Species Unite

“… we are trying to make something watchable that is just unwatchable. I don't want to be here and I don't want to see this. And every part of me wants to turn away, but you have to engage with it, and you have to come out the other end with something that hopefully can encourage other people to stick with long enough to have it land.” - Kelly Guerin How we treat animals is how we treat humans. Kelly Guerin is a documentary filmmaker who has been making that connection for as long as she’s been making films. She is a part of the extraordinary We Animals Media Team and has worked independently as well as alongside NGO’s to direct, film, and edit dozens of short films spanning topics of animal protection, environmental justice, and human rights throughout the world.  Her debut feature length documentary, Nations of Their Own is set to be released in 2021. The film takes place in occupied Palestine and follows an unexpected group of activists who are on a mission to rescue their country from the effects of decades of military occupation, starting with its animals.

“In a natural setting, these animals would be swimming maybe a hundred miles a day, diving deep. They have their social lives, their social networks, roles to play in very tightly-knit family groups. They raise their children. They have cultures, different ways of doing things in different populations. They can explore and play and come together. None of that is available in the concrete tank. None of it. They don't have any place to go. They don't have any place to dive… what you see is a lot of mortality, a lot of sickness, a lot of behavioral abnormalities. Everything that makes life worth living for a dolphin or whale is absent in marine parks and concrete tanks. None of it is available.” – Lori Marino Lori Marino is a neuroscientist and an expert in animal behavior and intelligence. Much of her work is focused on whales and dolphins. She's currently the president of the Whale Sanctuary Project, which will be a seaside sanctuary for former performing orcas and belugas that have spent their entire lives in concrete tanks. Lori is also the founder and Executive Director of the Kimmela Center for Animal Advocacy, an organization that bridges the gap between academic research and on the ground animal advocacy efforts. She has appeared in several film and television programs, including the documentaries Blackfish, Unlocking the Cage, and Long Gone Wild, which is a 2019 documentary that picks up where Black Fish left off, and is also where the Whale Sanctuary Project begins. The Whale Sanctuary Project is going to change the world for the lucky orcas and belugas that will end up there. They will also be a model for future sanctuaries for cetaceans – as we need a ton of them, there are way too many of these animals living in captivity. It stuns me that even after documentaries like Blackfish, people all over the world (including many in the US) still visit marine mammal parks. Mostly, people go because they don’t know. They don’t know how miserable life is for the whales and dolphins and they don’t know how intelligent and emotionally complex these animals are. Keeping them in tanks is cruel, inhumane, and unjust and it needs to stop. Lori has made it her life’s work to not only study their intelligence, but to advocate and fight for their lives. This conversation is an important one, after listening to Lori, I think it’d be very difficult for anyone to give another dollar to a marine park anywhere on Earth.

“Because we're told of so many problems and issues around the world, we get overwhelmed. And if you tell someone, okay, this is what's going on and this is what you can do. That's a bit different, people are like, okay, that's actionable.” - Amanda Hearst Amanda Hearst is co-founder of Well Beings, an organization that unites animal welfare and environmental protection throughout the globe - from closing down puppy mills in the American South to stopping deforestation in South America. Their most recent campaign is to stop the fires in the Bolivian Amazon; and because of COVID-19, they’ve also been campaigning to stop the next pandemic by preventing wildlife trafficking in the rainforests - which has been linked to the spread of similar coronaviruses. Amanda is also co-founder of the luxury, sustainable, fashion retailer Maison de Mode. Check out their cruelty-free edit – it’s absolutely stunning.  

