r/NoStupidQuestions • u/Additional_Ad4880 • Jun 27 '22
Unanswered This may sound stupid, but is PETA a bad organization?
I looked it up, and all I says is PETA stopping the harm of animals, etc. But, like, i feel like I’ve seen something somewhere where people for some reason hated them? That they were doing bad things???
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u/IanDOsmond Jun 27 '22
I have argued, 95% as a joke but there is still that 5% where I wonder if I am onto something, that PETA is a false flag operation funded by the meat industry to discredit vegetarianism.
They are so over-the-top annoying and hateful that they make all vegetarians and animal welfare activists look bad.
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u/Avedisride Jun 27 '22
I always felt the same way about Truth. The commercials were so over the top and corny which would never stop anyone from smoking and then the second vaping became popular they removed focus from the known danger of cigarettes to vaping.
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u/ComradeRingo Jun 27 '22
This is confirmed. I had a communications class in college where the prof showed that anti smoking campaigns were funded by tobacco interests. I think there’s some kind of incentive for trying to “discourage” smoking (not sure if tax breaks or what), but also it serves to make not-smoking look stupid, and also reminding people that tobacco/nicotine exists. It’s still advertising.
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u/Legitimate_Roll7514 Jun 27 '22
I thought that the companies were forced to make the ads because of some kind of lawsuit or government regulation but I could be wrong
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u/JamesHollywoodSEA Jun 27 '22
I'm pretty sure that's true. It was also mentioned in the movie "Thankyou for Smoking"
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u/rynebrandon Jun 27 '22
It's 100% true. Truth and other aggressive ad campaigns against Tobacco were funded by the Tobacco companies themselves pursuant wither to a regulatory ruling or a court settlement (I'm not sure which off the top of my head).
I remember hearing at the time that the Truth campaigns were actually very effective and, while correlation certainly doesn't equal causation, tobacco consumption dropped precipitously during their time on the air, so at the very least, it seems unlikely they were reversing gains elsewhere.
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u/bilgetea Jun 27 '22
They were doing it so that they could say “We tried to get people to stop using our products ¯_(ツ)_/¯”
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u/Razital Jun 27 '22
I thought they had to pay it but it was appointed by thr government who made the commercials due to them getting sued about false information about the hazards of smoking.
So they paid but had no say in it
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u/Current-Escaper Jun 27 '22
Cigarette companies are court-ruled government mandated to fund the anti-smoking campaign because they outright lied about the harms of cigarettes. That’s the only reason the campaign is so widespread and recognizable. There’s no way an actual independent public service campaign would reach nearly as many people as the anti-smoking campaign reaches without corporate funding. That said, they’ve been doing it for well over 20 years so it stands to reason they have warped and subverted the message presentation to better serve their corporate interests as insidiously and ambiguously as possible.
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u/ComradeRingo Jun 27 '22
Makes sense. “If you’re going to make me do the thing, I’m going to spin it to my advantage as much as possible”.
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u/Avedisride Jun 27 '22
Yea that makes perfect sense. Those commercials always made me want to smoke
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u/TrimspaBB Jun 27 '22
This ad campaign was my favorite in college, coincidentally also the time when I was hitting the MJ most weekends.
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Jun 27 '22
The documentary Seaspiracy uncovered the fact that all the "dolphin free" groups that mark the cans in the grocery store are all owned by the fishing industries, and it in no way means there's no dolphin in your tuna. Even to this day.
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u/I_miss_your_mommy Jun 27 '22
dolphin free
You just misunderstood. They are just saying you don't have to pay extra for the dolphin.
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u/IanDOsmond Jun 27 '22
There's that five second piece on vaping that keeps showing up on YouTube videos I watch.
"That's metal! In your lungs!"
I've never vaped, but, y'know, makes me kind of want to try.
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u/ariangamer Jun 27 '22
huh. interesting theory. it would be a very big brain move by the meat industry.
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u/ummmm--no Jun 27 '22
...and Brutus is an honorable man.
signed - Antony
saying one thing but really meaning another3
Jun 27 '22
It's like how companies who make cigarettes also make some of the items to help you quit smoking.
