Endangered Species Condoms Win Ad Award; Take Action Against Overpopulation



Our wildly popular Endangered Species Condoms are getting some additional love. This week we found out the colorfully packaged condoms, part of our campaign highlighting the connection between overpopulation and species extinction, won the American Advertising Federation's gold ADDY Award in Tucson in the "public service" category. In case you haven't seen them, the nifty condom packages feature illustrations of six different endangered species, along with catchy slogans like "Cover your tweedle, save the burying beetle" and "Wear a jimmy hat, save the big cat." The Center handed out 350,0000 condoms last year and hopes to send more out soon to draw attention to this crucial issue. Through the empowerment of women, education of all people and universal access to birth control, we can curb our population to an ecologically safe level.

But some members of Congress are making that very hard. In fact, the House has just passed a bill to cut government funding for critical programs like women's health clinics -- which for millions of people provide the only available access to reproductive services, family planning and birth control. With this February marking Global Population Speak Out month, it's time to tell our elected representatives they should be expanding those programs, not cutting them -- for the sake of our planet and the public.

Once upon a time, Arise could get all the condoms we needed by calling the Mass. Dept. of Public Health and asking them to send us some. But last year, when we put in that call, we were told that because of budget cuts, DPH would only send condoms to those programs which had contracts with them. Penny wise, pound foolish, of course, but that's par for the course these days, right?Then we found out that the Center for Biological Diversity was giving away endangered species condoms to qualifying groups! We've received two batches, both of which went quickly-- but they were fun to have around.From the Center: