After last week’s release of our new anti-fur ad featuring Neighbours’ star, Imogen Bailey, I got thinking… That gal has done so much for PETA and its affiliates that I just had to share it all with you. A ‘Fish & Chimps Retrospective Look at Imogen Bailey’, if you will. But basically, it’s just a chance to admire the gorgeous looks and deep compassion of this Aussie model and actress.

We want you to vote for your favourite in a poll! Leave us a comment below to tell us which one you like best and why.

First things first, there is of course her brand new ad – ‘Earn Your Wings, Don’t Wear Fur’. Here she dons all white and a pair of angel’s wings, matching her angelic good looks.

Then there was the saucy ‘Hands Off My Buns’ anti-bunny-fur ad…

Not content to stop there, Imogen also took on the bullfighting industry for RunningoftheNudes.com…

…and taught us that elephants in Thailand are often shackled, beaten and abused.

But perhaps my favourite is the ‘No-one Likes An Eight-Second Ride’ ad she did against bull riding/rodeos. Utterly priceless.

Get voting now!

It has been 25 years since the controversial and chilling documentary, The Animals Film, was released. It inspired thousands of people to go vegetarian and commit themselves to animal rights. In fact, since the eighties, animal rights has become one of the biggest movements in history! Great strides have been made, but we still have a way to go, and it is only by encouraging people to watch documentaries like this, and helping organisations like PETA that we can really help the animals, like they deserve.

The Animals Film hits the small screen today, released uncut and digitally re-mastered by the good people at the British Film Institute (BFI). It’s directed by Victor Schonfeld and Myriam Alaux, narrated by legendary actress Julie Christie (who fired off a letter to Burberry about their use of fur, earlier this year), and includes music by Robert Wyatt, and David Byrne of Talking Heads. The film explores the exploitation of animals for food, fur, sport, entertainment and science, and back in its day was absolutely groundbreaking – showing the world what really goes on behind closed doors at a time when animal rights was still beginning to make its mark on the world. PETA US was only two-years-old!

The new release offers both the original from 1982, plus the director’s 2008 cut. Not to mention a 32-page booklet with contributions from the director, essays, reviews and a biography. This is one film you simply cannot afford to miss. You can order it on DVD from a number of outlets, one of which is Amazon but we’ve teamed up with the BFI and are giving away 3 copies of The Animals Film right here on Fish & Chimps!

All you have to do, is leave a comment with your answer to the question below by Sunday 12th October and I’ll let you know if you’ve won on the following day. Check out our privacy policy and terms and conditions (you’re agreeing to both by entering), and then get typing! (This competition has now ended, thanks for entering!)

Good luck!

What inspired you to first consider animal rights?

You know those ridiculous photos you see of grinning fishermen clasping dead or dying fish in one hand and their rod in the other - boasting about ‘how big’ their catch is? Well, we reckon they’re trying to compensate for their, erm, undersized genitalia. Those Genii at the Diminutive Male Genitalia Disorder Research Organisation also point out that DMGD is an affliction among men with small or misshapen genitals, in which pleasure is derived by victimizing unprotected creatures who have no real means of defence or escape. Hmm, read back that last bit: pleasure is derived by victimizing unprotected creatures who have no real means of defence or escape. Fishermen take note.

To help this message hit home, PETA US had these special billboard ads made up. Subtle? Of course not! Enjoy and forward to any fishing wa**ers enthusiasts you know. I’m loving the first one, so very, very British.

Oh Ben & Jerry’s, now you have another reason to consider making your ice-cream with human breast milk. And perhaps other ice-cream and milkshake companies should be thinking along the same lines. In fear of the deadly toxin, melamine, the EU has decided to ban all children’s food products that contain milk from China. Pretty reasonable I’d say, but is the government really that concerned about our children’s health? How about banning all milk products – regardless of what country they come from – and switching Mother Nature’s very own human milk?

Dairy products are a health hazard. Fact. They contain no fibre or complex carbohydrates and are laden with saturated fat and cholesterol. They are contaminated with cow’s blood and pus, and are frequently contaminated with pesticides, hormones and antibiotics. Mmm, and that’s not mention the good ole melamine that so easily found its way into products transported across the whole world.

