In retirement, the veteran corporal has shifted his focus to defending animal rights, which now regularly puts him on the other side of protest lines and, on occasion, behind a Guy Fawkes mask.
NICK EAGLAND: ‘As a British Columbia (B.C.) RCMP officer, Dan Moskaluk swore to protect the public, investigate crimes and enforce the law. In retirement, the veteran corporal has shifted his focus to defending animal rights, which now regularly puts him on the other side of protest lines and, on occasion, behind a Guy Fawkes mask. For the past decade, Moskaluk, 56, was a public spokesman with the B.C. RCMP’s Southeast District. He retired on Jan. 30, 2019, after more than 33 years with the force.
He recently joined animal-rights activists at a protest at a pig farm in Abbotsford, where he donned a “Meat the Victims” T-shirt and used his skills and background to liaise with media and police, and help ensure the safety of protesters outside the farm. Protesters gathered at Excelsior Hog Farm after People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals released a video last week that it said was shot there. The clip appears to show dead piglets left among living animals, as well as fully-grown pigs with growths and cuts.
“I’ve been on both sides of the protest lines, and given what I saw yesterday I think we couldn’t have asked for much better scenario for accomplishing for what we wanted to do, and that was essentially pull the veil away from this industry that is represented by this one farm to show the public the conditions that these animals are being raised in before they’re slaughtered,” Moskaluk said.
Moskaluk’s activism didn’t come overnight. His wife, Sheanne, 55, switched to a whole-food, plant-based diet in 2011, after researching a bodybuilding supplement for their son and learning about some health risks of consuming meat and dairy. In 2013, at the age of 51, Moskaluk was diagnosed with Stage 4 kidney cancer and told he could die within months. On that day he, too, completed his switch to a plant-based diet. She credits the change with helping her lose more than 130 pounds. He says he believes it was a key factor in his recovery and has been cancer-free since 2015…
Moskaluk said there are “three doors” through which one typically enters the vegan lifestyle: health, animal rights or environmental concerns. He and his wife gravitated toward the movement as “concerned citizens” but in short time began to study the food industry’s impact on animal exploitation and climate change, he said. While recuperating from cancer, a housebound Moskaluk spent his days on his iPad reading about veganism and meeting like-minded people online. Eventually, the couple connected with a network of B.C. animal-rights activists.
On June 10, 2017, they walked in the Vancouver March to Close All Slaughterhouses, their first time doing activism in person. Moskaluk, still a member of the RCMP, felt compelled to speak at the event, and asked an organizer for two minutes to share their story with hundreds of people outside the Vancouver Art Gallery. “As a police officer, I’d only done that side of the protest line, there for public safety and public order,” he said. “Fast forward to 2017 and I’m there with this group of activists on the steps, and we all know what that symbolizes. It was quite an emotional speech that I gave, and it felt really good”.’ SOURCE…
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