Vegan Activist Tours the Country Spreading His Gospel

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mary zoeter <anmlntwk wrote: http://thesouthend.typepad.com/tsenews/2006/11/vegan_activist_.htmlTHE SOUTH ENDThe Official Student Newspaper of Wayne State University since 1967Vegan activist tours the country spreading his 'gospel'Gloria StamatContributing WriterFor 25 years, nobody ate more meat than Gary Yourofsky. He wore leathershoes and even owned a goat fur coat.But now, at age 36, Yourofsky is a vegan activist. He neither eats norwears anything that once had a face, a mother or a bowel movement.Yourofsky is

the founder of the Royal Oak-based animal rightsorganization, ADAPTT (Animals Deserve Absolute Protection Today andTomorrow). Lean, toned, and just a little bald, he delivers his litanyto college classrooms around the country. Since ADAPTT's 1996 inception,Yourofsky has given nearly 1,000 lectures - and on Nov. 14, he spoke atWayne State University.Yourofsky shows footage he took himself showing the gruesome inside ofslaughterhouses. Cows are chopped up and baby chicks run throughgrinders. He uses "Even God Must Get the Blues" by Jo Dee Messina asbackground music, and as the line, "Rain falls down from heaven" plays,a goat's blood sprays from its wounded neck on to the ground.As people turned away from the footage, Yourofsky said, "If it's notgood enough for your eyes, then why your stomach?"Yourofsky's path to veganism began in his early 20s when he went behindthe scenes at the Shrine Circus, where his

stepfather is a clown. He sawthree elephants chained to the floor, swaying neurotically from theirimprisonment. He looked around and saw bears in yellow tutus and tightsand other unnatural sights.He said to his friend, "Let's get the hell outta here." Over the nextfew years he switched to a vegan lifestyle.As a vegan, he is opposed to speciesism, which holds that humans have aright to do whatever they want to animals - whether to be eaten, orexperimented on, or treated poorly. Yourofsky feels that animals havethe right to live free; human enslavement of lower creatures, he said,is a form of social injustice.On April 31, 1997, Yourofsky, with members of the Animal LiberationFront, released 1,542 minks from Ebert's Fur Farm in Blenheim, Ontario.He spent 77 days in a Canadian prison for his efforts.His contention is, why is it illegal to free tortured and enslavedanimals, but legal to harvest animals

for slaughter in the first place?Which is the greater crime? In Yourofsky's mind, there is no questionabout this. Fighting for animal rights allows him to be able to look athimself in the mirror every day.As for those who love a tasty piece of meat and are hooked, Yourofskyonce loved meat as well. He thinks it is a murderous addiction, onebased on cruelty for wanting a piece of flesh."But, sadly, heroin, cocaine and alcohol ain't got shit on meat, cheese,milk and eggs," said Yourofsky.According to Yourofsky, 98-99 percent of all animal abuse occurs in themeat, dairy and egg industry. Also, it is an industry that uses up 70percent of the U.S.'s crops that could be used to feed humans. Meat anddairy are subsidized by the government. Water is free to farmers, andcattle are allowed to graze on public land. It is about supply anddemand. If people stop wanting these products, the cruelty would

stop,too.Yourofsky went on to say that humans find difficulty in digesting meat,and that it makes the blood acidic. To combat this, calcium is leachedout of bones to correct the pH. Furthermore, many people are lactoseintolerant. These are more reasons to veg it, and go whole grain,legumes, tofu and soy."How is soy gross? Blood, flesh, veins, muscles and tendons are gross,"said Yourofsky.Yet at the heart of his argument, Yourofsky feels animals should betreated by the golden rule. Animals should be treated as humans aretreated. He quoted clergyman William Inge as saying, "If animals formeda religion, humans would be depicted as the devil."Yourofsky sees hatred from every corner of society. This is his way tolift up those he sees as oppressed. "Man is the only animal that blushes - or needs to." Mark Twain www.actionforanimalsnetwork.orgPatricia Breen

www.petstorecruelty.org