THE WITNESS: A Tribe of Heart Documentary

THE WITNESS: A Tribe of Heart Documentary

How does a construction contractor from a tough Brooklyn neighborhood become an impassioned animal advocate?

In the award-winning documentary THE WITNESS, Eddie Lama explains how he feared and avoided animals for most of his life, until the love of a kitten opened his heart, inspiring him to rescue abandoned animals and bring his message of compassion to the streets of New York. With humor and sincerity, Eddie tells the story of his remarkable change in consciousness.

THE WITNESS has been an official selection in 32 film festivals where it has received eight awards for Best Documentary and two for Best of Festival. It has been broadcast on the independent film showcases of several regional PBS stations, as well as LinkTV, FreeSpeech TV, and United Kingdom's Community Channel. Thus far, the film has been translated into 11 languages, including Russian and Chinese.

Working hard to overcome the many challenges of growing up in a poor and violent Brooklyn neighborhood, Eddie Lama developed a deep sense of identification with the vulnerable and voiceless beings of our world. In one of the most moving sections of The Witness, he describes the harrowing experience of being beaten and left for dead, crying out for help and no one responding. Eddie then shares how this trauma helped him understand the plight of animals, who so often endure violence with no one to even witness their tragic fate, much less advocate on their behalf.


THE WITNESS in other languages:

PORTUGUÊS - A Testemunha - Um Documentário da Tribe of Heart

SVENSKA - Vittnet - En dokumentär från Tribe of Heart

ESPAÑOL (SUBTITULADA) - El Testigo - Un documental de Tribe Of Heart

ESPAÑOL (DOBLADA) - El Testigo - Un documental de Tribe Of Heart (DOBLADA)

РУССКИЙ - "Свидетель", документальной ленты Племени Сердец

SUOMALAINEN -The Witness - todistaja

POLSKI -Świadek - Film dokumentalny zrealizowany przez Tribe of Heart

HRVATSKI - Svjedok - Dokumentarni film organizacije Tribe of Heart

SLOVENIAN - Priča - Dokumentarni film organizacije Tribe of Heart

VIỆT -Người Chứng Kiến - Một phim tài liệu của Tribe of Heart

עברית - העד - סרט תיעודי מבית היוצר Tribe of Heart

ČESKY - Svědek - Dokumentární film od Tribe of Heart


In 2001, the Peace Abbey gave Eddie their Courage of Conscience Award.

Upon accepting it, he said, "In my lifetime I have been both the oppressor and the oppressed, both the fomenter of discord and the advocate for peace, both the perpetrator and the victim. But most significantly, I have been both the silence and the voice. It is the human voice that is the primary tool for change."

Eddie’s willingness to so openly share both the dark and the light of his own life has inspired many of those who have seen The Witness to follow his example, making a conscious decision to do all they can not to participate in the exploitation of others, be they “two-legged” or “four-legged.”

Interview Eddie Lama with Animal Libration Front

Transcript of Eddie Lama, star of The Witness and founder of the Oasis Sanctuary, May 1, 2002

Buy the DVD: http://www.witnessfilm.org/

Tribe Of Heart shop: http://www.tribeofheart.org/shop/main.htm

Animal Rights Links


Vegan Recipe & Cooking Links


Herbal & Garden Links


Martha Magenta's Poetry Links


General Topic Links

Animals Are Someone

Animals Are Someone

This series of images asks the question:

What does it feel like to a sensitive, intelligent individual to be loved, to be safe, to be at peace, to be seen and treated as someone, the way Sanctuary animals are? And what must it feel like to the same individual to be treated as a mere something to be confined, mutilated and killed for someone's whim?

Being Someone

Posters by Joanna Lucas for Peaceful Prairie Sanctuary, from the original series "I am Someone" http://peacefulprairie.org/outreach/someone2.html

Posters by Joanna Lucas for Peaceful Prairie Sanctuary, from the original series 'Being Someone' http://peacefulprairie.org/outreach/beingSomeone.html

Happy Cows ~ Behind The Myths


In order to maintain uninterrupted milk production, cows are forced year after year to go through an endless cycle of pregancy and birth, only to have their calves immediately taken from them. Cows and calves cry out for each other as they are separated.

All forms of dairy farming involve forcibly impregnating cows. This involves a person inserting his arm far into the cow's rectum in order to position the uterus, and then forcing an instrument into her vagina. The restraining apparatus used is commonly called a "rape rack."

Half of all calves born are male. Of no use in milk production, they are sent to veal-producing operations or directly to auctions where they are sold and slaughtered when they are just a few days old. Male calves used for veal production suffer a crude castration process and are killed after 4 months spent in small crates or pens.

After just 4 to 6 years, dairy cows are "spent" from being forced to continuously produce milk. Often weak and ill, they endure transport to auction and slaughter, both of which are traumatic for these gentle animals. If allowed to exist free of exploitation and slaughter, cows can live 25 years or more.


