 2011, Pei co-founded ACTAsia – an organization that’s dedicated to creating change in China through humane education. What that means is that they go into schools and train the teachers to teach a 6-year program called Caring for Life Education . The kids are in the program from ages 6 -12 and they learn animal welfare, empathy toward animals, environmental issues, social welfare, and citizenship. To date, 80,000 kids have gone through Caring For Life and 2,000 teachers have been trained. Pei believes that things won’t really change for animals in China until people start to view them differently – and, the best people for that job are the children – as they will create change for generations to come.
S3 E7 · Thu, January 23, 2020
Tim Harrison: Lions, Tigers, and Bears… and Wolves, Pythons, Cougars, Alligators, and Sloths Living in America’s Basements and Backyards
In neighborhoods all over the United States, there are homes with large predators, venomous snakes, and wild animals from every country on the planet. The desire to own and “master” some of the worlds most dangerous creatures, from lions to wolves to pit vipers, started to boom in the 90s – mostly because of reality TV. It’s big business and it’s very legal in many parts of the country. Not only is it incredibly dangerous for humans – the owners as well as the first responders who get the call when something goes amiss; but, it’s also cruel and leads to a miserable existence for the animals. No wild animal is better off living in some ones backyard, basement, or living room. There have been numerous situations where things have gone awry, situations like Travis the Chimp in Connecticut and the tragedy in Zanesville, Ohio where Terry Thompson turned 56 predators loose on the city and all of the animals were killed. Tim Harrison is a retired Ohio police officer, fire fighter, and paramedic and he is a leading specialist when it comes to dealing with the exotic pet trade. He has been fighting to get these animals out of people’s homes and into sanctuaries for over 40 years. He started out on what he calls “the dark side” of the trade. He owned lions and wolves and a menagerie of wild pets (that he’d rescued from the trade) until he made a trip to Africa and saw what wild animals in the wild looked and behaved like. Ever since, he’s been leading the mission to change the laws and get these animals to safe and sane environments. Tim is also the director of Outreach for Animals and he was the subject of the documentary, The Elephant in the Living Room – an award winning film made by Michael Webber that explores this growing trend of people owning dangerous exotics as pets. Only after I saw it did I understand just how terrifying and incredibly sad the American exotic pet trade is. It’s something that shouldn’t exist in the first place but until the laws change and more people get on board, wild animals will continue to be trafficked and live in small cages in suburbia. If you haven’t seen it, watch it. You will be floored. Tim’s stories of fighting this trade while rescuing hundreds of animals are absolutely incredible. He and I met a few weeks ago in Ohio and he shared quite a few of them. Please listen to this episode and then, get behind the Big Cat Public Safety Act and help get these animals out of the trade.
S3 E6 · Thu, January 16, 2020
Sharon Guynup: The United States Has A Tiger Problem
There is a tiger problem in the USA. There are more tigers in captivity in the US then exist in the wild. The number of American tigers lies somewhere between five and ten thousand. We don’t know the actual number because they mostly go unregulated. Sadly, most of these tigers live in cages in private homes, backyards, garages, or in cages in roadside zoos. Many of them are inbred, malnourished, and sick. There is absolutely no reason that this should be the fates of one of the most majestic creatures on the planet. What have we done? And, why are we still allowing it? Journalist and author, Sharon Guynup and photographer, Steve Winter spent two years investigating these questions for a story called, The Tiger Next Door , for December’s issue of National Geographic. If you haven’t read it, read it. Sharon’s story is astounding. It involves the criminal underworld, wildlife trafficking, murder, and thousands of captive tigers living sad pathetic lives all over the USA. America has a serious problem with captive wildlife, and what we’ve done to tigers is cruel, dangerous, and absolutely unnecessary. Sharon is a hero for tigers. She has been reporting on them for years, mostly tigers in the wild, until 2016, when her investigation into the famed Thai Tiger Temple for National Geographic published strong allegations of illegal wildlife trade, causing Thai officials to confiscate the 147 tigers living at the temple and shut the operation down. Sharon and I met in New York in December to talk about her story. The two-year investigation that she and Steve Winter did is mind blowing and absolutely devastating for anyone who cares about wild animals. There are ways to combat this crisis right now. The first is to not participate in any wildlife tourism that includes selfies with wildlife or any type of handling of wild animals, and the second is to get behind and support The Big Cat Safety Act.
