REGULATION

SUPREME MASTER TELEVISION: The Essenes were one of the main religious sects in first century Palestine. Members wore white and followed a vegetarian diet. According to the 4th century church historian, Epiphanius, and Jewish philosopher Philo, the Essenes were Jews who kept all the Jewish observances, but were nonviolent toward all living creatures and considered it unlawful to eat meat or make sacrifices with animals. As a member of this group, Jesus would have to have been a vegetarian, as was His brother James (Jacob) and all His disciples. The main Essene scripture is the Gospel of the…

CHARLOTTE POINTING: Centralization is king in the meat industry. The days of most people eating meat from small local farms are long gone. And now, a very small number of large corporations produce the majority of meat that arrives in grocery store aisles. In the US, meat giants like Cargill, Tyson Foods, JBS, and Marfrig, each of which is worth billions, control most of the market. Every year, the meat industry raises and slaughters billions of animals, including cows, sheep, pigs, chickens, and turkeys. All of this comes with a major environmental impact; livestock emits 14.5 percent of…

GO VEGAN WORLD: The new Go Vegan World ‘Spring Lamb’ advert has resulted in some grievances from members of the public who find it upsetting and not suitable for their children. The content of the ad is upsetting because it confronts us with the violent facts of killing and eating other animals. We hide this violence from children in the process of rearing them in a speciesist culture that ensures continued demand for products that profit the animal agriculture business. Are people upset because of the violence inherent in consuming other animals that our ad confronts them with, or are they…

LAURA TRETHEWEY: Late last year, UrgentSeas received an anonymous tip from a former employee at the Miami Seaquarium about animal tanks away from public view. The advocacy group went to investigate. In November, they posted a short clip of what they found by flying a drone over the property: an elderly manatee living alone in a decaying private pool. Within a month, the clip had been watched millions of times and the outcry had grown so intense that the US Fish and Wildlife Service moved the manatee, Romeo, and his mate, Juliet, to a sanctuary. Over the past decade, drones have become…

VEGCONOMIST: At an EU Agriculture and Fisheries Council meeting, ministers gathered to discuss cultivated meat and its potential to benefit or threaten people and the environment. A coalition of 13 agricultural ministers, rather than 12 as initially reported by Euronews, led by Austria, France, and Italy, had sent a note to the EU council urging a revision of the regulatory approval framework for cultivated meat. Supported by Czech, Cypriot, Greek, Hungarian, Luxembourg, Lithuanian, Maltese, Romanian, Slovak, and Spanish delegations, they raised concerns about the potential threat of…

THE HUMANE LEAGUE: Over the last few decades, residents of Oklahoma have watched their state transform before their eyes. The Illinois River—which supplies drinking water for communities of thousands—has changed from sparkling blue to a murky shade of green. Families who have farmed land for generations are being forced off of it. Since 1990, over three-quarters of agricultural jobs in the state have vanished. The reason? Factory farms. Over 220 million animals are raised and slaughtered in Oklahoma each year. Nearly all come from “concentrated animal feeding operations,” or CAFOs. Big Meat…

NOAH J. WESCOMBE: Veganism, as both a philosophy and social movement, faces numerous challenges to the communication of its ideas across society. As a unique modern counterculture, it stands in contravention of prevailing anthropological discourses that dominate conceptual frameworks. This has led to difficulty in constructing updated virtue epistemologies that result in veganism as a logical moral conclusion. It is clear that new social discourses need developing, and that this is a primary concern for affirming moral agency... An optimal, up-to-date approach to communicating veganism is…

PIONEER PBS: In 2020, Minneapolis-based PURIS, the largest processor of pea protein in North America, opened a plant in Dawson. For the past year, Pioneer PBS’ public affairs program Compass has been exploring what the growing popularity of plant-based proteins has meant for Dawson. As consumer demand for plant-based alternatives to meat grows, so does the demand for new methods of farming and food production. What impact will it have on the residents of Dawson and the surrounding rural communities? “Minnesota’s Alt-Meat Revolution” will air on Pioneer PBS on Thursday, March 21 at 9…

NAALPO: Ladislav Kuc is a Slovakian animal rights supporter imprisoned in the aftermath of an explosion in front of a McDonald’s on December 28, 2011. There were no injuries as a result of the incident. Actions that cause property damage, and explicitly avoid harming anyone, have been used in non-violent direct actions claimed by the Animal Liberation Front to promote awareness of the suffering of other species. Ladislav was arrested on January 1, 2012. Originally sentenced to 25 years in 2014, in 2016 his case was returned to the district court, the 'terrorism' charges were dropped, and he…

JACOB R. PEACOCK: Animal welfare, environmental, and public health advocates believe plant-based meats present a valuable opportunity to mitigate significant negative externalities of industrial animal agriculture, like animal suffering, greenhouse gas emissions, and antimicrobial resistance... The private and public sectors have taken note as well; in 2022, the “plant-based meat, seafood, eggs, and dairy companies” foods industry attracted at least 1.2 billion in private investment activity and at least 874 million in public funding... This enthusiasm has been propelled in some significant…