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Animals’ heads torn off: One Voice reveals its investigation footage on the goose neck game

Animals’ heads torn off: One Voice reveals its investigation footage on the goose neck game

Animals’ heads torn off: One Voice reveals its investigation footage on the goose neck game
19.09.2023
Animals’ heads torn off: One Voice reveals its investigation footage on the goose neck game
Domestic animals

On 17 September 2023, we went to investigate at the goose neck festival organised in Saint-Bonnet-près-Riom, in Puy-de-Dôme. To mark their passage into adulthood, ten young men tore the head off twenty geese, chickens, and rabbits that were killed for the occasion to cheers from the public. We are asking for a ban throughout France on this barbaric practice.

Young people all smiles, laughter, music… you could almost believe this was a good-natured party. Until we notice the rope stretched horizontally where twenty animals have been hung from. Geese, chickens, and rabbits whose lifeless bodies hang in the air were killed especially to be subjected to the most degrading treatment and to entertain the inhabitants of Saint-Bonnet-près-Riom. So how were they killed? Like in the Basque country: “either we drown them or we open their mouths and stick a knife in them”.

An extremely violent event

The ‘fête’ begins when a couple of these young men who have turned 18 that year pass under the rope, sitting in pairs on the back of a horse. With their arms raised, they hit the goose which hangs above them. The most violent blows send the animal’s head into the air before it falls, dangling limply at the end of its white neck. As if this French piñata were not sinister enough, the women make a second pass under the rope, alone, to kiss the bird, sometimes pulling on its neck so hard that it seems close to dislocating. At the height of the action: the men then tear off the heads of the geese, rabbits, and chickens with their bare hands before brandishing them while singing joyfully to the crowd. What better way is there to enter adulthood and ensure a promising future than these abject acts and the accompanying degrading spectacle? Of course, these beings are lifeless, but they are still animals.

A ‘tradition’ that creates victims each year

This is not the first time that we have condemned this barbaric ‘tradition’ which is still very much alive in certain French villages. We did so in August 2022, when a goose was mutilated in Beaux, then in August 2023 in Arfeuilles, where the decapitation was carried out using a sabre… The organizers defend themselves by boasting that they are not cutting off the heads of living animals. But they don’t seem to mind having them killed beforehand to allow their corpses to be torn apart. Here we are dealing with a practice dating from the Middle Ages that trivialises animal abuse and establishes it as a real rite of passage to adulthood. This initiation should be done without incitement to cruelty. Does our society really need this? The festival committee, organiser of the event, does not even take responsibility: the program for the day does not even say who they are.

To ask for a ban on the goose neck ‘game’ throughout France for all of the geese, chickens, rabbits, and ducks killed and decapitated every year, and for the protection of our youth who represent and constitute the future of our society, sign our petition.

Sign the petition

Translated from the French by Joely Justice

Animal defenders threatened with knives, insulted, and hit by the Muller Circus.

Animal defenders threatened with knives, insulted, and hit by the Muller Circus.

Animal defenders threatened with knives, insulted, and hit by the Muller Circus.
11.09.2023
Animal defenders threatened with knives, insulted, and hit by the Muller Circus.
Circuses

Living life as an animal kept in a circus… What would a celebratory weekend in Pérols near the Muller-Zavatta Circus be without hitting, insults, and threats? This is what the non-violent activists wishing to raise public awareness of the suffering of these animals at the hands of the Muller family’s patriarch were subjected to. A glimpse into the range of circus performers’ ‘methods’ to establish their dominance over others.

Death threats and threats to burn their cars, homophobic insults, misogyny, hitting, kicking…

The protest authorised by the Prefecture covering Pérols, organised by Alliance Éthique, One Voice, and supported by Sète Animal Save and Sèt’Animaliste in Thau, was the scene of a surge of violence by circus performers against people. As per tradition, the trainers, clowns, and Mr Loyal from the Muller-Zavatta Circus once again showed their true colours. Stripped of their makeup and glitter, they were nothing more than threatening and insulting thugs. Edmond Muller was there to hit people and intimidate the activists who were trying to raise public awareness near the circus and had only their beliefs to defend themselves. The rest of the family were standing a short distance away.

