Celebrities

kunsjoi reports that NBA star Yao Ming has given up shark’s fin soup as part of his campaign to promote wildlife protection in China. Ming has been working with San Francisco-based WildAid, and apparently he’s got a commercial out there somewhere in which he takes a bullet for an elephant. I must see this. Find it for me. I have no idea what else Yao Ming might be eating or using that would harm his credibility as a spokesperson for wildlife (though we know the basketballs are synthetic), nor do I know how available shark’s fin soup is for a basketball player, but it’s nice to see a celebrity actually take action beyond posing for photographs or lending his or her name to a cause. Link.

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kunsjoi reports that India has picked a candidate for the UN’s secretary general job. I don’t know if it’s possible to pick someone cooler than fan favourite Boutros-Boutros Ghali, who served from 1992-1996, and whose name, let’s face it, was just plain fun to say, but Shashi Tharoor might just have my (non-binding) vote: he’s a pure vegetarian. Link.

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PonderingWillow sent in a 3 minute video featuring Willie Nelson and friends talking about horse slaughter for human consumption. Amazingly, they’re against it. This is one of those videos where I start watching it thinking it’s pretty cool, but then it turns into one of those discussions I used to hear in the cafeteria all the time, where eating a “domesticated” animal is horribly wrong, but nobody even mentions cows and chickens and pigs, and then I go insane. I’m sure they mean well, and maybe a ban on horse slaughter will lead to more progress with the rest of the animals, but I’m not overly hopeful on this one. Link.

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Dave Noisy sent in the latest political gossip: David Miliband, Britain’s incoming Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, might have vegetarian tendencies. Farmers are… concerned. Link.

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arimoore sends word that rapper 50 Cent is the latest to join a campaign promoting healthy eating. He, or at least the company licensing his name, is putting on a contest that’ll award a college scholarship to the student who can design the most nutrient rich cafeteria lunch recipe. While there’s nothing about the contest that’s vegan, there’s nothing that says the entries can’t be. I’ve been thinking lately that while the whole “celebrities who are vegetarian” thing doesn’t really seem to be working, the idea of a celebrity-endorsed veggie meal might be interesting – even if it doesn’t convert anyone, increased demand for, say, guacamole might divert a lot of meat eaters for one meal a day. Hey, if sneakers and pants can have a level of cool associated to them, why not meals? Anyway, here’s the info: Link to article, Link to contest.

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Mention Michael Jackson’s Neverland Ranch, and I’d wager that most people worry about what might happen to children there (yes, Jackson was cleared in court, but I’m talking about the popular perception of the place). As arachnid points out, it’s about time somebody worried about what’s happening to the animals. The estate features a zoo, and apparently since Jackson left the country, the place has fallen into disrepair and the zoo animals are being neglected. Pictures have surfaced, and whenever pictures “surface,” you know it’s not good. That’s why we don’t say “pictures have been made into postcards.” It’s rumoured that the place might be sold at some point to pay of debt, and the chief vet is suing for back pay. As is the case with farms in financial trouble, when a company can’t afford to keep animals, something needs to be done quickly, before the “proof” becomes, well, more effective yet deader proof of the conditions. As is the case with farms, unfortunately, action doesn’t happen a lot. Link.

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Steve_L forwarded on today’s Pamela Anderson news: she’s now campaigning to get a major Canadian grocery store chain to label their battery eggs as “eggs from caged hens.” As someone else in the email chain noted, this qualifies as finance news on the site that picked up the story, which is a hell of an improvement over the “weird news” sections that this kind of story would have been slammed into in days past. As for the campaign, while I imagine Loblaws is equally likely to label a product “horribly cruel” as they are to call their meat “abattoir-fresh corpses,” it’s a good plan for gaining awareness of a problem so bad that the UK is in the process of banning some of the cages. Say what you will about Pamela, but she can make the front page (and the finance section), and you probably can’t. Yay! Link. Update: Steve’s added some links to photos, videos and letter campaign info on the TVA home page.

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Hannibal Lector has changed his ways, kind of. While Dr. Lector is famous for lines like “I ate his liver with a nice Chianti and some fava beans,” Pinky reports that the actor most famous for playing the serial killer has just recorded some public service announcements for PCRM. In the two spots, which will air across the USA in spring and summer 2006, Hopkins talks about the power of vegetarian foods to fight cancer. You can view the ads over at CancerProject.org.

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OK, I know we’ve already covered the whole J. Lo and fur deal, but celebrities love being talked about, and Pinky sent in a story I can’t resist: Heather Mills McCartney (wife of Sir Paul) was at a recent protest at J. Lo’s fashion headquarters, and Jenny from the block’s security team ripped Heather’s leg off. The leg was a prosthetic. After the leg was twisted off, security continued to show the compassion that’s evident throughout Ms. Lopez’s organization and refused to allow McCartney anywhere to fix her prosthesis with comfort and dignity (she reportedly found a fire escape to hide in). Remember kids, fashion cares!

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