LAST CHANCE: South Korea is funding cruel dog cloning experiments—in which most die or suffer severe pain—to engineer ‘designer’ sniffer dogs for airports. SIGN to urge South Korea to end this painful and unnecessary experiment before we hand in the petition NEXT WEEK: https://bit.ly/2VeBkrN
From http://www.lamanchaanimalrescue.org
A vacationing businessman was walking along a beach when he saw a young boy. Along the shore were many starfish that had been washed up by the tide and were sure to die before the tide returned.
The boy walked slowly along the shore and occasionally reached down and tossed the beached starfish back into the ocean. The businessman, hoping to teach the boy a little lesson in common sense, walked up to the boy and said, “I have been watching what you are doing, son. You have a good heart, and I know you mean well, but do you realize how many beaches there are around here and how many starfish are dying on every beach every day. Surely such an industrious and kind hearted boy such as yourself could find something better to do with your time.
Do you really think that what you are doing is going to make a difference?
The boy looked up at the man, and then he looked down at a starfish by his feet. He picked up the starfish, and as he gently tossed it back into the ocean, he said, “It makes a difference to that one.”
~Anonymous
Dear friends across the world,
Hell on earth looks a lot like Australia right now. The fires are so big they are generating their own lightning — and they’ve killed more than a **BILLION** animals!
A billion! It’s a wildlife holocaust!! Thousands of koalas have been roasted alive in the trees, while rare flying foxes are falling dead from the sky. Even worse, this nightmare could be a glimpse of our whole planet’s future if we don’t urgently tackle the climate crisis that caused it.
This is a call to arms: we need to fight Australia’s fires with burning, urgent action.
If 40,000 of us chip in now, we can provide immediate on-the-ground support — funding the heroes who are rescuing injured koalas and kangaroos, while backing a long-term recovery plan to plant billions of new trees to help nature recover.
But alone it won’t be enough. Even as their country burns, Australia’s leaders are denying climate change and trying to derail global action to reduce carbon pollution. We can’t let them win. So we’ll also bring all of our movement’s campaigning magic to face down blockers in Australia and all over the world ahead of crucial global climate talks later this year.
This is urgent — give what you can to help beat back Australia’s biodiversity apocalypse and spark the climate revolution our planet needs!
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Can you imagine how brave you must be to run into the flames to save terrified animals? Across Australia, heroic wildlife rescuers are working against the clock to save animals from this catastrophe — they deserve our support, and if enough of us chip in, we can give it.
But to really make their heroism count, we must spark change in Australia — and that means taking on the powerful climate deniers who have the government in their grip. Right now, they’re flooding Australia with fake news to play down the link to climate change, but as deadly fires blaze through homes, hospitals and schools, wrecking people’s lives, Australia’s leaders are under pressure like never before.
Avaaz is one of the few movements positioned to power recovery plans and wildlife rescue on the ground, while launching fearless people-powered campaigns and investigations all over the world to face down the climate deniers.
So let’s not stand by and watch as wildlife burns — chip in now to power the global response to Australia’s climate catastrophe that the whole world needs:
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This is personal for me. My brother lives in Australia, and I want my precocious, curious young nephews to grow up looking for koalas up in the treetops, and not just hearing about them in the history books. I hope they’ll be able to look out over the ocean, without choking on ash. And I’d love them to hear stories about a time when the world came together to defend their country’s splendid natural beauty — a moment that was both a global wakeup call and a tipping point toward building the healthier, more sustainable world we all want.
With hope, love and lots of grit,
Joseph, Bert, Marigona, Martyna, Francesco, Patricia, Aloys and the whole Avaaz team
PS – This might be your first donation to our movement ever. But what a first donation! Did you know that Avaaz relies entirely on small donations from members like you? That’s why we’re fully independent, nimble and effective. Join the over 1 million people who’ve donated to make Avaaz a real force for good in the world.
Everyone who knows Simba agrees the four-year-old pit bull is a very good boy. Unfortunately, the pup’s stellar reputation didn’t sway all of his neighbors, including one elderly woman who routinely rebuffed the friendly canine’s attempts to say hi.
