While I LOVE enjoying the health benefits of a healthy plant-based lifestyle, the truth is I originally went vegan for the animals. And the more injustices that are done to animals, the stronger my resolve.
The injustices that most of us are familiar with are the direct injustices to cows, pigs, poultry and fish that people consume.
But did you know what is happening to America’s wild horses? Many of us aren’t aware that we even have wild horses in America.
We do.
And they are magnificent to behold. They have families and feelings and grace our public lands.
But their numbers are rapidly dwindling.
Why? Because the Bureau of Land Management (a US Government agency) is inhumanely rounding them up, putting them in holding pens and then many are shipped across the border to be slaughtered. What? Slaughter? It is illegal to slaughter a horse for consumption in the US, but it is not illegal to do so in Canada or Mexico.
Some, not all of these horses find adoptive homes or wind up at a sanctuary. But the act of rounding them up is horrific via the use of helicopters that chase them into pens. Many horses are physically injured or worse during the round up.
They go from being majestic and an ecologically-friendly part of our landscape to unvalued despondent creatures.
They belong in their natural environment, roaming free- not in holding pens or worse.
Why is this happening? Part of the reason is that the meat and dairy industries are huge and powerful. In simplistic terms they have convinced the government that cows and sheep need to graze on our public lands. In order for there to be enough food (grass etc.) to graze, they forcibly remove the horses. (There are other reasons too and here’s a link to learn more.) The Wild Horse and Burros Act was passed in 1971 but that doesn’t seem to have much impact lately.
I learned about the plight of wild horses a few years ago when I watched Jamie Baldanza and Deb Lee Carson’s beautiful Wild Lands Wild Horses pilot film. You can watch it on YouTube.
Since then, I’ve been following Scott Beckstead and Animal Wellness Action, who fight for horses at the legislative level.
And I just watched Wild Beauty, a brand-new documentary that does an amazing job explaining what is going on. I’m not going to sugar coat it. It’s hard to watch the roundups that they captured on film. But we need to be aware of what’s happening. Then we can join the growing number of people voicing their disapproval about removing the horses from our public lands.
Here’s the movie trailer.
I watched it on Amazon Prime and it can be viewed elsewhere too. If you don’t want to watch the film but would like to get involved, check out The Wild Beauty Foundation and Save Our Wild Horses for steps you can take.
Thank you Jamie Baldanza for permission to use your photo for this post. Please visit Jamie’s websites to see her gorgeous horse photography and work.
I’d also like to cite that the photographer of the cow photo under the Wild Horse HMA sign is Bobbie Moller for Wild Horse Education. (It’s not legible in this shot.)