Since 1986 Etnies has been manufacturing some of the most cutting edge skateboard shoes on the market. Now celebrating their 25th year anniversary they are continuing on that path with a new campaign BUY A SHOE PLANT A TREE. For every pair of Jamieson 2 Eco shoes sold Etnies will plant a tree in the rain forests of Costa Rica. The Jameson Eco 2 is not only a stylish pair of shoes but the out soles are made from recycled bike tires and plastic gloves while the laces are made from Pet recycled plastic bottles.
• Jake Shields recently won Peta2’s most veg friendly athlete of the year! I interviewed Jake way-back-when, and it’s awesome to see his career is becoming so successful – and that someone who demands so much from his body does it without meat. When he fights GSP in April, he will become the highest profile vegetarian athlete in the world. Go Jake! For a glimpse into the life of Mr. Shields, watch the trailer for an upcoming documentary about him here:
• LA Weekly is reporting on a new BBC show that will premiere in the US on January 18th on Current TV, called Kill It Cook It Eat It. This show is certain to get a large viewership – but I wonder just how honest a depiction of the slaughter really is, and whether the viewers get to visit large factory farms and USDA slaughterhouses (where 99% of meat comes from) or just the small, killing-with-kindness farms that maintain the bucolic myth of where our food comes from. In addition, pay careful attention to the “It” in the title. It’s not “Kill Them Cook Them Eat Them” – or “him” or “her” for that matter. They are careful to refer to animals as objects as opposed to individuals. Current TV’s description is as follows:
” …a diverse group of participants is challenged to procure their main course the old-fashioned way: by hunting and killing their chosen prey, butchering it in the slaughterhouse, helping to prepare it in the kitchen, and ultimately sampling it at the dinner table. Some may enjoy the process while others recoil, but for each diner it’s an intense journey that just may change their perspectives — and appetites — forever.”
•Writer Jim Edwards, from CBS’s BNET website, is calling for Harper’s Bazaar to be sued over it’s fashion spreads – which could open a legal floodgate to help animals on fur farms. Long-gone are the days when fashion editorials were created for the sake of fashion-as-art. A list that was accidentally left in a hotel lobby revealed (what most fashion industry insiders already know) that paid-advertisers are given priority when it comes to shooting fashion “editorials”, which “…appears to be a blatant violation of the FTC’s new guidelines for advertisers.” Edwards c0ntinues, “If the FTC sued Harper’s Bazaar magazine for not disclosing that its advertisers influence its editorial features it would do readers of women’s magazines — and the fashion business in general — a huge favor…the legal framework exists to make it a possibility, and the FTC has shown interest in bashing the fashion biz before.Animal rights attorneys, pay attention!
“A fashion editorial is clearly an endorsement, but does Harper’s disclose the “material connections” between its fashion shoots and the advertisers who buy ads and provide the garments? Not online. In Harper’s December shoot with Iman, the items are identified by designer and price but it doesn’t say whether the Michael Kors fur scarf in shot 1 was selected because Kors is No. 2 on Harper’s list of advertisers.”
A large portion of the demand for fur originates from paid-advertisers, which explains why so much fur is in every fashion mag. Fur marketing organizations that represent independent farms have millions of dollars to play with, considering the exorbitant mark-up of fur garments. There’s a lot of legal jargon in the full article that I’ll leave to you lawyers, but when it comes to heavily-funded designers that use fur, their days gracing so many pages of editorials could be numbered. This also gives stylists something to celebrate, since their craft was hi-jacked in the early nineties.
“Of course, readers of women’s magazines know that most of the editorial is either made up or bought-and-paid for by advertisers, so it’s tough to argue that consumers are “damaged” by them. Still, wouldn’t it be nice if one area of the fashion world wasn’t complete fiction?”
• SDN’s Spring/Summer ’11 collection features patchwork blazers in reclaimed fabrics, hemp denim jackets with wood buttons, and vintage African fabric trunks for the beach and pool.
