Welcoming Attention to the Nonhuman Rights Project

I've written before about Steven Wise and the Nonhuman Rights Project, but the work they are doing is so important and exciting that every time I see them in the media I want to shout it to the world.

This week the cover story of the New York Times Magazine examines the NhRP's fight for the legal personhood of a chimpanzee, and I must say it does a very good job of exploring the issues related to this without veering off into the jokester territory so often navigated when it comes to nonhuman primate rights ("but they can't vote!", etc).

Thankfully, the NYT Magazine didn't use animal models for the story's accompanying photographs. This blog post shows how they were able to photograph a chimpanzee sitting in a courtroom, for example, using only human models. If only everyone in the media were so compassionate! Someday...

I was lucky enough to meet Mr. Wise the very week that he first filed legal suits on behalf of a chimpanzee living in captivity in New York. In what must have been a whirlwind week for him (simultaneously the culmination of a lifetime of work and also the start of something big), and I told him that I had no doubt that if anyone could accomplish this monumental task on behalf of chimpanzees, he could.

We both chuckled over the fact that because of him, I would have to add a revision to Monkey Business sooner than I had expected!

When I started writing my book I had no idea that by the time it was published, chimpanzees would have defenders of their rights prepared to fight in court. It's wonderful, and I can't help but feel that I am a small part in something very, very important.

Click here to read Charles Siebert's thoughtful portrayal of Wise's project.