Animal testing -- what you can do about it

I have written here about why animal testing is an unnecessary horror.

SO WHAT CAN YOU DO ABOUT ANIMAL TESTING ?

Boycott cosmetic companies that test on animals.

List of animal tested as well as cruelty-free companies can be found here:

PETA's Shopping Guide for Caring Consumers
http://www.caringconsumer.com/resources_companies.asp
http://ok.3bird.net/

You can also Google the company name along with the phrase "animal testing", and you ought to get your answers.

It's a good idea to boycott all products of guilty companies. By buying anything from such a company you are indirectly supporting animal testing.

Be smart

Just because a product has a rabbit symbol on it, it doesn't mean it's cruelty free. The use of such symbols is not yet regulated by law.
Also, a company saying "we don't test our cosmetic on animals", might not be testing the prepared cosmetic, but tests the ingredients. Or, it might get someone else to do the testing for them, or it may buy animal-tested ingredients.
When in doubt, trust the PETA's Shopping Guide for Caring Consumers.

Let the companies know why you are boycotting them.

Google for websites of companies that test on animals, and use their contact-us links to tell them that you are boycotting them (and convincing others to do so as well) because of their policy regarding testing their products on animals. Don't be rude, be firm.
To save time, prepare your statement and save it as a text file on your hard disk. Copy-paste it into feedback forms. You may do one per day, or even per week, to keep it from swamping you.
Maybe one of these days I'll post a page of links to feedback pages of major offending companies.

Of course, if you can tell them in person, that's even better

Spread the word.

Inform your friends and family. A good way (maybe the best) of doing this is inviting them to see a youtube video. Search for animal testing... and play it. You can leave the room if (like me) you are too sensitive to watch that. Effect is almost always guaranteed, many people break down and swear on the spot to boycott animal-tested products.
Blog it, post it on a forum thread, mention it in an e-mail. As long as you don't spam, use the power of the internet to get the word through.
If you are a teacher, lecturer, movie-maker, journalist, or have any job where you have a platform to communicate with a large number of people, use it !
You can put up posters !
More ideas on the bottom of this page on PETA's site.