Yeah. But it's PETA's leadership who has for years been spouting outright stupidities and hatred for any who disagree. Some tasty quotes.
---"It would be great if all of the fast-food outlets, slaughterhouses, these laboratories, and the banks who fund them exploded tomorrow." -- Bruce Friedrich PeTA's Vegan Campaign Coordinator. July 2001
---"Pet ownership is an absolutely abysmal situation brought about by human manipulation." -- Ingrid Newkirk, PeTA
---"Arson, property destruction, burglary and theft are 'acceptable crimes' when used for the animal cause." -Alex Pacheco, Director, PeTA
---"I wish we all would get up and go into the labs and take the animals out or burn them down." -Ingrid Newkirk, President, PeTA, National Animal Rights Convention '97, June 27, 1997
---"Six million Jews died in concentration camps, but six billion broiler chickens will die this year in slaughter houses." -Ingrid Newkirk, President, PeTA, The Washington Post, November 13, 1983.
---"The bottom line is that people don't have the right to manipulate or to breed dogs and cats ... If people want toys, they should buy inanimate objects. If they want companionship, they should seek it with their own kind," -- Ingrid Newkirk, PeTA
"The cat, like the dog, must disappear..... We should cut the domestic cat free from our dominance by neutering, neutering, and more neutering, until our pathetic version of the cat ceases to exist." -John Bryant, Fettered Kingdoms: An Examination of a Changing Ethic, PETA 1982, p.15.
"As John Bryant has written in his book Fettered Kingdoms, they [pets] are like slaves, even if well-kept slaves." -PETA's Statement on Companion Animals
"Andrew Cunanan, because he got Versace to stop doing fur." -PETA's David Mathews reply when to Genre request for "Men We Love"
"In a war you have to take up arms and people will get killed, and I can support that kind of action by petrol bombing and bombs under cars, and probably at a later stage, the shooting of vivisectors on their doorsteps. It's a war, and there's no other way you can stop vivisectors." -Tim Daley, British Animal Liberation Front Leader (Ingrid Newkirk is a HUGE fan of the ALF and has written a book on the history of them)
Rodney Coronado, a member of the Animal Liberation Front, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 57 months in prison for the destruction of an animal diagnostics research lab at the University of California, Davis in April, 1987 (total damage estimates: $4.5 million). PETA sent $ 45,200 to Coronado's 'support committee,' which was a sum 15 times greater than what PETA spent on animal shelters nationwide in all of that year.
You're characterizing the whole organization by a few key sound bites, that's completely idiotic.
I'm not a big fan of PETA myself, but they do do a lot a good things, and the "terrorist" aspect of the whole organization is very small, there are a few people on the fringes, as there is in any large organization.
I'm characterizing the movement based on their actions and words by their leadership. not a "Few small sound bites." PETA has repeatedly demonstrated their fanaticism time and time again. Their leaders are supposed to be the mouthpiece of PETA, well, they've been doing a great job of spreading their twisted message. Encouraging violence and donating money time and time again to people associated with even more extremist groups such as the ELF. Are we ignoring the point that PETA has donated money to the defense funds of people convicted of attempted murder? Are we ignoring the fact that they've donated money to groups exhorting violence and carbombings?
Geez, if the leadership of PETA doesn't accurately reflect the views of the organization, then please tell me who is supposed to?
So tell me this, does George W. Bush accurately reflect your views?
And before you say "well that's different", tell me, have you ever been involved in a fairly large, volunteer run, non-profit organization? It really isn't much different, there isn't the strict chain of command, and many of the volunteers will have slightly opposing viewpoints. Further, there is a board, there are several different administrators, the voice of an individual does not accurately represent the voice of the organization.
You can also get a pretty good picture of what they stand for, and what they do, by looking at their budget. The whole budget mind you, not just the few figures you have of money that might have been used for "terrorist" activities.
Mind you that I'm not denying that some money has gone to these activities, what I'm contending is that the vast majority of the resources of PETA go to legal activities and actions. You have every right to be opposed to PETA on what they stand for, you can even call them all fucktards. What you really should try to avoid doing is judging the many by the actions of the few, that's not helpful to anybody.
I am sure there are plenty of really nice people in PETA that would be horified by the use of violence for the animal rights movement. However there are a good many that aren't... the responsibility of the leadership of these kinds of organizations is to ensure that the members do not go overboard or otherwise "hurt the cause", and if they do they MUST speak out against it. Think of good old Arafat and his speaches for peace in english and his speaches for violence in Ahrabic. ELF are terrorists, PETA is fringe extremists... maybe not all but they allow enough in there ranks to be lumped with them. If you want a good place to send your money or volunteer time try the Humane Society, they are prety much spotless.
