Check out this amazing song and video made by Bryan Harrell in support of the Chicago foie gras ban. I particularly love the shot of signs that are popping up all over town because Mayor Daley is pushing to bring the Olympics to the city . . .

My friend and colleague Melissa sent me a couple of pics of her baby sisters’ college graduation over the weekend, and when I opened the email, I was totally expecting to see a couple of the usual stock family photos and move on. But instead I saw these amazing shots . . .

World, meet Stephanie and Kimberly Carpel, animal activists extraordinaire. They both just graduated from California State University—Northridge, where they started Students for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. After the graduation ceremony, their Mom and Dad (both vegan as well) threw them a huge reception (all the food was vegan of course) that wowed both the vegans and non-vegans alike.

Kimberly and Stephanie have a pretty exciting summer ahead of them as well. They’re soon heading off to Spain for the annual Running of the Nudes and shortly thereafter, they’ll be arriving here in Norfolk to intern at PETA for the summer.

Can’t wait to meet y'all!

Here's another classic from the PETA vaults, which I came across a little while back and filed away for summer barbeque season. The website, which you can find here, starts off like this:

And on it goes. As usual with this sort of pro-vegetarianism campaign—see, for instance, Eat the Whales and Say No to Pot (roast)—the underlying point is the same as ever: "Eating animals is weird and gross, and it sucks for the animals involved." But the sad fact of the matter is that a lot of diehard meat-eaters just zone out when you say stuff like that to them. Telling people that you're thinking of firing up a roadkill barbeque, however, tends to wipe that long-suffering "preached at" look right off their faces. And the message is ultimately the same: “Dude. Go vegetarian.”

Anyway, that's my two cents, but please do check it out for yourself and let me know what you think.

Since 1975, there’s been this kickass law that protects baby turtles from being bought and sold as pets for kids who are likely to mistreat and eventually abandon them. All well and good so far, but all of a sudden this law is facing a serious threat of being overturned from the commercial turtle lobby (no, I didn’t realize there was a commercial turtle lobby either). Turns out that selling turtles for meat is a $9.4 million industry, and some turtle-hating Louisiana farmers have banded together to pressure the federal government into legalizing the sale of baby turtles in the U.S. The bill, introduced in Congress as HR 924 and S 540, is called the Domestic Pet Turtle Market Access Act of 2007, but despite the stupid name, this irresponsible, profit-driven idea stands to cause a huge amount of suffering to animals, as well as putting unwitting purchasers of pet turtles at serious risk from salmonella poisoning (since most reptiles carry the bacteria and often pass it on to humans). Anyway, if you’re looking to give your Monday a bit more meaning by doing something positive for animals, may I suggest that you click the button below to learn more and then contact the House Committee on Energy and Commerce to ask them not to cave to this weird, shady Turtle Profiteers lobby and leave the current, perfectly sensible ban as it is.

I've been refraining from touching this story for a while now, partially because I didn't want to give any publicity to a lousy father who thinks that killing animals on the weekend is a good way to teach his son to be a productive member of society. But the latest twist in the sad tale of "monster pig" seems at least worth a mention. For those of you who missed it, some kid in Alabama shot a 1,000 pound wild hog, and the picture of his senseless act went pretty much everywhere on the Internet because, well, it really was a surprisingly large animal. As it turns out, though, far from being a wild "monster pig," as he came to be known, Fred was actually a companion animal who had been raised from birth by a couple named Phil and Rhonda Blissitt. Don't feel too sorry for the Blissitts, since they saw fit to sell their pet to a hunting preserve for some reason, but I do think this latest development adds a certain poignancy to Fred's already sad story. Hopefully it will be harder for people to take pleasure in this animal's suffering now that they know he had a name.