• Prophet, or Conspiracy Theorist? Meet Michael Ruppert, a different kind of American. A former Los Angeles police officer turned independent reporter, Ruppert predicted the current financial crisis in his self-published newsletter, From the Wilderness, at a time when most Wall Street and Washington analysts were still in denial. Now, the radical thinker spells out the impending energy, environmental and economic crises he sees ahead.
Don’t miss the premiere of Collapse, Saturday at 10 p.m. on Planet Green, and decide: is Michael Ruppert a prophetic genius or just an average guy?
• The Great Ape Protection Act is designed to address the approximately 1,000 chimpanzees who languish in research laboratories across the United States. The vast majority of these endangered animals are not being used in research experiments, but instead are being warehoused, costing taxpayers millions of dollars each year. The few chimpanzees who are used may be subjected to painful and stressful procedures such as those documented in our undercover investigation at the New Iberia Research Center in Louisiana, where more than 320 chimpanzees now live lives of deprivation and misery.
The Great Ape Protection Act (S. 3694/H.R. 1326), which was recently introduced in the Senate and already has more than 150 cosponsors in the House of Representatives, will phase out harmful research on chimpanzees in laboratories, retire all of the approximately 500 federally-owned chimpanzees to permanent sanctuary, and strengthen the government’s ban on breeding chimpanzees for harmful research.
• Someone who loved wood more than words could say? Sounds like one of us. Trees, forests, nature, and the smell of wood is something that echos in the most primal part of our brains. Guys who get down with sophisticated, organic smells will probably love Wonderwood, and being that Jaisalmer is my favorite scent – with hints of cardamon, cinnamon, pepper, benzoin, ebony wood and gaiac wood, I have a feeling I’ll love this one too. The Brother’s Quay, a pair of renowned animators known for their distinct, dream-like, and haunting imagery, have crafted a gorgeous, hallucinatory short film to usher in the new scent. It is screening onthelovemagazine.co.uk exclusively all this week. (Thanks to HINT for the hint!)
It’s sometimes hard to tell when a scent is cruelty-free, so I put in a call to Comme des Garçon’s offices in London and Paris to check if the fragrances would be considered suitable for vegans, and whether or not they’re tested on animals. The Europeans were not phased by the question one bit. I was told that there are no animal-derived ingredients in the scents, and that the labs do not test on animals, but could not be given a 100% guarantee. I am in the process of following-up to get that guarantee, but so far, this is great to know! Now I’ll see if I can convince them to put the leaping-bunny or certified vegan logo on their packaging. Stay tuned.
From fur to food to animal liberation… 3 new cinematic eye-openers.
I can feel it in the wind – 2010 is gonna’ continue to be an awesome year for powerful and inspiring cinema!! Following in the path of such successful and thought-provoking films as THE COVE & FOOD, INC., three soon-to-be released films entitled SKIN TRADE, FORKS OVER KNIVES and BOLD NATIVE, are going to profoundly impact and inspire our society to take a stand and change the planet for the better!
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SKIN TRADE
I attended an advanced screening of the documentary SKIN TRADE at Warner Brothers on February 25th. Having previously seen the director, Shannon Kieth’s, first documentary, BEHIND THE MASK, (an intense, riveting & ultra-inspiring story about the Animal Liberation Front) I was anxious to see what her second project would be like.
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I’m pleased, but not surprised, to say that this film is just as powerful as her first. Shannon is definitely a “truth seeker” and in SKIN TRADE she exposes the brutal realities behind the cruel and gruesome fur trade. Through devastating, nightmarish undercover footage inside fur farms as well as several informative interviews with some of my favorite people (“Skinny Bitch” author Rory Freedman, Actors/Activists James Cromwell, Martin Sheen, Jorja Fox & Ed Begley Jr., former NBA star John Salley, and the Discerning Brute himself, Joshua Katcher, just to name a few…) SKIN TRADE’s unrelentingly look into the fur industry dispels all the dumb myths associated with this very bloody, completely abominable business.
