CIVIS Bulletin Nr 1, 1983  (page four)

 

 

IGNORANCE OR PURPOSE?

 

The Law of Averages, which is not a vagary but a demonstrable mathematical principle (see Slaughter, p 28), rules out the possibility that all the persons in charge of Britain's AV societies be either illiterate or moronic, or equally afflicted by faulty eyesight; so a good number of them, if not all, are bound to be carefully trained infiltrators, who do not hesitate to resort to flat-out fakery, fabricating inexistent faults in an effort to discredit the first AV book that has been hailed by medical people as capable of disturbing seriously the lucrative organization whose fortunes are built not only on the torture of animals but also on the genocidal exploitation of cunningly misinformed humanity.

 

THE LAWSON TAIT CASE

 

The British AV leader's refusal to denounce determinedly the immense damage caused to public health by the present method of research, to cite the long list of medical people who have declared and demonstrated that animal experimentation is null and void and a constant source of new diseases, to publish the endless list of medicines that have been withdrawn from the market because of the havoc they have wrought although they were "safety-tested" on animals, could very well be attributed to innate laziness and total ignorance. But this cannot be so in all cases. And an AV leader - the leader of a minority group facing overwhelming odds has no tight to laziness or ignorance.

 

The Rt Hon Muriel, Lady Dowding, President of Britain's NAVS, has long been considered the flag bearer and glamorous figurehead of AV in the United Kingdom, and is credited with having done excellent things, like founding Beauty without Cruelty (cosmetics) and having effected Morarji Desai's ban on the exportation of monkeys from India in 1977, when he was Prime Minister. Her dedication to the animal cause seems convincing. Then how can one explain her and her league's determined refusal to use the massive arsenal of scientific arguments against vivisection put at their disposal?

 

Two and a half years after graciously acknowledging receipt of an advance copy of Slaughter, Lady Dowding made a surprising statement in a letter to the author, dated November 21, 1980. Trying to explain what prompted her and her husband to found their Fund for Humane Research now known as the Air Chief Marshal Lord Dowding Fund, she wrote: "It was first called the Lawson Tait Trust, after a doctor who refused ever to use animals."

 

Not so at all, Rt Hon Lady! Lawson Tait, the foremost British surgeon at the end of the last century, who had developed a long line of surgical techniques routinely employed today, had experimented on animals extensively at the beginning of his career, until he realized that his operations on animals were making him unfit for work on humans, and kept misleading him into continual, tragic blunders. This eventually caused him to forswear animal experimentation for all times, and to conduct a passionate campaign through lectures, publications and letters to the editor, in order to convince colleagues, educators, lawmakers, and public opinion that animal experimentation ought to be outlawed forthwith for the sake of true medical science.

 

In one of his many published papers, Tait explained for instance how his exploratory experiments on animals delayed by 12 years his development of one of surgery's most important techniques, the one for ectopic or extra-uterine gestation, which henceforth was to save thousands of lives.

 

Thus the works of this foremost pioneer of modern surgery should represent the veritable battle horse of abolitionists in the surgical field, and his priceless elucidations take up several passages in Slaughter, where he is cited on pp 93, 156, 174-176, 181, 198, 199 and 346. Added to many more similar statements by his colleagues, also cited in Slaughter, they provide the most powerful scientific evidence of the counter productiveness of animal experimentation in regard to human operations, and crush decisively all vivisectionist claims to the contrary. But they were lost on Lady Dowding, and on the various individuals who claim to fight for "eventual" abolition in Britain's NAVS, BUAV, SSPV, and IAAPEA.

 

Hans Ruesch's letter politely advising Lady Dowding on what Lawson Tait's experiences should mean to the movement and the abolitionist cause, remained unanswered. Neither was the list of some 200 medical authorities who have declared animal experimentation to be null and void for medical science ever been advertised by any of the British societies - anymore than the endless list of animal tested medicines that have brought havoc to humanity.

 

A COMMON DENOMINATOR

 

So far the common denominator of the major British AV societies has been their exclusive use of lofty - and perfectly valid - ethical arguments, to the systematic exclusion of all the powerful scientific arguments and evidence with which Abolition should be demanded and could be obtained, and whose list keeps growing day by day. They deliberately overlook all the massive evidence of widespread damage caused to human health by the erroneous method of animalbased research. And it tallies with the guidelines that the Vivisection Syndicate (see Naked Empress, p 39) imparts to the AV organisations it has managed to infiltrate at the top, or that it has founded outright, like the Eurogroup for Animal Welfare.

 

Today there are few people in America (and elsewhere) who do not approve of the abolition of slavery, and consider that the Civil War was justified if there was no other way to obtain the freedom of the slaves. But not all are aware of the fact that the Civil War was not waged out of ethical grounds - even if those ethical grounds were at the time the only ones mentioned to the people, as in all wars but was prompted by the huge commercial interests of the industrialized North that resented the economic pinch of cheap slave labor in the South. Ethical reasons coincided with economic convenience - hence America's Civil War.

