..................Discussion Time...................PETA.......................

..................Let me get it out there FIRST by saying I am all against animal cruelty and animal exploitation.

I do not believe we should be clubbing baby seals for fur.
I do not believe we should be killing millions of sharks a year just for their fins.
I do not believe we should tolerate battery cages.
I do not believe that elephants should be chained and tortured by Thai elephant workers.
I do not believe we should be animal testing human products.




Now ....... the reality.

I'm a carnivore.
I'm a predator.
I eat meat.
And we should be thankful that humans began eating meat all those eons ago.

It is the direct link of meat feeding the evolution of our brains that fed OUR evolution. I live in a world of houses, electricity, medical care, computers, technology and entertainment all because prehistoric man began eating meat. Meat made his brain grow. And this bigger brain started using tools, building homes, researching medicine, and ultimately led us to where we are now.



Now I am an amateur naturalist and a HUGE fan of nature and wildlife. Sir Attenborough, Jeff Corwin, Diane Fossey, Dr Jane Goodall, The Cousteau Family etc. These are the animal activists that I admire and appreciate. They use the modern, popular media of TV and film to promote the protection and respect of the global flora and fauna.




PETA on the other hand, are a bunch of extremists who have absolutely no grip on reality.

Sure I love their ad campaigns. Who wouldn't like yet another naked hottie on a poster? But that's it. That's all they got. That, and actively promoting arson, vandalism and criminal acts.



Now - I have to tell you. This doesn't seem all that well thought out to me. PETA staff say that sometimes violence is necessary to achieve the saving of animals. Personally - I don't know how torching a farmers buildings is going to endear him to your way of thinking. If it was me it would make me mad as hell and DOUBLY intent on doing whatever the fuck it took to piss these people off.

PETA advocates the following:

• Total veganism. PETA does not believe we should eat meat- at all.
• The total liberation of all animals and their return to their traditional ways of life.
• The total ban on animal / human interaction.
  
• The total ban on any animal products - at all. No leather - no wool - nothing.
• Total ban on zoos and circuses. This includes the captive breeding programs in place to save those animals most at risk of extinction.
  
• An open call to militantly enforce these ideas.

You think I'm pulling this out of my ass? Check these quotes out from the President of PETA.

Ingrid Newkirk
President PETA



Eating meat is primitive, barbaric, and arrogant.
- Washington City Paper (December 20, 1985)

I openly hope that it [hoof-and-mouth disease] comes here. It will bring economic harm only for those who profit from giving people heart attacks and giving animals a concentration camp-like existence. It would be good for animals, good for human health and good for the environment.
- ABC News interview (April 2, 2001)

We’re looking for good lawsuits that will establish the interests of animals as a legitimate area of concern in law.
- Insight on the News (July 17, 2000)

I wish we all would get up and go into the labs and take the animals out or burn them down.
- "National Animal Rights Convention" (June 27, 1997)

There’s no rational basis for saying that a human being has special rights. A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. They’re all animals.
- Washingtonian magazine (August 1, 1986)

I am not a morose person, but I would rather not be here. I don’t have any reverence for life, only for the entities themselves. I would rather see a blank space where I am. This will sound like fruitcake stuff again but at least I wouldn’t be harming anything.
- The Washington Post (November 13, 1983)

Six million people died in concentration camps, but six billion broiler chickens will die this year in slaughterhouses. [emphasis added]
- The Washington Post (November 13, 1983)




Even if animal tests produced a cure for AIDS, we’d be against it.
- Vogue (September 1, 1989)

Pet ownership is an absolutely abysmal situation brought about by human manipulation.
- Harper's (August 1, 1988)

One day, we would like an end to pet shops and the breeding of animals. [Dogs] would pursue their natural lives in the wild ... they would have full lives, not wasting at home for someone to come home in the evening and pet them and then sit there and watch TV.
- The Chicago Daily Herald (March 1, 1990)

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.
- Animals (May 1, 1993)

I don’t use the word 'pet.' I think it’s speciesist language. I prefer 'companion animal.' For one thing, we would no longer allow breeding. People could not create different breeds. There would be no pet shops. If people had companion animals in their homes, those animals would have to be refugees from the animal shelters and the streets. You would have a protective relationship with them just as you would with an orphaned child. But as the surplus of cats and dogs (artificially engineered by centuries of forced breeding) declined, eventually companion animals would be phased out, and we would return to a more symbiotic relationship – enjoyment at a distance.
- The Harper's Forum Book, Jack Hitt, ed., 1989, p.223

In the end, I think it would be lovely if we stopped this whole notion of pets altogether.
- Newsday (February 21, 1988) Probably everything we do is a publicity stunt ... we are not here to gather members, to please, to placate, to make friends. We're here to hold the radical line.
- USA Today (September 3, 1991)


Again - I'm not sure if this is the stuff you want the PRESIDENT of an animal welfare agency saying to the media. She may as well just change her name to Cruella De Ville for all the warm and fuzzy THIS woman has.




Sadly - I think that the issue here is not the welfare of the animals.

People like this just want a reason to be as out there and as socially extreme as they can be. These people are using animals as the excuse. And it's sad.




PETA considers itself validated by all the celebrities that they get in their campaigns.




Alicia Silverstone was on the Graham Norton show saying how she has moved her dogs from being meat eaters to total vegans. WTF? Dogs eat meat! That's how they have been for millions of years - and she made them vegan *smax forehead*

These people will probably achieve nothing for their so called cause.

Me - I condone and support ethical farming and animal breeding.




I eat meat after all.

I'm a carnivore and I am a part of Nature.

What PETA will do next will surely grab headlines and front pages. But will it actually achieve anything?

I don't think so.

Maybe they should join Scientology and go live in isolation somewhere.

People like this make my teeth ache.

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts about this...........

Discuss.
.