I see nothing wrong with more than half of those quotes ... animals are treated absolutely terribly by slaughterhouses, fur farms, and other means of animal-related product production. IBP, the nation's largest beef producer, not only keeps its animals in inhumane and disgusting conditions, but also doesn't always slaughter them humnely (I.E. they aren't dead when they're cut up), and they also treat their workers like crap. The majority of workers in slaughterhouses are migrant workers, and the job conditions are so abysmal that the majority of slaughterhouses have a 100% employee-turnover rate. That's absolutely unheard of, and the highest for any industry in the nation.
Just because we have the means doesn't mean we have the right to inflict pain on anyone or anything. If we were doing this with kittens or puppies or other cute things (those animals ARE scarificed in labs, btw) then people would flip out. We've developed this werid justification mechanism: "Oh, it's just a cow." Cows weren't stupid before we bred them to be that way, for food. And they have just as large of a central nervous system as you or I and have just as much capacity to feel pain.
I, personally, am a vegatarian. I eat cheese and dairy. I don't eat meat because A) red meat is unhealthy; B) I don't like the taste of it, except for some fish; and C) the methods of mass slaughtering are absolutely appauling. I don't have a problem with those who eat meat, I have a problem with the methods of production. Visit a slaughterhouse sometime. It will make you a vegetarian.
Here is my critism of liberalism. You would have me to not condem all of PETA's members because they couldn't participate in terrorim. Yet, you critize the meat industry for treatment of animals, and are you willing to vouch that the meat producers treat animals in a different manner? Could it be possible that animals are treated in a humane manner, and still be slaughtered? Personally, I have yet to meet an animal that would prefer freedom over having grain brought to them everyday.
Sure. You say we cannot judge all PETA by the few really crazy people, and I am saying that you cannot judge the meat industry by a few large suppliers
Oh I'm sorry. How dare I bring up valid criticisms of PETA's leadership? OH MY! Please forgive me! I mean, I should just let them do what they want, even if that encourages fanatics to try to kill fishermen (Josh Harper, CONVICTED), murder medical researchers (Fran Trutt, CONVICTED), and cause intense traumatic stress to young children. (http://web.archive.org/web/20010713205136/http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2000/06/11/sunmag/features/eco.htm) It's all fine since hey, it's for the animals. (Unless you're a human animal cause they don't count apparently.)
PETA deserves to lose their tax exempt status. Their leadership has repeatedly called for acts of violence and openly admired murderers for "making Versace stop using fur."
I do apologize for being somewhat emotional about this. I'm still kind of pissed off over how some peta members here in Seattle treated my friend's grandmother once. Apparently they thought it'd be a great idea to toss red paint on her for wearing a fur coat.
Keep in mind this lady was over 80 at the time and the coat was a wedding present from her late husband dating back to when she was in her 20s. So yeah, I'll admit I'm not too keen on PETA's tactics.
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no subject
Date: 2002-09-17 04:15 pm (UTC)---"It would be great if all of the fast-food outlets, slaughterhouses, these laboratories,
and the banks who fund them exploded tomorrow."
-- Bruce Friedrich PeTA's Vegan Campaign Coordinator. July 2001
---"Pet ownership is an absolutely abysmal situation brought about by human manipulation."
-- Ingrid Newkirk, PeTA
---"Arson, property destruction, burglary and theft are 'acceptable crimes' when used for the animal cause."
-Alex Pacheco, Director, PeTA
---"I wish we all would get up and go into the labs and take the animals out or burn them down."
-Ingrid Newkirk, President, PeTA, National Animal Rights Convention '97, June 27, 1997
---"Six million Jews died in concentration camps, but six billion broiler chickens will die this year in slaughter houses."
-Ingrid Newkirk, President, PeTA, The Washington Post, November 13, 1983.
---"The bottom line is that people don't have the right to manipulate or to breed dogs and cats ... If people want toys, they should buy inanimate objects. If they want companionship, they should seek it with their own kind,"
-- Ingrid Newkirk, PeTA
"The cat, like the dog, must disappear..... We should cut the domestic cat free from our dominance by neutering, neutering, and more neutering, until our pathetic version of the cat ceases to exist."
-John Bryant, Fettered Kingdoms: An Examination of a Changing Ethic, PETA 1982, p.15.
"As John Bryant has written in his book Fettered Kingdoms, they [pets] are like slaves, even if well-kept slaves."
-PETA's Statement on Companion Animals
"Andrew Cunanan, because he got Versace to stop doing fur."
