Written by PETA
Victory Update: Following a year of vigorous campaigning, PETA has learned that government officials have grounded plans for a cruel and ineffective radiation experiment on monkeys. Learn more about this victory for monkeys.
The price is wrong. That's the message that PETA pal Bob Barker sent to NASA chief Charles Bolden in a letter today urging him to call off the ridiculous plan to blast dozens of squirrel monkeys with a massive dose of radiation before locking in steel cages for life.
Writes the lovely Mr. Barker, "These scientifically invalid experiments squander $1.75 million of taxpayers' money and cost animals their health and freedom, so the price isn't right on any count."
Barker joins Sir Paul McCartney, Alicia Silverstone, the European Space Agency, former NASA astronauts, and former NASA employees, in speaking out against NASA's cruel, pointless animal experiment. Let's join them!
Written by Lindsay Pollard-Post
Brian Gratwicke/CC by 2.0
PETA has obtained government documents showing that in August 2010, the Brookhaven National Laboratory—where NASA has been planning to fund a study to blast monkeys with radiation—made a decision about whether or not to move forward with the cruel project.
Unfortunately, before the government sent us these documents, it blacked out Brookhaven's decision, so we don't know if plans to hurt these animals are moving forward or not. However, a NASA representative recently told a reporter that this misguided project might not happen, so underneath all that black might be an announcement that the monkeys will be spared.
In an additional boost to the campaign this week, former NASA astronaut Leroy Chiao spoke out against the monkey radiation experiments in a column for Discovery News.
You can help us find out the status of these cruel experiments by taking a moment to call the Department of Energy (DOE) at 202-586-5000 and politely asking if plans are still in place to bombard squirrel monkeys with radiation at Brookhaven.
Live and let die live: So goes Sir Paul McCartney's new hit … against NASA's pricey plan to bankroll the zapping of dozens of squirrel monkeys in cruel radiation experiments.
While his animal rights efforts are legendary, many people may not know that Paul also has a ton of space cred. It's true: He's an enthusiastic supporter of space exploration who has performed for the crew of STS-114 and worked with NASA to beam Beatles music into space.
In his letter to the space agency, Paul writes, "I believe NASA has the ingenuity to investigate the health effects of space travel without confining and experimenting on animals as was done in the old days. It would be terribly disappointing if in our zeal to explore new frontiers and to learn about the fascinating universe where we live we began to regress in our treatment of the animals with whom we share this planet."
Surely the rocker's support of our campaign against NASA's proposed radiation experiments will cause public disapproval of the research to skyrocket. Sir Paul joins other stars and the "ex-s" (as in ex-engineer and experts) who have criticized NASA's misguided plan. Please join them by speaking out too.
Written by Karin Bennett
But here on Earth, people aren't only listening, they're following you—on Twitter. Check out the following tweet from Astro_Sandy, aka NASA astronaut Dr. Sandra H. Magnus:
Hopefully, Dr. Magnus will avoid zoos (and, given the fishbowl reference, aquariums) entirely in the future. We also thought that she should know about some other caged animals who desperately need her help—the squirrel monkeys who are slated to be zapped with massive doses of radiation in a cruel NASA-funded experiment.
We are also sending her info on how massive amounts of radiation administered all at once cannot simulate the real conditions astronauts face in space and letting her know about the harm that will be inflicted on the monkeys (including brain damage, blindness, and cancer). In addition, we are telling her about her peers in the space exploration community who have openly criticized these misguided experiments.
Maybe Dr. Magnus will join former NASA aerospace engineer April Evans, members of Congress, and every member and supporter of PETA in objecting to this cruel and stupid experiment.
Written by Jeff Mackey
TiVo alert: April Evans, my nominee for Gutsiest Animal Defender of the Year, is scheduled to appear on Issues With Jane Velez-Mitchell tonight. Evans, who is also featured in today's Houston Chronicle, is the NASA engineer who walked away from her dream job working on development of the International Space Station to take a stand against NASA's cruel and pointless radiation experiments on monkeys.
"I began to feel guilty that I was part of an organization doing this," she told the Chronicle. "I've dedicated myself to trying to stop these experiments."
And she means it: Evans now spends her days working to halt NASA's misguided monkey radiation project and campaigning for an international treaty to end space experiments on primates.
You can support PETA's and April's efforts to stop these experiments by sending an e-mail to the Brookhaven National Laboratory, where a portion of these experiments are set to take place. (And don't forget to join PETA's NASA Facebook group.)
Written by Alisa Mullins
You don't have to be a rocket scientist to understand that NASA's plan to fund an experimenter who wants zap squirrel monkeys with massive amounts of radiation at Brookhaven National Laboratory is cruel and wrongheaded—but it clearly doesn't disqualify you, either!
Case in point: April Evans, a NASA aerospace engineer working on the International Space Station as a team lead, has quit her job over NASA's decision to irradiate non-human primates after 30 peaceful years without any space-related experiments on monkeys. Evans, a NASA Space Flight Awareness Honoree, wrote to Brookhaven director Samuel Aronson, explaining, "After much deliberation, I resigned from NASA because I could not support the scientific justification for this monkey radiobiology experiment." In the letter, Evans also encouraged the agency to develop better space radiation shielding to protect astronauts—instead of tormenting animals.