~I Am Someone~

Posters by Joanna Lucas for Peaceful Prairie Sanctuary, from the original series 'Being Someone' http://peacefulprairie.org/outreach/beingSomeone.html

Peaceable Kingdom: The Journey Home

Open your eyes. Trust your heart. Take the journey. This award-winning, life-changing documentary features five farmers, a humane officer, an animal rescuer, and a cow named Snickers, who will make you laugh and cry, expand your consciousness, and challenge your ideas about farmers, farm life, and perhaps most surprisingly, the animals themselves.

More info at: http://www.PeaceableKingdomFilm.org

"When we tell ourselves we're eating meat from "humanely raised animals," we're leaving out a huge part of the equation. The slaughtering of an animal is a bloody and violent act, and death does not come easy for those who want to live."
Colleen Patrick-Goudreau.

Animal Rights Links


Vegan Recipe & Cooking Links


Herbal & Garden Links


Martha Magenta's Poetry Links


General Topic Links

We have a choice today not to eat a sentient turkey

We have a choice today not to eat a sentient turkey

Wild mother turkey protecting her young

Turkey eggs from breeder farms are collected and sent to hatcheries where they are incubated in temperature-controlled rooms. In the United States more than 250 million turkeys are slaughter every year for human consumption, and as you will see in the following photos, many more die before they ever reach their slaughter age of 6 months.

After a few weeks, eggs are transferred into metal trays where chicks will hatch. Those who hatch early are sometimes left for up to three days.

Some chicks are manually removed from the trays and dumped into plastic containers. There is no gentleness or compassion here! Newly hatched turkey chicks, like these are simply dropped into the tray three feet below. To us, such an act seems to express deliberate and sadistic cruelty.

The rest of the chicks are kept in the trays and carted off to a machine where they will be mechanically sorted from the cracked egg shells.

Hundreds of thousands of chicks are hatched in this facility each week.

Overall, more than 252 million turkeys are raised for food in the U.S. each year.


Turkey Hatchery - Sorting

The trays are then turned upside down, and the chicks fall onto the moving sorter.

The machine separates chicks to one side and cracked egg shells are dumped in a disposal bin. If someone had deliberately set out to design a machine to torment and torture the living feeling souls, they could not have built a better machine.

Some chicks are mis-sorted and end up being dumped in the disposal bin along with the egg shells. There certainly doesn't seem to be any concern for the welfare of these turkey chicks. They are not even considered to be living beings; to them they are nothing by "production units" to be dealt with anyway they have to in order to make the most money.

Other chicks are tossed from the trays during processing.

Some chicks get caught in the equipment.

Many chicks become mangled from the machinery, and die an agonizing death.

Our investigator thought this mangled bird was dead before realizing he was still breathing. The horrors of animal agriculture go on and on! And, everyone who buys their products contributes to the suffering.

Injured chicks are often left suffering for hours, and many die from their wounds.

Some chicks get stuck in the machinery.

Other chicks are processed in the sorter before fully hatching from their shells.

These chicks are known in the industry as "hatch debris."


Turkey Hatchery Mutilations

Some chicks have their snoods ripped off their heads.

Chicks' rear toes are sometimes cut off with scissors.

This is generally done to minimize damage caused by stress-induced aggression while on the farm. Humans cause the problem, but blame the turkeys in an effort to try to excuse the mutilations and excruciating pain they cause these babies.

Chicks are roughly handled and tossed around during this process.

Chicks are also hung upside down and the tips of their front three toes are exposed to microwave radiation, killing the tissue. In essence, they are cooking the chick's toes while they are fully conscious.

After exposure, their toes turn white and the tips will eventually shrivel up and fall off.

Chicks are also hung by their heads and the tips of their beaks are exposed to high intensity infrared light.

Chicks are generally debeaked to minimize damage caused by stress-induced pecking while on the farm. Again, the turkeys are blamed for human cruelty.

While hanging, they are spun around the machine and will be dumped into containers below. If you wonder why we are vegans, these photos should help answer the question.We refuse to put our money in the pockets of the industries that cause these atrocities.


Turkey Hatchery Disposal

After birds are sorted from the shells, some are placed inside plastic bags to be later sent for testing. And remember that these are living, breathing, and feeling beings.

With live birds inside, the bag is tied closed. They do this with full knowledge that these living chicks will slowly suffocate to death.

Several bags of birds are collected each day chicks are hatched.

These birds are fully conscious, but no one in the death dealing industry cares that these chicks are struggling for a breath of fresh air.

The chicks gasp for air as they slowly die of suffocation.

Other chicks, some deemed "surplus" and some suffering from injuries, are dumped in the same disposal bin as the egg shells. The more that human beings become detached from the disposal of any life, the more they justify the disposal of other life, even their own babies.

The unwanted chicks are disposed of like trash.


Turkey Unit

These young turkeys recently have been placed in a large building of a factory farm, called a unit. They have been raised in an incubator without any love or care from a mother.