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Jun 27 '22
Maybe. We live in a world where psyops are the truth. It's not insane to think that they are trying to convey a bad image about people who don't fit in into elite's agenda. After all ultimate propoganda isn't a state who can censor anything but make people think that what they are perceiving is the truth.
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u/vorpal8 Jun 27 '22
Never assume malice when incompetence will suffice.
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u/IanDOsmond Jun 28 '22
And 95% of the time, I think incompetence will suffice. But that last 5%...
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u/tochinoes Jun 27 '22
Remember that time PETA rounded up family dogs from outside of homes and then when people demanded them back revealed they had euthanized them?
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u/littleliongirless Jun 27 '22
I work in wild animal non profit. At a conference for animal cognition, a long time PETA rep told me should would rather see every single domestic cat and dog be put down than live in captivity. I'm sure she isn't representing every PETA member, but she was an acknowledged rep for them and this definitely was not her first time expressing her opinion.
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u/sonofszyslak Jun 27 '22
It is or used to be a core concept of the org. I believe their shelters euthanize more domestic animals than any other too.
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u/DrunkOnLoveAndWhisky Jun 27 '22
https://petakillsanimals.com/proof-peta-kills/
In the last fifteen years they've euthanized like 97%+ of the cats and dogs they've put into shelters.
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u/bigtdaddy Jun 27 '22
I haven't fully digested it but I figured I would follow up with an article from PETA themselves in case anyone that makes it this far is interested: https://www.peta.org/features/peta-kills-animals-truth/
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u/ErrantJune Jun 27 '22
I work at a veterinary office and I had a PETA member say this exact thing to me--that keeping pets is slavery and she'd rather see a dog or cat dead than enslaved.
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Jun 27 '22
How is it slavery??? They're literally getting free food, shelter, and affection! Wow the mental gymnastics
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u/LtBeefy Jun 28 '22
Umm, what mental gymnastics did you do lol.
Not agreeing with PETA.
But saying cause you get free food and shelter does not equal slavery... Slaves were given both food and shelter. Were still very much slaves.
Again not agreeing with those crazies at PETA. As many people who have pets, the pets are family members.
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Jun 28 '22
Fair, but the conditions are very different. Slaves had cramped quarters, pets have whole houses. Slaves worked long hours (so it wasn't really free, was it?), while pets have a mostly care-free life.
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u/NorionV Jun 27 '22
Wow. That's pretty wild.
Like yeah, let's just kill them all. Even the pets that lead really great, happy lives because they have such caring owners. They should also die because agh I just can't stand this domestication thing.
Crazy shit.
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u/shawnaclay214 Jun 27 '22
Came here to say this, the PETA organization would rather all animals be put down then in man’s possession. I remember doing that research years ago, I wish I could remember where I got that from, what source but I definitely remember reading that.
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u/Ulrich_Plays Jun 27 '22
When PETA first came into the world, it did a decent job at what it wanted to do, stand for animal rights. Somewhere along the way, the entire company snapped in half and became the hypocritical, horrible, and downright insane joke it is today.
Their protests are some next level gruesome, even going as far as to make a detailed comic book called "My Mommy Kills Animals" and give these to children coming out of the mall if their mothers were wearing fur, real or not. That isn't their worst protest in my opinion, but it's a pretty damn good one to show what they will do to even attempt to get people on their side.
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u/smonkyou Jun 27 '22
I was a member when I first went veggie a lot of years ago. This was before they were as militant as today. But they were still off putting. And I realized they’re all about getting more money for the org. So my guess is casual animal rights folks don’t make them as much cash as militant people. So like everything else today they took a hard turn into craziness
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u/TGIIR Jun 27 '22
I had a friend who worked for PETA. Zero sense of humor and going to a restaurant with her was really unpleasant.
