Ecorazzi

She may play a blood-sucking, pumps-wearing vampire on HBO’s hit series True Blood, but outside of acting Kristin Bauer is all about preserving life — especially as it relates to whales and their habitat. Celebrity gossip blog Starpulse recently caught up with the actress and spent a surprising amount of time going in-depth into her animal activism — including her thoughts on Sea Shepherd and the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW). Below are some highlights:

On seeing the documentary Shark Water and learning more about “de-finning”:

“It is fantastically sad and ridiculous. I believe that about 90 or more percent of our sharks have their limbs cut off, and it is really hard to fight for such a non-popular creature. We are all primordially afraid of sharks, but they are responsible for the air we breathe; they are part of the underwater eco-system that creates oxygen from the plankton. If sharks are diminishing, then we run out of plankton and that is a problem.” (Razzi note: I think she means to say that Shark populations have declined by 90% — not that only 10% have all of their fins.)

On deciding to take a stand on an issue — even if it’s something overwhelming and hard to change:

“You can do that so easily, and I think it really defines who you are as a person. Say we are on the Titanic. I am not going to be someone who says, ‘Ah, screw it.’ I am going to be someone bailing the boat until the last second. I think it is hard in life because we are so overwhelmed, and we don’t have time to research companies, but you can look at it and ask yourself who you are. It is a big question, and someone who doesn’t want to know where their food came from, that is a deciding moment. Ok, that is fine, but don’t by default support something that if you saw you would not support it, but because you don’t see it, don’t care.”

Check out the full interview here.

Image © IFAW Tails for Whales