-PETA's David Mathews reply when to Genre request for "Men We Love"
"In a war you have to take up arms and people will get killed, and I can support that kind of action by petrol bombing and bombs under cars, and probably at a later stage, the shooting of vivisectors on their doorsteps. It's a war, and there's no other way you can stop vivisectors."
-Tim Daley, British Animal Liberation Front Leader (Ingrid Newkirk is a HUGE fan of the ALF and has written a book on the history of them)
Rodney Coronado, a member of the Animal Liberation Front, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 57 months in prison for the destruction of an animal diagnostics research lab at the University of California, Davis in April, 1987 (total damage estimates: $4.5 million). PETA sent $ 45,200 to Coronado's 'support committee,' which was a sum 15 times greater
than what PETA spent on animal shelters nationwide in all of that year.
no subject
Date: 2002-09-17 04:38 pm (UTC)I'm not a big fan of PETA myself, but they do do a lot a good things, and the "terrorist" aspect of the whole organization is very small, there are a few people on the fringes, as there is in any large organization.
no subject
Date: 2002-09-17 06:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2002-09-18 12:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2002-09-18 03:52 am (UTC)Geez, if the leadership of PETA doesn't accurately reflect the views of the organization, then please tell me who is supposed to?
no subject
Date: 2002-09-18 04:32 am (UTC)And before you say "well that's different", tell me, have you ever been involved in a fairly large, volunteer run, non-profit organization? It really isn't much different, there isn't the strict chain of command, and many of the volunteers will have slightly opposing viewpoints. Further, there is a board, there are several different administrators, the voice of an individual does not accurately represent the voice of the organization.
You can also get a pretty good picture of what they stand for, and what they do, by looking at their budget. The whole budget mind you, not just the few figures you have of money that might have been used for "terrorist" activities.
Mind you that I'm not denying that some money has gone to these activities, what I'm contending is that the vast majority of the resources of PETA go to legal activities and actions. You have every right to be opposed to PETA on what they stand for, you can even call them all fucktards. What you really should try to avoid doing is judging the many by the actions of the few, that's not helpful to anybody.
no subject
Date: 2002-09-18 04:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2002-09-18 01:01 pm (UTC)That's a stupid question; being a PETA supporter is voluntary. Having a government isn't. And for the record, I didn't vote for him.
no subject
Date: 2002-09-18 04:55 pm (UTC)1) To stop the killing of minks at a fur farm, they burnt it down. Of course, killing the minks inside.
2) To protest, the balling of tails of cattle for shows they cut tails off.
3) In an effort to free lobsters, they bought them and freed them in the Pacific were the lobster died because of the tempature difference.
Re:
Date: 2002-09-17 05:11 pm (UTC)The majority of workers in slaughterhouses are migrant workers, and the job conditions are so abysmal that the majority of slaughterhouses have a 100% employee-turnover rate. That's absolutely unheard of, and the highest for any industry in the nation.
Just because we have the means doesn't mean we have the right to inflict pain on anyone or anything. If we were doing this with kittens or puppies or other cute things (those animals ARE scarificed in labs, btw) then people would flip out. We've developed this werid justification mechanism: "Oh, it's just a cow." Cows weren't stupid before we bred them to be that way, for food. And they have just as large of a central nervous system as you or I and have just as much capacity to feel pain.
I, personally, am a vegatarian. I eat cheese and dairy. I don't eat meat because A) red meat is unhealthy; B) I don't like the taste of it, except for some fish; and C) the methods of mass slaughtering are absolutely appauling. I don't have a problem with those who eat meat, I have a problem with the methods of production. Visit a slaughterhouse sometime. It will make you a vegetarian.
no subject
Date: 2002-09-18 11:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2002-09-18 04:51 pm (UTC)Re:
Date: 2002-09-18 08:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2002-09-18 08:19 pm (UTC)no subject
no subject
Date: 2002-09-17 06:20 pm (UTC)PETA deserves to lose their tax exempt status. Their leadership has repeatedly called for acts of violence and openly admired murderers for "making Versace stop using fur."
Re:
Date: 2002-09-18 12:12 pm (UTC)Perhaps you should attempt to be a bit less emotive, and more realistic.
no subject
Date: 2002-09-20 11:21 pm (UTC)I do apologize for being somewhat emotional about this. I'm still kind of pissed off over how some peta members here in Seattle treated my friend's grandmother once. Apparently they thought it'd be a great idea to toss red paint on her for wearing a fur coat.
Keep in mind this lady was over 80 at the time and the coat was a wedding present from her late husband dating back to when she was in her 20s. So yeah, I'll admit I'm not too keen on PETA's tactics.