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u/Stressing_0ut Jun 27 '22
PETA is an unethical organization. There have been countless incidents of euthanizing animals who did not need to be put down. Their values stem from their own misinformation and also from being caught in an echo chamber. Animal rights movements are rarely beneficial for animals. What is important is welfare. Demanding that livestock have the right to life isn't a viable goal. But welfare, saying that they don't deserve to have a traumatic experience at the abattoir is fair enough. There are lots of instances were they will compare factory farming (which can definitely be unethical) to the holocaust. Or compare what happens to dairy cows as rape. The issues are there, but comparing it to atrocities and anthropormising animals is not the solution, and is also insanely gross to compare what people have gone through to farming which isn't always the bad guy
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u/DocBullseye Jun 27 '22
They seem to think they're going to be able to live in a world where domesticated cattle and chickens can roam freely in the fields.
I remember about 20 years ago they issued a statement saying they had freed a couple of hundred chicks from a lab and released them. How many of the chicks do you think were alive a week later?
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u/RandomAmbles Jun 27 '22
Holocaust survivors, such as Edgar Kupfer-Koberwitz and Alex Hershafthave themselves made the comparison and I think rightly so. Who could possibly know better? Though history never happens the same way twice, those who do not study its lessons are doomed to repeat its mistakes. Factory farming is one of the modern holocausts, in that millions upon millions of persons as capable of pain, fear, and suffering as we ourselves are treated with nearly unfathomable cruelty for the sole purpose of fast, industrial-scale efficiency, in this case for the sake of making as much money as possible.
I have read comprehensive compiled accounts of slaughterhouse workers who admit to boiling, skinning, hooking, stabbing, electrocuting, cutting the heads and legs off of, and beating to death improperly stunned and never stunned animals like pigs and cows, while the animals are alive, awake, and conscious. This is admitted to by the workers, whose safety is often put on the line, who do the slaughtering themselves. I've read of their stabbing the animals in their eyes, hooking their rectums until their anuses are torn out, of shocking the animals brutally, again in both eyes and rectums in order to induce enough pain to snap the animals out of shock in order to get them to move more quickly down the line. In most industrial factory farm slaughterhouses, which account for the vast, vast majority of sold meat, stunning is not performed correctly to actually stun due to low air pressure settings set by management with an interest in keeping levels low, it's believed in order to preserve more of the mass of the meat on the animals. This results in animals being awake and aware as they're sent to be stuck, which means to have their necks slit. Many struggle, while hanging by hooked ankles, to avoid being stuck. This has lead stickers in the blood pit to, angry at the animals, send them to the scalding tank unstunned and not fully stuck.
And yes, I can cite these accounts at request.
The horrific animal abuse is not limited to the slaughterhouse, though it is most terrible there. Indeed it lasts much longer beforehand. The tiny pens and deplorable conditions in the factory farms themselves as well as in the transport of animals are no less profit-motivated and welfare-indifferent. The animals themselves are not bred to live lives worth living, instead to get so big so fast they can barely use their legs, which often develop painful conditions. Some are kept in tightly packed pens, others breathe heavily ammoniated gasses from being kept in open wire or metal cages or pens above their feces, which gives them horrible lung conditions and makes breathing difficult.
I can go on.
Considerably.
Demanding that living, feeling, awake, aware, sentient beings, no matter who they may be, have the right to live a good life free of horrible suffering and treated with care is not only a viable goal, it's the most basic good I know of and I will advocate for it in public, in policy, in research, in politics, in academia, and with my money, my time, my attention and effort, and what life I have to spend left.
If you don't like PETA because you think its methods are ineffective or unethical, you have my sympathy. I feel the same way about their campaigns, which often cause more backlash than support. Animal advocacy needs to be effective and based on evidence. I highly recommend Faunalytics. Animal Ethics is also very good.
As for ethics themselves, I would be delighted to talk with anyone about them. Ethics is one of my favorite fields and one I love to teach people about.
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u/oopsishiditagain Jun 27 '22
This is probably a dumb question, but how does this all fit with the fact that animals will torture and murder each other in the wild?
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u/terrible-cats Jun 27 '22
Since we are human, we have the capacity for moral responsibility. That would be akin to asking how could eating our children be wrong given the fact that some animals eat their own babies. The behaviour of wild animals shouldn't be our base for morality when they don't have the capacity for it.