We have said this over and over again: this circus, that specifically kept Jumbo, tigers, and monkeys, spends its time standing up to local authorities and committing crimes (defacing, theft, and others).

A circus of thugs, the worst there is in France

Having become, within a few years, a symbol of the worst of what circuses with animals are criticised for, trainers have nonetheless been protected by the government since 2021, and still in recent days with the publication of a ministerial document trampling on the spirit of the law of 2021 on animal mistreatment, and the publication of a decree stating the equivalence of competency certifications for zoos and circuses.

If only the irregularities and non-compliance with regulations were the least of our criticisms against them… but the boss, the family, and the employees of the Muller Circus stand out a little more each day for their contempt for their neighbours, whether humans or animals, elected representatives, or simple citizens.

What must the animals be subjected to when no one can see them or film them, while circus performers do not hesitate to pick up their pitchforks to resist police, driving trucks towards them at high speed, or threatening the Ministry of Ecology or tribunals with killing and slaughtering animals if they take Jumbo, the tigers, and the monkeys? This circus of thugs has been cracking the whip with the support of the State for far too long.

Activists have filed a complaint in particular for the hitting, injuries, and armed violence. The video was sent also to an association fighting homophobia. We condemn these acts of violence and call on the authorities to be extremely inflexible towards these outlaw intimidating individuals. To support us in the fight for Jumbo, sign our petition!

Translated from the French by Joely Justice

The extermination of wolves planned in France and Europe?

The extermination of wolves planned in France and Europe?

The extermination of wolves planned in France and Europe?
11.09.2023
The extermination of wolves planned in France and Europe?
Wildlife

Authorities have just announced a new estimate of the number of wolves in France after discontent throughout the summer by those opposing these magnificent animals, unsatisfied by the result of the first count. After the initial report from the announcement of the Wolf Plan on a national level, the European Commission urges Member States including France to implement these exemptions – read: slaughtering permissions – to the great satisfaction of the Ministry of Agriculture… Even if this fight is hard, we will never stop fighting for them.

An intensive agricultural system on the mountainside

In recent weeks, wolf critics have had a great time: agricultural groups left a national group meeting to put pressure on. On their side, presidents of the Alps departmental councils were in tears about the ‘growth and threat’.

Their scheme worked so well that a new count was carried out to appease them. What a surprise: the figures revealed on 6 September were changed to a higher number, going from 906 wolves counted in June to 1104, which is almost 200 individuals.

These ‘poor shepherds’ who try to make us believe that they are participating in mountain biodiversity, when in reality they are grazing flocks of several hundred – if not thousands – of sheep in overgrazed meadows, for which the State provides financial aid and compensation on request even though many do not properly protect the animals that depend on them. These farmers who are simply crying over a potential financial loss that they will not be able to sell to the abattoir. And remember that the wolves only take a tiny amount of the herds: they are the cause of only 0.15% of the mortality of ewes and lambs from all causes (diseases, transport accidents, falls, etc.).

After France, wolves are in the EU’s sights

For years, we have been warning the public of the fact that the number of ‘targets’ to slaughtered is constantly increasing – even though their population was half that at the time. Are authorities looking to simply exterminate them again?

New proof of the “power” of the deadly breeder-hunter duo, the President of the European Commission declared at the start of the school year that the packs constitute a “true danger for livestock and, potentially, for humans”, adding to the hysteria that wolves have suffered since the Middle Ages.

Attacks on humans are a myth. The vast majority of those that happened in France in the distant past were carried out by rabid animals, a disease that has now been eradicated. Wolves do not attack humans, as Nicolas Rossignol, a point of contact for the Calanques National Park, explains. As a reminder, 10,000 dog bites are recorded in France each year.

After this string of announcements, the presentation of the new Wolf Plan, which was supposed to take place at the beginning of September, was postponed until the end of the month. By complaining, the agricultural lobby, supported by local elected representatives and even the French President, achieved its goals. The satisfaction of the Ministry of Agriculture does not bode well. Since the start of the year, at least 126 wolves have already been slaughtered: 120 legally and 6 poached.

We are obviously taking part in the consultation organised by the European Commission until 22 September. Nothing will stop us getting these lethal shots stopped. While waiting, sign our petition to call for the end of wolves’ persecution.

Translated from the French by Joely Justice