“He always tried to greet her, but she called him mean and looked at him with fear,” Mehana, Simba’s guardian/owner, explained to The Dodo. “She never liked him because he was a ‘bad’ breed.”
Photo: Instagram/arjanitmehana
But the elderly woman’s chilly reception didn’t stop Simba from being a good neighbor. One day, Mehena and Simba were climbing the stairs to their apartment when the dog started acting peculiarly. “He stopped,” Mehana recalled. “He began to bark and run to the door where the neighbor lives. I pulled the leash but he refused to come.”
But when Simba’s owner bent down to pick the dog up, he noticed a muffled noise coming from inside the apartment. “I heard a weak voice shout for help,” Mehana said. “She said, ‘Please don’t go.’”
Photo: Instagram/ arjanitmehana
When Mehana opened the door, he found his elderly neighbor had broken her hip and collapsed on the floor, where she’d been waiting for help for two days. If Simba hadn’t heard her feeble cries, she would have continued to go unnoticed. The dog likely saved her life.
When the elderly neighbor realized that Simba had saved her, her previously frosty demeanor thawed completely. “She said, ‘Thank you for hearing me,’” Mehana recalled. “I thought she was talking to me at first. But then she said, ‘No, not you — the nice doggie.’”
Photo: Instagram/ arjanitmehana
The heartwarming story of Simba’s heroics have improved his reception around the apartment building, where residents had previously dismissed the pit bull based on their ignorance and fear. “I know Simba is a wonderful dog,” Mehana said. “But I hope this event will make people see bully breeds differently. We, as human beings, must deserve their loyalty and love.
J. Swanson is a writer, traveler, and animal-enthusiast based in Seattle, an appropriately pet-crazed city where dog or cat ownership even outweighs the number of kids.
From: https://theanimalrescuesite.greatergood.com/clickToGive/ars/home
Spuds the cat and Ollie the dog watch from the hearth rug as Aunt Joan rolls out the dough with her grandmother’s rolling pin. She smooths butter on the dough, sprinkles it generously with cinnamon and brown sugar, rolls it up, and pops it into the stove. Outside it’s dusk. Snow is falling.
Tori comes into the kitchen, inhaling deeply. “Umm. What’s cooking?”
“Mouse. Your great-grandmother used to make it from the leftover dough from her pies. Did your mom make it?”
“I don’t think so. I don’t remember. Come on, Ollie. Let’s go feed the barn animals.” She motions for him to follow her.
Ollie sighs, reticent to leave the warmth of the kitchen, and rises. He follows Tori out the door, squinting his eyes to a gust of snow that swirls off the roof. They walk toward the barn. In the hills there glimmers the twinkling of lights of other farms. Tori looks up at the sky and sticks out her tongue to catch snowflakes.
They walk to the barn through the mounting snow. The donkey, Frank Sinatra, shakes his mane and the horse, Fred, whinnies in greeting. Tori pats them, gives them fresh water and hay and some extra grain, because it’s Christmas Eve. The chickens, which roam in the relative warmth of the barn, come over to them, clucking softly. Ollie noses them gently. Tori stoops down and runs her palm over their feathers, murmuring to them. She gives them extra feed and adds more hay to their nest for warmth.
They listen to the soft munching of the horse and donkey, the gentle clucking of the chickens. Tori closes the door and they step out into the snow, which has covered their footsteps leading to the barn. Stars have started to emerge, little pinpricks of light in the dark blue sky. The farmhouse roof is draped with snow, and each window is aglow with candles. Through the steamy kitchen window, Aunt Joan takes cookies from the oven. Through the living room window, Uncle Jon lights candles nestled in pine boughs on the mantle. Spuds follows Aunt Joan into the living room and sits beneath the Christmas tree. Uncle Jon turns toward Aunt Joan, laughing at something she says.
Ollie looks up at Tori beside him, who reaches down and scratches him behind his ear. Then they trudge through the snow together. At the doorway she dusts the snow off of Ollie’s back and kicks the snow off of her boots. They enter the house, which smells of pine and baking, and join the family.
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Ingrid E. Newkirk
Founder