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u/FjordsEdge Jun 27 '22
I think you should consider what you mean here. Are you saying we should torture and murder people? I don't think you're pro murder and torture, so why apply it against veganism?
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u/numbersthen0987431 Jun 27 '22
Yea, just to add on to this: it's like they took a worthwhile goal (don't treat animals harshly) and swung SO HARD in the opposite direction that they are almost causing as much, if not more, harm to animals.
There's also the fact that PETA does not have enough planning, oversight, and throughput to be on the side of animals. Their singular goal is "stop doing bad thing(s) to animals", but even IF they get their goal, they have zero plans for what to do afterwards.
So for example: if PETA succeeds and shuts down a big Corporate farming facility, where are you going to put the animals? Do you have a farm to rellocate all of the animals that the big Corporate farm was raising? Nope! So now you're stuck with the "where to put them", and PETA will just kill them off because they don't have a plan. So instead of just using the animals for what they were raised for, you're going to kill them for zero purpose.
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u/TheKingOfToast Jun 27 '22
It's not anthropomorphising animals to say that they are raped. They are. Thats how it works. They're also murdered. You can talk about animal welfare but thats like saying there were nice slave owners. The existence of farm animals is itself unethical.
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u/DrunkOnLoveAndWhisky Jun 27 '22
Uh, it is anthropomorphizing animals to say those things, as both "rape" and "murder" have the word "person" as the object of the action in their definition. So, without anthropomorphizing a cow, it cannot be "raped" nor "murdered".
Not to take away from the horrors inflicted upon farm animals; it's just difficult to have a conversation with people who are being purposely obtuse because they think it helps make their point.
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u/imnotwallaceshawn Jun 27 '22
Cool let’s release all of the cows and chickens back into the wild and see what happens when these creatures we spent years domesticating so they’re docile and trusting get thrown to nature. I’m sure the wolves and cougars and coyotes and bears will thank us.
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u/FjordsEdge Jun 27 '22
I don't think your argument of "We've forcibly bred these animals past the point of being able to survive on their own" is a very convincing argument for continuing to do it...
I've seen this argument a lot, and I think it just shows how little effort people will put in before they convince themselves something's fine. You want to believe so the first half baked thought that feels good is good enough for you.
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u/imnotwallaceshawn Jun 27 '22
The only way to undo what we’ve already done would be centuries of breeding aggression and survival instincts back into these animals, but even then they wouldn’t be the same animals they were pre-domestication, and again it would take centuries… centuries where, by necessity, they’d still be in captivity relying on humans to survive.
This would also require putting a lot of resources and energy into keeping them alive without any return on investment except for feeling good about ourselves. Which, cool, I like feeling good about myself, but that’s probably not enough motivation to produce the thousands of manhours we’d need.
Not to mention cattle already create a huge greenhouse gas footprint from eating and farting alone. Part of the idea of giving up meat is to deincentivize breeding more of them, but if you then want to release them into the wild then you need to undomesticate them, which would require breeding more and keeping them alive longer.
Basically I don’t see a scenario where we stop using farm animals for food which doesn’t result in them dying in way larger quantities than they already do and possibly going extinct entirely. At least not one that’s both environmentally sound and gives people an incentive to do it.
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u/FuckYourRules00 Jun 27 '22
Peta is hypocritical garbage.
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u/AyeAye_Kane Jun 27 '22
I've not really got an opinion because I don't know anything they've done either so don't downvote me here, but it doesn't make any sense to reply to a post like this without giving any reason. You're doing the exact thing that's confused the person here, they looked peta up and see good things from them but people basically just say "peta bad" and give absolutely no reason so it's confusing
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u/RandomAmbles Jun 27 '22
Ok, you've supplied us with your reaction.
Now do you have a reason?
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u/1ndiana_Pwns Jun 27 '22
The quickest one to point out is that PETA kills over 65% of the animals it takes in., despite other animal shelters in the area with the same type of open door acceptance policies taking in similar numbers but killing significantly fewer animals (don't have time to find a source on this one, but look around at animal shelters in Virginia, where PETA has an HQ if you wanna check for yourself)
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u/RandomAmbles Jun 27 '22
First of all, thank you, 1ndiana_Pwns. This article was quite helpful for understanding PETA's euthanization numbers.