“The core of this problem in the world in many ways. is the consciousness that we bring to the world. When we think of others in the world or ourselves as being more or less worthy of being treated with respect, that very thinking is what drives many of the social problems we see in the world.” – Dr. Melanie Joy Melanie Joy is a Harvard educated psychologist, specializing in the psychology of eating animals, social transformation and relationships. She is the award-winning author of six books, including the best-selling, Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs and Wear Cows. She is the founder of the non-profit, Beyond Carnism, dedicated to exposing and transforming carnism, the invisible belief system that conditions people to eat certain animals. Melanie is a recipient of the Ahimsa award for her work on global nonviolence. This award was previously given to the Dalai Lama and Nelson Mandela. She also received both the Peter Singer Prize and the Empty Cages Prize for her work developing strategies to reduce the suffering of animals. Melanie’s TEDx talk called, Toward Rational Authentic Food Choices has received over 800,000 views. No matter what your diet consists of, I hope that this conversation will inspire you to delve a little deeper into the systems and beliefs that quietly run the show when it comes to the psychology behind what (and who) we eat.

“When I moved my mom in, I certainly felt, okay, now I'm off the market. I've got a broken-down house, a crazy mother, a high-pressure job being a vegan activist at PETA… this is not really a good resume for finding Mr. Right.” – Dan Mathews Dan Mathews is the Director of Campaigns at PETA. He’s been there since the 80s when he was hired as a receptionist right after college. Dan’s responsible for PETAs most controversial and outlandish campaigns including the "I'd Rather Go Naked Than Wear Fur" ads.  He’s been arrested more than 20 times, but all for good reason - having changed the world for millions of animals. He is also the author of two books, Committed and most recently, Like Crazy: Life with My Mother and Her Invisible Friends, a darkly funny memoir about the hardships and rewards of taking in a mentally and physically fragile parent. It shows the spectacular amount of expansion and growth that result from to choosing to do the right thing over the easy thing, from choosing the more beautiful life. Dan is brilliant, extremely funny, and a gift to humans and animals everywhere.

"…when I say people had no idea, these were investors, right? These were people who thought they had a crystal ball on the future. And I was like, look, our world has to change for so many reasons. The fact that we're slaughtering animals and doing so in really horrific ways, that is not the future. And so, if that is not the future, what is? It's embracing biotech, it's embracing food science, it's embracing the things that will remove these animals and the environmental impact of this out of the system."  - Ryan Bethencourt 30 percent of the meat consumed in the United States is eaten by our pets. That is a staggering number. Ryan Bethencourt thought so too, which is why is doing something about it. Ryan is the founder and CEO of Wild Earth, a sustainable, meat-free alternative to dog food. It’s the Beyond Meat for dogs. You may have seen Ryan pitch it on Shark Tank – not only did the Sharks taste his dog treats, Mark Cuban invested. Ryan is a scientist, entrepreneur, and a biotech investor. He has led, built and advised more than 80 companies, including: Shiok Meats, Memphis Meats, Geltor, New Wave Foods, Clara Foods, and Finless Foods. He co-founded IndieBio, the world's leading biotech accelerator and was head of Sciences for the XPRIZE Foundation. He's currently a partner at Babel Ventures, a consumer biotech fund. Ryan believes that using biology as technology will solve some of the world's most intractable problems.

We are on the cusp of the fastest, deepest, most consequential transformation of human civilization in history, a transformation every bit as significant as the move from foraging to cities and agriculture 10,000 years ago. James Arbib and Tony Seba, Rethinking Humanity James Arbib is co-founder of RethinkX, a nonprofit think tank that explores how technology will shape the future and disrupt all levels of society, including information energy, materials, transportation, and my favorite, food – food that will not come from slaughtered animals. Jamie and RethinkX cofounder, Tony Seba are the authors of Rethinking Humanity: Five Foundational Sector Disruptions, the Lifecycle of Civilizations, and the Coming Age of Freedom. They predict that new technologies could wipe out poverty and solve climate change in the next 10-15 years, and bring in a new "Age of Freedom.” Which sounds pretty phenomenal, but they also warn that it could pose huge challenges for a a world that still clings to outdated concepts such as democracy, capitalism and the nation state.

