
WHY HELP ANIMALS?
Like us, animals have biological needs and experience pain, stress and discomfort. Many are intelligent and feel complex emotions like joy, happiness, depression and distress. Studies show that they have family bonds and feel true compassion for each other.
But what they can't do is speak for themselves. So humans feel justified in treating them as mere objects.
By pretending that animals don't suffer, that they can't feel pain, that they have no real need or desire for freedom, it is easier for people to use them purely as commodities and ignore their suffering.
So every year billions of them are captured, imprisoned, neglected, abused and slaughtered for human ends. They are used for everything from entertainment and sports to consumer product testing and food.
If animals don't have a say in their treatment, then it is up to all caring human beings to give them a voice, speak up on their behalf and end their abuse.
VOICE OF THE VOICELESS I am the voice of the voiceless:
Through me, the dumb shall speak;
Till the deaf world's ear be made to hear
The cry of the wordless weak.
From street, from cage, and from kennel,
From jungle and stall, the wail
Of my tortured kin proclaims the sin
Of the mighty against the frail.
For love is the true religion,
And love is the law sublime;
And all that is wrought, where love is not,
Will die at the touch of time
And Science, the great Revealer,
Must flame his torch at the Source;
And keep it bright, with that holy light
Or his feet shall fail on the course.
For he who would trample kindness
And mercy into the dust-
He has missed the trail, and his quest will fail:
He is not the guide to trust.
Oh shame on the mothers of mortals
Who have not stopped to teach
Of the sorrow that lies in dear, dumb eyes,
The sorrow that has no speech.
Oh, never a brute in the forest,
And never a snake in the fen,
Or ravening bird, starvation stirred,
Has hunted his prey like men.
For hunger, and fear, and passion
Alone drive beasts to slay,
But wonderful man, the crown of the Plan,
Tortures, and kills, FOR PLAY.
He goes well fed from his table;
He kisses his child and wife;
Then he haunts a wood, till he orphans a brood,
Or robs a deer of its life.
He aims at a speck in the azure;
Winged love, that has flown at a call;
It reels down to die, and he lets it lie;
His pleasure was seeing it fall.
The same force formed the sparrow
That fashioned Man, the King;
The God of the Whole gave a spark of soul
To each furred and feathered thing.
And I am my brother's keeper,
And I will fight his fight,
And speak the word for beast and bird,
Till the world shall set things right.

