Seven years ago, The Independent famously warned that the critically endangered orangutan might have only 10 years left before the species becomes entirely extinct in the wild. If that estimate is correct, the time remaining is now down to three years.

Orangutans are found in...

They say a single picture is worth a thousand words. Gretchen Ryan should know -- her haunting, evocative paintings have been exhibited in galleries around the world.

Now, Ryan's embarked to work in a new medium, recording "My Story," a unique advocacy video for...

On August 1, hundreds of thousands of Americans went to bed with a belly full of chicken, feeling they'd been warriors for free speech.

After calls from the LGBT community to boycott Chick-fil-A for its president Dan Cathy's prolific anti-gay activity, former Governor Mike Huckabee called for a national...

On June 10, my husband and I joined Mercy For Animals at L.A.'s Gay Pride Parade, the first time an animal rights group has marched in the celebration in West Hollywood.

I've marched and leafleted for gay...

As I write this, the people of North Carolina have voted to strip their gay and lesbian citizens of civil rights.

Like California's Proposition 8, North Carolina's Amendment One was a measure hatched and propagated by conservative Christians.

So to those Christians...

On February 1, 2012, California Attorney General Kamala Harris officially recommended that the latest appeal of Sirhan Sirhan, convicted in the 1968 murder of Senator Robert Kennedy, should be denied.

I respectfully disagree.

In 1997, I made a film called Voice of Dissent, arguing why the...

This past year, the big American agribusiness tried a novel new way to prevent the nation from seeing the truth about its factory farms -- four states introduced bills that would've made all undercover filming of animals inside them illegal. All four attempts failed.

Now, Finland has brought...

All vegans and vegetarians have heard it: "But what about the plants? What about their feelings? They feel pain, too. Don't you feel bad for the carrots? You are killing them, you know."

Sorry, but the above represent the dumbest set of excuses I've ever heard as to why some...

Last week's decision by the United States Supreme Court, affirming the rights of the anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church to spew hatred at military funerals, was greeted as a victory for free speech by nearly everyone across the political spectrum.

That celebration turned out to be short-lived and wholly premature.

The following is a true story.

At age 25, Natala Constantine was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. For the next five years, she tried to fight the disease through endless regimens of drugs and a doctor-recommended diet. But Natala's diabetes grew out of control, leading to severe nerve damage and...

The last few years have seen a strong rise in awareness of how the animals we raise for food are treated. Numerous laws have been passed in several states in an attempt to make life less hideous for animals in factory farms.

California's Prop 2, which passed in 2008, not...

It's been an interesting week for gay rights in Europe, and not such a good one for the religious right. On Tuesday of last week, the Finnish Broadcasting Company hosted a live gay rights panel, with people from both sides gathered for a strikingly civil discussion.

What was unexpected was...

As a left coast liberal, it pains me to say this, but someone has to: Al Gore's persistent refusal to engage in a real discussion about the impact of meat production on climate change is starting to severely hurt his credibility as a spokesman for meaningful solutions.

To me,...

With the publication of Jonathan Safran Foer's captivating and powerful book, Eating Animals, much has been said and written about his undercover investigative work, which gives America a view inside the hidden world of factory farms.

What has not been commented on, however, is the disquieting fact that under...

This is not another doom and gloom piece about how eating meat is destroying the planet, I promise.

But Ecorazzi senior editor Michael Parrish DuDell's recent blog about environmentalists partying with beef tartar got me thinking: If people know about the massive global damage caused by meat production,...

You may not have heard of 24-year-old Nathan Runkle. Even if you haven't, you've probably seen the startling undercover images shot inside the California egg industry last year. Those were filmed by Nathan's organization, Mercy for Animals. Nathan started the group in 1999, when he was just 15 years...

Some people seem genuinely puzzled by the uproar over Obama's choice of anti-gay activist and megachurch pastor Rick Warren as inaugural speaker. It's just words, they argue, free speech, what's the big deal? Obama himself said of Warren: "We can disagree without being disagreeable."

The problem, as many commentators have...

On November 4, California voters will face the choice of whether they wish to amend our state's Constitution to take away the existing right of same-sex couples to marry. The passage of Proposition 8 would mark the first time in our state's history that the Constitution has been amended to...