Dairy products are also linked to allergies, constipation, obesity, heart disease, cancer and other diseases. The late Dr. Benjamin Spock, America’s leading authority on child care, spoke out against feeding cow’s milk to children, saying it may play a role in the onset of anemia, allergies, and insulin-dependent diabetes and in the long term, can set kids up for obesity and heart disease.

Vote below! Should the EU ban all dairy milk and switch to human breast milk?

Gillian Anderson may be just weeks away from delivering her third baby, but the gorgeous X-Files star is squeezing in one last film project before the big arrival.

Our favorite redhead is all set to narrate a brand-new video of undercover footage taken inside European and Chinese rabbit fur farms, as part of PETA’s campaign to pressure Giorgio Armani to stick to his fur-free pledge—which, as we reported yesterday, he’s clearly having trouble with, if the freaky fur coats for toddlers in his new collection are anything to go by.

Gillian, who is well aware that most children have a natural affinity for and love of animals, wants to strike while the iron is hot, so she has agreed to spearhead our campaign against the designer. The dedicated animal rights advocate says, “I am stunned that Armani has gone back on his word. I can’t understand why anyone would want to use real fur, and especially rabbit because it is so easy to replicate as the pile is so short.”

Gillian has helped PETA and the animals repeatedly over the years, and she won PETA’s Humanitarian Award back in 2006. She invited PETA US Vice President Dan Mathews to give a talk at her daughter’s school in London, and she helped map out PETA’s Armani campaign strategy at the classy Groucho Club on Monday night. Though, of course, there wasn’t a champagne in sight—Gillian and Dan worked hard over glasses of lemonade and apple crumble. Cute ….

Linklane / CC

Ladies and Gents, PETA are proud to announce our brand new video, Whose Skin Are You In? It’s slick, it’s smart and yes, it’s sad too, but the message is so powerful that no person in their right mind could continue to wear fur after watching it. We’re taking aim at the fashion industry, so for all you Christopher Baileys and other fur-peddlers out there - listen up!

Sign our pledge to tell the world you’ll never, ever wear the skin of any animal, and order some fab free stickers too! Remember, every animal - whether it’s a cat, dog, cow, fox or snake - deserves the right to a life free of pain, suffering and death by bludgeoning, gassing and other crude methods. No coat or trim is worth that.

Oh and totally add it to your YouTube channel, we’re aiming for 1 million viewers!

Last year, Giorgio Armani (right) was quoted as saying, “I spoke with the people from PETA, and they showed me some materials that convinced me not to use fur.” That’s what we like to hear, and how happy it made us. But now…. well, you could say things have taken a turn for the worse.

Armani’s new fall collection includes fur coats for babies (wrong on so many levels), floral-printed fur coats (wtf?), fur-hemmed skirts and fur-trimmed jackets. As you can imagine, we’re not even remotely impressed. But instead of disrupting his shows during Fashion Week in Milan last week, PETA US is aiming higher - at the stars, in fact.

PETA US Senior Vice President Dan Mathews hit ‘em where it hurts . TomKat (Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes if you’re not as obsessed with celeb life as I am).

Check out the full text of Dan’s letter to Tom and Katie below.

    September 23, 2008

    Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes
   

    Dear Tom and Katie,

    Greetings from PETA, where we’ve always admired your fur-free personal style. Because you are among the most highly visible wearers of Giorgio Armani, we are obliged to alert you to a distressing situation that has arisen with the company. We’ve been in talks with Armani for the past few years, asking the designer to drop fur. We showed his senior design team PETA’s four-minute video-which documents how animals on fur farms are strangled, electrocuted, and skinned alive-and a few months later, Armani told Time magazine that his meetings with PETA, “convinced me not to use fur.” Unfortunately, he’s gone back on his word; his new collections are full of fur.