S3 E5 · Thu, December 19, 2019
Allison Argo: On Passion, Purpose, and the Wisdom of Following Your Heart
If you were to take a brief look into Allison Argo’s life, you’d see the definition of what it means to follow your passion - written in large neon letters. She grew up in the theater on Cape Cod and as soon as she was old enough and able, she moved to NYC with a hundred bucks in her pocket ready to pursue her dream of acting. She walked dogs and cleaned apartments until she landed on her first role on Broadway. After acting in a few Broadway productions, she moved to Los Angeles and had another successful career on television. But her real life’s work didn’t begin until she left acting. In 1990, without having any idea as to what she was doing she made her first documentary, The Urban Gorilla. She wrote, directed, produced, and edited it – learning all of the above on the job. It was picked up by National Geographic and was nominated for two Emmy’s. She’s gone on to make another 18 films and has won six Emmy’s and scores of other awards. Her documentaries focus on animal welfare, endangered wildlife and conservation. They have brought awareness and change to the plights of many species around the globe, including: gorillas, chimpanzees, snakes, dogs, elephants, and most recently, pigs. The Last Pig is Allison’s documentary about a pig farmer named Bob Comis and his final year of sending his pigs to slaughter. It’s an incredibly beautiful, meditative film, narrated by Bob, while he struggles with the monthly
S3 E4 · Thu, December 12, 2019
Jo-Anne McArthur: What We Can't Un-see
Jo-Anne McArthur is an award winning photojournalist and the founder of We Animals Media . For 20 years she has been photographing and bearing witness to our complex relationship with animals. She’s worked in over 60 countries in just about every industry one can imagine - including: fur farms, factory farms, bear bile farms, zoos, rodeos, circuses, and marine parks with the mission to make the lives of these invisible animals visible. Her images tell the stories of unseen suffering, the stories of what happens when we stop paying attention, of what hopelessness looks like, and of thousands of little lives that would have otherwise gone unnoticed. She is also co-founder of the Unbound Project and the author of two books, We Animals and Captive . And, she was the subject of Liz Marshall’s acclaimed documentary, The Ghosts in Our Machine .
S3 E3 · Thu, December 05, 2019
Natasha Daly: Shedding Light on the Dark Reality of Wildlife Tourism
Natasha Daly is a writer and editor at National Geographic where she covers animal welfare, exploitation, and conservation. She wrote National Geographic’s June cover story, Suffering Unseen, the Dark Truth Behind Wildlife Tourism. If you haven’t read it yet, read it. It is the story of the bleak reality that is daily life for so many captive wild animals, including: elephants, tigers, sloths, dolphins, whales, even polar bears. And, it’s the story of why so many wild animals are living miserable and often painful existences. The answer is, us. Well… us and social media – which is also us. Animal related activities that we often associate with travel and global tourism, activities like bathing elephants in Thailand or taking selfies with sloths in South America, have become social norms and even rites of passage when it comes to taking off to see the world with a backpack or on holiday or honeymoon. And that is because of social media. Yes, people were doing these things pre-internet, but the numbers didn’t compare. We see friends or celebrities swimming with dolphins or holding baby tigers in their Instagram feeds and it looks innocent, harmless and fun and all of a sudden, there’s one more thing to add to the bucket list. But the truth is a different story. The truth involves a lot of pain and a lot suffering behind the scenes. Natasha and photographer, Kirsten Luce spent a year on four continents investigating this story, and what they learned and reported will astonish you.
S3 E2 · Thu, November 21, 2019
Barbara King: Animals Grieve, Mourn, and Love
Many of us who have animals in our lives know that they experience emotion, we know because we’ve seen it. We’ve witnessed our dogs express joy when we walk through the door, watched them display jealousy toward another animal, or we’ve seen them mourn the loss of a companion. When someone asks, “how do we know?” usually, most of us say something along the lines of, “we just know... it’s obvious.” But, that’s not how it works in science. Science needs proof and for too many years proof wasn’t an option, as a large majority of the scientific community avoided any research or any studying of the inner lives of animals, classifying the entire idea that they even have inner lives as anthropomorphic. Fortunately, for many species, science has started to come around. Research and studies are expanding every year and scientific circles have become increasingly accepting and supportive of the idea that many species do indeed have emotions. Barbara King is a biological anthropologist who has studied the complex emotions throughout the animal kingdom – from orcas to elephants to ducks to dogs, with a focus on grief and love. Her work is centered on how the science of animal thinking and feeling can help us better understand and advocate for the rights of animals. The more that humans know about animal’s intelligence and emotional lives, the harder it becomes to harm them. Barbara is an emerita professor of anthropology at the College of William and Mary and the author of several books, including How Animals Grieve and Personalities on the Plate . Her books are loaded with impassioned stories of animal’s emotional lives and inner worlds, all backed with the scientific rigor that builds the case toward changing the way in which the world treats animals. She also gave an incredible TED talk this year, which has already been seen by a million and a half people.
S3 E1 · Wed, November 13, 2019
Beverly and Dereck Joubert: Are We Being the Best Version of Ourselves?
