• Today is World Vegan Day! There’s no end to the things you can do to celebrate.
• Two Boots fetes us with a new pie called V for Vegan. It’s available by the slice today through Saturday, and ever after by the pie. Get to Avenue A tonight for a free tasting from 6-8pm.
• Gardein wants to spread the love too: You can win $500 and a three months’ supply of meatless meals by liking Gardein on Facebook, taking a photo of yourself serving Gardein to friends and family (with the package in plain view) and posting the photo on their Facebook page.
• Even The New York Times is getting into the spirit with a post about turkey-free Thanksgivings.
• In other news, New Yorkers for Clean, Livable & Safe Streets has an alternative to the carriage horse industry: fully electric, vintage-replica vehicles. I think that’s a swell idea. Donate to the cause here.

I love sugar. And I love holidays that put sugar front and center. So as you can imagine, Halloween has a special place in my heart.

Now, there’s a vegan version of pretty much everything a vegan could want. And there are official guides to vegan Halloween candy to help you find your way. There are even sites that tell you which ingredients to watch out for because they’re animal-derived.

In addition to everything that’s accidentally vegan, there are purposely vegan pumpkin-flavored marshmallows, and chocolate-covered versions. You can even find Creepy Brains Lollipops and organic, Fair Trade Dark Chocolate Scary Skulls. But there are some things with which vegan food technology just has not caught up, and at the top of this list is candy corn.

Oh, candy corn: You are so small, yet so sweet and creamy and delicious. How I miss you! Yes, sometimes you are manufactured without gelatin or honey, but then what do I find on your ingredients list? Beeswax. Sigh. Why, I ask you, why must we be apart? And will we ever be together again?

Yes, dear reader, I know I could make my own. But while there are some things I don’t mind making from scratch, there are others, like the tender corn candy, that I want simply delivered to me, ready to eat, and to enjoy.

And yes, I’ve heard there’s a vegan version in town. And I am grateful for the effort. But the corns are large, not small, so you can’t eat a handful at a time; instead you have to break off pieces. They also come in a box, not a bag. Which might lend itself to a more gourmet experience, but when it comes to sugar, I am a purist, and when it comes to reliving the past, it just does not match up.

So for now I do without my beloved candy corn, until some brilliant mind decides that we vegans have suffered long enough and that the vegan version of candy corn shall be true to the original, experience and all. That moment I eagerly await.

This is one of Supervegan’s posts for Vegan MoFo 2011.

Vegan bloggers, UNITE! And get ready to tippity type away with joy this weekend, August 26-28, at the first annual and *sold out* Vida Vegan Conference! A vegan blogging buffet where workshops, panels, speakers, and special events are up for grabs, and I am going to absolutely engorge myself! Figuratively. But also literally! Because it’s in Portland, and I’ve never been there, which means I have to taste the whole city. Lick the sidewalks and such. Mmmm.

In addition to the above mentioned conference-y stuff, there will be goings-on a-plenty: a sneak preview of Vegucated Thursday night followed by a post-screening Q&A with director and creator Marisa Miller Wolfson; a VegNews-sponsored cupcake reception Friday; and the Galarama, a fancy shmancy party and silent auction to benefit Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary, on Saturday. (The Galarama is open to the public, so bring your friends! Con attendees’ admission is included with Con tickets; everyone else can still buy tickets here.) For a full schedule, check the con’s fantabulous agenda.

Oh, and hey, is that my name on the list of speakers? Why yes it is! Jason Das and I are attending as speakers on the Travel, Group & Community Blogging, and Dating & Mating panels with a bunch of other super cool vegans. We will try our very best to bring you first-hand accounts from the Con, but if we don’t, we know you’ll look at that schedule and understand.

Vida Vegan’s organizers told me how y’all at home can catch a glimpse of the conference (and watch your loving SuperVegans!), and shared a few other helpful tips for conference-goers and admirers alike.

SuperVegan: How can people at home follow the conference?

Vida Vegan Con: LiveStream, Vida Vegan Blog, Facebook, and Twitter. And we’ve heard rumors of some our attendees liveblogging. We’ll be sure to point you in their direction.

SV: I want to attend every single session, but my clones are busy this weekend. Will the classes and lectures be recorded for us to view when we get home?

