The Mammalian Daily

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Developing story: Gunnar Rotte claims he was assaulted at bakery outside Park

By

Gunnar RotteDEVELOPING STORY
Journalist Gunnar Espen Rotte, who gained notoriety in December when he published a controversial editorial in the Rodent Commoner, claims that he was assaulted this morning when he was shopping at a bakery outside The Park.

Rotte, whose opinion piece was entitled, “Why I Don’t Bleed for my Striped Brothers,” has been the target of threats since early December. He spent two weeks in hiding and was the recipient of personal security from Park Police until January 1.

Rotte told The Mammalian Daily in a call from his burrow that that he had gone on a “usual” excursion outside The Park to buy some pastries for a small gathering he is hosting tonight.

“As soon as I walked into the place, I could feel the tension,” Rotte said.

The bakery was filled with customers, most of them Humans, and Rotte said he just wanted to place his order and leave.

“But before I knew it, they’d mobilized. One got a broom; another got a spray can. I went behind the counter, picked up two pies, threw my money at the server and ran,” he said. “I didn’t even wait for the change.”

Rotte was visibly shaken when he returned to The Park, his friends say.

“He ran into his burrow and stayed there for about an hour. Then he called us to say he was all right.”

DWBS advises Police to ease curfew, lift ban on travel for Winter celebrations

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DWBS: ease curfew, lift travel ban

The Department of Well-Being and Safety (DWBS) has advised Park Police to ease the curfew for Park Animals and to lift the current ban on travel outside The Park in advance of the Celebration of the Winter Solstice.

After a meeting this morning with the Archons, DWBS Director of Public Relations Cornelius Kakapo announced the recommendation.

“After private consultations with the Archons, the Park Association of Shops and Services (PASS), and members of The Park’s health and welfare communities, the Department of Well-Being and Safety has reached the conclusion that it would be detrimental to the emotional, physical, and financial well-being of Park Animals to restrict their movements and cut short their celebration of the Winter Solstice,” he said.

Kakapo also confirmed that a series of meetings with the Park Association of Shops and Services (PASS) had convinced the department that continuation of the travel ban would have dire economic consequences for Park businesses, especially those that are food-related.

“We realized that we are risking impoverishment in our quest for security. We must be wary of overreaching in that regard,” he said.

Neither the Archons nor Park Police have commented thus far on the DWBS recommendations. The curfew and travel ban were enacted on December 8. The Celebration of the Winter Solstice takes place December 21.

Newspaper editorial should not be ignored, say Park’s aid groups

By

Rodent Commoner

 

An editorial published last week that has ignited a firestorm of protest, has endangered the life of its writer, and has resulted in a curfew and a ban on travel outside The Park “should not be ignored,” say members of The Park’s aid groups.

“[Reporter Gunnar Espen] Rotte makes a valid point, in that you don’t have to have stripes or spots to be treated badly, inside or outside The Park,” says Rosbritt Piggsvin, head of the aid association Rodents at Risk.

“Almost all of us have all suffered from some sort of prejudice in our lives,” she says.

Inez Gallina, president of the immigrant aid group Home to Roost, agrees: “It’s not just prejudice. It’s more than that. I sometimes think it’s a holdover from the way we’re treated outside The Park. I think it spills over into our immigrants’ lives here. Native Park citizens make assumptions about us, based on what they’ve heard outside The Park. It can be devastating to a new immigrant, especially a refugee,” she says.

But Hendrik Dalmatiër of the Spotted Animal Alliance says these Animals are missing the point.

“This is not a contest about which Animal has a harder time. There is no winner here; there are only losers. It is our opinion that if a Park treats its Animals differently on the basis of appearance, we are all losers. And there is plenty of evidence that that happens,” he says.

Police impose curfew, ban on travel amid protests and disappearances

By

FCSW President Gareth Shepherd

Gareth Shepherd: curfew, ban on travel outside The Park

DEVELOPING STORY
After an overnight series of consultations with the Archons and the Department of Well-Being and Safety, Park Police announced today that they have imposed a curfew on Park residents and a ban on travel outside The Park.

Gareth Shepherd, a 17-year veteran of the force and president of the Federation of Canine Security Workers (FCSW), made the announcement this morning at a hastily-arranged press conference.

The announcement read as follows:

Due to recent events, including violent protests, threats on the lives of Park Animals, and a number of mysterious disappearances, the Archons and the Park Police have made the decision to impose order on The Park by establishing a 10:00 p.m. curfew on all residents, as well as a ban on travel outside The Park.

