Pig Farmer Van Boekel Files Charges Against “Thirsty Pigs” Animal Activist (But Pleaded Guilty to Breaching Water Resources Act Himself)

heatherclemenceau

Illustration courtesy of Katharina Rot

Written by:  Heather Clemenceau

Torontonians in particular are by now very familiar with the “Thirsty Pigs” court case whereby Van Boekel Farms pressed charges against Anita Krajnc. Dr. Krajnc, who is a principal activist behind the peaceful “Save“ vigils (Toronto Pig Save,Toronto Cow Save, Toronto Chicken Save), was charged under the Criminal Code with mischief under $5,000 for providing water to pigs in a truck en route to their slaughter at Fearman’s pig slaughterhouse in Burlington, Ontario.

On a hot day in June, a Van Boekel Hog Farms trailer full of pigs was stopped at an intersection.  Krajnc and other activists gave water to them in squirt bottles, an action that the court disclosure describes as: “spraying an unknown liquid into the trailer where the hogs were situated.” The concern is that, even though there seems to be no question that water was the…

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How Leo Tolstoy influenced Gandhi’s passisve resistance fight against the British

1000 petals by axinia

Leo Tostoy is widely known as a great writer, Mahatma Gandhi is widely known as a great freedom fighter, the only one so far who could inspire people for the non-violence fights and made them win.

Little is known however about the connection between the two. Let me show you the missing link!

  

A couple of years before the death of Leo Tostoy, there was a highly interesting letter exchange between the two, please read here.

Gandhi mentioned several times in his life that Tolstoy was his true inspiration for the nonviolence fight.

A detailed text on relationship between Tostoy and Gandhi is here.

Further quoting the article “Tolstoy and Gandhi’s Law of Love” By Thomas Weber

When Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi started to practice law in South Africa as a young barrister in the 1890s, he was confronted with glaring racial discrimination as well as various other injustices. It…

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Compassion in Action

Welcome back granola girl. Toronto Pig Save animal activists are so happy to be there on the ground bearing witness together

 

Toronto Pig Save Vigil

Toronto Pig Save Vigil.

 

New blogs and videos about Toronto Pig Save’s campaigns

Please join our “Toronto Pig Save weekly vigils to bear witness events page on Facebook or alternatively click here to see our events calendar.

Pig Save: Bearing Witness from Toronto Pig Save on Vimeo.

 

Recent blogs about Toronto Pig Save:

AN1MAL March 11 2013

• “Toronto Pig Save Creates Glass Walls in Local Pig Slaughterhouses” by Noelle Vieau

• People To Know: Anita from Toronto Pig Save. Jennifer Sorrell’s poetic blog at The Vegan Sprout about the Pig Save movement. Jenn adds photos worth a thousand words to illustrate the meaning and poignancy of bearing witness of pigs sent to slaughter in downtown Toronto.

• An Interview with Anita Krajnc: 10 Questions For the Founder of Toronto Pig Save. Victoria Niederhoffer’s creative and wonderfully illustrated blog called My Non Leather Life

• From A to Vegan’s blog “Chalk Art and Bearing Witness,” by Mauro posted on May 23, 2013.

• Harlem Shake Toronto Pig Save style by  LILIANA DANEL

 

New videos:

Chalk art and bearing witness at Toronto Pig Save vigil

Toronto Cow Save bears witness of crippled cow at “St. Helen’s” slaughterhouse

We Promise You by Michael Sizer

My Journey Bearing Witness with Toronto Pig Save by Michael Lanfield

 

Winter vigils to bear witness of pigs & vegan BLT giveaways — there is an alternative!

 NEW VIDEOS:  “Harlem Shake is so Vegan with Toronto Pig Save,” “Pigs transported in -20 ºC face frostbite & hypothermia – Toronto Pig Save bears witness”

and Toronto Pig Save’s Vegan BLT giveaway… ‘Tis the season of peace and love.

I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.

-Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

Photo credit: Jo-Anne McArthur http://www.WeAnimals.org

Toronto Pig Save shared more than 50 vegan coconut bacon BTL’s with drivers (watch 3 min video), including a couple of pig transport truck drivers at our morning vigil on Tuesday, Dec. 18, 2012. The vegan BLT giveaway occured on a traffic island dubbed Pig Island at Lake Shore and Strachan in downtown Toronto — where the pig transport trucks pass in a busy intersection enroute to “”Quality Meat Packers” slaughterhouse was an exhilarating day, full of emotions.

