5 things you might not realise are cruel

Doing the research for Living Cruelty Free, I was shocked to discover there were things I had no idea involved so much animal cruelty.

1. Merino wool - I wrongly assumed sheep were simply sheared. Imagine you have chunks of your flesh hacked off. Would it hurt? Of course it would, yet this is what happens to most sheep in Australia in a process known as "mulesing." Farmers do this to prevent the animals getting fly strike. 

The worst think about this is its needless because farmers can breed fly strike resistant sheep but they refuse to do this. Despite pressure from top clothing stores like Next and Marks and Spencer who readily sell merino products but said they would try and use only wool from sheep not subjected to this abhorrent practice, the practice of mulesing still goes on.

2. Chocolate - To feed the inexhaustible demand for milk chocolate you need milk and this means male calves go without. They can't produce milk so they are often killed or dumped in veal crates.

For an alternative to milk chocolate, go for dark chocolate or carob, which tastes like chocolate and comes from a plant. I've read in places that it can't compete with real chocolate, but it can IMHO. The good news is that unlike real chocolate, its NOT harmful to dogs or cats. 

3. Horse racing - Those horses love to run and jump don't they? Maybe in the wild they do, but with a jockey on their back, kicking into their sides and even using a whip, somehow I doubt it.

Horses are pushed to extremes, often beyond their endurance, and unlike the recent case of Fox Hunt in the $1 Dubai Gold Cup whose leg snapped, when they die or get injured it's rarely reported. Well, we can't have the enjoyment of race goers diminished by the site of a majestic animal being shot.

4. Fake/Faux Fur – Real fur is such a hard sell that it’s been passed off as fake in garments like coats, hats and waistcoats. Quite often this "fake fur" comes from China which kills animals like dogs and cats to produce the so called fake or faux fur.

Personally, I would never wear faux fur or anything fake that resembles fur, as I strongly believe that it may inadvertently encourage people to wear real fur because it looks so real. That said, of course I would rather people wore the fake kind than the real kind. 

5. Free range eggs – The boy chicks can’t lay eggs and are killed. This is done by crushing or gassing. If it’s crushing the method used is called IMD - Instantaneous Mechanical Destruction. This involves dropping handfuls of babies alive into a mincing machine in a process.

Hens also have their beaks trimmed – an extremely painful process using a hot metal blade. This has been likened to having a limb amputated.

4 Reasons why it’s manly NOT to eat meat

The sad fact is that more women that men are vegetarian or vegan. The one reason for this apparently (or so I’ve been told) is that it’s not seen as manly to be vegetarian.

Men don't need to act like cavemen any more

1- Showing compassion towards animals is a sign of strength and not weakness. Well, if a man were to dominate a woman would he be considered as manly? Maybe in days gone past when women had little rights he might have been but not these days.

2- There’s nothing manly about eating meat when we are continually being told that meat is bad for your. It increases your risk of getting cancer and heart disease and a whole range of illnesses. Vegetarians are also less likely to be obese and being obese means you are at a higher risk of ending up with diabetes.

Vegetarian Joaquin Phoenix - is he man enough for you?

3- Associating meat with masculinity goes back to the days when humans had to hunt in order to survive. These days nobody needs to hunt in order to survive. You just need to grow your own food or go to the supermarket.

4- Meat consumption has been linked to virility, yet a low sperm count has been linked with eating too much meat. A study in 2007 found a link between American men being unable to father children and their mother’s eating too much beef whilst pregnant.

This was blamed on the growth hormones in the beef that were fed to cows when they were alive. Other types of meat such as chicken also have traces of growth hormones.

Click here for a link to yet another survey.

5 Simple Ways to go Cruelty Free Today

1. Look out for the leaping bunny on products that guarantees a product is verified as cruelty free. 
Companies may say they don't test on animals, but sometimes their claims are misleading. Copies that carry the leaping bunny logo (accept no imitations and believe me, there are plenty) need to prove their cruelty free credentials. 

Go to http://www.gocrueltyfree.org/shopper to find cruelty free companies. You can select by country.

Go bananas for Fair Trade

2. If you're buying bananas, chocolate or coffee, make sure it's Fairtrade (also Fair Trade). 
By buying Fairtrade, you are making a real difference to real people's lives. 

Remember though, that milk chocolate can never be cruelty free because the dairy industry kills unwanted calves and that's only one of the cruelties they inflict on cows.

They are paid a fair wage for their work and farmers get a fair price for their goods.

The true face of leather

3. Ditch the leather because it's NEVER cruelty free: it's a by-product of animal slaughter, of the meat industry. 

Get synthetic belts, handbags and shoes instead.