Are we being the best version of ourselves? That’s a question that Beverly and Dereck Joubert asked quite often during this conversation and also one that they seem to live by. It’s embedded into their work, their lives, their relationships - with each other, the wilderness, and the planet; as if the question floats above their heads as a gentle reminder of who they want to be in the world. And, the continual asking of that question shows in everything that they do, fight for, love, and are actively trying to save. They are award-winning filmmakers, National Geographic Explorers-in-Residence, and wildlife conservationists who have made over 30 films while researching, exploring, and doing vital conservation work throughout Africa for nearly four decades. They also happen to have what could possibly be the best love story of our time. They have been together for nearly 40 years and the great majority of it has been spent living in the bush in Botswana, making films, doing research, and fighting to save what’s left of the African wilderness and the large predators who inhabit it. For months and years at a time they’ve lived without electricity, without much human interaction, without many comforts, nor personal space – things that most couples have a difficult time managing over a week long glamping trip. They’ve been doing it for 38 years. Living in the bush for decades has included many death defying close calls, including what they simply refer to as the “incident” with a wounded (therefore angry) cape buffalo that nearly ended it all. Fortunately, everyone survived and after an 8 month stint in the hospital for Beverly, they returned to the bush and began filming again – at the exact place where the attack occurred. Did I mention that they are a little tougher than most of us? Their love story, like all of the good ones, is about something much bigger than themselves. It’s a story about Africa, the wilderness, the wild animals who live there, and it’s about fighting the biggest fight of our time, to save what’s left of this majestic planet. In the last 50 years, Africa has lost 90 to 95 percent of its large predators. We could very well witness the end of wild lions, cheetahs and other big cats in a decade or two. It’s that urgent and we are in that much trouble. If we want to live in a world with lions and leopards and elephants and rhinos, then we’ve got to get behind those who are out there on the front lines. Beverly and Dereck are not only out there, but they’ve documented it for decades, so that we can see and understand the African wilderness in all of its magnificent glory and so that we know exactly what’s at stake, what we are about to lose. Their most recent film was released in October. It’s a three part series called:
S2 E8 · Thu, August 01, 2019
Shannon Keith: Hope for Thousands of Beagles Used in Laboratory Experiments
In the United States we still use millions of animals in laboratory experiments. It’s a secretive industry and I think, many people are under the impression that it ended years ago. Not only is it still huge, but we test on just about every type of animal one can imagine, including dogs. 70,000 dogs a year are used in laboratory experiments and a great majority of them are beagles. The heartbreaking reason that beagles are so often the dog of choice is because they’re docile, sweet, trusting, and they don’t fight back. Like all laboratory animals, their lives are miserable from the time they are born until they’re euthanized. They are taken from their mothers and are subjected to horrific cruelty, painful tests, torture, and then finally, when the experiment is over, they are killed. Shannon Keith is a superhuman. She’s the founder of Beagle Freedom Project, an organization that rescues and advocates for beagles as well as for many other animals who are tested on in laboratory experiments. She’s is also an animal rights lawyer, activist, and documentary director/producer. She has changed laws, rescued thousands of animals, brought enormous amounts of attention and awareness to issues that have been kept secret for decades, and in her spare time, she’s made three documentaries that have exposed the hidden worlds of lab testing, the fur industry, and the lives of captive primates. I’m certain that future generations will look back on what we’re currently doing to animals with shock and horror, but they’ll also be able to see that there were indeed heroes amongst us: those who gave all to battle against the incredible injustices and atrocities that so many animals face every single day. Shannon is one of the heroes. Thousands of animals are alive, safe, and free because she refuses to give up the fight.
S2 E7 · Fri, July 19, 2019
Kevin Schneider: The Battle for Legal Personhood for Elephants and Chimpanzees
Elephants, great apes, dolphins, and whales are incredibly complex, social, and intelligent creatures, but our legal system considers them to be “things,” meaning they have no more rights then a can of beans does. For too many years these animals have been taken from the wild, held captive, lived for decades in confinement, tested on, tortured, abused, isolated, or neglected. Kevin Schneider is Executive Director of the Nonhuman Rights Project, an organization that is fighting to secure actual legal rights for these animals. Their lawsuits demand recognition of the legal personhood and fundamental right to bodily liberty of great apes, elephants, dolphins, and whales that are being held in captivity across the United States. Not out of concern for their welfare, but with respect to their individual rights. Since 2013, the Nonhuman Rights Project has filed lawsuits on behalf of four captive chimpanzees and four captive elephants, including Happy, the saddest looking elephant in the state of New York. Happy has spent the past 13 years living in isolation at the Bronx Zoo. The Nonhuman Rights Project is fighting for her freedom, so that she can be released to an elephant sanctuary where she’ll have room to room and other elephants to spend her days with. In todays conversation Kevin shares why the Nonhuman Rights Project will not stop until these animals are considered persons in the eyes of the law and why it matters, not only for the animals, but for us humans too. Kevin Schneider is Executive Director of the Nonhuman Rights Project, an organization fighting to secure actual legal rights for these animals through a state by state, country by country, long term litigation campaign. What that means is that their lawsuits demand recognition of the legal personhood and fundamental right to bodily liberty of these animals – the great apes, elephants, dolphins, and whales - that are being held in captivity across the United States. With the support of scientists, they argue that the common law courts must free these self-aware autonomous beings to appropriate sanctuaries, not out of concern for their welfare, but with respect to their individual rights. Since 2013, the Nonhuman Rights Project has filed lawsuits on behalf of four captive chimpanzees and four captive elephants, including Happy, the saddest looking elephant in the state of New York. Happy has spent the past 13 years living in isolation at the Bronx Zoo Lately, Happy’s case has been receiving all sorts of attention from the public, the press, and politicians alike, with a recent statement by New York City Council Speaker Corey Johnson, urging the Bronx Zoo to release Happy and Patty (the other isolated elephant at the zoo) to a sanctuary. The Nonhuman Right’s Project has just been assigned a judge in the Bronx to hear Happy’s case. Kevin is a man who clearly loves h
S2 E6 · Thu, July 11, 2019
Patrick Battuello: American Horses are Racing to their Deaths
On Sunday, June 23rd the winter racing season at Santa Anita racetrack in Southern California finally came to a close. And on Saturday June 22nd the 30th horse died in racing or training at Santa Anita this year. That’s a lot of horse deaths. But there are a lot of horse deaths every year. In 2018, 493 thoroughbreds died in racing or training. And so, there’s been a lot of talk about reforming horse racing. But the reforms that have been put in place aren’t really working: horses are still dying every week. Patrick Battuello has been reporting on animal rights issues since he launched the Animal Rights blog for the Times Union (Albany, NY) in 2009. In 2013, he founded the organization, Horse Racing Wrongs. They aren’t interested in reforms. Instead, they are dedicated to a a complete abolition of horse racing, period. And with all these deaths, I can’t see how more people aren’t going to get behind them.
