Worldlog Week 45 – 2012

In last week's Worldlog I gave a more comprehensive report of our 10 year anniversary party held on Sunday of last week. I would once again like to say just how nice and convivial day this was. When I founded the Party for the Animals along with three other people, the world of traditional politics reacted with its usual scepticism. But we soon proved to the front runner in the race. And we still are!

Here is a short excerpt from my speech:
Today it is exactly ten years ago that our small group of people founded the Party for the Animals just 15 minutes before the Electoral Council deadline. We had no idea the things we would have to deal with in setting up a political party. Now, ten years later, I'm pleased with what we've made of it. That we got to know each other. That we did not let our concerns about animals, nature and the environment degenerate into powerlessness and frustration, but turned them into militancy and communal action.

We also premiered our film ‘The Hare in the Marathon', about the Party for the Animals’ 10 years of existence. Wonderful! Filmmaker Joost de Haas made a film about our party under commission from our scientific agency. In film contains interviews with our party's founders and reactions from the scientific, political, and media communities to our new political movement. The film is primarily in Dutch. If you'd still like to see it, the trailer is available on our website. You will soon be able to order the film from our webshop.

We also had two inspiring guest speakers. Well-known Canadian political philosopher Will Kymlicka held a talk about his book 'Zoopolis' which was published in 2011. His groundbreaking book 'Zoopolis' discusses political theory on animal rights. In his book he applies the concept of 'citizenship' to animals – with surprising results. If you haven't read it yet, we really recommend it!

Plus Paul Cliteur, Professor of Jurisprudence and someone who's been there from the very beginning, was also there. He held a lecture about our legislative proposal to ban unanaesthetised ritual slaughter and placed the debate in a broader social context. Paul Cliteur says: “If people think that experiencing religion must be paired with suffering, then let it be their own suffering.”

Work continues in the Lower House. The new Rutte cabinet has presented its plans and so last Tuesday we held a formation debate. My compliments on the pace in which both informants hammered the cabinet together. You can say a lot about vegetarians, but not that they work slowly 🙂 . However, speed definitely not the only criteria that warrants assessment. Aside from the criticism we have for the Accord, we're very happy with the ban on wild animals in circuses and the more stringent punishments for cruelty to animals. This is the third time since 2006 that animal welfare has been discussed in a coalition agreement, and it bears absolute witness to the courage of the founders against the scornful comments from people who have nothing to do with animal welfare. My sincerest compliments are in order here!

My colleague Esther Ouwehand asked parliamentary questions this week about apes being cruelly slaughtered in a laboratory animal breeding facility. The British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection announced that ‘surplus’ apes in Noveprim Ltd's laboratory animal breeding facility on Mauritius were being killed in a cruel way, dumped in containers, then burned. It is truly gruesome and unbelievable that a laboratory animal breeder can allow an animal surplus to occur and then kill them in such a brutal way. We want to look into such things as whether Dutch ape trader R.C. Hartelust BV also buys apes from the ape breeder on Mauritius.

And to conclude: Australia has dedicated an entire website to our film, Meat the Truth! So great to see!

See you next week! Marianne