Evans' principled stance is in line with that of the European Space Agency, which has rejected the use of cruel and archaic experiments on monkeys—the kind that may violate federal guidelines here in the U.S. If you'd like to thank Evans for her commitment to justice, why not add your voice to the growing number of compassionate people calling for NASA to scrap its plans to torment monkeys?
As NASA public affairs specialist Stephanie Schierholz took to the stage at Monday's TWTRCON to weigh in on "customer service," animal defenders elsewhere took to their Twitter accounts and took over the #TWTRCON hashtag—specifically weighing in on NASA's plan to fund a misguided, cruel, and wasteful experiment in which dozens of squirrel monkeys would be blasted with harmful space radiation.
Tweets about NASA's radiation experiments started appearing on large projectors flanking the sides of the stage that the conference was using to display tweets about the event. One attendee reported that after the NASA representative responded to the surprise Twitter protest by shrugging her shoulders and rolling her eyes, curious audience members could be heard tapping on their keyboards for more information about NASA's plans to bankroll the torment of monkeys at the Brookhaven National Laboratory and Harvard's McLean Hospital.
Schierholz reportedly muttered, "[M]aybe we're experimenting on monkeys." No, NASA—if caring people have anything to say about it, you won't be. We'll keep tweeting and taking to the streets, the phone lines, and online petitions until your plans for these cruel, senseless experiments are canceled.
The European Space Agency (ESA) is light years ahead of NASA in the compassion, technology, and common-sense departments. In a recent letter to Animal Defenders International, Jean-Jacques Dordain, the ESA's director general, stated that the ESA "declines any interest in monkey research and does not consider any need or use for such result."
So in other words, the European equivalent of NASA is saying that experimenting on monkeys is useless! That's pretty much exactly what PETA has been saying all along about NASA's cruel plan to fund an experiment in which as many as 30 squirrel monkeys would be blasted with radiation and confined for the rest of their lives so that researchers could observe the devastating results. The ESA recently launched its sophisticated Mars500 project, which includes a 520-day-long experiment on six human volunteers and simulates the conditions of a trip to Mars.
We're applauding the ESA's staunch stance against these archaic and inhumane experiments and are keeping the pressure on NASA. Just today, PETA members dressed as Trekkies protested at the debut of NASA's Star Trek Live stage show at the Kennedy Space Center to urge the space agency to let monkeys live long and prosper:
You can join the protest by contacting the Brookhaven National Laboratory and urging it to halt plans to irradiate monkeys for this NASA-funded experiment.
Let's hope that this pressure from Trekkies, taxpayers, and NASA's overseas counterpart convinces the agency to finally move out of the Dark Ages and into the Space Age by dropping cruel and crude animal experiments in favor of humane and effective modern technologies that are actually relevant to human astronauts.
Some people just can't take a little bit of constructive criticism. Over the weekend, a PETA supporter took to the stage at the National Space Society's International Space Development Conference to interrupt a speech by NASA administrator Charles Bolden. Today, we received a phone call from Gary Barnhard, executive director of the National Space Society, threatening to sue us if we released details of the microphone takeover to the media. Ground control to Major Tom?
Wondering what happened that the National Space Society doesn't want you to see?
Alarms everywhere are sounding over NASA's plan to spend squander $1.75 million in tax dollars so that a vivisector can subject as many as 30 squirrel monkeys to cruel radiation experiments and a lifetime of confinement in order to observe the devastating effects of radiation on the animals' brains and bodies. NASA apparently insists on strong-arming its way forward with these experiments, even though they may also violate NASA grant guidelines and federal regulations.
The results of NASA's planned experiments cannot be reliably applied to humans because of biological differences between species and the fact that astronauts are exposed to low levels of radiation over extended periods of time, as opposed to the single large dose that the monkeys will be given in a matter of minutes. In a recent column criticizing these experiments, a neurologist who is affiliated with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration stated, "[T]he experiments are poorly planned and a far cry from the real life conditions humans would be confronted with in space. . . . At best we will come away $2 million poorer with information that we won't know how to safely apply, and at worst, we will be misled by the results of this experiment in ways that can seriously jeopardize the safety of future astronauts."
NASA officials seem bent on proceeding with this cruel, wasteful experiment. So let's show them that our collective determination to stop it is stronger by tweeting, dialing, and e-mailing in defense of monkeys and decency today.
Who wouldn't, right? Earlier this month, we asked our Twitter followers to let everyone know what they'd rather do than torment animals in NASA's cruel radiation experiments.
If you haven't heard, NASA plans to spend $1.75 million of our tax dollars to fund an experiment that entails irradiating squirrel monkeys, socially isolating them in barren cages, and then watching what happens to their minds and bodies. Effects of the radiation exposure may include blindness, brain tumors, and cancer. This is why we pay taxes?
Check out these creative Tweets from the tweeps who are exposing NASA's monkey-torment plan:
And if you haven't yet, let NASA know how you feel. It's not too late, tweeple!
Written by Paula Moore
If you have a general question for PETA and would like a response, please e-mail Info@peta.org. If you need to report cruelty to an animal, please click here. If you are reporting an animal in imminent danger and know where to find the animal and if the abuse is taking place right now, please call your local police department. If the police are unresponsive, please call PETA immediately at 757-622-7382 and press 2.
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