For individuals in states with animal-related measures on the ballot, it is important to get out to the polls and make sure your opinion is counted!

State Ballot Initiatives

Ballot initiatives give voters a direct say in the adoption of specific provisions of law and have been appearing on state ballots for decades. This year we see both initiatives that are pro animal welfare and those that are not. It is essential that you take the time to consider these ballot measures if you are voting in one of the states below. Even more importantly, let your friends and neighbors know what these are about before they go into the ballot box. Spread the word—then VOTE!

 

1*  The Idaho Hunting and Fishing Amendment, HJR 2, is a legislatively-referred constitutional amendment, meaning that the legislature approved the resolution by a two-thirds majority, giving the public the right to vote on it. If a simple majority of voters approve this measure, it will become law. This provision is intended, like other “hunting heritage” provisions:

“to provide that public hunting, fishing and trapping of wildlife shall be a preferred means of managing wildlife”

The consequence of adopting this constitutional amendment is that in the future no state law can be passed that would interfere with the rights of hunters, such as establishing a wildlife refuge on public land, and no state policy regarding land use could be adopted without giving the rights of hunters and trappers primary consideration.

*If you live in Idaho, please vote NO on ballot measure HJR 2*

2*  Kentucky voters will be asked to decide on a similar measure, a proposal to amend the Constitution of Kentucky passed by the state legislature as HB 1. The measure specifically asks:

“Are you in favor of amending the Kentucky constitution to state that the citizens of Kentucky have the personal right to hunt, fish, and harvest wildlife, subject to laws and regulations that promote conservation and preserve the future of hunting and fishing, and to state that public hunting and fishing shall be a preferred means of managing and controlling wildlife?”

This measure was already approved by the legislature and needs only a majority vote by Kentucky voters to become law.

*If you live in Kentucky, please vote NO on constitutional
ballot measure HB 1*

 

3*  Nebraska voters are also going to have a chance to vote on a state constitutional amendment, the Nebraska Hunting and Fishing Amendment, known as Amendment 2. Similar to the provision in Kentucky, Nebraska’s proposed amendment proposes:

“A constitutional amendment to establish the right to hunt, to fish, and to harvest wildlife and to state that public hunting, fishing, and harvesting of wildlife shall be a preferred means of managing and controlling wildlife.”

Voters are asked to vote for or against the measure.

*If you live in Nebraska, please vote NO on constitutional ballot measure Amendment 2*

 

4*  In North Dakota, voters will be asked on November 6, 2012, to vote on specific measures in addition to casting their ballots for the future President and local legislators. There are TWO ballot measures of interest to animal advocates.

The first measure, Constitutional Measure No. 3, reads as follows:

“The right of farmers and ranchers to engage in modern farming and ranching practices shall be forever guaranteed in this state. No law shall be enacted which abridges the right of farmers and ranchers to employ agricultural technology, modern livestock production and ranching practices.”

Voters are asked to vote “yes” or “no” to this measure, but what does it really mean? This provision would prevent animal advocates—or anyone else!—from passing a measure to end the use of gestation crates, to phase out battery cages, or to enact any other humane farming reform measure in the state. This would include environmentally-based efforts to regulate pollution from Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFO), which routinely pour run-off into local water supplies.

*If you live in North Dakota, please vote NO on
Constitutional Measure No. 3*
 

A second North Dakota ballot measure of concern is Initiated Statutory Measure No. 5, which reads as follows:

“This initiated statutory measure would create section 36-21.1-02.1 of the North Dakota Century Code. This measure would make it a class C felony for an individual to maliciously and intentionally harm a living dog, cat or horse and provide a court with certain sentencing options. The measure would not apply to production agriculture, or to lawful activities of hunters and trappers, licensed veterinarians, scientific researchers, or to individuals engaged in lawful defense of life or property.”

This measure would enact much needed reform to the state’s animal cruelty laws, allowing animal abusers to be charged with a felony instead of merely being slapped on the wrist after abusing an animal. If this passes, North Dakota will be the 49th state to enact a felony animal cruelty provision, leaving only South Dakota without an effective punishment available for intentional animal abuse.

*If you live in North Dakota, please vote YES on
Constitutional Measure No. 5*

 

5*  The Wyoming Hunting Rights Amendment, Constitutional Amendment B, is a legislatively-referred constitutional amendment, meaning that the legislature approved the resolution by a two-thirds majority, giving the public the right to vote on it. If a simple majority of voters approve this measure, it will become law. Opposition to this measure is largely because opponents don’t think a constitutional amendment is necessary, not because they oppose hunting initiatives:

“The adoption of this amendment will recognize and preserve the heritage of Wyoming citizens’ opportunity to harvest wild birds, fish and game.”

This provision is intended, like other “hunting heritage” provisions, to preserve citizen’s rights to hunt and fish, making a restriction on these activities very difficult if not impossible to legislate in the future.

*If you live in Wyoming, please vote NO on Constitutional Amendment B*

NAVS

In November, Idaho residents will be voting on a controversial amendment that will make hunting, fishing and trapping a right protected by the state’s constitution.

The amendment, HJR 2, was introduced by Sen. Lee Heider (R-Twin Falls) under the guise of protecting traditional hunting methods and the heritage of hunters, but probably isn’t much of a surprise considering that it’s coming from a state that thinks it’s cool to use live animals as bait to kill wolves.

Idahoans Against Trapping launched a campaign against the amendment and makes some very good points about why it shouldn’t be voted for, starting with the obvious: Idahoans already have the right to hunt, fish and trap and if it’s defeated, nothing will change.