S2 E5 · Thu, June 27, 2019
Mike Wolf: Undercover in America’s Factory Farms
Mike Wolf spent four years working undercover on factory farms. He has seen thousands of animals living in deplorable conditions and witnessed abuse that I think few of us can even imagine. He’s now Director of Investigations for the animal protection organization, Compassion Over Killing. Mike has led investigative efforts into meat, dairy, and egg facilities. He has overseen multiple investigations that have gone viral, sparking a national conversation about the treatment of farmed animals, and ultimately, impacting meaningful change. Among the investigative efforts Mike has led are a 2015 investigation into Hormel supplier Quality Pork Processors , exposing the dangers of a cruel USDA high-speed slaughter pilot program; and a 2016 Tyson Foods investigation that offered the first hidden-camera look inside broiler breeder factory farms and provided hard-hitting evidence that drove unprecedented trials and convictions for cruelty to chickens. Mike also has a strong passion for vegan fitness, and hopes to show how easy it is to gain vegan muscle as a member of PlantBuilt’s Powerlifting team. Since Mike and I met at his home in Arizona this spring, Compassion Over Killing has released another investigation. This time it was Martin Farms, a dairy farm in Pennsylvania that is a supplier for Nestle. The footage that they released is shocking to say the least. It’s absolutely horrific and extremely difficult to watch but I beg you – watch it. Share it. It's the only way that change happens. As hard is it is for us to sit through and watch these videos – think about the animals that are actually living through this. Watch the video.
S2 E4 · Thu, June 20, 2019
Delcianna Winders: Justice for Animals
Delcianna Winders is an animal law attorney, scholar, and professor. She has recently joined the Lewis and Clark Law School for Animal Studies where she will lead the newly formed animal law litigation clinic focused on the legal protections and rights of farmed animals. This is the nation’s first-ever clinic focused exclusively on animal law litigation, and with its creation, Lewis & Clark Law School becomes the first law school in the world to host two separate clinics devoted to animal law. (The existing animal law clinic, founded in 2008, focuses on policy.) Delcianna has practiced animal law for more than a decade in a variety of settings and has taught the subject for nearly as long. As Vice President & Deputy General Counsel at the PETA Foundation, Professor Winders led a team of lawyers, veterinarians, and scientists to successfully transfer over a hundred individual animals from appalling conditions to reputable sanctuaries. She originated the legal theory underpinning the recently filed first-ever lawsuit brought by a horse and also developed and brought litigation that successfully ended the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s decades-long policy of secretly and illegally issuing Endangered Species Act permits to roadside zoos and circuses. She is leading a team of future lawyers in the fight to change a system that has perpetuated enormous amounts of unnecessary suffering toward animals throughout the US. Animals everywhere are very lucky to have Delcianna on their side.
S2 E3 · Thu, June 13, 2019
Kathy Stevens: On Hope, Love, and a Vegan World
Kathy Stevens is the founder of the Catskill Animal Sanctuary, or CAS. It’s based in upstate New York and she founded it in 2001 with a mission to rescue farmed animals, ignite social change to end their exploitation, and to champion vegan living. CAS has rescued and been haven to more than 5000 animals over the past two decades and currently has over 300 incredibly happy residents. Kathy is also the author of 2 books: Where the Blind Horse Sings and Animal Camp: Lessons in Love and Hope from Rescued Farm Animals, and she is one of the best voices on veganism that I have ever had the pleasure to have listened to.
S2 E2 · Thu, June 06, 2019
Matt Rossell: His Time Inside The Hidden Worlds of Animal Torture, Abuse, and Suffering
He has spent the past two decades fighting to create a better world for animals and it all started by accident. While he was in grad school in the 90s, he worked security at a hospital at night. One night he heard some horrible cries behind closed doors and he proceeded to investigate. And, what he saw changed his life forever – horrific experiments taking place on live kitten’s brains. He took photos and contacted PETA, and thus began a seven-year stretch as an undercover investigator. He worked in fur farms, factory farms, circuses, primate labs - really in every industry where that terrible things are done to animals under massive secrecy. And in all of these industries, the only people who are really checking on anything are the animal undercover investigators. Matt’s footage has created awareness and sparked huge change in many of these worlds. In order to get the footage, he like all other undercover investigators, had to work horrible jobs with long grueling hours and minimal pay all while having to perform jobs that harmed, exploited, or killed the very animals he has dedicated his life to protecting. He has witnessed the worst of humanity yet somehow he’s positive, hopeful, and all love and light. Since his undercover days, he has worked for many organizations - all in the fight for animal rights, freedom, safety, and welfare. He’s an advocate, an activist, and a hero. Animals everywhere are lucky to have this man on their side.
