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From the president’s desk ... November 1998

The summit

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By: Staff  Date: 11/7/1998 Category: | From the Offices of NAIA |

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I am just back from NAIA’s Full Circle Summit where I finally met some of the newer board members face to face and also saw some old friends. It was a wonderful experience, primarily the result of Patti’s vision, planning and arranging. I can’t think of anyone else who could have pulled it off.

We spent two full days working to learn about each other’s involvement with the animal world and planning how we could work as a team to counter the well-financed forces chipping away at the human-animal bond. As the last on the program, speaking on the subject of the “muddled middle,” the title of my last president’s message, I began by asking the group of about 70: who had learned something new? Every hand went up! None of us knows everything about the ways people interact with the animal world and probably most of us came with one misconception or another, whether it concerned biomedical research, fur farming, trapping, dog breeding or any number of other activities.

One thing unified the group though: the recognition that legitimate human activities must be protected by the rule of law. That is why we agreed unanimously to sponsor the petition against anti-terrorism that we intend to send to the Senate Judiciary Committee. It is, of course, possible that some might not agree with one or another lawful use of animals, although this often can stem from misconceptions pushed by the animal rights movement. Nevertheless, if one does not support the petition because of such disagreement, he is, in effect, saying that terrorism and vigilantism are quite all right in this society – under the ‘proper’ circumstances. I have learned of a few such individuals. To me, they fall into the muddled middle.

Adrian R. Morrison, DVM PhD
President, NAIA

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