VVC: As a first-year conference, we won’t be able to stream and record every single class offered, but we’ll happily link to all recordings posted by attendees. And check our Livestream for select classes – some total, some partial.

SV: Is there one item every attendee should pack? I’ve never been to Portland — or a blogging conference!

VVC: Look for a blog post up on our site soon! Of course, for a vegan blogger’s convention in Portland, there are a few necessary things–a camera (don’t forget your charger!), layers (rain knows no boundaries here, though it is supposed to be nice), and an extra bag to take home all your swag.

SV: There’s a wonderful list of donors supplying auction items for the Galarama Saturday night. Can you give us a taste of what we’ll be bidding on?

VVC: So many generous folks are coming forward to help support Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary–more stuff shows up every day! We’ve got a Shiraleah Amelie satchel from Alternative Outfitters, some handcrafted items from Kittee Berns, Panda With Cookie, and Late to the Revolution–plus gift certificates, books, wine, and a ticket to Vida Vegan Con 2013!

This is an April Fools post. We flipped the whole site upside down to celebrate, but now it’s right-side-up again. Except for this post, which we’re leaving upside-down.

We’re having some trouble with our site layout today. We’ve contacted our ISP to see if they know what might have changed and why, but meanwhile we’re pulling out our hair trying to track down the root of the problem. If anyone can help point us in the right direction, please leave a comment! Thanks from Team SuperVegan.

]]> http://supervegan.com/blog/site-problems-can-any-web-savvy-people-out-there-help/feed/ 3 http://supervegan.com/blog/lobsters-out-of-boiling-water-into-the-crustastuns-electrified-bath/ http://supervegan.com/blog/lobsters-out-of-boiling-water-into-the-crustastuns-electrified-bath/#comments Tue, 22 Dec 2009 17:00:12 +0000 Melissa Bastian http://supervegan.com/blog/lobsters-out-of-boiling-water-into-the-crustastuns-electrified-bath/

Even dedicated meat-eaters are finally realizing that lobsters and crabs feel pain, and that even if their perceptions of pain and suffering aren’t quite the same as those of mammals (read: ours), it may not be OK to boil them alive for the eaters’ gustatory pleasure. What’s being done with these realizations, unfortunately, reads more like bad sci-fi than like any genuine acquisition of humane awareness.

A new “solution” to the problem of these animals experiencing pain and stress has been found, one that is supposed to allow seafood lovers to be nice to their lobsters and eat them too. Enter the CrustaStun, the hot new contraption on the “humane” meat market.

British inventor/entrepreneur Simon Buckhaven believes that crustaceans feel pain, and indeed, upon opening the home page of the CrustaStun website, the following text rolls out: “Crustaceans are sentient animals. Butchering or boiling alive causes them pain and stress.” He thinks it’s much better to shock them to death instead. That’s right folks–the CrustaStun is an electric chair for lobsters, crabs, and the like. Buckhaven has taken advantage of the fact that salt water can carry an electrical charge to give these creatures a shocking watery grave rather than a boiling one. Makes perfect sense, right?

One wonders whether, with his oh-so-deep concern for all things crustacean, it occurred to Buckhaven that his device does nothing to address the stress and discomfort caused by methods of trapping and/or farming and transportation of shellfish, or the crowded tanks in which the animals are kept until ready to be consumed. But hey, why worry about little details like that? Clearly a short, less painful death makes up for a long miserable life. Did he stop to consider that his invention might make concerned consumers feel better about eating these animals, thereby actually increasing demand for crustaceans, directly raising the number of animals who live torturous lives only to become expensive “gourmet” platters? Well, we know for sure one thing that he did think of: “The animals do not get stressed during the process and, as a result, the meat tastes better.” Touching.

Oh Ellen, you went vegan, and I was so proud. So how can you shill for a company that tests on animals?

While the same atrocities go on day after day in animal testing labs, this year World Week for Animals in Laboratories, April 18-26, seems just a little less bleak. Why?