    Most shockingly, his collections include fur coats for babies and kids. Please be vigilant about any packages that Armani sends for Suri, as they could include bunny fur from his toddler lines. We imagine that Suri, like other children, has a natural affinity for animals, which is why we find it shocking that Armani is not only breaking his fur-free promise but also trying to lure children into fashion derived from skinned rabbits. We also ask that you please use your considerable influence with Mr. Armani to urge him to keep his word and leave fur out of future collections and that you consider wearing fashions from some of the fur-free designers such as Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren, and Stella McCartney.

    Thank you very much for your consideration.

    Sincerely,

    Dan Mathews
    Vice President
    PETA

Image: TimeInc / CC

Everyone knows that breast is best, so I had to chuckle when I saw what the guys at PETA US were up to yesterday. They have asked ice-cream giant, Ben & Jerry’s, to switch from using cows’ milk to…. human breast milk! Yep, that’s right. And frankly, why not? Like Matt pointed out the other week when Channel 4 aired a TV show about ‘other people’s breast milk’, it’s a helluva lot more natural than drinking/eating milk from another species.

So, when PETA US wrote a letter to the people at Ben & Jerry’s, they made sure they explained that using cow’s milk for their ice cream is a hazard to consumers’ health - it may play a role in the onset of anemia, allergies, and juvenile diabetes and, in the long term, can set kids up for a lifetime of obesity and heart disease.

Ben & Jerry’s issued a statement explaining their stance on the matter, that they believe a mother’s milk is best used for her child. Hmm, they agree with us then! Sorted. So, now the only question is: when will they be ditching the cow’s milk then?

In what seems like perfect timing for Fish Amnesty Day (so cute), a new scientific study has revealed that ‘fish fingers’ have existed for longer than we thought. And I’m not talking about the dead fish parents serve up for their beloved children – real fingers and toes! On fish! Fancy that…

So it turns out that scientists have thought for a while that tetrapods, who crawled up out of the ocean about 360 million years ago, were the first creatures to develop fingers. But it turns out that proto-fingers were actually sprouted some 20 million years earlier, by a curious animal called the Panderichthys.

Bear with me people, I’m about to get scientific…

The Panderichthys had little finger bones, called distal radials, inside flippers. Interestingly, the same gene that shapes feet in mice is found in the lungfish – a direct cousin of the transitionary tetrapods. So, basically, the Panderichthys started feet, the tetrapods developed feet, and we all have feet today (in case you hadn’t realized)!

Bearing this in mind, us having evolved from fish ‘n all, it makes you want to give the fish fingers a break, doesn’t it?

Alexia’s back, ready and raring to go! Tune in your radios or turn your computer speakers up, people – here’s a program you won’t want to miss. On BBC Radio 4 tonight at 8pm, ‘File on 4′ examines the link between child and animal abuse – a worrying subject, and one that concerns the PETA Foundation a great deal.

The link between all abuse – by people of all ages, against people and animals of all ages – has been documented throughout history and one only has to look at the headlines each day to see the connection. Animal abuse shows a deep mental disturbance in the abuser. Research in psychology and criminology shows that people who commit acts of cruelty to animals don’t stop there (as if that wasn’t bad enough). Many move onto make humans their victims and it is thought that animals make the perfect “practice” victims as they can do little to fight back. Cruelty to animals, if left unchecked can escalate and it’s something that all people should be aware of.

Did you know that child killers Mary Bell, Robert Thompson and Jon Venables and multiple-victim killers Ian Huntley, Thomas Hamilton (Dunblane massacre), Fred West, Denis Nilsen, Ian Brady and Jeffrey Dahmer all started out by deliberately harming animals?

So what do the lovely people at the PETA Foundation do to try and stop this in its tracks? Well, they believe that many acts of violence can be prevented if we all simply teach kindness and compassion towards animals from an early age. Whenever reported cases of cruelty to animals reach them, they respond by sending information to schools in the area about why the education system should teach humane lessons in the classroom. In 2007, the PETA Foundation responded to 86 cases of cruelty to animals across the UK and sent out information and 2,641 humane-education packs to schools. Yes!

So, what will you be doing at 8pm tonight, huh? If you don’t catch it, make sure you visit the BBC’s ‘listen again’ page.

Image: Amorak / CC