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| | |  Dear Anne,This Chinese New Year marks the start of the Chinese Year of the Dragon, but many real-life "dragons" have no reason to celebrate. Around the globe, alligators, lizards, crocodiles, and snakes are being painfully stripped of their skin—often while still alive—to fuel the exotic-skins trade. PETA is leading the global fight to save these and all animals from exploitation, suffering, and abuse. Won't you help strengthen our lifesaving work for animals by becoming PETA's newest member right now? We're looking for 2,012 new card-carrying PETA members by the end of this month, and we're still 900 members away from our goal. A generous PETA supporter has agreed to donate $10 for every new member who joins during this special drive, meaning that your membership will go even further to help animals in the new year. While you may be most familiar with the misery of animals slaughtered for their fur, every snakeskin handbag, every alligator wallet, and every other product made from exotic-animal skin sold to consumers is the result of horrific suffering. Alligators are often kept in filthy, crowded tanks on farms before being clubbed and skinned alive. A PETA investigation of an alligator farm documented gruesome slaughter methods, including cutting through an animal's spinal column with a chisel and hammer. Animals slaughtered this way can take up to two agonizing hours to die. Snakes are routinely pulled from their homes and nailed to trees before being skinned alive and tossed onto a pile to die. They can suffer for days before succumbing to shock or dehydration. Lizards may live as long as 33 years in the wild, but those killed for their skins are usually clubbed on the head or have their spines severed with chisels as soon as they reach "marketable" size. From rabbits to alligators and from foxes to snakes, every day countless individual animals are trapped, beaten, and painfully skinned alive in the name of fashion. PETA is the most effective organization that the world has ever seen at stopping the abuse and exploitation of these and all animals. Will you help us do more for them in 2012 by becoming PETA's newest member right now? No organization has accomplished more in the fight to save animals' skins than PETA. For more than three decades, we've exposed the horrendous animal suffering behind the cruel skins trade. Our attention-grabbing campaigns and shocking undercover investigations of this bloody industry have helped convince designers like Calvin Klein to drop fur and retailers such as Nike and Victoria's Secret to ban the sale of exotic skins. Tens of thousands of consumers have signed PETA's fur-free pledge and shared our undercover videos with family and friends. A Canadian business professor recently told the media following the closing of an Ottawa fur store this month: "[PETA has] made it less fashionable—or less acceptable, I should say—to wear fur." By becoming a PETA member today, you will help PETA save cats, dogs, and other animals from abuse and neglect; continue our daring exposés of secretive fur farms, factory farms, laboratories, and puppy mills; take on companies that promote cruel products like fur and exotic skins; and much more. Regardless of who is behind the abuse, the reality is that if you love and cherish animals, you can't stand idly by while they are mistreated. Your heart tells you to act. And that's why I hope your heart is telling you to become PETA's newest member right now. Animals urgently need your support. Kind regards,  Ingrid E. Newkirk President P.S. This Year of the Dragon is a perfect time to commit to saving alligators, lizards, and other animals from pain and abuse. Won't you help support our work to save these and all animals and meet our goal of 2,012 new voices against cruelty to animals by becoming a PETA member online right now? | | | | ||
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| |  | Dragon: © iStockphoto.com/exxorian Iguana: © iStockphoto.com/parfyonov  Share on Facebook  Share on TwitterClick to update your e-mail preferences or to unsubscribe. This e-mail was sent by PETA, 501 Front St., Norfolk, VA 23510 USA. | | | |||
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