4. Encourage anyone interested in getting a pet to adopt and not buy. 
There are so many animals in need of good homes. 

There's no reason for anyone to buy a pet. 

When people buy a pet they might as well be locking the cage on an unwanted pet at an animal shelter.

5. Make a veggie meal for everyone. 
Let your family/partner/housemates taste how good a cruelty free meal can be.

Remember if it's really cruelty free, ditch the milk and butter. Better for you too. 

It's not that good for you anyway.

Why the fight to ban Foie gras inspired me to write a crime novel

In Cannibal City the killer's victims are force-fed in a similar way
Suffragettes were before they're killed

Years ago I lived on an island. Not one of those remote Islands but one of the most accessible ones you are likely to get. One day I was walking past a local restaurant and I was shocked to see something on the menu that's so cruel the production of it is banned in my country but not the sale. 

You can read about what happened next on my companion blog for my book Living Cruelty Free: Live a more Compassionate Life here 

That product was Foie gras which is made by ramming a metal or plastic pipe down a duck or goose's throat so their livers swell abnormally to around ten times their normal size. 

Foie gras is French and translates as fatty liver.​ 

There's never been an appetite for reversing the ban on producing it in the UK where I live because even farmers who could make money out of producing this vile 'foodstuff' find the cruelty involved too much. 

In Cannibal City, DI Waddell investigates a sinister killer who's killing
people and removing their livers

When I was writing book 2 in the Detective in a Coma series (the follow up to Vile City) I wanted to do something a bit different. Come up with a different method of murder whilst also letting people who don't know into the sick little secret of how cruel a 'food' Foie gras is. 

In Cannibal City, my killer craves Foie gras but is so sickened by how it's obtained he decides that he'll make a human version instead. Pretty gross but as well as coming up with a more novel way to kill people, it also gives folk an insight into one of the cruellest things humans eat. 

A food so cruel that when Scottish tennis star Andy Murray discovered what it was he banned it from being served in the hotel he owns. 

If you want to see how it's used in Cannibal City you can check out the book now.

A killer is stalking his victims on Glasgow's streets.
Men are being abducted, kept tied up for weeks and force-fed, then strangled and their livers are being removed.

~Coming April 16th from Jennifer Lee Thomson @jenthom72 and Caffeine Nights~ 

Pre-order #CannibalCity, the follow up to VILE CITY

now-

AmazonUK

Amazon.COM 

#Kindle #paperback

Simple ways to tell if cosmetics ARE tested on animals

Since I wrote Living Cruelty Free I get asked all the time whether a certain company's products are tested on animals, so I thought it was time I wrote a bit about how to tell whether a make-up brand do test their products or ingredients on animals, either by doing it themselves or getting another company to do it on their behalf.

Of course, you can go to gocrueltyfree to check out if a company's listed or get the app for your phone (it's a free download from the Apple store for anyone lucky enough to have an iPad or iPhone) but sometimes you don't have time or a company that is cruelty free won't be accredited, because not all CF brands are.

Stars like Ricky Gervais and Spice Girl Mel C have made their opinions clear
NO TO ANIMAL TESTING.

Here's a quick lowdown -

1. If the brand sells in China, it will be tested on animals because aimal testing is obligatory. 

2. If celebrities endorse it, it probably is tested on animals. Animal testing companies use beauty to hide the ugliness behind their products. Celebrities like Angelina Jolie may boast about their ethics, but show them the money and those ethics evaporate.

3. If a company boasts about 'a new formulation' or says things like 'amazing new' or this is the 'first product to contain a revolutionary ingredient' it probably is tested on animals.

4. They'll use a lot of fancy, scientific jargon that sounds impressive when they advertise. Talking about things like 'liptides,' 'skin elasticity,' 'non-comedogenic'and 'positive ergons.' Okay, I made the last one up, but then I supsect the cosmetics companies do too. They think, 'what can be bamboozle them with next to make them think this product is a must buy.'

5. They'll make wild boasts about their products that seem too good to be true. Things like 'this will reduce wrinkles by 50 percent' and 'reduces the appearances of fine lines.' 
First off, how can they back this up - by animal testing, that's what. And, secondly, claims that sound too good to be true usually are.

6.If it's made in China, it probably is tested on animals. Non-animal testing companies have been discovering that the Chinese factories where their products are made have been then testing their products so they can sell them under their own brands in China. More commonly though, previously cruelty free companies are abandoning their ethics to sell in China. 

Remember - the only country that makes the animal testing of cosmetics compulsory is China. Companies who say they need to test their products on animals are -

A. Lying

B. Being greedy and selling their products in China where they are required by law to test products on animals.

Tip - Being cruelty free helps sell a product, so if brands are they will boast about it.