Drip, drip... blotch. The harsh realitites of vivisection

Written by Lisa Bluett

Lisa Bluett wrote this article to accompany my article "If veganism was a religion, I'd be a sinner." She strongly advocates animal rights and here she condemns the practice of vivisection.
Photo: Gabi Falanga

As I look down at the pen in my hand, haunting images cross my mind as the ink spills across the page. As I take notes, I picture a young white rabbit strapped to a table, shivering in fright, her eyes pleading for release. No eyes return her gaze. No ears hear her pleas. Choking on pen ink as it forces its way down her throat, she cannot scream. The gurgling sound of the black ink dies down in the silent room as she drowns.

 “You have to see who that animal is, get to know that animal, not it, but who!” Steve Smit’s voice reaches out to grab me from the horror of what he has come to speak about: vivisection. 

 “What is vivisection again?” the person next to me asks. I simply write, ‘cutting up animals’ in response in my note book. But there is more to it than that. According to the Animal Rights Africa website, vivisection literally means the 'cutting up' of living animals, but has now become more generally used as the term for all experimentation on living animals. On Thursday, 12 May, for animal rights week, Smit, a spokesperson from Animal Rights Africa and a renowned animal rights activist encouraged people to arm themselves with knowledge “…until every cage is free”.

“…Until every cage is free” is the organisation’s slogan. “We don’t want bigger, better cages for animals, we do not want them in cages at all,” said Smit. “We don’t want ethical meat production or ethical research practices and we all know that dairy cows suffer more.” Smit added that in fact it would be better to eat meat because diary cows are prone to getting mastitis and other diseases which cause them to suffer.

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 During the break before the talk began, the snacks arrived. Platters of cheese sandwiches, cheese wrapped in cucumber, cheese on a tooth pick and a few samoosas and spring rolls were to be washed down with Namaqua wine (a wine which uses animal products during the filtering process). Animal rights organisations promote veganism because non-human animal products should not be commodified for human gain. Perhaps we didn’t all know how much suffering went into the making of that platter after all.

With the number of sandwiches outnumbering people, the turn-out was looking dismal. The crowd was made up mostly of ROAR committee members, the organisers. Strange that more people were willing to take their clothes off and parade through the street in the cold during the “Wear your own skin” streak, than were willing to attend a talk on the disfigurement, mutilation and torture of non-human animals as a result of experimentation.

“We know nothing in South Africa,” says Smit as he talks about the legislation and practice of experimentation on animals. Smit also admits that talks on vivisection are not frequent but that vivisection is not a fad topic. It is up to animal rights organisations to encourage people to have a vested interest in fighting testing on animals. After all, the practice is not only stealing the lives of countless non-human animals but humans themselves. There is no conclusive evidence that shows that testing on animals means medication is safe for humans.

Published in Grocott's Mail on 27 May 2011

If veganism was a religion, I’d be a sinner

For the Rhodes Organisation for Animal Rights (ROAR) animal rights week, I became a vegan for the week. When I told a vegan friend of mine what I was doing, she asked sarcastically, “Oh, so is that like becoming Christian for a week?”

Point taken.

Yes, my decision to become vegan for a week seems kind of crazy and very hypocritical. Why would one become vegan for a week for animal rights reasons and then carry on munching them the next? But, before I explain why I did it and what it was like, I’d better explain what being a vegan means.

Veganism is not only related to what one eats, but is a lifestyle philosophy and choice, and is promoted by the vast majority of animal rights organisations (except ROAR from what I can gather). Veganism is different to being a vegetarian, which only excludes meat, in that it means not eating or using any animal or animal by-products. Meat being the obvious exclusion, but cheese, milk, eggs, honey, many alcoholic beverages, leather/fur clothing and any products made by companies which test some of their products on animals. Little did I realise just how much being a vegan would exclude me from eating and using.

My reasons for doing this were so that I could support animal right week without feeling hypocritical about biting into my ham and cheese sandwich at the same time. But more than that, veganism has been something I’ve come across over the past few years through a friend of mine. I’ve always been curious about what veganism is like and I promised myself that I would use the week to make myself more aware of the products that I use and consume and then impart my new-found knowledge and experiences on my readers.