…not everyone can afford to donate a certain percentage of their money, not everyone can afford to volunteer their time because they're working so much. If you can, this is your generosity to the world, this is your generosity to all the people that cannot. And I think that's kind of our duty and our privilege. What is the max generosity that you can live with, with your food choices, with your time, with your money choices.  - April Tam Smith April Tam Smith is the co-founder of PS Kitchen, a plant-based restaurant in the Theater District in New York City that gives away all of its profits and hires people in need of a second chance. By day, April is a managing director at a large New York City investment firm. While spending her days on Wall Street and nights at the restaurant, she still somehow finds an amazing amount of time to give to and serve in other communities throughout New York City, as well as around the world. April and I sat down at PS Kitchen to talk about what it means to give, to be radically generous, to live a life of service, and the insane amounts of energy that she has - not only to do all of the above, but to do it with grace, joy, and a boundless love of life. April is an inspiration. After hearing her story I couldn’t help but rethink about what it means to be a human walking around on this planet and how we all can be doing it a little bit better.

There would be some mornings that the indigenous tribal leaders would take us out into virgin rainforest… [I was] like, “no human has ever stood here before.” And it was alive with, I mean, you name the animal… and it was loud full and of life. And they would take us out the very next day and it was just smoldering because it had been slashed and burned illegally in the middle of the night. And it was just completely quiet except for what was left of the fire. And that that changes you. Liza Heavener Liza’s story is one of my favorites. She spent a decade working in federal politics, grassroots and campaign strategy and with the United States Congress. Liza was a healthcare lobbyist for a large membership organization, running their national advocacy program to engage hundreds of thousands of advocates across the country. Then… she won a contest to work a documentary and tv series in Borneo. Liza went there for what she thought would be 100 days… but ended up staying for the next year. While she was there, her world turned upside down. And what came out of it is this force of a woman who has dedicated herself to creating a better planet for everyone who lives on it, not just the humans. Liza is the Chief Operating Officer at NEXUS Global and she chairs the Nexus Working Group on Animal Welfare and Biodiversity Conservation, which is dedicated to educating, empowering and connecting Next-Gen impact investors, philanthropists, and social entrepreneurs. She also serves as an Advisor to the Millennial Action Project and as a Vice Chair of the Alumni Council for Eastern Mennonite University. Liza had a feature role in the internationally-acclaimed documentary and tv series, “Rise of the Eco-Warrior,” and has spoken at conferences across the country.

“Bearing witness is difficult. It does hit your emotions... I think you've got to remember, these images that you take are not yours to keep… it's your duty to put them out there or let organizations get them out there. I think that's how you cope - it’s thinking, okay these aren't going to stay in my head. These are actually going to go out into the world and are going to create change.”  - Gemunu de Silva Today’s episode is a special one. It’s with Gemunu de Silva. Gem is a filmmaker and an activist who has been investigating and documenting animal rights abuses since the eighties, before there was even such a thing as a camcorder, instead he covertly filmed inside of factory farms with a video camera and a VHS recorder attached to his back. He was the first person in the UK to film in and expose the atrocities that happen every day on industrial farms. He directed and produced programs for UK national television, including the documentary, Meathead. Watch it – it’s absolutely spectacular. He left the film and television world to set up and run the Investigations Unit at Compassion in World Farming. Gem also lead the unit’s pioneering work on long distance animal transport. In the early 2000’s, Gem went to work as the Director of Research and Investigations at Cruelty Free International, where he specialized in exposing the vile international trade of primates for research. In 2006, Gem co-founded Tracks Investigations. They have just completed their 250th investigative film project. That is an enormous number of investigations. 35 animal rights and protection organizations have benefited from their work in 57 countries. The work that Gem has done for the past three and a half decades has changed laws, minds and the world for millions of animals. For most of that time, he has laid low and stayed under the radar and has not done any media in decades. It was an absolute honor to have Gem on the show to tell his story.