S2 E1 · Thu, May 30, 2019
Chrissy Beckles: Golden Gloves Boxer in the Fight of her life: Saving the dogs of Puerto Rico
Chrissy Beckles is the founder of the Sato Project, an organization that has been fighting to save the dogs of Puerto Rico for close to a decade. They truly couldn't have a better leader than they do in Chrissy. Not only is she one of the toughest, most resilient human beings I've ever met, but she's also got real skills in the ring. She's a Golden Gloves champion boxer, and she uses every one of her skills in the fight to save these dogs. There are 250,000 stray dogs living on Puerto Rico, and many of them are starving, emaciated, diseased, sick, wounded, and abused. The conditions for these animals are dire across the island and were made much worse in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. Chrissy originally went to Puerto Rico in 2008, because her husband - a stuntman, was working on a movie there. She went down for a weeklong vacation from her busy life in NYC. At the time, she had a big corporate job and spent her remaining hours training in the ring. So, a little getaway sounded like a good idea. Before she arrived, her husband had warned her that some of the dogs near where they were staying were in pretty bad shape. She was expecting to see a bunch of sad skinny strays roaming around, but it was far worse than she ever could have imagined. In fact, what she saw changed her life forever. There were hundreds of dogs in beyond deplorable conditions. As soon as she arrived and saw the state that these dogs were living in, she knew that she had to do something. She spent that vacation running around the island helping as many dogs as she could. When she got back on the plane to go home, she said to herself, "You know what? I need to do more." Which became kind of her mantra for the next 13 years. Currently, she lives in Puerto Rico full time and has saved and is still saving thousands upon thousands of unwanted dogs. Hurricane Maria almost knocked them out. It undid much of the progress that The Sato Project had made in the years previous. But, just like in the ring, Chrissy got up and went back in. Almost every minute of her days is spent saving these dogs and giving as many of them as possible a life of freedom, safety, and love. The Sato Project (and 26 other organizations) are also involved in an enormous effort to spay and neuter 100,000 dogs on the island, which will make a huge impact on the stray problem that has overtaken the island. Little did Chrissy know that when she took that first trip to Puerto Rico many years ago, her life would be forever changed. And, as you will hear, she is beyond grateful for that. So are thousands of dogs.
S1 E8 · Thu, February 28, 2019
Susan Wagner: Stop sending our horses to the slaughterhouse.
Susan Wagner is a hero to horses everywhere. She is the President and founder of Equine Advocates, a horse rescue in Chatham New York. They rescue horses from horrifically abusive situations and have saved hundreds that were literally en route to the slaughterhouse. For decades, they have been an enormous force in the fight against horse slaughter. We don’t slaughter horses on American soil anymore – the last horse slaughter plant closed in 2007, instead we send 100,000 horses a year to horrific deaths in Mexican and Canadian slaughterhouses. The horses are from every industry, including: quarter horses, racehorses, draft and plow horses, summer camp horses, wild mustangs, and even backyard pets – the slaughter pipeline doesn’t discriminate. It’s gruesome, terrifying, and way too popular. The horses are sent to auction by their owners and are placed in filthy, over crowded pens with a ton of other horses - many of whom are sick and injured. From there, many are purchased by kill buyers – who are specifically at the auctions to fill their trucks with enough horses to head either directly to the slaughter plants or they’ll take them to a feed lot to fatten them up pre-slaughter and then transport them to the Mexican and Canadian plants. The horses can spend up to 30 or 35 hours on these trucks, packed in without food or water. Once they arrive at the slaughter plant, they are soon after stunned and then killed. The process is cruel and often the stunning doesn’t work because the horses are afraid and duck and dart their heads so that the guns miss them, so a few moments later when they are hung by their back leg and have their throats slashed, they are still totally conscious. It is a barbaric and cruel industry – so horrible that we don’t allow it in the US yet somehow, we are totally fine with shipping tens of thousands of our horses over the borders to go through these agonizing miserable deaths. Susan founded Equine Advocates in the 90s, after having spent 15 years working for the racetrack. During her time at the track, she had no idea that the slaughter industry even existed – neither did many other people back then, it was a secretive world and that unless you were directly involved it was a complete unknown. It wasn’t until she left the racing world and got a job at the NY zoological society that she learned that we slaughter horses that was the moment that she changed everything. She started Equine Advocates from her apartment in Queens in 1996, rescuing and saving abused and slaughter bound horses while working to change laws and policy all over the US. In 2004 Equine Advocates established a 140 acre sanctuary in Chatam, NY. There are 82 horses who have permanent homes at the sanctuary, most of them came from horrifically abusive situations, or were on their way to the slaughterhouse or both. It’s like they all
S1 E7 · Thu, February 14, 2019
Dr. Andrew Halloran: On Ending the Nightmare for Chimpanzees