More details of these arrangements will be made public shortly. For now, please be advised that officers will be permanently stationed at all Park exits and will begin making rounds at 9:50 this evening.

Park Police and the Archons are appealing to all residents to respect this decision. It was made with the welfare of all in mind.

Shepherd also confirmed that they have enlisted the assistance of the Does of Peace in this effort.

The new restrictions come into effect tonight, December 8, 2014.

This story will be updated as more information is gathered.

Newspaper’s front page editorial sparks furor among Park residents

By

Rodent Commoner

 

Animals have taken to the streets, the Archons and Park Police are calling for calm, and the author of a front page editorial published in The Rodent Commoner this morning has been granted security protection after receiving hundreds of threats on his life.

The piece, written by Rodent Commoner reporter Gunnar Espen Rotte, has ignited a firestorm of protest and, according to one observer, “opened the floodgates to a torrent of interspecial hate.”

In the editorial entitled, “Why I Don’t Bleed for my Striped Brothers,” Rotte explains his reaction to the results of various studies that confirm that striped Animals in The Park are “not getting their fair share of the economic pie.”

“So why am I not banging the ‘equality’ drum and championing their cause, as so many of my compatriots have done?” the well-respected writer, who has published articles in a number of Park newspapers, asks.

This is part of his answer, written simply and eloquently:

“I come from a species that is universally hated, not just by Humans, but by many other species, who are all too happy to stand by and watch as we are poisoned, kidnapped, incarcerated, used as laboratory subjects, and suffer other similar or worse fates.”

The rest of the editorial expands on this statement and concludes with what some have described as “a condemnation of not only the promises of zoocracy, but its policies.”

“In short,” Rotte writes, “our system has failed not only the striped and spotted, but whole species. I would argue that, as a Park, we have nothing to be proud of at this moment.”

Struts convinced Archons to encourage Human tourism in Park: rumour

By

headsNtales

Former Finance Officer Milton Struts convinced the Archons to promote Human tourism in The Park: rumour

Former Finance Officer and budget architect Milton Struts was the force behind the 2012 Archons’ decision to encourage Human tourism in The Park, the gossip site headsNtales is reporting.

In an article posted this morning, The Park’s “most-watched” gossip site quotes an anonymous source as saying that the creator of the controversial 2015 budget “pulled some strings with the Archons” to get them to consider the financial benefits of Human tourism in The Park.

The source, whose name and species is known to headsNtales but who wishes to remain anonymous to the site’s readers, says Struts had a “longtime” relationship with two male Humans who regularly spent their Summer lunch hours in The Park. The source claims there is video evidence of Struts accepting food from these Humans.

The source also claims that the two Humans “talked up” the financial benefits of encouraging Humans to spend time in The Park and that Struts took the idea to the Archons as early as 2010. Amaury Porpoise, who served two terms as Chief Archon during the calendar harmonization period, had no interest in the plan, according to the source.

The idea was resurrected, though, when his arch rival, George Irving Nathan Gallagher Newt, assumed the Chief Archonship in 2012 and vowed to do the opposite of whatever his predecessor had done. Despite the resistance of many of the other 34 Archons, the source says, Newt not only embarked on the plan to promote Human tourism in The Park, but he took full credit for the idea and moved swiftly on Struts’s advice to use Park funds for the purpose.

The three-prong plan that was subsequently adopted was praised by some who owned Park businesses, but it was met with opposition from many others, including The Park’s environmental groups, who vowed to fight its funding. The 2015 budget did not include tourism.

Heart of well wishes makes a beautiful send-off for Park’s hibernators

By

Wall of Messages

Animals sent best wishes to The Park’s hibernators on this heart-shaped dish

A heart-shaped terracotta dish bearing the good wishes of thousands of Animals and hung on the eastern wall helped make yesterday’s send-off even more meaningful for The Park’s hibernating community.[pullquote][Hibernation] makes solitudinarians of us all.—Hieronymous Hedgehog[/pullquote]

“It was a beautiful gesture and we appreciated the fact that they hung it in the east, where the sun rises and, hopefully, we will too in the Spring,” said Oliver S.P. Franklin, head of the Confederation of Ground Squirrels.

