Thursday 25th February 2010 - SPEAK Demo
On Thursday 25th February, activists from BARC travelled to Oxford for the weekly SPEAK demonstration against the university's new multi-million pound animal lab. Read more...

In 2006, a macaque monkey named Felix (the Latin word for "happy" or "lucky") was tortured for a period of around a year and then killed. Nine other macaques are to be used in the same experiment.

Felix had the top of his skull sliced off, a procedure that has been documented through human and non human primate research as extremely painful. Electrodes were forced into his brain and then he was fitted with a cranial chamber (a box like contraption that sits on top of the skull). His pain must have been unbearable but he had no one to comfort him. Just a barren cage surrounded him, there were no comforts. There was no kin to cuddle up to, to ease his pain. He was alone until the day his torturers had finished with him; the day they put him to death. During the first week of September 2007 SPEAK learned that Felix had finally been put to death by Oxford University. Felix was born in a cage, lived and suffered in a cage, and ultimately died in a cage, never having experienced the freedoms which were his birthright.

Despite the cold and rain, we chanted and held banners and placards to educate the residents of Oxford and the students at the university to the horrors on their doorstep.

We will be travelling up to Oxford regularly on Thursdays for future protests, please get in touch if you would like to come along. If you need further convincing, see www.speakcampaigns.org