Dr. Andrew Halloran is the director of chimpanzee care at Save the Chimps in Fort Pierce, Florida. Andrew has spent the past 20 years working to improve and save the lives of chimpanzees, not only chimps in captivity here in the U.S. with, but chimps in the wild as well in Sierra Leone. He has truly dedicated his life to these apes, and he's got incredible stories, a wealth of knowledge and a huge heart. 20 years ago, Andrew was right out of college, living in New York City in a little apartment with a bunch of roommates, working at a bookstore, not really knowing what he was going to do with his life. He’d had a life long fascination with apes, but never thought it was something he'd end up doing until one night when there was an AOL chat room, which was a thing in the 90s - where you could write in and talk to Koko the gorilla. Koko was the famous gorilla that spoke sign language. People would write in and Koko’s interpreter would respond with whatever Koko had signed. The responses were somewhat inane and nonsensical, but Koko’s caretaker would then link them to something else and explain why that answer made sense. Except to Andrew it didn't make sense. He thought why are we trying to teach apes how to be more human instead of getting a better understanding of apes? Right then and there he decided that's it. He knew what he wanted to do and shortly after the Koko debacle, he moved to Florida, started a Masters program and got a job at an animal park working with chimpanzees. Eventually, he earned his PhD, became a primatologist, and spent 10 years at that animal park before moving on to academia as well as a decade long project in Sierra Leone, focused on chimps in the wild and the loss of habitat. He’s been at Save the Chimps for the past few years. It’s an incredible sanctuary, founded by Dr. Carol Noon in 1997. At the time, our space program was still using chimps for research and in '97 they decided they were going to finally retire the chimps and gave them to a lab in New Mexico, called the Coulston Foundation; which had more animal welfare violations than any lab in the country and was a living hell for animals. Dr. Noon sued the Air Force on behalf of the chimpanzees and got permanent custody of the 21 chimps, she saved them from Coulston and Save the Chimps was born. A few years later, when the Coulston Foundation was on the verge of bankruptcy, they offered to sell their laboratory lands and their buildings to Save the Chimps and they donated their remaining 266 chimpanzees as well. Save the Chimps then built the 200-acre sanctuary in Fort Pierce. The chimps live on 12 large (2 to 3 acres) islands
S1 E6 · Thu, January 24, 2019
Jan Creamer: Stop Circus Suffering
Jan Creamer is the president and co-founder of ADI, Animal Defenders International , an organization that has been around since the nineties when Jan and her husband Tim Phillips founded it, and since then Jan and Tim have changed the lives of countless animals all over the globe. One of ADI’s enormously successful campaigns is Stop Circus Suffering. Thanks to Jan, Tim, and ADI, the use of wild animals in circuses has been banned in 45 countries thus far. From Serbia to Scotland to Singapore, wild animals no longer have to live the torturous lives of constant confinement, transport, abuse, and nonstop suffering. In order to get these bans passed, ADI spends years doing undercover investigations in each country. Once they have enough evidence showing the terrible lives these animals are forced to endure, including being stuck in tiny enclosures, without room to move, for their entire lives, they present it to the people, the media, and the government. The government then makes it illegal to use wild animals in circuses and the ban becomes law. But, that isn’t enough. Animal Defenders International stays in each country until every single circus hands over their animals. They hand them over to ADI (sometimes with resistance) who then moves them to temporary sanctuaries, brings them back to health, and then eventually relocates them to permanent sanctuaries all over the world. It’s and absolutely incredible feat that they have accomplished. There’s never ever a good reason to have a wild animal in a circus. Aside from the fact that they're abused and treated horribly, it is absolutely inhumane and cruel to force them to live lives on the road, in small cages and trucks and trailers. Most of them are in spaces not much bigger than their body, and that's where they spend 95% of their time. The time not confined is when they are forced to perform, which none of them want to do and that's usually where a lot of the beatings and abuse takes place. Tigers are in small barred covered cages for 22 hours a day. Elephants are chained and can’t move more than a couple of feet for their entire lives. And all of these animals are in transport constantly. Every day or few days, they're traveling somewhere new on the backs of trailers, trains, and trucks. ADI's conducted undercover studies in all of these countries for years, and every time that they're behind the scenes, they film violence and abuse at every circus on the planet. It doesn't matter what country, what they claim their laws are, the abuse is the same across the board. Jan, Tim, and ADI have truly changed the way that the world views animal entertainment. They’ve shifted culture all over the planet. They aren’t stopping either; they’ve just built an ADI sanctuary in South A
S1 E5 · Thu, January 17, 2019
Suzanne Roy: Protecting America's Wild Horses Part 2
Suzanne Roy is the Executive Director of the American Wild Horse Campaign. an organization that has been fighting for years to save America's wild horses. If you didn’t know that our wild horses needed saving, or even that we had any wild horses, here is some back story: We do, we have 30,000 of them. They roam freely in 10 western states. They need saving because they are threatened, pretty much single day of their lives by our government. The BLM, the Bureau of Land Management, doesn’t like these horses and they would much rather lease that land to ranchers for cattle. They already do lease most of it for cattle. It's 50 to 1, so for every 50 cows on public lands in those states, there's one horse, but that's still too many for the BLM. And so, they organize roundups, which means they go after these horses with low-flying helicopters and chase them, sometimes for over 20 miles. The horses run at full speed, breaking legs, falling down, some die, mothers get separated from foals, they’re terrorized and terrified, and then rounded up, loaded onto trucks and put in government holding like prisoners. Until I met Suzanne I didn’t know big this fight was. It’s huge, and it’s really complex and there are many smaller battles that happen within it constantly. The crazy part is, well there are a lot of crazy parts to this story, but one of them is that when polled, the American public wants these horses free. 75% of the USA says keep them free. Between the helicopters and the holding, there are millions of dollars spent on getting rid of these horses. The rounded up horses live the rest of their lives either in government holding or in