Did someone say that 2012 was looking set to be a kick-ass year for our campaigns to expose cruelty to animals? It’s certainly looking that way!

For the last couple of weeks ARAN has been monitoring the movements of the Courtney Brothers Circus. They are now touring Ireland and will be visiting various towns and cities in the coming weeks, and arrived in Wexford this week parading a family of five elephants through the town’s streets in a pathetic publicity stunt designed to get people to visit the circus. Over the weekend, ARAN campaigners and activists converged outside the Wexford Racecourse to peacefully protest the circus and to bring attention to the fact that animals in circuses, in our opinion, and in scientific opinion, are suffering and that the circus’s days of using animals are well and truly numbered. Click here to see footage of the action.

The protesters gathered holding signs reading ‘Stop Circus Suffering,’ ‘The Slave Trade is Alive and Kicking,’ and ‘Boycott Animal-Act Circuses Now’. During the peaceful, but lively demonstration, supporters distributed dozens of leaflets to members of the public and attendees helping to highlight the dreadful situation for the many animals confined in travelling circuses. Sam McCauley’s Chemist also dropped a Facebook posting of the elephants at the circus been paraded through the streets of Wexford after a deluge of complaints from ARAN members. Media coverage in the run up to the event was favorable with various local newspapers such as Carlow People, Wexford People, Wexford Nationalist, covering the story. After the demonstration the Wexford People and Wexford Echo covered our protest with an almost full page in one paper and a half page article in another paper that prompted enquiries from their readers. ARAN has written to every Wexford Councilor urging them to make the visit of the Courtney Brothers Circus the last visit if they intend on using animal-acts in the future.

ARAN's message to the circus industry here in Ireland is that the tide is turning on the use of animals in circuses. Public opinion is fast swaying in support of animal-act free circuses. We encourage the industry to step right up to a future where no animals will have to be enslaved for public entertainment. ARAN stands ready to assist in the relocation of all animals from the circus into caring, dedicated sanctuaries set up to care for these broken animals.