Besides our booth at the Pride Festival, ARC also marched in the Pride parade in Minneapolis. Marchers carried “Go Faux” flags and handed out suckers and stickers that said, “I fake it!” – all to encourage the parade audience to think about swearing off leather and fur. The stickers were a huge success!
ARC has been busy getting humane education materials into the hands of teachers. In addition to our booth at the Education Minnesota Professional Conference, ARC offered Cruelty Free Circus Action Project packs to K-3 teachers.
The kits contained a lesson plan, student worksheets, and stickers, and they were snapped up quickly by educators eager to teach compassion for animals. We also sent middle school science teachers Frog Fact Files which are colorful kits filled with frog fact sheets covering topics ranging from alternatives to dissection to the lifecycle of a frog. Birdwatching Kits (as alternatives to chick hatching projects) were also sent out to teachers.
The Animal Humane Society’s five area shelters provide impound services for over 20 cities in and around the metro area, including Afton, Minnesota. In September 2009, a group of Afton residents asked their City Council to review the animal control arrangement between Afton and AHS. This request arose from the discovery that in May 2009, seven cats were caught in live traps, taken to the AHS shelter in Woodbury, and euthanized the same day. By doing so, AHS failed to honor the five-day waiting period as required by Minnesota law. After looking into the matter, the Afton City Council voted unanimously to terminate its impound contract with AHS.
Over 20 million animals suffer in U.S. laboratories every year. These innocent victims are subjected to addictive drugs, caustic chemicals, ionizing radiation, chemical and biological weapons, electric shock, deprivation of food and water, psychological torture, and many other horrors. World Laboratory Animal Liberation Week is the time when activists come together to make a difference for these animals.
Thanks to all the volunteers who helped make the Twin Cities premiere of Skin Trade, the most provocative documentary about fur production to date, at the Ritz Theater such an incredible success. And many thanks to the film’s director Shannon Keith, for hosting a fascinating Q&A session after the film.
Thank to our sponsors for their support of this important event with their donations of silent auction items and items for the goodie bags: Everyday People, Fabulous Furs (the world’s finest faux fur), LUSH, Vaute Couture, VegNews, Lantern Books, and Perseus Books.
Everyday People Clothing Exchange, the Cities’ hippest stores for vintage and second-hand clothes, has pledged not to buy or sell fur or fur-trimmed items at any of its three locations. Owners and sisters Kitty and Liza didn’t hesitate to make the commitment since they had always been apprehensive about dealing with fur items in the past. As Kitty explains: “We’re both huge animal people, we don’t eat meat, so it made sense for our business.”
