Those Wacky Folks at P.E.T.A. are at it again

[morosco]

Posted: 8/13/05 at 11:42pm

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is reconsidering a campaign comparing images of animal abuse with those of slavery after complaints from civil rights groups and others.


PETA reconsiders campaign after complaints of racism Updated On: 8/14/05 at 11:42 PM

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 12:22am

A very very distasteful display of images is terrorism, how?

[morosco]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 12:30am

No...you misread. I wasn't saying that this particular stunt was an act of terrorism but I did note that the organization is famous for using terrorist tactics for their causes.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 12:40am

Asassinating physicians who provide abortion-level terrorism or flying jets into skyscrapers-level terrorism?

Posted: 8/14/05 at 12:46am

He didn't misread, you misrepresented.

I thought the same after reading the article you linked to your post. PETA's actions in this case are disgusting, offensive and racist. But there were no acts of terrorism committed.

I'm not attacking you, but words have power. And you shouldn't misuse that power.

[Yawper]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 12:48am

my wish for the more radical P.E.T.A. members is that some day they'll all get a chance to go out and hug the grizzlies.

[morosco]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 1:03am

Yeah. I guess you guys are right. I just researched and noticed that after 9/11 PETA's website equated the terrorist attacks with eating meat. So that kinda screws around with me calling them terrorists. So until further notice, I'm going to change my subject line to read "Those Wacky Folks at P.E.T.A. are at it again". Let me know if everyone is comfortable with that.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 1:05am

I'm curious about the source of your research.

[Pinguin]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 1:12am

A couple years ago they did a exhibition putting photos of animal slaughtering next to photographs from the Holocaust and got a LOT of people upset (for obvious reasons).

I wouldn't call these sort of tactics terrorism, but I would certainly call them offensive and insensitive.

[morosco]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 1:14am

The American Farm Bureau Federation.
Farm Bureau

[Kringas]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 3:16am

Of course, it's not like The American Farm Bureau Federation has their own agenda, either.

Posted: 8/14/05 at 3:25am

the point theyre making is that an animals life is as important as a human life and theyre equating 'animal' as a sort of 'race' but most people dont hold animals in that high of a regard to compare it to the life of another human (well, atleast Americans rarely would) so many would find the comparison ridiculous and thus also offensive. im definitely not a fan of this but i understood the message they were attempting to send.

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 10:17am

I like animals as well as the next person but I am sorry but I do not think of a raccoon & person as being equal. Peta should go after the blood thirsty animals who kill each other in the wild. After all , Mr Lion, don't kill that gazelle . Just starve. Imagine if no animals were ever killed by other animals or man. Bit crowded wouldn't you say

If you want to think of animals as equal & do not eat them, fine. Do not force Peta views on others

Updated On: 8/14/05 at 10:17 AM

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 12:24pm

Once again, a metaphor that shows a lack of taste, especially right after 9/11, if the "reportage" of the American Farm Bureau is accurate.

But what's inaccurate is what appears to be the writer's COMPLETE inability to understand a message he just quoted. Look at the disconnect between paragraphs two and three. Never underestimate the human ability to miss a point, even if it is delivered in a manner lacking decorum.

On the front page of its web site, PETA equated the terrorist attacks with eating meat. "As we struggle to understand the violence that has been thrust upon us, we have an opportunity to seize control of some equally real violence and stop it." And then PETA asks, "Have our hearts and minds been closed to the unspeakable violence toward other innocents that takes place in our slaughterhouses, and do we not look violence in the eye three times a day – at breakfast, lunch and dinner?"

There are words to describe this diatribe that we won't print here. Suffice it to say if any of us thought giving up eating hamburgers would stop world terrorism, we would do it in a minute. Terrorism may have a number of root causes, but eating meat is not one of them.

[morosco]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 12:51pm

"As we struggle to understand the violence that has been thrust upon us, we have an opportunity to seize control of some equally real violence and stop it."

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 1:25pm

Let me spell it out for YOU, morosco.

"Suffice it to say if any of us thought giving up eating hamburgers would stop world terrorism, we would do it in a minute."

The Farm Bureau reporter seems to think that PETA's point is that if people didn't eat burgers there would have been no Sept. 11. But that is obviously not what they were saying and a deliberate misread. Unless the reported didn't have none of that fancy book learnin' like the uppity stuck ups in PETA.

[Kringas]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 1:40pm

Here's the entire "diatribe" that the AFBF misrepresented:

As we reel from the shock of the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, as we struggle to understand the violence that has been thrust upon us, we have an opportunity to seize control of some equally real violence and stop it. We are not powerless. We are thinking, feeling beings with choices that rule life and death for others. We have the power to cause unbearable pain and fear, and we must not exercise it. Now is a time to examine how we can reduce suffering in the world and be life-affirming: Have our hearts and minds been closed to the unspeakable violence toward other innocents that takes place in our slaughterhouses, and do we look violence in the eye three times a day—at breakfast, lunch, and dinner? Do not turn away. Please. Unlike the violence over which we have no control, there is something we can do about this. We can actually stop it. We can reach out to the victims of this slaughter through easy choices for our families and ourselves.


Whether or not one chooses to admit it, cooking and eating bits of an animal killed only for consumption is a form of violence. Meat is not just what you serve up on a platter at dinnertime. It is the flesh of living, thinking, suffering animals who feel pain every bit as much as we do, are horrified at the sights and smells of the slaughterhouse, and are afraid to die. On this very page you can see how PETA's own investigation of a typical U.S. pig farm showed that employees regularly beat young pigs with heavy metal rods, kicked them, and dashed their heads against the pavement to kill them.

Look beyond the neat packages wrapped in plastic in the tidy grocery store and you will find a bloody, ugly nightmare that millions of animals endure every day. It's every bit as terrifying to them as the news reports of the terrorists' work are to us. As a recent joint investigation by NBC's Dateline and The Washington Post revealed, many animals are conscious as they move down the slaughterhouse butchering lines. In violation of federal law, fully conscious pigs are screaming as they are dropped into tanks of boiling water and cows are looking workers in the eye as their hooves are cut off.

Dropping the flesh of animals from our diet probably wouldn't end the threat of terrorism, but it would lessen the amount of violence in our lives. Please do something to make the world a less violent place. Right now. We are here to help you make the switch.

http://www.peta.org/feat/wtc/


While the link to terrorism is of course specious (though there's plenty of precedent in our daily lives with that already), I believe they do make some logical points. And, as Namo pointed out, no where is a claim made that eating meat contributes to global terrorism.

[morosco]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 1:40pm

"As we struggle to understand the violence that has been thrust upon us, we have an opportunity to seize control of some equally real violence and stop it."

What bothers me is how PETA equates 9/11 with eating meat. That's was my only point. I'm not saying that if people didn't eat burgers there would have been no Sept. 11.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 2:29pm

No, but the Farm Bureau report you cited from your "research" DID say that PETA was saying that. Which was my point.

So far nobody here is saying that using the 9.11 theme was a good strategy. What I've been looking for is clarification of your original headline on this thread and for an understanding that the Farm Bureau reporter appears to have deliberately misread the PETA campaign.

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 8/14/05 at 4:10pm

As I sit lounging on my chinchilla recliner, reading this on my lap top which is being supported by an elephant foot table as light gleams down from my antler chandelier, I have to take a quick nibble from my tray of assorted meats and think to myself, “What should I do about this? Should I take the chicken that I have marinating for this evening’s bar-b-que, and just bury it in the back yard so that it will make for good compost? Or, maybe I should blame my mother for feeding me Hamburger Helper when I was a child.

How is any of this related to 9/11?