Monday, May 20, 2013

Dear Jennifer,

UniverSoul Circus is planning to team up with infamous exhibitor Hugo "Tommy" Liebel and feature the suffering elephant Nosey in its upcoming performances in Tampa and Tallahassee this month, despite abundant indisputable evidence of Nosey's decades-long neglect at the hands of Liebel. Please join PETA in urging UniverSoul CEO Cedric Walker, Tampa Sports Authority President and CEO Eric Hart, and North Florida Fairgrounds Manager Mark Harvey to cancel Nosey's scheduled appearances in these upcoming shows immediately.

Liebel currently faces almost three dozen formal charges for violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act, most of them related to his abuse and neglect of Nosey. Despite these charges, Liebel continues to fail to give this elephant the care that she needs: Recent photographs of Nosey reveal that her condition continues to deteriorate and that she is in pain and suffering as a result. Click here to learn more about Liebel's unrelenting neglect of Nosey's health and well-being.

Please click here to urge Walker, Hart, and Harvey to make the prudent and compassionate decision to cancel Nosey's appearances immediately.

Please also forward this urgent information to your family and friends.

Thank you for your compassion.

Sincerely,



Delcianna Winders
Director of Captive Animal Law Enforcement
PETA Foundation
Jenni --

I wanted to make sure you didn't miss the important email I sent. Today fewer than 160 Florida panthers remain in the wild and as panther habitat becomes more and more fragmented, it will be increasingly difficult for these creatures to stay out of harm’s way. 
-- Elizabeth
Give Panthers a Brake
Give Panthers Room to Roam!
Florida Panther NPS
Fewer than 160 Florida panthers remain in the wild. Victims of shrinking habitat, panthers are increasingly vulnerable to a growing human presence.
Save Florida Pathers -- Take Action
Ask the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to Make Panthers a Top Priority!
Dear Jenni,
Beautiful, elusive, powerful – and critically endangered.
The Florida panther is one of the most endangered mammals on earth and the future of this subspecies is in our hands.
Florida panthers once prowled and flourished in America’s southeastern woodlands and swamps, but today, fewer than 160 of these majestic cats remain in a tiny portion of their historic range. And that habitat is shrinking every day – gobbled up by highway construction, subdivisions and commercial development.
In recent months, vehicle collisions between panthers and humans have taken a deadly turn. Vehicles are a leading cause of panther mortality – a total of 19 panthers were killed on Florida highways in 2012. That’s the highest recorded number of panthers killed by cars in a single year.
We’re in a race against time. As panther habitat becomes more and more fragmented, it will be increasingly difficult for these creatures to stay out of harm’s way.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service must prioritize efforts to create and expand wildlife refuges by obtaining and allocating funding and working with landowners to protect habitat that secures the Florida panthers’ future in the wild.

Sincerely,
Elizabeth Fleming with a Panther Kitten Elizabeth Fleming
Florida Representative
Defenders of Wildlife

Exclusive: HIM Premiere New Song, “All Lips Go Blue”


HIM’s new album, Tears on Tape, will be released on April 30 on Razor & Tie in the United States and Canada. In anticipation, the band is premiering the new song “All Lips Go Blue” right here right now. Listen to it below and let us know what you think in the comments.
Tears on Tape is now available for pre-order on the iTunes Store in the United States. The iTunes Deluxe Digital Edition of the album includes a Digital LP plus five recently shot new in-studio music videos. See the full track list under the song stream.
The complete Tears on Tape Deluxe track listing is:
  1. Unleash The Red
  2. All Lips Go Blue
  3. Love Without Tears
  4. I Will Be The End Of You
  5. Tears On Tape
  6. Into The Night
  7. Hearts At War
  8. Trapped In Autumn
  9. No Love
  10. Drawn & Quartered
  11. Lucifer’s Chorale
  12. W.L.S.T.D.
  13. Kiss The Void
Bonus In-Studio Videos
  1. Heartkiller
  2. Wings Of A Butterfly
  3. Join Me (In Death)
  4. The Kiss Of Dawn
  5. The Funeral Of Hearts