some sort of captivity, or they end up in the slaughter pipeline, which means they end up going to slaughter houses in Canada or Mexico. These horses were supposed to be protected. In 1971, Nixon signed a law called The Wild Free and Roaming Horses and Burro Act. The law states that the BLM is supposed to manage these herds, but no management has happening at all. Instead, it's inhumane, it's unsustainable, and it makes no financial sense whatsoever. Right now, we have 30,000 horses on public lands, and 50,000 in government holding. Most of them will never leave. Very few of them are adopted and the rest of them stay in holding or end up on their way to Canada or Mexico, and there’s just no reason for any of this. There's a birth control vaccine called PZP, which is a perfect solution to the entire issue. It’s used in wildlife populations all the time. The horses would get darted once a year and they would not get pregnant, but the BLM would rather spend the money on helicopters and government holding. PZP costs $30 a year per horse. Because this is such an enormous issue and it's happening right in our backyard, and because we can actually do something about this, we've decided to make this a two-pa
S1 E4 · Thu, January 10, 2019
Ellie Phipps Price: Protecting America's Wild Horses
Ellie Phipps Price is the president of the American Wild Horse Campaign, an organization that has been fighting for years to save America's wild horses. If you didn’t know that our wild horses needed saving, or even that we had any wild horses, here is some back story: We do, we have 30,000 of them. They roam freely in 10 western states. They need saving because they are threatened, pretty much single day of their lives by our government. The BLM, the Bureau of Land Management, doesn’t like these horses and they would much rather lease that land to ranchers for cattle. They already do lease most of it for cattle. It's 50 to 1, so for every 50 cows on public lands in those states, there's one horse, but that's still too many for the BLM. And so, they organize roundups, which means they go after these horses with low-flying helicopters and chase them, sometimes for over 20 miles. The horses run at full speed, breaking legs, falling down, some die, mothers get separated from foals, they’re terrorized and terrified, and then rounded up, loaded onto trucks and put in government holding like prisoners. Until I met Ellie and Suzanne Roy, who’s the executive director of the American Wild Horse Campaign, I didn’t know big this fight was. It’s huge, and it’s really complex and there are many smaller battles that happen within it constantly. The crazy part is, well there’s a lot of crazy parts to this story, but one of them is that when polled, the American public wants these horses free. 75% of the USA says keep them free. Between the helicopters and the holding, there are millions of dollars spent on getting rid of these horses. The rounded up horses live the rest of their lives either in government holding or in some sort of captivity, or they end up in the slaughter pipeline, which means they end up going to slaughter houses in Canada or Mexico. These horses were supposed to be protected. In 1971, Nixon signed a law called The Wild Free and Roaming Horses and Burro Act. The law states that the BLM is supposed to manage these herds, but no management has happening at all. Instead, it's inhumane, it's unsustainable, and it makes no financial sense whatsoever. Right now, we have 30,000 horses on public lands, and 50,000 in government holding. Most of them will never leave. Very few of them are adopted and the rest of them stay in holding or end up on their way to Canada or Mexico, and there’s just no reason for any of this. There's a birth control vaccine called PZP, which is a perfect solution to this entire issue. It’s used in wildlife populations all the time. The horses would get darted once a year and they would not get pregnant, but the BLM would rather spend their money on helicopters and government holding. PZP costs $30 a year per horse. I met Ellie this summer in northern California. She has been involved with the America
S1 E3 · Thu, December 20, 2018
Sarah Blaine: How to see an elephant
Sarah Blaine is the founder of the Mahouts Elephant Foundation, a project in northern Thailand and a model for what elephant tourism should and hopefully one day will look like. Ten years ago, Sarah and her husband, Felix, and their two small kids got on a plane, showed up in Thailand at an elephant trekking camp for tourists, eager to learn to help and to just be a part of things. But shortly after they arrived, they realized something was really off. The elephants were miserable. The conditions were terrible, and the Mahouts, the guys who train and handle the elephants, were living in abject poverty and in a cycle they just couldn't get of, living in these little, tiny shacks, barely able to afford to eat or take care of their families. And so Sarah looked at Felix and they quickly left and went to another camp, and things weren't much better. And this set them on a decade long journey. For the first few years, they researched and they learned all that they could. They went to camps, they went to sanctuaries, they spoke to tons of elephant handlers, to locals from villages all over Thailand, they found a Karen village up in the North that seemed to be a perfect fit for the project they’d envisioned. And so they created the Mahouts Elephant Foundation, which is an 8,000-acre sanctuary for rescued elephants, where both the Mahouts and the elephants can be safe and free. In Thailand, there are only 6,000 elephants left. They're critically endangered. Half of those that remain are captive, the other half wild. The wild elephants live in national parks and the captive elephants work in tourism and entertainment. And they have pretty hard lives. Some of them have unbearable lives. And so that is what Sarah and Felix decided they wanted to change in any way that they could. The reason so many elephants have ended up working in tourism and entertainment is because in the '80s, logging became illegal and when it did, itput a lot of elephants and their Mahouts - well, all of them, out of work. And for the handlers, this was the only way they knew how to survive. It was generational. This is all their fathers had done, their grandfathers and back beyond, beyond, beyond. And so they fled to the cities, and a lot ended up begging in the streets in Bangkok, and a lot ended up in tourism. I visited the Mahouts Elephant Foundation last spring. I had this conversation with Sarah a few months after that. When I arrived at a small Karen village up in northern Thailand, I looked around and wondered, "Where are the elephants?" I didn't realize that Sarah's model of tourism is very different. There were no elephants until the next morning when we had to go find them. So, she and I and about six other people, and three or four Mahouts, went to find the elephants, which meant we hiked through the forest for hours. It was 100 degr