• The Environmental Protection Agency, the National Toxicology Program and the National Institutes of Health have agreed to implement new technologies that will allow for the phasing out of animal testing.
• President Obama’s reversal of the Bush administration’s stance on embryonic stem cell use is another step on the path toward the end of animal testing.
• In response to Obama’s pledge to scrutinize federal spending on a line-by-line basis, In Defense of Animals is calling the government’s attention to “wasteful and inhumane experiments.”
• IDA is also asking Obama to award stimulus funding to the NIH for nonanimal testing only.
• The Great Ape Protection Act, which is currently in the House, seeks to “prohibit the conducting of invasive research on great apes.”
• And as of March, “the EU has banned all animal tests for cosmetic ingredients, formulations and final products. In addition, the sale of cosmetics and ingredients that have been tested on animals, regardless of where the testing occurred, is also prohibited, with the exception of three test areas… The final three test areas will be banned in March 2013.”

Of course, implementing any of these changes will take time, so they don’t mean much to the animals suffering in labs right now. If risking a prison sentence isn’t your bag, you can attend demonstrations through groups like Win Animal Rights, during WWAIL as well as the rest of the year.

If you’d rather use your wallet to take a stand, buy only cruelty-free products from companies that don’t test on animals. (If you’re not sure about a company or a product, you can find out here.) You can also donate only to charities that conduct nonanimal research. In addition to advocating for the creation and use of alternatives to animal testing, the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine awards the Humane Charity Seal of Approval to organizations that don’t test on animals.

And never underestimate the power of knowledge. As with factory farming, a lot of people just don’t know what goes on in laboratories, so educate yourself and those around you. Organizations like the National Anti-Vivisection Society, the American Anti-Vivisection Society, PETA and others provide plenty of information as well as letter-writing campaigns and other ways to get involved.

We blogged it a few weeks ago, but this is worth another mention. If you are anywhere near New York City, and you care at all about animal issues, you are a fool and a loser if you don’t visit Banksy’s “Village Pet Store And Charcoal Grill” at 89 7th Avenue between West 4th and Bleeker Street.

The shop touches on humans’ exploitation of animals for food, chemical and behavioral testing, fur, and entertainment. I’ve never been a big fan of Banksy’s drawing/stencil work, but this show is just great, conceptually technologically, and aesthetically. It’s subversive and clever, sure, but also quite touching and unnerving.

It’s great how it’s just a store-front. I suspect most visitors stumbled upon the place, rather than seeking it out. Even if you don’t think you like or understand fine art, you’ll be OK here. It’s just a mock store, with animatronics, just like at Disneyland.

The show closes on October 31st, Halloween. The price and the hours are friendly–free admission, open 10am-midnight. Go!

We stay alongside the Nisshin Maru to prevent the fleet from whaling.

This is the sixth blog post in the series documenting the February to March 2008 leg of the Sea Shepherd anti-whaling Antarctic campaign. Previous posts in the series are here. The following post was an email I sent 20 days into the voyage. The next update will come Friday, July 18th.

(A donations page, if anyone wants to help me pay for plane tickets to my next Sea Shepherd campaign)

From: Steve Irwin Vessel
Sent on: 3/5/08 06:34:53 +0000

We’ve been keeping up with the Nisshin Maru for a few days now. Yesterday, we were surrounded by a HUGE pod of dolphins, minke whales, pilot whales, and giant humpback whales, all swimming together! They swam alongside our boat to say hello, and we circled around them to keep them safe from the whaling factory ship. There were whales from horizon to horizon.

The Japanese fleet is unable to kill any whales while we’re in their midst. (photo taken by ship’s photographer Noah Hannibal)

It was such a good feeling to see all these whales, that would’ve otherwise been hunted, especially the minke whales which the Japanese whalers particularly targeted. As it was, the whalers couldn’t do anything while we were there. It seems that during this time, the whalers started to get frustrated. They even stopped their ship when all the whales surrounded both ships, even though the whalers couldn’t do anything or kill any of the whales.

Whales from all over the world converge in the Southern Oceans from December to March, which is why the Japanese whaling fleet hunts there during those months. Every day that we engaged the fleet, we also saw whales swimming alongside us.

The Japanese government has been spinning this week’s engagement with the Nisshin Maru to make us seem like bloodthirsty bar brawlers. We made sure that we only threw things onto unmanned whaling decks, so that no one would be hurt but they can’t do things on the whale processing areas. We threw two dozen bottles or so. However, the Japanese government (through newspapers like the Yomiuri Shinbun) is saying that we (33 of us crewmembers, none of whom were apparently driving or running the ship at the time) threw 2,000 bottles within a span of two hours, and that we also had a missile launcher, and that 4 of our missiles hit their Japanese crewmembers, causing them eye irritations. Furthermore, we apparently boarded their vessel and squirted acid into a crewmember’s face, and got into broken bottle fights with fully armed and armored Japanese marines and WON. We’re more macho than we thought!