Day one, Monday, 9 May, went surprisingly well, until the end of the day when a function was held for everyone who was involved in the production of SciCue. I walked into a room with platter upon platter of yummy looking finger foods – samoosas, chicken drumsticks, crumbed chicken strips, cheese puffs, caramel cups, chocolate cake, you name it. The only platter I could eat from was the teeny weeny measly veggie platter (which consisted of baby sweet corn, cherry tomatoes and cucumber). Oh, and I had some crackers.

Throughout the week I quickly realised that vegans are an oppressed minority and that very few restaurants and functions cater for them. On Thursday morning, I left with the other fourth year writers to go to the Franschhoek Literary Festival. There weren’t many food options along the way. We went to a nice restaurant for lunch in Knysna and the only item on the entire menu that I could eat was a Greek salad, minus the feta.

For breakfast the next morning, I had brought my own pack of original instant oats and an avo. Lunch had to be done on the go and any vegetarian wraps or sandwiches that I might have wanted had either cheese on them or a cheesy type sauce. I landed up buying slap chips and a salad from the Pick ‘n Pay. This time, I let my friends pick the yummy looking feta out.

Eating vegan food at home was never a problem. I have already almost completely cut meat out of my diet for environmental reasons. Not eating cheese, one of my all time favourites was more difficult. But I soon discovered that one can make delicious, nutritious vegan-friendly meals fairly easily and cheaply. Websites like Vegan SA and PETA have recipe ideas for those days when inspiration is running low.

I broke my veganism on the Friday evening with a hearty, mincey bobotie and plenty of alcohol, in a Franschhoek restaurant. So I guess that if veganism was a religion, then I’d be a sinner.

My greatest breakthrough however, came the week after animal rights week. My research during animal rights week consisted mainly of internet searches. This week I have had time to watch films made by animal rights organisations. Meet your meat consists of 12 minutes of horrific footage: Cows in abattoirs, hanging upside down from one leg, thrashing around with their necks slit open - bleeding, but still alive. Pigs - petrified and packed in on a truck, trampling each other to death. Chickens whose legs have collapsed or broken because they’ve grown so big so quickly, due to all the hormones they are fed, that their legs cannot support their body weight.

As if that wasn’t enough, I watched Earthlings. Divided into five categories of animals used for food, entertainment, science, animal companionship and clothing, Earthlings is an hour-and-a-half worth of heart-breaking, disgusting, shocking and nauseating images of animal cruelty and suffering. I can safely say that I haven’t cried so much in a very, very long time and it has finally pushed me the final step into becoming a proper vegetarian. As Beryl Scott, the national chairperson of “Beauty Without Cruelty” said in an interview with Vegan SA, “I feel that, for some people, the journey towards veganism is a gradual process, but it should ALWAYS be the end goal for everyone who wishes to adopt a cruelty-free lifestyle and especially those who call themselves ‘animal lovers’. Being vegetarian means you are only half way towards being the best person you can be!”

Being a vegan for a week was definitely one of the most eye-opening experiences I’ve ever had, and although I know that being vegetarian is not enough, I am hoping to one day be strong enough to adopt a lifestyle which is completely cruelty free to animals.

Here I am, the day after my vegan week, and very relieved to be drinking a hot chocolate!
Photo: Albert Falanga

Published in Grocott's Mail on 27 May 2011

Some Vegan meal ideas:

Breakfast: Oats, Oats so easy, toast with jam, avo, fruit, museli with soy milk

Lunch: Sandwiches (Use margarine, sweet chilli sauce, cucumbers, tomato, pepperdews), salads, pastas.

Supper: Pasta, vegetable curries, vegetable pie, vegetable soups, stuffed butternut, stir-fry

Snacks: Fruit, nuts, raisins, popcorn,

Treats: Jelly tots, chips (check flavouring), dark chocolate, chocolate soya milk

Protein/ meat replacements: Soya mince, protham, lentils, chickpeas, beans

Websites to visit:

http://www.vegansa.com/ (This website has great vegan recipes, using products which are easily available in South Africa and are animal friendly).

http://www.barnivore.com/ (To find out which alcoholic beverages are vegan friendly and which are not)

http://www.peta.org/ (People for the ethical treatment of animals. The website is packed with information about animal abuse and animal rights. It also contains plenty of information about how to lead a cruelty free life – from food choices, to which companies do and don’t test on animals, clothing choices and the keeping pets debate).

http://www.beautywithoutcruelty.com/  and http://www.bwcsa.co.za/ (More about cosmetics, which products have not been tested on animals and where to buy them).

http://animalrightsafrica.org/ (Find out more about animal rights and cruelty free living).