UConn Told To Return Funds
Violations Of Animal Welfare Rules Prompt Order Against Health Center
By GRACE E. MERRITT |Courant Staff Writer
January 25, 2008
The National Institutes of Health has ordered the University of Connecticut Health Center to return some of the grant money given for brain experiments on monkeys, because of violations of animal welfare regulations.
The federal agency asked UConn this week to return $65,005 of the grant because of violations in the primate lab, where researchers drilled holes into monkeys' skulls and implanted steel coils into their brains to record eye movements for a neuroscience experiment.
Read entire article here.
Read another story from the UConn Daily Campus here.
Editor's note: These kinds of administrative actions should not be viewed as ends within themselves (since the law merely regulates the systematic exploitation of animals in labs), but means by which to hold animal abusers in laboratories legally accountable (since they are unconcerned with the moral implications of their violent work) and keep the discussion of animal rights in the open. JG
Monday, February 4, 2008
NIH orders UConn to return $65K in grant funds
Barack Obama on animal rights
This first quote from Obama is reposted from Primate Freedom blog:
"It has not always been the pragmatist, the voice of reason, or the force of compromise, that has created the conditions for liberty," he writes about the antislavery movement of the 19th century. "Knowing this, I can't summarily dismiss those possessed of similar certainty today--the antiabortion activist ... the animal rights activist who raids a laboratory--no matter how deeply I disagree with their views. I am robbed even of the certainty of uncertainty--for sometimes absolute truths may well be absolute."
Quoted from The Audacity of Hope, in "The Fresh Face," Time, Oct. 15, 2006.
And here is an article from earlier this month:Obama pledges support for animal rights
Wed Jan 16, 1:26 PM ET Yahoo News
Democrat Barack Obama says he won't just be a president for the American people, but the animals too.
"What about animal rights?" a woman shouted out during the candidate's town hall meeting outside Las Vegas Wednesday after he discussed issues that relate more to humans, like war, health care and the economy.
Obama responded that he cares about animal rights very much, "not only because I have a 9-year-old and 6-year-old who want a dog." He said he sponsored a bill to prevent horse slaughter in the Illinois state Senate and has been repeatedly endorsed by the Humane Society.
"I think how we treat our animals reflects how we treat each other," he said. "And it's very important that we have a president who is mindful of the cruelty that is perpetrated on animals."
3/30- Speaking event at UConn-Storrs- "For the Prevention of Cruelty"
Speaking event at UConn-Storrs
"For the Prevention of Cruelty"
Dr. Diane Beers, Professor of History, Holyoke Community College
Sunday, March 30, 3 p.m.
Biology/Physics Building, Room 130
University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT
No registration needed - Free
Animal rights. Those two words conjure powerful images and reactions: some nod in agreement, while others roll their eyes in contempt. Many people fall uncomfortably in the middle, between endorsement and rejection, as they struggle with the moral, philosophical, and legal questions provoked by the debate. Today, thousands of organizations lobby, agitate, and educate the public on issues concerning the rights and treatment of nonhumans.
Dr. Beers present the history of organized animal advocacy in the United States and demonstrates how the cause has evolved within the broader social context as the country shifted from an industrial to a postindustrial society. Until now, the legacy of the movement in the United Satates has not been examined. Few Americans today perceive either the companionship or the consumption of animals in the same manner as did earlier generations. Moreover, powerful and lingering bonds connect the seemingly disparate American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals of the nineteenth century and the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals of today. Beers' lecture and 2006 book, For the Prevention of Cruelty, tell an intriguing and important story that reveals society's often-changing relationship with animals through the lens of those who struggled to shepherd the public toward a greater compassion. There will be a book-signing afterward.
