Sam Iles's Blog

This New Year we’ve got ourselves has made me look closely at all of my web properties (for want of a better word) and better consider how to manage them, how to develop them further and how better to spend my time.

One such property is my charity Cures Without Cages. Now, several more people that I expected have donated and the website gets a nice number of views. However, to really do what I want to do with it, I need to work a lot with it and I just can’t do that right now.

So, here is the plan. Stop it being a charity. I will change a few parts of the website to reflect this new status, remove the option to donate but add more and better information about animal testing and its faults.

I still, however, believe very much in the idea of it all – ‘voting with one’s dollar’ and exploiting basic capitalist world rules to achieve one’s goals. For that reason, I shall maintain the website’s point of not donating to charities which test on animals. To that end, I will add a prominent list of charities to the website which do not test on animals and encourage people to give those organisations their support (rather than using me as the direct monetary intermediary and was the previous set up).

The eventual goal, however, shall be to reinstate it as a money accepting organisation in the future. Perhaps, this will happen in a few years when I have more time to run it (or, more help to run it).

I shall continue to run the podcast (which has, from my best estimates of glancing at server logs, around 50-75 listeners) and I shall use the CWC blog to share my thoughts on occasion. I shall also use the Twitter page to share more, too.

I hope you agree that this approach will be far better and will hopefully further our goal of an animal-testing free world much faster.

I has a thought, which I tried to compress into 140 characters but couldn’t. So here it is.

Animal testing has an 8% success rate. In other words, 8% or drugs which work in animals work in humans. For example, 30 AIDS vaccines have been developed that worked perfectly, but failed in humans. I won’t bombard you with facts though, you can look it up if you need more.

My point is this: of so many drugs have passed animals and failed or killed at humans, imagine how many more have failed animal tests but could have worked for humans.

Literally, we could have discovered thousands of cures for cancer and AIDS but they were written off because they failed to work on animals.

It just seems like such flawed science to me.

Anyway: Cures Without Cages

I’ve never really understood where I stand on animal testing.

Of course, I’ve thought it was wrong and I wanted it to stop. But, I wasn’t sure of what should happen in the mean time. Of course, animal testing won’t happen over night. I’ve always struggled with questions like “should we just stop animal testing right now” because I’ve never been sure of the impact it would have on medical research.

That’s why I set up Cures Without Cages. I thought that it would help (in a way other charities don’t at all) reduce demand and funding for animal tests and allow the industry to adjust. (I, of course, don’t expect CWC to have that much of an effect, that’s just the vision).

I am firmly convinced that animal testing is not essential. The alternatives are better. Also, the results really are bad for science, not helpful to it. This is agreed by science. So, I think that it should stop and always have done so. However, it is my position on what should happen now that I’ve been rethinking.

My question is simply is it ever right to experiment on animals? Is there ever any justification in the use of animals for human benefit? Take this quotation from Gandhi on animal experiments: “All the scientific discoveries stained with innocent blood I count as of no consequence”. I think this sums it up perfectly. Gandhi was firmly on the side of it never being acceptable, in any situation.

I think that reading the horror stories of experiments has what’s confirmed my opinion. I won’t bother relaying them to you – you can head over to PETA if you want to see some. But, fundamentally, I began to question whether this horribly evil level of suffering is right and I came to the conclusion that it isn’t.

I mow believe that never, under any circumstance is it essential to test on animals. Despite the potential benefits, there is no reason to do it. Mostly because those benefits don’t exist. Scientist after scientist and university after university and report after report are saying that animal tests are pointless and only hinder science.

So, I’m pleased to finally have an more concrete and stable answer to the animal testing debate: I hate it, wish it would stop and don’t care about the ‘benefits’ at all.

But, there is one more thing to clear up. The question ‘would you reject a cure for cancer if it was obtained through animal testing’. There are few problems with the question first off. Namely, this isn’t the debate. The point is that it isn’t needed at all. The same cure could be developed through the use on non-animal means. The makes the question moot and a highly hypothetical situation.

But, I like hypothesising, so I will attempt to answer it anyway. Short answer: yes, I would reject, on behalf of humanity, such a animal obtained cure. I’ve come to the conclusion that animal testing is always wrong, no matter what it may bring us. If I presented you with the question ‘would you happily torture a hundred or so children and adults for a few years to get a cure for cancer?’ you would probably say no. Some of you would say yes, I expect. But, not me. I don’t think it’s right to torture people for the benefit of others. For me, this also expands to animals, I now realise. Of course, this is just a fictitious, hypothetical situation, so doesn’t really matter.

Anyway, that’s my view: animal testing is bad under any circumstance. No exceptions.

Recently I’ve been doing a little side project and it’s just launched.

Cures Without Cages is my new animal testing charity. But, it’s different from most animal rights charities in that it doesn’t spend its donation money on raising awareness and sending people leaflets and not really doing much.

I aim to take a proactive approach, by spending money directly funding medical research projects that do not test on animals. Pretty simple, huh?

It is, as in economics, voting with your dollar, a simple attempt to reduce demand.

I’ve also recorded a podcast which explains lots about animal testing. I recommend you subscribe in iTunes.

The website explains more about animal testing, why it’s wrong and why non-animal tests would be better.

I hope you take a look at the site and perhaps consider donating. Thank you.