Target: Vern Kimball (vkimball@calgarystampede.com)
Sponsored by: Jo-Anne McArthur (We Animals) and Shannon Kornelsen (Empathy Unlimited)
Respecting tradition shouldn't be automatic, least of all when the tradition is cruel. When calf-roping, chuck racing and bull riding were introduced to rodeos, the scientific community had yet to confirm what our intuitions already told us -- animals feel fear and pain in ways startlingly similar to our own. But science has long since confirmed this, and it must now be understood that Canadians will not support animal suffering, least of all for entertainment. As Wayne Pacelle, the President of the Humane Society of the United States, explains: "With our new knowledge of how animals think and feel come new obligations in how we care for them."
Let's send a message to the Calgary Stampede and it's supporters: the abuse of animals for entertainment and profit is NOT acceptable. Let's leave this cruelty in the past where it belongs and create a Stampede ALL Canadians can be proud of.
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