Please Watch and Circulate “Blinders”
Please watch and circulate widely and go to the Coalition to Ban Horse-Drawn Carriages for what you can do to help the effort to ban the carriages. Banning them is more of a reality than ever, and this is a crucial time for this effort.
You'll notice that the film demonstrates this initiative involves several groups that are coming together to get the horses off the streets, which is great.
This isn't a very gruesome film visually (until the horse slaughter near the end), but it is sad and infuriating to learn that the lives of carriage horses are now worse than ever. And the politics involves are disgraceful (including Mayor Bloomberg, who should be ashamed of himself).
The notion of the "romantic" nature of a horse-drawn carriage ride is well deconstructed in "Blinders," as is the "tradition" argument ("tradition is a really lame excuse for cruelty" says one activist).
"The bottom line is they want to squeeze the last buck out of them that they can."
"The bottom line is they want to squeeze the last buck out of them that they can."
Please watch.
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I'll post this on my site for tomorrow. Thanks, Mary.
The film made my cry… seeing those horses go in their "prisons" for the night – in those ridiculous brick buildings was so sad… The white one looking through the window 2 stories up – It's just sick.
Horrible on the horses & so foolish for to the residents in the city. The danger, the way the carraiges slow traffic… the poop. I just thought New Yorkers were so much smarter than that.
I really want people to see movies like this. I've set up some small URLs that link directly to them. I hope this can be a tool of vegan outreach:
Earthlings: http://earthlings.vegpage.com
Blinders: http://blinders.vegpage.com
When speaking to someone about animal rights, this is something you can write on the back of a business card, or a piece of paper, something small that will take people directly to the videos.
Thanks for getting this out, Mary. I know Friends of Animals has been prominent in the Horse-carriage abolition movement among the abolitionist movement itself.
I just watched Earthlings last night – for the first time – the whole thing in one sitting. It was extremely depressing and rage-provoking. For a long time now, I’ve thought of average human ‘morality’ as well into the imbecile range. Earthlings merely confirmed it. Again. (And yeah, like I needed more confirmation.)
Mary, I agree with everything you said in your review of it on this blog in November 2007.
I think Earthlings is good for waking people up who otherwise would not be responsive to a rational moral argument – which sadly is most people. I also think it’s very disappointing that there wasn’t a call for veganism and abolition at the end. But I noticed a lot of welfarist names in the credits, so that explains everything.
I don’t think it’s good for people like me to watch films like Earthlings, and this will likely be the last time I watch anything like it. I have enough trouble keeping my disgust and contempt for the human species at bay, and I’m NOT one who needs an occasional “prod” to rejuvenate my interest in abolishing exploitation. Films like Earthlings merely renew and refresh my disgust and contempt for humanity. I’ll leave it at that.