The sun did, in fact, manage to peek through the clouds for a few minutes yesterday, just as Walmond Murmeltier, the newly-elected 2015 Park Official Prognosticator of Spring (POPS), waved to the crowd and began the descent into his burrow.

While some of The Park’s well-known hibernators were gracious when Animals snapped photos and called out to them, others were more sanguine, demonstrating the gravity of the occasion.

“This is usually more of a solemn event and one that makes solitudinarians of us all,” said Hieronymous Hedgehog, as he headed for his own burrow.

Meanwhile, Eduarda Teresinha Coelho, whose election as 2015 Keeper of the Nut was celebrated four days ago, expressed her best wishes, on behalf of all non-hibernators, for a happy and safe hibernation.

“May you all rejoin us in the Spring,” she said, as she extemporaneously reiterated her oath “to keep this nut from harm and to preserve it intact” until the hibernators return.

Okapi quits Archon Transition Team, citing “philosophical differences”

By

Blandine Okapi

Blandine Okapi joined the Archon Transition Team in 2007.

Blandine Okapi has resigned from the Archon Transition Team.

In a statement released this morning, Okapi thanked her Team members for their “generosity” in welcoming her to the Team and said that she had learned an “unfathomable” amount during her tenure.

Nevertheless, she wrote, her political ideas had evolved over the last few years to the point that she felt continuing on the Team constituted a “conflict of interest.”

“I cannot, in all conscience, perform my duties on the Archon Transition Team when, deep in my heart, I no longer feel that sortition is the best method for choosing our Archons,” she wrote.

Since the establishment of zoocracy, sortition or the lottery or allotment method, has been the only method used to select The Park’s 35 Archons.

Calling the last three Park governments “unwieldy and ineffective,” Okapi said she had felt forced to “seriously consider” the other side of things and last month she joined the Coalition Against Sortition in The Park (CASP).

“I think zoocracy has matured to the point where it would be appropriate for us to take matters into our own hands and elect our governing officials and I intend to work, along with other members of CASP, to make that a reality,” her statement concluded.

Archon Transition Team spokesAnimal N.V. Hoatzin has made no comment thus far on Okapi’s resignation.

Simply Structures sues after losing bid to build 2015 prognostication pad

By

jgroundhogday

Simply Structures files suit over loss of contract for 2015 prognostication pad

BREAKING NEWS
Simply Structures has filed suit against the Park Archons and the Department of Holidays, Festivals, and Celebrations after losing its bid to construct the prognostication pad for the 2015 Groundhog Day celebrations.

In a short statement issued to media early this afternoon, the 2014 Archons confirmed that they had received notice of the suit.

“It is with regret that we confirm that Simply Structures, one of The Park’s oldest and most respected construction companies, with whom we have a longstanding relationship, has filed suit against us and against the Department of Holidays, Festivals, and Celebrations, for damages related to loss of income and alleged defamation. We are saddened by the company’s decision, but we intend to meet these allegations head-on in the days and months to come,” the statement reads.

The construction company is believed to have engaged the services of the law firm founded by Ingmar Prärievarg in mid-October, after they were informed by the department that they had lost their bid. The department announced at the same time that they had selected Nesthetics as the builder of the 2015 prognostication pad.

Finance Officer Milton Struts “strangely absent” from State of The Park Account

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Finance Officer Milton Struts was nowhere to be seen during Tuesday’s Account of the State of The Park

Park Finance Officer Milton Struts was not in attendance on Tuesday afternoon as the Park Archons delivered their annual Account of The State of The Park.

After repeated requests for clarification by members of The Park’s media, the PFO finally issued a statement this morning, confirming that the architect of the controversial 2015 budget was absent from Tuesday’s proceedings.

Although the short statement offered no explanation for Struts’s absence, many in The Park believe that he has fallen ill as a result of eating food that was offered to him by Humans.

Struts was last seen in public earlier this month when he attended the Park Interspecial Film Festival (PIFF) awards ceremony. By all accounts, he looked well that evening, though some said they thought he was showing signs of stress.

“Considering the treatment he received [that night], I thought he was holding up fantastically,” says Konrad Eule, who saw Struts beat back spitballs and suffer bites from a group of Animals.

Struts was ushered into the Cinema that night but was not seen exiting and it was believed at the time that he stayed inside until it was safe for him to be escorted home by Park Police.

Though theories abound as to his whereabouts and the reason he stayed away from the State of The Park Account, no definitive statement has been made by him or on his behalf.

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