 

In vivisection, the situation is the other way around: economic considerations stand in contrast to the ethical views, the huge financial interests at stake overwhelm both the ethical and the scientific considerations, thanks to the venality of the opinion making mass-media and the ruling politicians; that's why anti-vivisectionism fails to make any progress. To defend and foster those economic interests it is necessary to falsify the scientific facts, to hide the truth. And the leaders of the big AV societies, which attract to their ranks some of the best and noblest elements the nation has to offer, play a preponderant part in this game of deception.

 

Even the most brilliant ethical arguments, already brought forth by Pythagoras (500 AD) all the way up to Leonardo da Vinci (1500), to George Bernard Shaw and Albert Schweitzer in our time, have not had the slightest effect of even just reducing slightly the blight of vivisection. And since humanity is not growing more humane, but less - just look at the mounting criminal wave and the kind of national leaders who manage to get themselves elected - it is simply puerile to believe that ethical considerations alone will ever bring about a change.

 

But the already existing evidence of the havoc the wrong method of medical research is wreaking on humanity is so massive and undisputable, that it could bring about the outlawing of the method overnight if all facts were known to the entire population. To keep these facts from becoming generally known is no less than criminal - not only a sin of omission by the AV societies, who purport to defend the animals, but also of the media and politicians, who profess to defend the public welfare, but actually only defend the interests of the Drug Trust and other conglomerates of power.

 

WHAT CAN WE DO?

 

Apart from personally helping to spread the truth, earnestly concerned AVs should demand that the societies they belong to start spending some of the big moneys most of them are sitting on - and from which they draw interests that help keep the whole fraudulent scheme going - to advertise the scientific facts of vivisectionist blunders over the media. They should by all means join the protest marches some societies are organizing, but such marches achieve nothing if they are being led in the wrong direction. They just serve to blow off steam and keep the AVs contented and deluded. The marches should lead to Downing Street and Parliamant. And if the societies, scIerotized by infiltration and riches, do not change their trends, the AV s should abandon them and form new, more intelligent and courageous ones.

 

The moneys they have accumulated from membership fees and legates were not meant to be invested in interest-bearing bonds and dividend-bearing stocks (some of pharmaceutical and related firms), but to be spent with a bang, advertising the facts.

 

Meanwhile, the AVs should support in every way, financial and otherwise, with money and deeds, organisations like the Animal Liberation Front, the Northern Animal Liberation League, and other similar groups that are springing into being.

 

They are the noble-minded activists who are not afraid to do what all sincere abolitionists would deep down want to do, even though for most of them it remains just an unrequited wish - to raid the infamous laboratories at great personal risk, to inflict material damage to the sites of the legalized, relentless crimes against innocent creatures, to liberate some of the victims of a pseudo-science organized for personal gain and satisfaction.

 

And in time the world will realize that by helping the animals, they will have helped humanity as well.

 

For all their unquestionable morality, those raiders' actions are considered illegal by many in the light of existing laws. But are they really illegal? Perhaps not, if we keep in mind the arguments of people like Professor Lawrence Kohlberg of Harvard, who at the time of the Vietnam war suggested that a government might become illegal, rather than those who insurge against it. Wrote he in 'Moral Reasoning':

 

"Laws can and should be challenged or changed when they are seen to violate more general humane principles. When the government consistently violates humane principles, one has the right of revolution, because the government has broken the social contract."

 

Animal Liberation Front (Abstract from informative material distributed by Britain's ALF):

 

Aims: Eventually to end totally the exploitation and persecution of animals by human beings. In the short term, we hope to save as many animals as possible. Methods: Direct action. Rescuing animals from premises where they are subjected to suffering. Destroying property used in the process of torturing animals, thus also causing financial loss to animal exploiters.

 

History: The ALF was formed in June 1976. It grew out of a smaller group known as the Band of Mercy, which was started in 1972. Over the years, the ALF has rescued thousands of animals from vivisection labs. Membership: There is no formal membership. People become members by taking part in ALF actions, not by paying money and filling out forms.

 

Violence: We do not consider that damage to property designed to inflict suffering and torture on animals can be termed violence. We avoid using personal violence against those involved in animal persecution, as this would be a grave tactical error. We take great care not to harm animals or innocent human beings. It is not against our policy to put an animal to sleep that is undergoing extreme suffering.

 

How you can help:

 

a) By becoming an activist and taking part in ALF raids. Don't become an activist unless you are prepared to accept the risks involved. Several ALF activists have been imprisoned. People taking part in our actions must be prepared to go to prison for the cause of animal liberation.

 

b) By giving a temporary or permanent home to rescued animals.

 

c) By donating money to our cause. The more money you donate, the more we can do. Actions can be expensive: travel, trucks, loss of jobs etc.

 

d) By doing 'intelligence' work, finding out as much as possible about those who cause suffering to animals. This may mean taking on a job in a laboratory.