Saturday, May 18, 2013

Black-footed Ferret Black-footed ferrets (Mustela nigripes) family group being prepared for release. Captive breeding facility, Colorado, USA
Once thought to be globally extinct, black-footed ferrets are making a comeback. For the last thirty years, concerted efforts from many state and federal agencies, zoos, Native American tribes, conservation organizations and private landowners have given black-footed ferrets a second chance for survival. Today, recovery efforts have helped restore the black-footed ferret population to nearly 1,000 animals across North America. Although great strides have been made to recover the black-footed ferret, habitat loss and disease remain key threats to this highly endangered species.
Ship in Arctic
Give Panthers a Brake
Give Panthers Room to Roam!
Florida Panther NPS
Fewer than 160 Florida Panthers remain in the wild. Victims of shrinking habitat, panthers are increasingly vulnerable to a growing human presence.
Save Florida Pathers -- Take Action
Ask the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to Make Panthers a Top Priority!
Dear Jenni,
Beautiful, elusive, powerful – and critically endangered.
The Florida panther is one of the most endangered mammals on earth and the future of this subspecies is in our hands.
Florida panthers once prowled and flourished in America’s southeastern woodlands and swamps, but today, fewer than 160 of these majestic cats remain in a tiny portion of their historic range. And that habitat is shrinking every day – gobbled up by highway construction, subdivisions and commercial development.
In recent months, vehicle collisions between panthers and humans have taken a deadly turn. Vehicles are a leading cause of panther mortality – a total of 19 panthers were killed on Florida highways in 2012. That’s the highest recorded number of panthers killed by cars in a single year.
We’re in a race against time. As panther habitat becomes more and more fragmented, it will be increasingly difficult for these creatures to stay out of harm’s way.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service must prioritize efforts to create and expand wildlife refuges by obtaining and allocating funding and working with landowners to protect habitat that secures the Florida panthers’ future in the wild.

Sincerely,
Elizabeth Fleming with a Panther Kitten Elizabeth Fleming
Florida Representative
Defenders of Wildlife

Teen Sues for Right to Carry Her Pregnancy

Teen Sues for Right to Carry Her Pregnancy
A Texas teen is highlighting another aspect of choice with a court case against her parents, demanding the right to carry her pregnancy to term. R.E.K., 16, won a restraining order against her separated parents in an attempt to protect herself from their attempts to coerce her to have an abortion, and the case has attracted considerable attention in the media, because it touches on a number of hot-button issues.
In conservative Texas, many pregnant women feel that abortion is not an appropriate option for them even if they may have concerns about the timing of the pregnancy. This teen isn’t the first, or the last, to exercise her right to choose to carry her pregnancy and raise the baby, rather than electing for abortion or adoption. Her parents, however, didn’t support her decision, highlighting the power imbalance that can arise between teens and their parents.
While parents are technically permitted to make medical decisions on behalf of their children, most doctors prefer cooperative, engaged patients who take part in the decision-making process. And when it comes to abortion, courts have affirmed that parents do not have the right to compel children to get abortions — or to force their children to carry pregnancies to term — given that pregnancy is such an intimate and emotional issue.
R.E.K. claimed her parents attempted emotional intimidation and coercion, threatened to take her to a facility for an abortion against her will, and conspired to slip her RU-486, a medication that causes abortion in the early stages of pregnancy. If the allegations made in the eight pages of documents are true, they make for a chilling story of a teen struggling to go against her parents and do what she thinks is right for herself.
She called on a conservative anti-choice organization, the Texas Center for Defense of Life, for help with her case. The group has successfully represented other teens in similar situations and appears to be making headway with her case, using it as yet another promotional opportunity for the work it does. And yet another chance to paint people who support the right to choose with the same brush, suggesting that all reproductive rights advocates would support forcing an abortion on a young woman who doesn’t want one, or that doctors and other clinicians would provide an abortion to an unwilling patient in violation of both the law and medical ethics.
Particularly in Texas, where there are considerable barriers to accessing abortion services, it’s highly unlikely her parents would have succeeded in compelling her to have the procedure at all, but her fears are understandable. For teens defying their parents with a major life decision, it can be incredibly frightening to speak up.
She could easily have gone to a pro-choice organization for help as well, and it’s telling that she chose the anti-choice route; in Texas, as in many other regions of the world, the social understanding of the reproductive rights movement is as a coathanger-armed crowd ready to charge forth and murder innocent babies, which is a huge tragedy. Cases like this should never happen, and young women who need support while they decide how to handle a pregnancy should feel comfortable seeking assistance from people with the resources to help them — like pro-choice groups that offer prenatal care, counseling and assistance to pregnant teens.

Read more: http://www.care2.com/causes/teen-sues-for-right-to-carry-her-pregnancy.html#ixzz2Tfad1Wqd