One of the apparent unfortunate victims of the vegan death squad.

The factory ship has been trying to play cat and mouse games with us to get rid of us, but by now we’ve had so much constant experience with that game, dodging the Japanese military ship for so long, that they simply haven’t been able to shake us from their tail in any way. They’re also a gigantic ship that’s a huge blip on the radar and we moved away from all the ice berg fields, so it’s pretty futile for them to try and get rid of us.

I tried to explain The Dark Crystal movie to the captain, but he got fed up with it and left in the middle of the film. Sigh. We have Star Trek IV on board, though, so I may force the rest of the crew to watch it one of these days. Oh! Duty calls, be back later.

-Tod

We catch the Nisshin Maru

This is the fifth blog post in the series documenting the February to March 2008 leg of the Sea Shepherd anti-whaling Antarctic campaign. Previous posts in the series are here. The following post was an email I sent just over two weeks into the voyage. The next update will come Wednesday, July 16th.

(A donations page, if anyone wants to help me pay for plane tickets to my next Sea Shepherd campaign)

From: Steve Irwin Vessel
Sent on: 3/2/08 23:30:24 +0000

We just engaged the factory ship just now. As long as we’re on their tail,
they can’t do any more whaling. They had a group of soldiers on deck and ready for the engagement, but they’re in Australian waters breaking Australian law so what can they do? Shoot a boat full of Australians to prove they rule Australian territory?

The Nisshin Maru

The first battle begins. As we come into combat distance, the Japanese soldiers come onto the deck, and the Nisshin Maru uses its water cannons to try to repel us.

We threw acid and chemicals etc at their decks, so even if they lose us in a storm or something they can’t continue whaling operations. They tried to repel us with water cannons, but that did nothing. We threw everything we had, even some old vegan salad dressing that no one liked.

I was particularly happy that I hit their decks with my throw, because we had a butyric acid throwing contest a week ago to determine the teams, and I didn’t just throw badly, I threw so badly that everyone including me laughed. I threw like a disabled cat. So I kinda had to hit their deck during this engagement.

Me after hitting the Nisshin Maru with chemicals.

My friend Lawrence fighting the Nisshin Maru with butyric acid.

Lots to do since we’re still hot on their heels and the media keeps calling, so I gotta go for now.

-Tod

We raise the Jolly Roger flag when we start battles or chases

This is the fourth blog post in the series documenting the February to March 2008 leg of the Sea Shepherd anti-whaling Antarctic campaign. Previous posts in the series are here. The following post was an email I sent two weeks into the voyage. The next update will come Monday, July 14th.

(A donations page, if anyone wants to help me pay for plane tickets to my next Sea Shepherd campaign)

From: Steve Irwin Vessel
Sent on: 3/2/08 10:18:33 +0000

Yesterday, that Japanese military ship (the Fukuyoshi Maru No. 68) came within a mile of our tail, so we turned and attacked them head on again, and they flinched and turned to avoid us. Perhaps in hindsight it was dangerous, but at the time the other officer on the bridge and I were both American so we love to do cowboy crap like that. It worked out for the best anyway, since then the Fukuyoshi kept its distance. And since it stayed so far away from us, we managed to shake it off our tail completely using a tactic the Millennium Falcon used to evade the Star Destroyer fleet in The Empire Strikes Back, which I haven’t gotten tired of telling everyone on the bridge. They’ve been quoting Star Wars and Star Trek ever since, which I’m very proud of.

We gun it towards the Fukuyoshi Maru No. 68, and they swerve to avoid us.

Everyone, including the grizzled manly first officer and captain (they’ve been doing these rough seafaring campaigns for 25+ years now), say they’ve never spoken more about scifi shows and Star Trek in their entire lives until I stepped aboard their ship. I suppose I have that effect on people. The first officer calls me Sulu now. This morning, one of my friends on the deck crew, Lawrence, a police officer, starting changing the lyrics of the song he was singing to include “gigabytes” as I passed by. I was proud of that.