 

Activism was started in Great Britain in the early '70s by members of the Band of Mercy, now renamed Animal Liberation Front, impatient with the shilly shallying and ambiguousness of the official "animal welfare" societies. Their example has spread to France, West Germany, the USA, and even staid, old, chemical Switzerland, as the obscenities committed in the animal laboratories protected by corrupt politicians in the interest of a profit-hungry Drug Trust can no longer be kept secret.

 

West Germany: In April 1983, a fire-bomb was thrown through a smashed window into the animal laboratory of the Free University of Berlin. Thereupon four members of the 'Autonome Tierschutzer' (Autonomous Animal Protectors) were arrested and will soon come up for trial.

 

In the following May, the same group, led by Andreas Wolff (24), staged a spectacular "human torch" demonstration on Berlin's main avenue, Kurfurstendamm.

 

Our picture: The asbestos suit of the human torch, carrying a sign reading "Animals are burning in this lab", is aflame. Soon it will topple over and will be doused by a fire-extinguisher.

 

 

Continental Societies

 

A few examples of infiltration into European societies have been told in Naked Empress, and also of "animal welfare" societies that have been founded outright by vivisectionist interests, to keep the official fraud going. Furthermore, cases of famous people who have gained the reputation of "fearless animal defenders" only to propagate more effectively the illusory benefits of vivisection have been documented in Hans Ruesch's French, German, and Italian Technical Reports.

 

Since Swiss journalist Franz Weber launched his "popular initiative for the abolition of vivisection and all painful experiments on animals" in 1980, based on Slaughter of the Innocent, attempts to split and infiltrate the "Association of Swiss Anti-vivisectionists" of which Ruesch's CIVIS-SCHWEIZ league is part, have been multiplying.

 

In 1979, Ruesch's first German Technical Report (Die Ftilscher der Wissenschaft, Hirthammer, Munich), had exposed many professed "animal defenders" who used their reputation primarily to promote the vivisectionist interests and keep the myth alive. One of them was Dr Samuel Debrot, professor of veterinary medicine at the University of Lausanne, who was also the President of the local SPA, besides being director of the municipal slaughterhouse!

 

When the news was added that this SPA President was importing dogs from Italian shelters to be used in the vivisection laboratory of Lausanne university, the long-time President of the AV League of nearby Geneva, Henri Kunz, wanted to denounce this respected, powerful veterinarian, university professor and "friend of animals." However, the executive committee was so horrified by the idea of openly attacking such an influential personality as Dr Debrot that they persuaded poor Henri Kunz that he had grown too old for his post, and that the best thing he could do for the animals was to resign. Which he eventually had to do, leaving the Presidency of the Geneva AV League to a Madame Denise Pasternak, a Frenchwoman and former air hostess who had brought money to the league.

 

Her first official action was to disavow Henri Kunz, who had issued an anti-vivisectionist statement in an interview to a local newspaper, and to change the name of the Geneva league to Swiss League. Then she launched into a series of spectacular, money, time, and energy-consuming activities, which all hewed strictly to the Syndicate's line: don't ever question the medical aspects of vivisection, just stick to ethics! Her high ethical convictions did not prevent her standing on friendly footing with vivisectionist Dr Debrot, whose defense she took up in newspaper articles when he was accused of trafficking in laboratory animals.

 

When she debated vivisectors on Swiss Radio and TV, she declared herself "not qualified" to rebut any of her opponents' pseudo-scientific claims, which thus went unchallenged. And like the British (and many other) AV leagues she remained silent about the massive damages caused to public health by the plethora of animal-tested drugs, and withheld the long list of medical authorities who have denounced animal experimentation on all counts.

 

Madame Pasternak became thus a natural for membership in the executive of Eurogroup, the phony "animal welfare" organisation founded by Britain's RSPCA, which will be dealt with in the second part of this Bulletin.

 

In West Germany, a league 'Doctors Against Animal Experimentation' was founded by Herbert Stiller, M.D., in 1979, which fought vivisection on medical grounds. The harassment this intelligent, honest, but not combative Dr Stiller underwent was such that by 1982 he had resigned, leaving the Presidency to a Dr Bassler, who reintroduced the ethical angle to the exclusion of all medical considerations.

 

In Switzerland, no previous bickering was necessary to have a valueless 'Doctors Against Animal Experimentation' league: it was founded outright by one Dr Balz Widmer, and its statement of purpose didn't claim to seek abolition, and not even a massive reduction of experimentation, but merely to be opposed to "further escalation" of animal experiments. Hundreds of Swiss doctors (well over 400 by the end of 1982) joined this league, presumably because they were against animal experimentation; but apparently not many of them had taken the trouble to read the league's statement of purpose.

 

In the next Bulletin, we shall report about the Swiss anti-Hans Ruesch front, which was founded shortly after Franz Weber launched his popular initiative against vivisection, based on Slaughter.

 

Being a muck-raker like CIVIS is a highly thankless task. One is accused of being a "troublemaker," of "rocking the boat." But that's just what CIVIS intends to keep on doing: to rock the boat until it capsizes, and only the swimmers can survive.

 

 

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