Jo-Anne McArthur of WeAnimals.org so perfectly captured it on camera (some of the photos appear in this video) in all its feelings and emotions on all sides, from people to puppets and pigs. See Jo’s entire photo album “Toronto Pig Save Vigil and Vegan BLT giveaway”

It’s the holiday season and we all acutely felt the sharp contrast of giving free vegan BLT sandwiches with love, kindness and smiles, on the one hand, and the sad and scared pigs in transport trucks, on the other. It’s why we’re out there… to spread the love-force or soul-force (as Tolstoy and Gandhi put it) and to save the pigs and our souls. The fab vegan coconut bacon which will soon save millions of lives once it gets into mainstream supermarkets and restaurants was made by the gentle soul Kristen Bethel of Know thy Food.

We also gave gift packages with DVD of Peaceable Kingdom (film by James LaVeck and Jenny Stein featuring multiple generation dairy farmer turned vegan animal rights advocate Harold Brown) and packages of vegan bacon to two pig transport truck drivers and a third for Mr. Clair Schlegel–a Mennonite pig farmer via his cheerful driver.

Come out and join us please at our weekly vigils by joining our “Weekly Vigils” facebook event page or emailing us at torontopigsave@gmail.com. It was so good to have everyone there collectively bearing witness and offering support and kindness to everyone: Paul Figueiras and Carlos Garcia for handing out vegan BLT’s, Jo-Anne McArthur, Julie O’Neill, Sylvia Fraser, Mary Fantaske, Rhiannon Arseneau, Brad, and Ian.

Julie, who is pregnant and just came back from India volunteering with Animal Aid Unlimited helping rescued pigs such as Stacie, saw three sows in one transport truck. It’s the first time we saw sows. Again, the contrasts between the dirty, scared and abused sows heading to “Quality Meat Packers” slaughterhouse where they will experience electric prods, a carbon dioxide gas chamber, being hung upside down on one leg, bled with a hollow knife and thrown into a scalding tank after being used for 2 or 3 years impregnated 2x a year to “produce” piglets who are stolen from them in a couple of weeks vs. how all life and pregnancy ought to be treated… as sacred, special, joyful and wonderful. Pigs are treated with love and respect in sanctuaries across Ontario such as Ruby Ranch Pig Sanctuary, Snooters, Cedar Row, Wishing Well, Teja’s, RR Horse Refuge and others. See video “Introducing Stacey, our rescued paralysed pig at Animal Aid“, with whom Julie spent time with in India.

Everything we do makes a difference from being vegan to spreading the word and taking part and supporting animal justice activism.

These are quotes from Leo Tolstoy’s Calendar of Wisdom (entries for Dec. 12):

Kindness defeats everything and can never be defeated.
-Tolstoy

You can stand firm in a fight against everything except kindness.
-Jean Jacques Rousseau

It is not the blaming of evil but the glorifying of goodness that creates harmony in our life.
-Lucy Malory

The most tender plants can push their way through the hardest rocks, and it is the same with kindness. Nothing can stop a truly kind and sincere person.
-Henry David Thoreau

The person does not exist to whom you cannot do good.
-Lucius Annaeus Seneca

The best and easiest way to thwart evil in this world is to respond to it with kind words, return an evil action with good.
-Tolstoy

Vegan coconut bacon: Kristen Bethel, Know thy Food veggiecookingclasses.com/
Photos: Jo-Anne McArthur, WeAnimals.org
Video: Anita Krajnc, TorontoPigSave.org

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For more info, please visit TorontoPigSave.org
Join our FB group at: facebook.com/groups/144171365639268/
Most important, please join our weekly vigils page at: facebook.com/events/200342320082846/
Follow us on Twitter @TorontoPigSave

Please “like” Toronto Cow Save–sister group of TPS at: facebook.com/TorontoCowSave

 

Sparking grassroots movement to end farm animals’ misery: Interview

Sparking grassroots movement to end farm animals’ misery

 

Click here to download Toronto Pig Save brochure

Join us on Facebook.

If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be vegetarian.

– Paul McCartney

 

 

In Pig Save: Bearing Witness, a 9 minute short, Toronto Pig Save activists bear witness each week of the pigs in transport trucks and in the slaughterhouse at Quality Meat Packers in downtown Toronto. The regular Toronto vigils are part of a growing Pig Save movement including weekly vigils in Burlington organized by Hamilton/Burlington Pig Save and the rise of Melbourne Pig Save and their regular protests to highlight their ban sow stalls campaign. Photographer Jo-Anne McArthur goes on a road trip to visit the recently rescued Julia and her piglets at Farm Sanctuary in Watkins Glen in upstate New York.

Please join us at our weekly vigils and consider starting a Pig Save-like group at the slaughterhouse in your community… some useful tips on our webpage here