My blog page has been sitting sorrowfully empty on my site for too long. It’s time for my first blog! Most of you know I already send out DawnWatch email alerts, which let people know what is going on in the media with regard to animal rights and welfare. This blog will also deal with animal issues. My whole life deals with animal issues! Well, any part of my life I am going to write about publically anyway. But while on DawnWatch I do my best to keep myself out of the story, if you read my blog you will surely learn what I think. The blog will be full of animal news, and my thoughts on that news, and will generally have some embedded video. As our society loves celebrities and I happen to live in celebrity central, from time to time I will be sharing video of the famous folks talking about the animals.

Which brings us to this week: If you have seen any movie trailers in the last few weeks, or watched any commercial television, or driven down any highways with billboards, you know that Star Trek opened last weekend. So I am including here parts of an interview we recently did with Bruce Greenwood. You may know him for his portrayal of dashing authority figures such as President Kennedy in “13 Days,” the President of the United States in ” National Treasure: Book of Secrets,” or surfing dynasty patriarch Mitch Yost in “John From Cincinnati.” In the new Star Trek movie Greenwood plays Captain Christopher Pike. As the movie is a prequel, Pike , not Kirk, heads up the USS Enterprise. Greenwood plays Pike beautifully, but many of us will find considerably more beautiful what he has to say about cruelty to animals in the attached video. His heartfelt points are splashed with humor. And fans of Paula Pitbull Dawn, who might know her from conferences or from my book jacket or website, will enjoy her delightful supporting role.

As all of the reviews will tell you, the new Star Trek movie is good. In fact, at the bottom of this post, I am going to share a video from the Onion satirical news site in which Trekkies “decry” how good it is. But while actor Bruce Greenwood might talk about animals, unfortunately his character doesn’t — the Star Trek movie doesn’t at all. The only reference to animals is a joke about somebody having attempted to beam a dog from one place to another, with the dog having disappeared. I love totally un pc, black humor, that insults everybody of every race and nationality — we might as well just call it South Park humor. But I just can’t find blithe references to animal testing, except perhaps in such an outrageous context, at all funny. The uncomprehending, scared and lonely dogs and chimps sent into space, when there were astronauts who wanted nothing more in the world and would willingly have risked their lives to go, are a blight on human history.

Some might argue that it is not the place of the new Star Trek movie to be making statements about animal rights. But I think the original creator of Star Trek, Gene Roddenberry, would disagree. He created a character, Mr. Spock, half Vulcan and half human, with a Vulcan’s commitment to logic above all else, but with human emotion, including caring and kindness. No surprise that the character was vegetarian. That character was created in the 1960s. In the new Millennium, the impact of the livestock industry on global warming, its destruction of our environment, and our inability to feed seven billion people on meat based diets, make vegetarianism the logical choice more than ever, and it is being increasingly accepted as such by the mainstream. And the advent of factory farming with its unconscionably cruel conditions in which animals are raised, also makes vegetarianism, more than ever, the choice of compassion. So while at least JJ Abrams didn’t have his Spock chowing into beef burgers — nobody ate anything during the film — a reference to Spock’s vegetarianism was sorely missed. Let’s hope the sequel to the current film, which is already being planned, holds more true to Star Trek history, and doesn’t ignore that fundamental aspect of Spock’s logical and compassionate character. Maybe Greenwood, with his soft spot for the critters, can put in a good word.

I told you if you read this blog you’ll know my opinions!

Yours and the animals’,
Karen Dawn

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