Piper Hoffman

When a neighbor of ours got pregnant, her obstetrician told her to get rid of the cat who had been part of her family for eight years. He said if the cat was around, the baby might have an increased chance of developing an allergy to her. The cat was packed off to a shelter. A few years later, at a …

Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me. Buy some butter or a block of cheese, and you are getting fooled twice. First, the price tags on these products are lies. They would be a whole lot higher if the government hadn’t already paid part of the price before the package even reached a grocery store cooler. …

I am an ethical vegan, but I slaughtered a horde of ants when they invaded my bedroom. I wrote about it in October in “A Vegan Angel … of Death” for my column on Our Hen House. As my article explains, I felt terrible about it but didn’t know what else I could have done. Vegans who responded were supportive, agreeing …

The Paleo diet’s popularity is bad news for animals. Paleo adherents avoid carbohydrates, including whole grains, and load up on protein – the more of it that is animal-based, the better (legumes are not allowed). The staples are “meat, seafood, and other animal products.” Paleos argue that pre-agriculture hominids didn’t suffer from many modern maladies, so if we eat like they …

We can’t save every animal, but we can save some. When we do, we are choosing who lives and who dies. People who rescue cats, dogs, and other companion animals know this problem intimately. Do they save homeless animals who are old or sick or don’t behave the way people want them to, or do they kill them to free up …

It all started with the sound of a plastic bag crinkling. I was home alone at night, watching TV in the living room. The noise didn’t stop. Figuring it was one of my cats, I got up quietly to try to catch the miscreant in the act of breaking into our food. The kitchen was empty. The noise continued. I moved …

One Saturday morning not too long ago, I was rushing about, trying to pack, shower, and eat in under an hour so we could hit the road to my in-laws’ house in the Catskills for the weekend. Ten minutes into this mania I locked gazes with my treasured cat Zelda and wigged out. One of her pupils was smaller than the …

The animals need environmentalism. They need veganism too, of course, but it isn’t enough. Practicing vegans reduce the atrocities humans commit against domesticated animals, including those raised for food or fiber, tormented for entertainment, and caged for research. But veganism on its own doesn’t protect the animals humans haven’t trapped or bred for our own purposes – the ones who live …

People who love some animals, like their pets, but eat other animals, like chickens, have long been a prime target for opponents of meat eating. Campaigns focused on them have appealed to logic by pointing out the inconsistency here, but most people succumb to cognitive dissonance, which allows them to believe two contradictory things simultaneously (animals are lovable and deserve our …

Burger places seem to be popping up everywhere. For a while we were back to the ‘80s with frozen yogurt chains appearing on every other block, but lately it’s burgers. In my Brooklyn neighborhood I counted five new burger joints in the last year. Five. Has no one gotten the memo about how red meat is bad for you? But these …

It has taken me until 5 p.m. to write a word of this column. It was due yesterday. I feel like I’m burning out. It’s not the common kind of working-too-hard-and-needing-a-break burning out. This is different, unique to activists and advocates and caregivers and whoever else cares that something really terrible is happening to someone. This is compassion fatigue. I can’t …

Are vegans just childish dreamers? I wonder sometimes. I work so hard to stamp out animal suffering, but who am I kidding? Animals in the wild are still suffering and always will. I strive to protect animals from being eaten, but come on – just turn on the National Geographic Channel. Animals are food for each other. I just watched a …

A polar bear in a small tank of water swims back and forth, back and forth, for hours. She doesn’t splash or play – basically, she paces. This is a children’s zoo, but it isn’t fun or instructive. It’s just depressing. Kids love animals. We take them to see animals at the zoo and the circus, and to touch animals at …

A vegan diet results in more animal deaths than an omnivorous one. That is the ludicrous conclusion of a 2003 paper by Steven Davis published in the Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics. A professor of animal science at Oregon State University, Davis based his argument on the theory that modern crop harvesting kills more animals than eating cows who grazed …

The dietary focus of the media and many activists make it easy to forget that being vegan means more than not eating animals or animal products. For instance, coverage of Natalie Portman’s wedding by CNN and People Magazine focused on the food being vegan, but didn’t mention whether her dress was made of silk. Veganism “is a way of living which …

Part of parenting is teaching children how to live in the world. As a human adult who pays attention to at least a bit of life as it passes, I don’t need kids of my own to see what a tall order that is. A parent’s task only grows harder if she decides to stray from the regulation playbook and teach …

Living in our society as a vegan and animal rights advocate presents countless challenges. One of the biggest is that to combat the horrifying and seemingly endless animal exploitation around us, we have to know about it. That means educating ourselves about things we would rather never see, hear, or learn. Another is potentially navigating difficult social situations that involve food …