But I haven’t told you the most exciting news yet. Today, we took on the whaling fleet! It’s the first day in a few days that the weather’s been calm enough for them to start whaling again, so it was important that we catch them today before they could harpoon any whales. Last night, our brilliant quartermaster, Jeff, plotted a course to intercept the fleet, and we started the morning by chasing three harpoon ships out of an area filled with whales. And, for the past nine hours or so, we’ve been chasing the factory ship, the Nisshin Maru! That’s especially exciting because, if we catch that ship, it’s game over for whaling. And as long as we keep it on the run like we are now, none of the harpoon boats can whale.

We’ve been chasing the Nisshin Maru via radar through ice fields and bad weather (I’ve been getting lots of radar practice), and now we’re chasing them through good, calm weather due north. They’re running away at full speed, and they’re not yet close enough for us to see with the naked eye, but we’re slowly catching up.

We chase the Nisshin Maru factory ship through ice berg fields. We can’t see it yet but we’re catching up.

We’ll probably catch them in about 12 hours. Gotta get back to the radar again (been pulling off some insane overtime at the bridge), but I’ll update you again soon!

-Tod

• On Sunday, June 29, at noon, cookbook author Hannah Kaminsky will be at the Herbivore store in the vegan mini mall in Portland. Buy a copy of My Sweet Vegan (I highly recommend it!), meet the fantastically talented sweets guru, have her autograph your tome, and enjoy some of her treats!
• I eat a lot of cashews, but if researchers in Japan have their way, there’ll be less in the supermarket for me and more on feedlots, since the nuts appear to cut greenhouse emissions made by cattle. Not to be outdone, New Zealand scientists are looking for a vaccine.
• ESPN finally gives props to veg*n athletes.
• Boston offenders can now get vegan meals in the clink.

Victimless Leather, part of the Design and the Elastic Mind exhibit at MoMA.

Some things that raise interesting questions have been collecting in my browser tabs bar. I thought I’d share them with you.

• There’s a thorough post over at U.S. Food Policy about the scope of meat in rising food costs. It takes into account the rising cost of animal feed (and competition from the biofuels industry) and also the dramatic increases in meat consumption, especially in developing nations.
• A turtle named Myrtle, who was well known in the backyards of her block in Williamsburg was painted pink, presumably by some construction workers. It became quite a local “human interest” story. It seems like Myrtle will be OK, which is great, but I’m sure that most of those sympathizing with her story would have no moral qualms eating turtle soup.
• I’ve been noticing a similar disconnect in regards to Eight Belles, the racehorse who was driven to her death last week at the Kentucky Derby. The mainstream seems sort of upset about the abuse and effective murder of Eight Belles, but not really enough to realize that horse racing can be just as evil as their favorite bugaboo, dog fighting.
• And finally, Paola Antonelli, a curator at the Museum of Modern Art has “killed” a piece by artists Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr called Victimless Leather. The tiny jacket-shaped object/creature was made of mouse stem cells and was kept alive via a nutrient tube. It (I actually feel OK using an inanimate pronoun here) grew faster than expected and clogged its own life-support system. Says Antonelli:
  

  [It] started growing, growing, growing until it became too big. And [the artists] were back in Australia, so I had to make the decision to kill it. And you know what? I felt I could not make that decision. I’ve always been pro-choice and all of a sudden I’m here not sleeping at night about killing a coat…That thing was never alive before it was grown.

  I wonder how Antonelli thinks other “things” become alive?

It literally makes me sick when I think about the millions of animals who are tortured and killed in laboratories every year. Most people will decry animal testing when they’re confronted with images of cats with electronic devices sticking out of their brains or bunnies locked in boxes so that chemicals can be poured into their eyes. But after they compose themselves, a lot of people still come out in favor of vivisection, because if we didn’t test on animals, where would we be? And aren’t testers as ethical and responsible as possible?

As far as I’m concerned, there’s no excuse for animal testing, and until it ends, every day should be World Day for Animals in Laboratories. But since it’s not, we have World Week for Animals in Laboratories, which began this past weekend.

I never know where to begin with these things, so I’m just going to mention some of the more notable developments, old and new, as well as ways you can get involved. (I was going to try to work in this ”funny” Onion article, but it reads so close to reality that I found it hard to find much humor in it.)

