Why we need to re-think cultural traditions

By Tracy Brighten

How we justify cultural traditions that exploit animals and why that needs to change

Culture and animals

Cultural traditions are passed on through generations, perpetuating our use of animals for food and pleasure. In upholding religious festivals and food practices, medicinal ‘cures’, and superstitious beliefs, animal abuse continues without question. We can be reluctant to let go of cultural traditions, seeing change as a rejection of our culture, or even an attack on our identity. Continue reading

Rising tension between Faroe Islands and anti-whaling Sea Shepherd

Sea Shepherd’s Bob Barker vessel, with 21 activists on board, has been refused entry to the Faroe Islands by Danish authorities protecting whaling. 

A Faroese government statement said the decision was to protect “the legal and regulated activity of driving and killing pilot whales for food,” reported The Guardian. Sea Shepherd believes the action by Danish Customs at the port of Sund is unlawful.

Although Denmark is a member of the European Union that bans whaling, Denmark supports whaling in its Faroe Islands self-governing territory. Continue reading

Gadhimai slaughter festival to be reincarnated

By Tracy Brighten

The Gadhimai Temple Trust says the slaughter festival will be ‘free from bloodshed’ in 2019, but over two million pilgrims must be persuaded first

Calf in Gadhimai killing fields

The statement made by the trust chairman at a press conference in New Delhi this week is an important milestone, with a compassionate plea to make this traditional slaughter festival a blood-free celebration of life.

The decision follows negotiations and campaigning by Animal Welfare Network Nepal, Humane Society International/India and People for Animals, who organised the conference.

Heartbroken at witnessing the bloodshed at Gadhimai, Gauri Maulekhi, of HSI/India and People for Animals, welcomed the announcement. “Animal sacrifice is a highly regressive practice and no nation in the modern world should entertain it.” Continue reading

Faroe Islands pilot whale massacre ‘a natural way of life’

By Tracy Brighten      Contains graphic images

Anti-whaling group Sea Shepherd estimates 250 pilot whales were killed last week. Is it time tradition was buried with whale bones littering the seabed?

Pilot whale slaughter 2 by Sea Shepherd Peter Hammarstedt

Sea Shepherd protestors have been arrested trying to stop the pilot whale hunts in the Faroe Islands, but video footage and photographs by other group members captured the horrors of the mass slaughter.

The whale hunt known as the grindadráp, or “grind”, is a centuries old tradition with recorded history dating back to 1584, according to whaling proponents Whaling.fo. The whale meat and blubber once provided an important food source for the Faroese people, and whale oil was used for cooking and export. Continue reading