home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search
- Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
- Path: sparky!uunet!wpg!russ
- From: russ@wpg.com (Russell Lawrence)
- Subject: Re: Silver Spring monkeys
- Message-ID: <C1G7IM.Hpt@wpg.com>
- Organization: WP Group
- References: <mhulsey-250193161930@fatrat.fcs.uga.edu>
- Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 06:32:45 GMT
- Lines: 66
-
- From article <mhulsey-250193161930@fatrat.fcs.uga.edu>, by mhulsey@hestia.fcs.uga.edu (Martin Hulsey):
- > Russell Lawrence, who is already having a bad day as a result of last
- > night's episode of "60 Minutes," recently posted a quote by Peter Gerone
- > concerning the conditions in Ed Taub's lab as "evidence" of Taub's alleged
- > "cruelty" toward his monkeys.
- >
- > I thought that TPA participants would be interested in seeing this letter
- > that Gerone wrote. The letter was provided to me by Taub after I sent him
- > a copy of Russell's post.
- > [Gerone letter deleted]
-
- Ah, it's nice to see that you're partially awake, Martin. I
- previously told you, over and over again, that you were
- misconstruing Gerone's position. To wit, consider the following
- interchange:
-
- ======================================================================
- mh> I resent Gerone's false implication that Taub mistreated his monkeys.
-
- rl> Why don't you try to critically understand what Gerone was saying
- rl> instead of trying to discredit every statement that doesn't suit your
- rl> ideology?
- ======================================================================
-
- Or better still, consider the following:
-
- ======================================================================
- mh> Gerone's "hands on" experience with these monkeys months after the Taub
- mh> incident has absolutely no bearing on whether Taub treated his monkeys in a
- mh> cruel fashion. Gerone's assessment of Taub is an opinion that is obviously
- mh> not based on the legal record. He is, in this instance, acting as an
- mh> apologist for PETA.
-
- rl> You're jumping to conclusions here -- bigtime.
-
- mh> Not really. Gerone's opinion of Taub is not consistent with the legal
- mh> record. It is consistent with PETA's account of the events.
-
- rl> Reread the statement, Martin, and try to think about it critically
- rl> without bending and shaping the evidence to make it fit your theories:
- rl>
- rl> ... Scientists who work with animals now know that
- rl> they are being scrutinized, and they act accordingly.
- rl> "Today, you'd never see conditions like the Silver
- rl> Spring Monkeys because people are more conscious of
- rl> this," says Gerone. "Ten years ago, there was a lot
- rl> less consciousness on the part of researchers about how
- rl> they cared for animals. The animal rights movement has
- rl> done a great deal to increase the consciousness of
- rl> people working with animals."
- rl>
- rl> see The Washington Post, February 24, 1991, FINAL Edition
- rl>
- rl> It's hardly a condemnation of Taub. Rather, it's a statement about
- rl> growing awareness in the research community.
- ======================================================================
-
- > Therefore, it is obvious that Gerone was one of many reasonable people who
- > was falsely convinced of Taub's guilt by PETA's hyperbolic propaganda. How
- > many others are out there?
-
- Read the letter again, Martin.
-
- --
- Russell Lawrence, WP Group, New Orleans (504) 443-5000
- russ@wpg.com uunet!wpg!russ
-