Unfortunately, there’s never a shortage of depressing news on the animal research front, but in the interest of sanity, I’ll be brief. Most of us were shocked to learn that ”eco”-giant Ecover tests its products on animals—how does that make the company green? More recently, there was the stomach-turning news that a monkey had been boiled alive in its cage in a research facility. And then after all that, we’re presented with even more proof that animals are suffering for naught, since, as with the Vioxx scandal, more safety tests, this time on Botox, were found to be inaccurate.

Even more disturbing, the Washington Post reported that the Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Validation of Alternative Methods isn’t doing its job, which is to review and approve nonanimal tests. (Ask Congress to intervene here, and urge the FDA to pursue nonanimal testing alternatives here.)

But thankfully, the landscape isn’t all bleak. Last year, POM Wonderful stopped testing its products on animals as a result of protests, Israel outlawed animal testing on cosmetics, and the NIH stopped breeding chimps for research. (Project R&R—Release & Restitution for Chimpanzees in U.S. Laboratories—now seeks to end testing on all great apes in the U.S. and have them released to sanctuaries; show your support for the Great Ape Protection Act here.)

Just this month, Yale canceled a vivisector’s lecture—to kids!—following an outcry. The fact that there’s such a thing as the Johns Hopkins University Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing is cause for hope. And in what has to be the biggest positive development in vivisection in recent memory, three major U.S. agencies have agreed to phase out animal testing. Of course, as with the phasing out of gestation crates and the like, it will probably take at least 10 years, but it’s a step in the right direction.

With the tide seemingly starting to turn, now is a great time to do your part, since it’s likely your actions can have a greater impact than ever before. And there are so many ways you can help.

If you can afford to donate, put organizations like the American Anti-Vivisection Society and the National Anti-Vivisection Society on your list. (Also, be sure to enter your artwork in NAVS’ Art for Animals Classic.) The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine is one of the most amazing groups around, because not only does it push the FDA to implement nonanimal tests, it has convinced medical schools to stop using live animals in their labs, it advocates for a vegan diet, and it does it all by spotlighting concern for people as well as animals.

Another way to let your wallet speak for you is to find out which companies test on animals and to refuse to buy their products. (And if you can, drop them a line and let them know why.) The Coalition for Consumer Information on Cosmetics’ Leaping Bunny Program, In Defense of Animals’ list of cruelty-free companies and NAVS’ guide to companies that test or don’t test on animals can point you in the right direction.

If you’re an organized, articulate thinker, write letters to the editor in response to relevant news. (If you can’t keep up on your own, subscribe to DawnWatch to receive news digests and info on where to write in; FYI, the site isn’t restricted to vivisection news.) And there are always plenty of petitions to go around—simply sign up to receive e-mail alerts from animal protection organizations. To start, you can tell Mars to stop testing their products on animals (and ask your omni friends not to patronize them).

You can also set up a Memorial Field display commemorating animals used in research, ”adopt an activist,” and more.

If getting out and making noise is more your style, there are plenty of demonstrations going on. You can attend a protest of Mars on Saturday in NYC or any number of other IDA-sponsored demonstrations. Or join one of Win Animal Rights’ protests against Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS) customers and suppliers. (For activists in the UK, Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty is holding a Novartis protest on Saturday, its World Day for Laboratory Animals. You’ll also find a list of actions taking place in Europe and elsewhere on the site.)

Speaking of HLS, support the five remaining SHAC 7 prisoners, who were convicted under the Federal Animal Enterprise Protection Act, by donating to their Support Fund, writing letters and sending books to them in prison.

And don’t forget to speak out against the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act. It’s nothing more than an attempt to silence activists and to protect big-money interests that profit from the suffering of nonhuman animals.

Most of all, keep talking about animal testing. There’s a reason research facilities have no windows, and it’s up to us to make sure that the animals suffering on the other side of their walls aren’t forgotten.

As we’re all very aware, recent media coverage of veg-friendly issues usually takes the “OMG how trendy! Check out these five inch plastic heels!” tack. But Wired magazine’s June issue is impressively sophisticated and comprehensive on some of the top, tech-related issues facing the environment of animal agriculture: cow emissions, overfishing and honeybee hive collapse. I know, I know, I sound like an overly sincere sycophant, but what can I say? They got sweet graphics. Mmm, infoporn.

It’s like The Matrix, but the turkeys are the batteries and you’re the robot overlords.

The first manure-burning power plant in the US opened recently in Benson, Minnesota. The state’s 600 turkey farms generate more than $600 million dollars from 44.5 million birds-per-year. And that leaves behind a lot of manure.