S1 E2 · Thu, December 13, 2018
Anita Kranjc: How One Woman Started A Global Movement
Anita Kranjc is living proof that one person can create earth shattering impact, because that is exactly what she did when she made global headlines after being arrested in 2015. She was charged with criminal mischief for giving water to thirsty pigs on their way to the slaughterhouse. And after two years awaiting trial, she was acquitted. Her case attracted media from all over the world and brought global attention to her movement, The Toronto Pig Save – which has spawned The Save Movement: numerous Animal Saves that take place all over the planet. Each save group is shows up to their local slaughterhouse once, twice, or three times a week and bears witness to cows, pigs, chickens, fish, even whales and horses on their way to slaughter. But it all started with one woman, Anita and her dog Mr. Beans. In 2010, she was living near a slaughterhouse in Toronto. Everyday as she walked the dog, she’d see the truckloads of terrified pigs being driven to the slaughterhouse. She wondered why no one was doing anything, and six months later, she formed the Toronto pig save, which began as a small group of people that stood vigil outside of the slaughterhouse, three times a week. As the trucks pull into the slaughterhouse gates, they have to stop at a red light. Anita and her group (and most Save groups around the world) give water to the thirsty animals, who are often on the trucks for as long as 36 hours and are not fed nor given any water in that time. When they finally arrive they are often insane with thirst (plus, a little water is the only act of compassion that these animals ever receive in their entire miserable lives). Even in the beginning, with a tiny group of activists bearing witness, Anita had big ideas for the movement. She wanted and still wants all slaughterhouses to have glass walls and watching the pigs being driven into a single slaughterhouse in Toronto was a first step. Since her arrest, the Save movement has grown into more than 330 groups in countries all over the world, including Canada, the US, Mexico, The UK, most countries in Europe, Central and South America, all over Asia, and Africa. It truly is a global movement and her goal, to see inside and bear witness to all of the slaughterhouses in the world is becoming a reality. She is exactly why we all need to Dream BIG. She is a force. I met Anita in Toronto. The day before we met, I’d been at an all day vigil at with the Toronto Pig Save. It was my first vigil and I had no idea know what to expect. On one hand, seeing live six month old animals in abject terror, packed into truck after truck was horrifically sad and way more real than I had anticipated. But there were also many wonderful moments throughout the day. The people were kind and generous and incredibly good to me and to one another. By the time the 2nd or 3rd truck pulled in, I felt like a part of the community
S1 E1 · Tue, November 27, 2018
Marc Ching on his time inside Asia's dog slaughterhouses
Marc Ching has all of the makings of a superhero. He is the founder of the Animal Hope and Wellness Foundation , which is an organization that’s dedicated to rescuing abused and neglected animals. In 2015 he expanded that outreach to include rescuing dog from the horrific Asian dog meat trade - where it’s estimated that 30 million dogs a year are killed for their meat. What makes it especially horrific though, is that many of those dogs are brutally tortured first. Between 2015, when he first he learned of the trade and 2018, Marc has made close to twenty trips going undercover into multiple dog slaughterhouses. When he’s been inside, posed as a wealthy meat buyer, he has filmed hundreds of videos that show some of the worst things that human beings are capable of: dogs being nail gunned to walls, being beaten with lead pipes and bats, being blowtorched, having their limbs chopped off while they bleed out, all while the dogs are fully conscious and alive. This is done because of the myth that dogs that die in terror and agony taste better. I think that until Marc started risking his life to go inside and make these videos, very few people in the US at least had any idea that the dog meat trade even existed and far fewer knew of the torture that often goes hand and hand within it. Marc is a huge hero of mine but I would guess that he’s a huge hero of anyone who has ever met him. He’s tough, he’s brave, he’s relentless, and he is as compassionate as they come. He is one of those people who - the minute that he heard about something terrible happening jumped on a plane, and then he figured out how he could help. He hasn’t stopped helping since, not only with dogs from the meat trade but also in the US, taking on some of the hardest rescue and abuse cases there are, running clinics and doing rescue in Mexico, and working on legislation and changing laws to give the animals here better lives. I interviewed Marc right after one of these trips. He’d just returned from China, Cambodia, and South Korea. Our conversation will give you some insight as to what he’s faced, what these dogs go through and just how incredibly difficult the work he’s done and is doing is. Just a warning, some of what we discuss is tough to hear: details on some of what he’s seen, filmed and bared witness to inside the slaughterhouses. I think our minds often want to skip through the terrible parts because it’s so hard to hear about, but I also think that’s part of our responsibility as humans on this planet, to bear witness to see or hear about what we are doing to other species. If Marc can be in it, and see it first hand and film it and if these animals have to actually endure it, then I think that the least we can do is allow ourselves to hear about it, to become aware of it.
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