The group also argues that changing the state’s constitution to cater to special interests sets a bad precedent, the amendment will lead to lawsuits at the taxpayers’ expense, it will interfere with regulating wildlife and that issues involving cruelty, such as trapping, should remain open for public debate.

According to the group, “The intent of this proposed amendment is to eliminate the right of Idaho citizens to decide wildlife issues by majority vote. Its passage would take those decisions out of the Legislature and the initiative process and put them in the courts. State laws pertaining to wildlife would be regularly challenged as unconstitutional. Judges would be saddled with the difficult task of determining where regulation ends and prohibition begins. The rights of our children and grandchildren to weigh in on these issues will have been eliminated.”

Possibly the most disturbing thing about this amendment is that it will forever protect the cruel and barbaric practice of trapping in the state. Traps are notoriously inhumane and they don’t discriminate. Animals who are caught can be left to suffer in agony for long periods before anyone bothers to check their traps, while non-target animals, pets and people are needlessly put at risk.

An undercover investigation of trapping conducted by Born Free USA and Respect for Animals last year brought to light the horrific brutality that goes on behind the scenes of what some like to defend as a sound wildlife management practice.

The amendment is supported by the Idaho Fish and Game Commission, along with the National Rifle Association (NRA), which wants to ensure hunters can use traditional methods and “eliminate any opportunities for well-funded animal rights activists to ban the use of certain methods like archery tackle or dogs for hunting.”

by  Alicia Graef

Link

Animal Cruelty Found at Harvard Labs

An international group of prominent scientists has signed The Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness in which they are proclaiming their support for the idea that animals are conscious and aware to the degree that humans are — a list of animals that includes all mammals, birds, and even the octopus. But will this make us stop treating these animals in totally inhumane ways?

While it might not sound like much for scientists to declare that many nonhuman animals possess conscious states, it’s the open acknowledgement that’s the big news here. The body of scientific evidence is increasingly showing that most animals are conscious in the same way that we are, and it’s no longer something we can ignore.

 NEWS: How Long Until We Learn Animal Languages?

What’s also very interesting about the declaration is the group’s acknowledgement that consciousness can emerge in those animals that are very much unlike humans, including those that evolved along different evolutionary tracks, namely birds and some encephalopods.

“The absence of a neocortex does not appear to preclude an organism from experiencing affective states,” they write. “Convergent evidence indicates that non-human animals have the neuroanatomical, neurochemical, and neurophysiological substrates of conscious states along with the capacity to exhibit intentional behaviors.”

Consequently, say the signatories, the scientific evidence is increasingly indicating that humans are not unique in possessing the neurological substrates that generate consciousness.
 

NEWS: Dolphins May Be Math Geniuses

The group consists of cognitive scientists, neuropharmacologists, neurophysiologists, neuroanatomists, and computational neuroscientists — all of whom were attending the Francis Crick Memorial Conference on Consciousness in Human and Non-Human Animals. The declaration was signed in the presence of Stephen Hawking, and included such signatories as Christof Koch, David Edelman, Edward Boyden, Philip Low, Irene Pepperberg, and many more.

The declaration made the following observations:

• The field of Consciousness research is rapidly evolving. Abundant new techniques and strategies for human and non-human animal research have been developed. Consequently, more data is becoming readily available, and this calls for a periodic reevaluation of previously held preconceptions in this field. Studies of non-human animals have shown that homologous brain circuits correlated with conscious experience and perception can be selectively facilitated and disrupted to assess whether they are in fact necessary for those experiences. Moreover, in humans, new non-invasive techniques are readily available to survey the correlates of consciousness.

• The neural substrates of emotions do not appear to be confined to cortical structures. In fact, subcortical neural networks aroused during affective states in humans are also critically important for generating emotional behaviors in animals. Artificial arousal of the same brain regions generates corresponding behavior and feeling states in both humans and non-human animals. Wherever in the brain one evokes instinctual emotional behaviors in non-human animals, many of the ensuing behaviors are consistent with experienced feeling states, including those internal states that are rewarding and punishing. Deep brain stimulation of these systems in humans can also generate similar affective states. Systems associated with affect are concentrated in subcortical regions where neural homologies abound. Young human and nonhuman animals without neocortices retain these brain-mind functions. Furthermore, neural circuits supporting behavioral/electrophysiological states of attentiveness, sleep and decision making appear to have arisen in evolution as early as the invertebrate radiation, being evident in insects and cephalopod mollusks (e.g., octopus).

• Birds appear to offer, in their behavior, neurophysiology, and neuroanatomy a striking case of parallel evolution of consciousness. Evidence of near human-like levels of consciousness has been most dramatically observed in African grey parrots. Mammalian and avian emotional networks and cognitive microcircuitries appear to be far more homologous than previously thought. Moreover, certain species of birds have been found to exhibit neural sleep patterns similar to those of mammals, including REM sleep and, as was demonstrated in zebra finches, neurophysiological patterns, previously thought to require a mammalian neocortex. Magpies in articular have been shown to exhibit striking similarities to humans, great apes, dolphins, and elephants in studies of mirror self-recognition.

• In humans, the effect of certain hallucinogens appears to be associated with a disruption in cortical feedforward and feedback processing. Pharmacological interventions in non-human animals with compounds known to affect conscious behavior in humans can lead to similar perturbations in behavior in non-human animals. In humans, there is evidence to suggest that awareness is correlated with cortical activity, which does not exclude possible contributions by subcortical or early cortical processing, as in visual awareness. Evidence that human and nonhuman animal emotional feelings arise from homologous subcortical brain networks provide compelling evidence for evolutionarily shared primal affective qualia.

Read more about this here and here.

by    George Dvorsky


Link