But rather than being an efficient disposal system for this (cruel, barbaric and unnecessary) industry, the plant is actually just so much pork. The process is not energy efficient, and turkey droppings make ideal fertilizer as is. The plant, built by a company called Fibrowatt, is heavily subsidized, to keep industry happy and presumably to keep us off dirty foreign fuels (wouldn’t wanna catch any cooties!).

There’s a big write-up on the front page of today’s New York Times, which includes some choice quotes from Fibrowatt chief executive Rupert J. Fraser, including: “We are completely puzzled by why people would make such a major effort to denigrate what we’re doing.” Rupert, I denigrate all over you.

Slaughter a squid: buy an iPhone!

Apple CEO Steve Jobs still creeps into lists of “famous vegans.” But he’s not vegan, and never has been. If the leather iPod case wasn’t evidence enough, see the brand new iPhone ad entitled “Calamari.” Wow, a phone that lets you watch Pirates of the Caribbean (a natural choice, seeing as Steve’s the largest shareholder in Disney), only to have your appetite whetted for some tentacled chow. So you switch over to the local search (Google Maps-powered, just like SuperVegan’s restaurant guide) and pick out a seafood restaurant. Eat some squids, buy an iPhone. Yay.

Coming soon to a gas station near you…?

ConocoPhillips and Tyson Foods have been working this past year to develop a renewable bio-diesel with lower carbon emissions than conventional fuels. They announced their apparently brilliant idea on Monday: their bio-diesel will be made using beef, pork and poultry fat. ConocoPhillips said it hopes to introduce the fuel at gas stations in the Midwest toward the end of this year. More strange than the idea itself is that people are really buying into it–even though it’s an obvious ploy for more money, not for a cleaner environment. A columnist notes that animal fat burns as clean as natural gas. Uh, plus the smell of burning animal fat? “Animal fat is an ideal solution for a breakthrough fuel. The possibilities are not limited to just heating buildings and water. Other projects are underway.”

I’m partial to the tack taken on Grist: why not suck the fat out of humans to run our cars?

It may sound sci-fi, but scientists now theorize that mobile phones could be to blame for Colony Collapse Disorder that’s struck bees across the U.S. and Europe. Scientists say the radiation given off by mobile phones and other high-tech gadgets may be interfering with the bees’ navigation systems, preventing them from finding their way back to their hives.

Although sufficient hard proof of this theory is still lacking, research already suggests that cell phone radiation may have serious adverse effects on human health, causing brain tumors, reduced sperm counts and loss of brain cells. If cell radiation can do this to people, imagine what it could do to bees…

Eyeing cupcakes from Little Vegan Monsters

• We mourn the passing of Sara Whalen of Catskills no-kill shelter Pets Alive. Sara saved thousands of animals, and should be an inspiration to us all.
• Ryan at the Veg Blog’s Tips for New Vegans: Restaurants reminds us that “veganism’s not about sacrifice, it’s about doing what you know is right.”
• His advice is no help for Pamela Anderson, as Hooters prevents her from hosting a faux-winged book-launch party for PETA.
• I’m scared to eat at Hooters, and even more scared of trying eat in meat-laden foreign countries. But here’s some great vegetarian travel roundups for Moscow and Buenos Aires.
• Vegan actress Emily Deschanel tries to convert David Boreanaz to veganism. (I know, a few readers are thrilled to hear this; everyone else is shrugging.)
• And only movie stars can afford the hot new vegan footwear from Mink shoes.
• Remember that vegan cupcake eating contest in New Haven? Read all about it and see the shirtless carnage.
• There are stories running around on less reliable news sites that mad scientists have created a sheep that’s 15% human (in it’s internal organs). I’m not convinced it really happened, but it’s scary to think about!
• The metaphor of the week award goes to Dennis Kucinich, for his quote about facing Fox News: “I have to be ready to go into the lion’s den. I’m a vegetarian and a vegan — I mean, maybe the lion doesn’t want to eat me because I’m a vegan.” How can you not love the guy!

Microsoft Research has rolled out a truly wonderful CAPTCHA-alternative called Asirra. Instead of transcribing illegibly distorted “words” to prove to the internet that you’re human, Asirra has you identify pictures of cats and dogs. And not just any random critters, but folks up for adoption from PetFinder.com, with an “Adopt Me” link under each one.