At this young age, the turkeys appear to have plenty of room to move around, even if they can't go outside and enjoy God's creation. However, this extra space will soon disappear.

As these turkeys continue to grow, the free space begins to disappear; for these farmers put just enough turkeys in this building so that when they are fully grown, they are packed solid.

Although these turkeys are still very young, the building is already quite crowded. Think of how we would feel with this many people around us every moment of every day, and we may begin to feel what these turkeys are experiencing.

Up until this time, some people might say that these turkeys are being treated humanely; but intent is more telling than appearances. We believe a more accurate description is "delayed premeditated cruelty."

By this time, the young turkeys are so crowded together that they can't move around without rubbing against one another.

There is no family or community life for these turkeys who are crowded together in such factory "units" containing as many as 25,000 birds. There is only frustration! Think of how we would feel in such conditions, and we might come close to the reality of what these turkeys suffer every day of their lives.

The foreground turkeys in this photo have been illuminated by the flash on the camera. The remainder of the crowded "unit" is in near darkness to keep the turkeys from becoming too "aggressive" which is a direct result of these unnatural living conditions. If we lived in such conditions our frustration would most likely turn into aggression, too. The way these turkeys are being treated is piling one evil upon another. And every time we eat a turkey's flesh we contribute to this nightmare.

At least in this turkey warehouse unit there is some natural lighting, but the turkeys are allocated only three square feet of space each. This is quite small when we consider the large size of turkeys.

The turkeys in this house unit are packed together wall to wall. From looking at this picture, it is very likely that these living, feeling, and social beings have less than three square feet of space each. They are being deprived of their God-given right to enjoy life.

This photo shows how evil some human beings can be. A portion of the upper beak of this turkey was cut off with a red-hot knife as a way of curbing the turkey's aggressive tendencies. In the natural state, turkeys are never this aggressive. Humans make the turkeys aggressive and then debeak them to stop the aggression. Only humans can devise such evil! Furthermore, this turkey has suffered an eye injury or disease that has gone untreated. Think of how much it hurts when we get a little speck in our eye, and we might understand the degree of suffering that this turkey has been forced to endure day after day. Stop this cruelty! Stop eating turkeys!

This photo speaks for itself. We may be humans, but most of us are not humane if we allow such conditions to exist. Every time we eat or buy turkey flesh or by-products, we contribute to this horror.

Perhaps this turkey's death was a blessing, for her suffering is over, unlike the millions of other turkeys on factory farms who have to continue to suffer until they are killed in a slaughterhouse to satisfy human lust.

Farmed animals are considered commodities and not living and feeling beings with emotions and needs like ours. They only consider the economics of raising them for food: it is cheaper to allow this kind of pain, suffering and eventual death for a certain percentage of turkeys, than it is to provide proper medical care.

The living and the dead! Economically, a certain number are expendable! As long as we eat turkeys, this nightmare will continue. If these three animals were our companions, we would be terribly upset with the death of one of them; but because they are "food", we are indifferent to their death. This is insanity! Perhaps, we need to considered how similar a dog's hind leg feels compared to a turkey's thigh?

Think of how much pain we would be in if this much of our body was raw and bloody, then we should also understand how much pain this turkey is in. To allow this is inhuman. To do nothing about it is depraved. To buy and eat turkeys is to contribute to this continual atrocity.

This is a male breeding turkey. He's not very attractive with partially removed beak and disheveled feathers; but that doesn't matter with these farmed animals, because this guy will never come in contact with a female turkey. Instead, he is masturbated three times a week by a
human farm worker to collect his sperm which is used to artificially inseminate female turkeys in a process that is really rape. In our opinion, what humans do to these birds is an abomination before God, for in reality they are having a form of sexual relationship with the turkeys.

These are turkeys that have been "packed" into a shipping container for transport to a slaughterhouse. At no time in their miserable lives do these turkeys have a moment's peace. Why? In order to satisfy the human lust for cheap flesh.

These turkeys have just been unloaded from the transport containers and hung upside down in shackles on their way into the slaughterhouse. They are crying out in fear and pain as they await their own slaughter.

A turkey shackled upside down in a slaughterhouse. They are supposed to be stunned so that they feel no pain before their throats are cut; but from what we have come to understand, this is not always the case. More recent investigations have even come to the conclusion that only the muscles are paralyzed, leaving the turkeys fully conscious to pain.
These turkeys have just been unloaded from the transport containers and hung upside down in shackles on their way into the slaughterhouse. They are crying out in fear and pain as they await their own slaughter.


Make a compassionate choice:

Delicious Vegan Christmas Holiday Recipes

Lots of recipes for Autumn, and Thanksgiving holiday

Enjoy A Vegan Barbecue Extravaganza!

Vegan Turkey Loaf

Traditional Vegan/Vegetarian Festive Roast Dinner

Animal Rights Links


Vegan Recipe & Cooking Links


Herbal & Garden Links


Martha Magenta's Poetry Links


General Topic Links