Andrew Fenton is an associate professor in the Department of Philosophy at Dalhousie University. Fenton received his B.A. (Hons.) in Philosophy and Comparative Religion from Acadia University, his M.A. in Philosophy from Dalhousie University, and his Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Calgary. Fenton primarily teaches in applied ethics, including animal ethics, but has also taught courses that have included some philosophy of animal cognition and behaviour. He has authored or co-authored papers related to animal philosophy or animal research ethics in such journals as Biology and Philosophy, Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics, Developing World Bioethics, Journal of Animal Ethics, and The Monist and has chapters on these topics in The Routledge Handbook of Neuroethics (co-edited by L. Syd M Johnson and Karen Rommelfanger, Routledge, 2018), The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Animal Minds (co-edited by Kristin Andrews and Jacob Beck, Routledge, 2018) and the Philosophy of Behavioral Biology (co-edited by Kathryn Plaisance and Thomas Reydon, Springer, 2012). Fenton has also been a part of a small but mighty group of philosophers submitting amici curiae in support of two cases spearheaded by the Nonhuman Rights Project. These recent efforts resulted in a co-authored book, Chimpanzee Rights: The Philosophers’ Brief (Routledge, 2019), whose royalties go to the Nonhuman Rights Project.

Since 2014, Morten runs his own tours together with Nozomi Takeyabu through their company NozoMojo LLC – Tours & Arts for Nature Conservation. In 2015, Morten published “Polar Bears on the Edge – Heading for Extinction While Management Fails” – the first book ever to seriously address the issues of current overhunting and lack of proper protection of polar bears.

Joshua Katcher is a fashion entrepreneur, author, educator and vegan cheesemonger who has taught at Parsons The New School and LIM college, and has lectured internationally and lobbied in the United States for sustainable and ethical fashion. He is on the Advisory Board for The New Fashion Initiative and in 2019 he published Fashion Animals, the first book dedicated to understanding how and why animals are exploited in the fashion industry.

Katcher was named one of the Top 20 Most Influential Vegans of 2019 by Veg News Magazine. He launched the first vegan, ethically-made menswear fashion brand, Brave GentleMan in 2010 after launching the first men’s vegan lifestyle website The Discerning Brute in 2008. VOGUE says that, “The full scope of Katcher’s ethical commitment is rather head-spinning, just as it is to gape about his Williamsburg shop, with its complete future-is-now men’s range”. PAPER MAG said BGM has “just about everything a mindful fashionisto could want”, while Sportswear International said that BGM is, “vegan smart and cool menswear”. Brave GentleMan has graced the cover of British GQ’s November 2016 Issue on Benedict Cumberbatch. Forbes has featured BGM in their gift guides, while COMPLEX called BGM one of the “coolest things” they’ve seen. Katcher was awarded “Menswear Brand of the Year, 2016” and “Most Influential Designer of 2015” by PETA. He is a contributor to CFDA News, has appeared on the cover of Vegan Good Life Magazine, and has been interviewed on major networks, such as PBS News Hour and Al Jazeera America as a fashion expert.

Winnie is a well known wildlife biologist who has been working to protect Kenya’s wildlife for the last 20 years. Winnie Kiiru previously served as the regional representative of the UK based charity, Born Free Foundation and as a Trustee of Kenya Wildlife Service.

www.elephanttrust.org

www.elephantprotectioninitiative.org

stopivory.org

www.friendsofkarura.org

Camille’s work includes intervening in court cases to protect and enhance animals’ legal interests; false advertising complaints against companies making misleading humane claims; documenting Canada’s commercial seal slaughter; and exposing hidden suffering behind the closed doors farms and zoos through undercover investigations. Camille also has a strong interest in defending and protecting the rights of animal advocates.

Camille is a frequent lecturer on animal law, and a regular contributor to national publications like the Globe and Mail, iPolitics, and Lawyers’ Daily, and her work has been featured in countless media stories.

 Rob Laidlaw is a Chartered Biologist, founder of international wildlife protection charity Zoocheck and a recipient of the prestigious Frederic A. McGrand Lifetime Achievement Award for substantial contributions to animal welfare in Canada. He is the award winning author of 10 children’s books about wildlife and animal welfare issues, as well as numerous articles, book chapters and blogs. Laidlaw’s 40 years of animal protection work has involved numerous investigative, legislative and public awareness campaigns, animal rescues and litigations. His efforts have contributed to the closure of dozens of zoos, changes to existing laws and regulations, new laws and policies being put into place, and other successful outcomes. In past years, Laidlaw served as Projects Manager/Technical Advisor to the World Society for the Protection of Animals and as a humane society inspector. His current areas of interest are the exotic pet trade and making Canada’s animal protection movement more effective. In his spare time, he enjoys solo long distance bicycle rides, cave exploration and traveling.

