Woman Strips Naked To Protest Arrival Of Duffy's Circus

ARAN Beauty Bares All, Including Truth Behind Irish Circus Cruelty

For Immediate Release
March 3, 2006

Contact:
John Carmody 087-6275579

Limerick — Confined to a cage with her nude body painted like a tiger and a banner above her reading, "Wild Animals Don’t Belong Behind Bars," a woman will protest the use of exotic animals by Duffy’s Circus. The protest will highlight the dangers that animal acts pose to humans and animals alike:

Date: Friday, March, 3
Time: 12 noon sharp
Place: Start of Cruises Street (Opposite HMV Music Store)

Recently animal protection group Animal Defenders International revealed for the first time ever their findings of an undercover investigation into several Irish circuses in Ireland including Duffy’s Circus. The campaign report on Ireland's circuses is based on undercover investigations by ADI Field Officers into seven circuses touring Ireland in 2000 and 2003. ADI Field Officers obtained employment with two Irish circuses, and observed many more. Examples of the violence used to control the animals were captured in the Irish launch video:

* a camel slapped in the face and then hit in the face with a
broom and finally jabbed with a broom handle
* an elephant kicked in the leg and then punched in the face
* a hippo whipped to hurry it along when it was already
walking in the desired direction
* a keeper whipping an elephant in order to get her to move
* a baby camel being roughly handled to force him to move
* a pregnant camel performing just days before giving birth

"This cruelty, these beatings are what the circus is desperate to hide from the public," says ARAN’s Campaigns Coordinator John Carmody. "These animals are not volunteers. They have been deprived of their precious freedom and beaten for a lifetime of cheap tricks."

ARAN wants the public to know that circuses can in no way provide for the animals the use and abuse. In order to force wild animals to perform stressful and often painful acts, trainers use metal bullhooks, whips, muzzles and electric prods. These horribly cruel training methods are commonly used in Irish circuses all over the country. Animals in circuses have being taken from the wild at some stage in their life for a lifetime of boredom, misery, cheap tricks and cruelty. Animals in circuses really are not volunteers; they are slaves, confined to their ‘beast’ wagons for some 23 hours a day with no room to exercise compared to that of their homes in the wild and regardless of them being ‘born’ in the circus, still have the instincts of their fellow companions in the wild, they like to roam for miles, go foraging for food and vegetation and raise their young. ARAN will also be distributing DVD’s of the undercover investigation into Irish Circuses by Animal Defenders International that show’s cruelty, neglect, abuse, beatings and horrid conditions.

Animal Rights Action Network (ARAN) will also be distributing copies of the DVD, leaflets and posters to the public along and will begin contacting local councilors on introducing a ‘motion’ to ban circuses with animals coming into Limerick. These initiatives are already underway in Galway and Cork city where local councilors are working to get similar bans.

Copies of the DVD investigation are available upon request. For full report and pictures of the investigation please visit www.ad-international.org

ENDS