An Afternoon with the Murder King

**Edit: Carey just sent me a link to several pictures of a recent KFC boycott she attended. (She's "Beaks Cut Off".) Thought it an appropriate intro to this particular post. Click the image to enlarge.**

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Part of Carey's 29th Birthday Extravaganza was a Saturday trip to Animal Acres, a farm sanctuary in Acton, California, for their Grand Opening event.

To save you a Google, a "farm sanctuary" is a safe-haven for animals that have been rescued from the horrorshow of factory farms and managed to survive. Abused, crippled, and otherwise maltreated beasts and fowl of every stripe are nurtured back to health and allowed to live out their days as God intended. Farm sanctuaries tend to operate on donations and volunteer support and there are precious few of them in the United States. (In fact, Carey made the decision to go vegan 15 years ago on a visit to one such facility in New York.)

I didn't know what to expect. Carey had promised a plentiful selection of vegan delights (like veggie dogs, soy desserts and tofu skewers), not to mention the opportunity to romp with maimed chickens and pet deformed pork bellies.

We arrived to find a gaggle of Carey's kindred spirits: nice folks selling their vegan wares and volunteers maintaining animal stables. There was live music and a benefit auction. A lot of hippies and granola-types, a fair amount of regular folk and, of course, the occassional whacko (the most memorable being the guy that walked around with animal masks, a plastic "decapitated" pig head and a homemade sandwich board, decorated with magazine cut-outs of animal imagery and ransom-note-style Bible quotes re-shuffled to demonstrate the idea that Meat is Murder).

We meandered through a few of the stables, frolicking with goats and sheep and various chicken life. We chatted up the volunteers and posed for photo ops with a baby pig.

Then we settled in to watch the featured film: "The Peacable Kingdom."

The Peaceable Kingdom is a nicely-produced indy doc about the horrific practices of factory farming. I don't mind admitting that I was shocked and outraged and I'm a cynical bastard:

Cattle... tortured, tased, pumped with hormones and stuffed into holding bins for years without daylight, proper nutrition or the opportunity to excercise so that their extremities atrophe and deform. Pigs genetically altered through steriods to outgrow their own bodies before maturity. Cows forced to produce over 10x the amount of milk they would naturally, 50% of them developing Mastitis (resulting in swollen, infected udders the size of bathtubs). Chickens, de-beaked and sardined into massive egg-production facilities where they never have the opportunity to walk or see daylight. As the doc demonstrates, these practices are not only common, they are the norm in factory farming, where the vast majority of the United States' animal-based foodstuffs are produced.

I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it.

Needless to say, Carey lost it. She sobbed openly and she wasn't the only one. All the gathered vegans howled with disgust as horror after horror materialized onscreen. Gradually, the crowd became surly and energized. I scanned the room to see if anyone suspected I wasn't a vegetarian (if my secret was leaked, that might've been it for me). I felt my cover was secure until, about 3/4 through the movie, I looked down and gasped.

Shit! Leather shoes!

After the film, we exited nonchallantly and took in more of farm (though Carey remained shaken the rest of the day). At her suggestion, I sampled a portabello sandwich, but passed on the pork substitute kebabs.

Eventually, the live music ended and the "Murder King" took the stage (I don't know his real name, but he wore a t-shirt with the logo at the right emblazoned on the front. I discovered later that the logo was part of a PETA boycott campaign of yesteryear. [The boycott ended, Burger King relented and PETA was successful, but I don't think you sweat those kinds of details when you're the Murder King.]).

MK danced and whooped and pontificated on the virtues of veganism. He scolded meat eaters and dairy-consuming vegetarians alike. And, finally, he treated those gathered to a song of his own devising called "Animal Acres" sung (or, in his case, awkwardly stuttered) to the tune of "Green Acres". "I wish I had a video camera right now," I told Carey while the King shucked and jived, "it would have been a great candidate for JeremyBear.com's first bit of streaming video."

The auction was admittedly very cool: I walked away with a ridiculously incredible deal on a couple of DVD boxed sets (collections of Scorcese and Errol Morris films). Carey, unfortunately, lost her object of desire: a framed rooster portrait (that actually would have been a nice addition to our home).

The highlight of Carey's day, though, came when she discovered that Animal Acres was established by Lorri Bauston, who began Farm Sanctuary in New York in the 80's. Long story short, Lorri was the one that convinced Carey to veganize 15 years ago and here, now, in Acton, California, Carey was able to meet her again to say "thank you." This woman is, without a doubt, Carey's Kevin Maguire. I wish I'd thought to take a picture.

Eventually we made our way back to Long Beach, ate a nice dinner and caught a really terrific movie. Not a bad day, all in all. I certainly learned a lot.

But I'm still not touching those kebabs.

posted by Jeremy Bear 10:32 PM

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