 Randy Malamud is Regents’ Professor of English at Georgia State University. He is the author of 10 books, including The Language of Modernism, Reading Zoos: Representations of Animals and Captivity, Poetic Animals and Animal Souls, and The Importance of Elsewhere: The Globalist Humanist Tourist. His essays appear in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Times Higher Education, Film Quarterly, Senses of Cinema, The Point, truthout, In These Times, Salon, and Common Knowledge. He is a life fellow of the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics.

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 Lori Marino is a neuroscientist and expert in animal behavior and intelligence, formerly on the faculty of Emory University.

Lori received her Ph.D. in biopsychology in 1995, and is internationally known for her work on the evolution of the brain and intelligence in dolphins and whales (as well as primates and farmed animals). She has published over 130 peer-reviewed scientific papers, book chapters, and magazine articles on marine mammal biology and cognition, comparative brain anatomy, self-awareness in nonhuman animals, human-nonhuman animal relationships, and the evolution of intelligence.

She is also an expert on marine mammal captivity issues such as dolphin assisted therapy and the educational claims of the zoo and aquarium industry.

In 2001, she co-authored a ground-breaking study offering the first conclusive evidence for mirror self-recognition in bottlenose dolphins, after which she decided against further research with captive animals.

Lori is also the Founder and Executive Director of The Kimmela Center for Animal Advocacy, which focuses on bridging the gap between academic research and scholarship and on-the-ground animal advocacy efforts.

She has appeared in several films and television programs, including the 2013 documentary Blackfish about killer whale captivity, and Unlocking the Cage, the 2016 documentary on the Nonhuman Rights Project.

Melissa Matlow has a BSc in Ecology, a Masters in Environmental Studies and more than 15 years’ experience leading animal welfare and environmental campaigns. Since 2005 she has worked with World Animal Protection to protect the welfare of wild and domesticated animals in Canada and around the world. As the Campaign Director at World Animal Protection she oversees the organization’s Canadian campaigns. As part of their “Wildlife, Not Entertainers” campaign, she works with travel companies to implement animal welfare policies and remove cruel wildlife entertainment from their supply chain.

Erica Meier is the president of Compassion Over Killing (COK), a non-profit animal protection organization based in Washington, DC.

Since 1995, COK has worked to expose farmed animal abuse and promote veg-friendly eating by employing a variety of strategies, including hard-hitting undercover investigations, groundbreaking pro-active litigation, successful corporate campaigns, and empowering public outreach programs.

In addition to ending the egg industry’s misleading “Animal Care Certified” claim, under Erica’s leadership, COK has persuaded food giants including Subway, Dunkin Donuts, BOCA Foods and Morningstar Farms to add vegan options to their menus. Erica has also appeared in several major news stories on CNN, ABC’s Nightline News, the Washington Post, LA Times, and more.

These accomplishments along with many more earned her the coveted National Animal Rights Hall of Fame award in 2013.

Before working at COK, Erica served as an animal control officer in Washington DC, rescuing sick, injured, and homeless animals as well as enforcing animal protection laws.

Elisabeth’s academic background in neuroscience and animal behaviour/welfare/ethics has driven her passion to critically evaluate the use of animals in science, and to promote the replacement of animals as best scientific practice. In 2015, she co-founded, and is currently Executive Director of the Animals in Science Policy Institute – a Canadian registered charity that aims to build a more ethical culture of science by promoting alternatives that reduce or replace animals in research, testing and science education. Elisabeth serves as an advisor to the Canadian Centre for Alternatives to Animal Methods, the Canadian Council on Animal Care, the Humane Education Coalition, and the Vancouver Foundation. In addition to these roles, she is an instructor at the University of British Columbia – she teaches Non-Animal Methods in Biomedical Sciences (ISCI 330), Ethical Issues in Science (ISCI 433), Animals and Global Issues (APBI 414), Animals and Society (APBI 314), and Scholarly Writing and Argumentation (LFS 150).

