A Message From Ingrid Newkirk

I receive many wonderful (and some weird) letters. I hear from people in what my mother used to call “diminished circumstances.” Living on a meager budget, they apologize for not giving or not giving much. They worry that they’re letting animals down. I assure them that they are still helping if they just don’t spend money on anything that an animal suffered for, like a pork chop – refusing to pay for cruelty to continue is a version of giving to stop it – and when they leave our materials at a senior center or doctor’s office so that others can learn what animals endure. Often, elderly writers worry about what will happen to their own animals if they suddenly pass away. I advise them to tape instructions on their door now and tell everyone they know what to do if that happens.

Today, an 82-year-old lady wrote that she does not get out anymore “due to arthritis and failing eyesight.” She has lost her son, her husband, and, recently, her beloved dog. She feels useless. Just writing helped animals, though, because it prompted me to take out a small insurance policy. It’s not much, but it provides a chained-up dog or two with a sturdy doghouse with an overhang – providing shade during the boiling hot summer – and veterinary care for some dogs with flystrike, infected ears, ticks and fleas, or injuries.

There are always things each of us can do, and it doesn’t have to be giving money. For example, put this magazine where someone else will read it. As the Quaker missionary Stephen Grellet wrote, “Any kindness I can show, let me do it now. Let me not defer it or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.”

Thanks for all you do!