In this week's edition:

• Tell Giant Eagle What You Think of Ongoing Circus Promotion
• Animal Cruelty at CMU
• Foie Gras Watch: Toast! Restaurant on Alert
• Amazing Animals! - VFA's New Newsletter Series
• Update on Lin Marie's Continual Court Hearings
  

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  Giant Evil Survey Allows for Good Campaign Opportunity
   
  Everyone who has been following our Giant Evil campaign knows that Giant Eagle annually sponsors and promotes the notoriously abusive Shrine Circus and we are working to end their ongoing promotion of animal circuses. We were excited to be made aware that Giant Eagle has unknowingly provided us with a unique opportunity to express our opposition to this partnership: Giant Eagle is temporarily giving its customers a chance to participate in a survey through the website www.gianteaglesurvey.com.
   
  VFA fully realizes that since Giant Eagle has a nearly complete monopoly on grocery stores in this region, there are a definite lack of alternative grocery stores available to shop in, leaving a great majority of our members and supporters to shop at this ethically confused establishment. Fortunately, we can now use this to the advantage of VFA's Giant Evil campaign by filling out the survey. In order to participate, you will need to enter your user code, which can be found at the bottom of your Giant Eagle receipt. To start off the survey, there are a list of agree/disagree questions you can choose to answer; please be aware if you do answer some or most of these preliminary questions, your opinion to follow will be considered more seriously, but the most important thing to answer is the last question, which allows you to enter your own comments. Space is provided to tell Giant Eagle how to improve your shopping experience, so here is your chance to express your opinion about their continuous animal circus promotions! Urge Giant Eagle to drop the Shrine Circus sponsorship, and you can even add that you would be a more regular customer at their store if they made an ethical decision towards this important issue. We don't know how long this survey will last so let's use it while it's available!
   
  The survey can be found at www.gianteaglesurvey.com
   
  For more information about our Giant Evil campaign click here
  

 
The Shrine Circus will be appearing in Pittsburgh at the Mellon Arena again on April 9th, 10th, and 11th. VFA will hold our main protest on Saturday April 10th outside of Gate 1 at Mellon Arena from 5:30-7pm. Signs and materials will be provided, just bring yourself and hopefully some friends! You can view this event on VFA's calendar at this link.

Once again, Giant Eagle is promoting Shrine by their partnership with the circus through their Giant Eagle Family Fun Pack, and their logo for this can be seen on the Shrine Circus promotion signs. If you see any of these Shrine Circus advertisements around the city, please feel free to relocate them to your nearest receptacle!

A Case of Animal Cruelty at CMU
 
You may have seen the recent story in the news that nine chickens were spray-painted different colors and dumped inside various campus buildings at Carnegie Mellon University. The chickens were rescued by a volunteer and transported to local wildlife rehabilitator Beth McMaster of Wild Bird Recovery. Beth is currently kindly caring for the chickens (during only the beginning of her busy spring season!) and reported that two of the chickens were suffering from respiratory illness and that all of them were starved and haven’t eaten for days. Furthermore, the spray-paint crudely streaked on their bodies is toxic to the chickens, and could not be safely removed. Beth states that the paint will stay on the birds until they molt their feathers, hopefully not ingesting any of the toxic lead-based paint as it flakes off.
 
The students responsible for this have clearly committed deliberate acts of animal cruelty, and we are almost certain that the chickens were victims of some ridiculous childish fraternity prank. So far, however, the university has not reported who is responsible or will even say if they suspect fraternity involvement, even though they say they are looking into it. CMU released the following statement about the incident on Tuesday, March 16th:
 
"Carnegie Mellon University campus affairs staff members are gathering the facts to understand what happened on Saturday, when farm chickens were found in campus buildings. Our students are fully cooperating with the university to gather details during this internal process. If disciplinary action is warranted, it will be handled through the normal internal judicial process."
 
Beth McMaster first questioned how seriously the university is taking this crime, especially given that the university did not even call her to check up on the chickens’ conditions. CMU has shown some interest in pursuing the case though, and have hired a police detective to investigate the incident, who visited Beth, saw the birds, and took Beth’s statement last Thursday.  CMU’s spokesperson told the Post-Gazette, "We're taking this matter very, very seriously. I can't stress that enough.” It does appear that after some initial hesitance , CMU is not taking this issue too lightly and many of the students are asking the ones responsible to come forward as they feel animal cruelty greatly tarnishes the reputation of the university.

We couldn’t agree more and the people or organization who did this need to be held fully accountable and reprimanded accordingly for the harm they caused these animals. It’s also critical to point out that there is overwhelming evidence that people who hurt animals rarely stop and will go on committing more cruel and heinous acts against both animals and humans until someone puts an end to it. Please make sure CMU hears from you (especially if you are a CMU student or CMU alumni)and let them know you want this matter treated with the severity its warranted, that the university should show that animal cruelty will not be tolerated, and that the students responsible are brought to justice fittingly for their crime. Please make sure your emails are polite, especially since CMU does seem to be taking the matter seriously:
 
Michael Murphy
Interim Dean of Student Affairs and Vice President for Campus Affairs:
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Most importantly, you can donate to Wildbird Recovery (www.wildbirdrecovery.org) to help cover the intensive care a wonderful bird rehabilitator is providing to these chickens, as well as the many more birds who will desperately need Beth's assistance throughout the spring season!

Please send donations to: Wildbird Recovery, 120 Forsythe Road, Valencia PA 16059

For more information, see the news articles below concerning this issue:
 
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10077/1043755-53.stm#ixzz0j1eNHevd
 
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10078/1044004-53.stm#ixzz0j2YwRy94
 
http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/news/22875714/detail.html
 
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/pittsburgh/s_672403.html
 
http://www.wpxi.com/news/22884243/detail.html
 
http://www.thetartan.org/2010/3/22/news/chickens

Foie Gras Watch: Toast! Goes Back on Agreement