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I highly recommend everyone get a copy of this film stat! Whether you’re familiar with the atrocities of the fur biz, or you’ve never looked into it before, I guarantee, you will be profoundly affected, and most definitely inspired to tell all your friends and family to boycott fur and fur trim forever! http://skintradethemovie.com/
FORKS OVER KNIVES
Shortly after seeing SKIN TRADE, I was invited to another screening of an equally enlightening film called FORKS OVER KNIVES. Written/directed by Lee Fulkerson and executive produced by Brian L. Wendel, FOK discusses the power of a plant-based diet in preventing and even reversing degenerative diseases such as heart disease, several forms of cancers, as well as type 2 diabetes.
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The majority of the film follows the fascinating journeys of the incomparable Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn (a former surgeon at the world renowned Cleveland Clinic) & Dr. T. Colin Campbell (a nutritional scientist from Cornell University who penned the brilliant book, THE CHINA STUDY), who conducted several brilliant health studies, including one of the most comprehensive health-related investigations ever made. In the film, these two incredibly eloquent, engaging and intelligent physicians are on a mission to help treat several ailing patients who are living miserably with chronic conditions and an overload of prescription medications. The two doctors teach these ailing individuals how to adopt a whole foods plant-based diet as their primary approach to remedying their health issues. Soon enough, all of these sick people have thrown their pill bottles away, replacing the chemical compounds with fresh veggies; and the results speak for themselves! All of these previously-ill patients begin to gain back control of their lives and get healthy!
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FORKS OVER KNIVES is entertaining, informative, inspiring and literally life-changing. When the film was over, I felt invigorated and enlightened; I have no doubt that this documentary is going to dramatically change the way we prevent and cure disease in the world. So, give yourself the ultimate gift of a healthier life and check out this film as soon as it’s available! You can stay in the know by visiting the film’s official site for updates on a possible theatrical release near you, as well as where and when you can purchase dvd copies: http://forksoverknives.com/
BOLD NATIVE
I feel extremely lucky and proud to be a part of this very unique narrative film, which is set to be released on DVD this summer. BOLD NATIVE, a political-thriller with a lot of heart, directed by Denis Hennelly and produced by Casey Suchan & Mary Pat Bentel, tells the riveting fictional story of “Charlie Cranehill”, an animal liberator wanted for domestic terrorism. The film follows Charlie and several other colorful characters (one of which is me ) as he emerges from the underground to organize and execute a nationwide action to liberate innocent animals being tortured in factory farms and testing facilities. All along, Charlie must out-maneuver the FBI who are quickly closing in on his tracks.
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This film was super cool to work on; not only are the makers of the film some of the most awesome people I’ve ever worked with, but the majority of the cast consists of actors who are both animal rights activists and vegans. I know that this film’s message is going to go far. It’s not about how much money the movie can make, it’s about how far can this compassionate message travel. And I’m envisioning it reaching all across the world. For none of us can truly be free, unless all of us are free!
Please check out the trailer for the film and spread the word. BOLD NATIVE should be available to purchase on DVD at the film’s official website this summer, and if you’d like to host a public screening, please contact the makers of the film through the contact page on the website: http://boldnative.com/
It’s definitely gonna’ continue to be an amazing year for cinema and our world! With films like these to inform and inspire, our society most certainly is headed in a more peaceful and compassionate direction. I applaud all the filmmakers, truth-seekers, directors, producers, writers, actors and activists. They are exposing truths and calling on the human race to take action through growing awareness, optimum nutrition & universal respect & love for all living beings.
“A fashion editorial is clearly an endorsement, but does Harper’s disclose the “material connections” between its fashion shoots and the advertisers who buy ads and provide the garments? Not online. In 
not being used in research experiments, but instead are being warehoused, costing taxpayers millions of dollars each year. The few chimpanzees who are used may be subjected to painful and stressful procedures such as those documented in our 