The main hero here seems to be developer John Douceur, who’s been vegan for 17 years, and clearly loves his cats. While presumably owned by Microsoft, Asirra is freely available to use on your own website. If we ever need captcha-like capabilities on SuperVegan, I bet we’ll be using Asirra!

Right now, you may encounter animals who live far away from you or are even already adopted, but the developers are working on it. From the FAQ: “Asirra is currently in beta-testing. The production version will do geolocation based on client IP address, showing users pets that are nearby … The production version will initially show only pets that are actively looking for homes.”

This project is totally brilliant. Congratulations to John, his fellow developers Jeremy Elson, Jon Howell, and PetFinder.com’s Jared Saul!

(Discovered via Jack Shepherd’s “PETA Files,” which is a surprisingly good blog, as long as you ignore the inevitable posts about PETA itself.)

Update: We’re now using Asirra for new account registrations on SuperVegan. But please don’t set up bogus accounts just to ogle the cuties!

• The York Press asks: is it time to go veggie? Obviously.
• Caring Consumer tells you how to make your own vegan and eco-friendly soy candles.
• “The ultimate irony”: last Wednesday, one of the oldest vegetarian restaurants in Austin was accidentally burnt down by a homeless man cooking steaks.
• This Food for Thought dishware set is decorated with “clinical schematics of commonly eaten animals, showing exactly where bacon is hacked off a pig, or loin chops removed from a lamb.” …Adorable. Give them to your favorite meathead.
• The USDA granted approval to Sacramento-based Ventria Bioscience to grow engineered rice that contains human genes.
• Political cartoonist/columnist Ted Rall discusses the “pretzel logic” of vegetarianism. S’long as the pretzel’s vegan, I say.

Yawn. Once the striptease is out of the way, we see a series of video clips depicting animal cruelty, all accompanied by a sensitive guy song that amplifies the sheer discomfort of it all, Goldfinger’s ‘Free Me’. (Is this the real agenda of the animal rights movement – a Sarah McLachlan CD in every stereo?)

Confession: on my first viewing of the video, I switched it off as soon as soon as the self-described “hot chick” left the screen, thereby completely missing the animal rights message. Perhaps the video would have been more effective if the clips of the woman stripping were juxtaposed with the clips of factory farms, animal experimentation, et al. Then again, if PETA had done that, they might have invited uncomfortable comparisons to The Sexual Politics of Meat.

Tissue Culture and Art project predicting the future c. 2003.

British media is reporting on a couple ways science is taking the weight off omni’s meaty consciences without taking the weight out of their meaty bellies. The Daily Mail ran a story last week on scientists “investigating ways to remove the stress and aggression gene from animals” to create what one prof calls “animal vegetables” with little to no intelligence or awareness of their surroundings and treatment on their way to becoming food.

And yesterday the Times featured a story on meat grown in Petri dishes, which scientists say would solve the ethical issues of eating animal flesh in terms of less harm to animals and the environment. I guess some people would rather pay $10,000 a kilo (not to mention all the additional cash necessary to pay for heart attacks, diabetes, etcetera) for Petri meat than pick up a package of the fake stuff for $9,995 less. Go figure.

Cingular: raising the bar on animal abuse

If Cingular provides your cell phone service, you’ve probably heard about the deal that will allow you to update your MySpace page right from your phone. Pretty cool, right? Well, before you sign up for it, you might want to consider switching to a new carrier.

It seems that the innovative folks over at Cingular also sponsor rodeos. In fact, they bill themselves as “the ‘Exclusive Wireless Provider’ for the largest rodeo-sanctioning organization in the world.” According to In Defense of Animals, the cell phone company—the largest provider of wireless service in the country— is in the pocket, so to speak, of the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA). And we all know how much fun rodeos are for the animals who are forced to perform in them!

Anti-rodeo org Showing Animals Respect and Kindness gave Cingular until Jan. 1 to give the PCRA the boot, and you can help them let Cingular know that supporting rodeos isn’t okay (Starbucks finally relented, so there’s no reason why Cingular wouldn’t too).

If you use Cingular, tell them you’ll take your business elsewhere if they don’t stop supporting rodeos. If you don’t, tell them you won’t even consider them when your contract is up. For more ways to put the spurs to Cingular, check out this page from IDA.