Naomi Rose is the marine mammal scientist for the Animal Welfare Institute in Washington, DC. She campaigns against cetacean live capture, trade, and captivity and has been a member of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) Scientific Committee since 2000, where she participates in the subcommittees on environmental concerns and whale watching. She has authored or co-authored over 45 scientific papers and articles for animal protection publications, as well as chapters in several books. She has participated in various conferences, workshops, meetings, and task forces at the international, national and state level. She has testified before the U.S. Congress four times, at the Canadian Parliament, and at several state legislative and regulatory hearings. Her work was featured in the 2012 non-fiction book Death at SeaWorld: Shamu and the Dark Side of Killer Whales in Captivity, by David Kirby, and she gave a TedX Talk in Bend, Oregon in April 2015 on captive orca welfare. She received a Ph.D. in biology from the University of California at Santa Cruz in 1992, where her dissertation examined the social dynamics of free-ranging orcas. She has worked in the marine mammal advocacy field for over 25 years.

Anne E. Russon is a Professor of Psychology at Glendon College, York University, Toronto. Her research has focused on observational field studies of orangutan behavior in Indonesian Borneo, especially their intelligence as they use it to solve problems they normally face in their native habitat. My studies have focused on ex-captive rehabilitants reintroduced to free forest life (1989-2009) and on wild orangutans (2009-present). Major themes have included imitation and related abilities (e.g., deception, pretense, pantomime), social learning, cultures, tool use, innovation, spatial cognition, and cognitive development. Other research topics have included great ape conservation, primate tourism, and evolutionary perspectives on great ape intelligence. She has served on editorial boards of several scientific journal (e.g., Behaviour, Journal of Comparative Psychology), and as a board member or scientific advisor to orangutan support organizations (e.g., Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation–Indonesia, Orangutan Conservancy-USA, Borneo Orangutan Society-Canada) and to several orangutan documentaries.

Jeffrey Ventre is a medical doctor in Washington State practicing in the specialty of physical medicine and rehabilitation.

Prior to becoming a physician, he worked as a marine mammal trainer at SeaWorld from 1987 to 1995, spending seven years with cetaceans and one year with pinnipeds.

In June of 1996 he joined orca scientists Ken Balcomb and Astrid van Ginneken for Orca Survey, an ongoing photo identification study of the Southern Resident population of killer whales in the Pacific Northwest. Seeing killer whales in the wild radically altered his perspective on keeping these animals in captivity and led him to be a co-founder of the advocacy group Voice of the Orcas (VOTO).

He has co-authored several science-based works and articles, which can be found at the VOTO website. He is featured in the documentary Blackfish and the book Death at SeaWorld. He also helps organize the annual whale watching event and symposium called “Superpod” in the San Juan Islands.

Liz White is a long time resident of Toronto, Ontario. Liz began her career as a registered nurse and has spent all her working life advocating for a fair and just world. She has spent over 30 years as a community activist, and has worked on issues including advocating for the disadvantaged, animal
protection and aboriginal land settlements.

In 1987, Liz began working with the Toronto Humane Society, an experience that redefined her activism. She is a founding member of Animal Alliance of Canada and has remained with the organization for over 25 years.

In 1990, Liz and a number of other Toronto Humane Society staff formed Animal Alliance of Canada. For close to 30 years now, Animal Alliance has fought to protect animals and the environment.

In 2005, Liz became the leader of the Animal Protection Party of Canada (formerly the Animal Alliance Environment Voters Party of Canada).

Liz is proud to be part of a movement that seeks protection for all living species and the environment we all share.

Liz can be reached at 416-462-9541 ext: 23 or liz@animalprotectionparty.ca.

Liz White
Director, Animal Alliance of Canada
Leader, Animal Protection Party of Canada
416-462-9541 ext: 23

www.animalalliance.ca
www.animalprotectionparty.ca

Since 1999 Julie has worked for Zoocheck. In her role as campaigns director she is responsible for campaigns to protect wild animals. She has been instrumental in various successful campaigns for Zoocheck including improving animal protection laws; convincing Toronto City Council to transfer three elephants to PAWS and leads the legal battle to get Lucy out of her solitary confinement in Edmonton. She has also lead successful campaigns to end the supply of wild grizzly and black bear cubs in British Columbia and Manitoba by convincing officials to allow orphaned cubs to be returned to the wild. Julie is currently working to get similar protections for polar bear cubs and working to ensure there is no more culling of wild horses in Alberta and elsewhere in Canada.