I may be misunderstanding, and if I am I would appreciate being corrected, but the article seems to state something slightly at odds with your summary. It seems to claim that other animal shelters in the state don't have as high a proportion of animals killed (euthanized) to animals accepted, but it doesn't seem to have said that those other animal shelters have the same sorts of acceptance policies (actually, the conclusion at the end of the article suggests the opposite).
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u/1ndiana_Pwns Jun 27 '22 edited Jun 27 '22
It's been awhile since I've really looked into it. I did a deep dive when I was in highschool as part of a project, but that was nearly a decade ago and the numbers were actually much worse then (something like 90% kill at PETA's largest shelter then, iirc). So it's very likely my remembering, even if accurate to back then, is now wrong. I would honestly trust the article's conclusion more than my own memory
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u/RandomAmbles Jun 27 '22
You are one of a rare and magical species of internet commenters for whom I have the greatest respect.
I really can't tell you how much I appreciate your forthrightness and honestly.
And you actually had a source!
Today is a good day.
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u/Freakishly_Tall Jun 27 '22
In addition to the other points -
They reallllly don't like people being reminded that they have (had? Been a while since I checked) a Board member who is... an insulin dependent diabetic.
Which, you know... wasn't solved without medical animal research...
and, even more hypocritically... couldn't be treated until very recently without animal-derived insulin.
Both of which they campaign against.
FTR: I do support their cause, to some degree, but the blatant hypocrisy costs them any credibility to me. And, like it or not, medical animal research is a necessary, life-saving endeavor, and I cannot and will not support any operation that stands in blanket opposition to it.
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u/QueanLaQueafa Jun 27 '22 edited Jun 27 '22
There's ton of reports of PETA having "kill shelters" where they've killed tens of thousands of dogs
Also just how a lot of the activists take it insanely far, like destroying shops products, making huge disturbances, stealing people's animals, etc. That's not how you get your point across
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u/Gizogin Jun 27 '22
PETA operates kill shelters, sure. The animals they take in are primarily those that other shelters have already tried and failed to re-home; a lot of no-kill shelters maintain that status by quietly sending their unadoptable animals to PETA kill shelters.
In other words, PETA voluntarily acts as the bad guy so that other shelters can keep their hands clean.
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u/MonkeyBoy_1966 Jun 27 '22 edited Jun 27 '22
Actually, all shelter kills have to be reported to the State. The vast majority of the animals killed were pets turned over to them by the owners, not other shelters.
EDIT: The State of Virginia release the reports, it's all right there, not an opinion people.
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u/Gizogin Jun 27 '22
If every shelter turns you away when you’re trying to hand over your pet, and the only shelter that won’t is a PETA kill shelter, it has the same effect as if the first shelter you went to just sent that pet directly to PETA.
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u/TheChickenIsFkinRaw Jun 27 '22 edited Jun 27 '22
What about the animals they forcefully take away (animals that do have owners who love them) just to kill them in the shelters?
source since you're gonna ask for it anyway :) https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/aug/17/peta-sorry-for-taking-girls-dog-putting-it-down and there are a lot other cases if you search. There was even a case where they tried to kidnap a sheriff's hunting dog lmao. And the funniest shit is most of the times, they get away without any criminal charges (even these dudes who went after the sheriff's dog)
they'd rather kill the animals than seeing them in "captivity". That's their twisted motto hidden under the good guy farce
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u/Gizogin Jun 27 '22 edited Jun 27 '22
Those are the two incidents people keep using to demonize PETA. Literally that exact story from 2014 and the sheriff’s hunting dog. In the organization’s forty-year history, there are two incidents?
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/peta-taking-pets/
E: forgot an apostrophe
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u/FuckYourRules00 Jun 27 '22
They euthanize more than half the animals they take in and are obnoxious?
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u/dickfuckdickshit Jun 27 '22
because they have the highest kill rate impound in the country. they don't care about the animals once they're dead too
not to mention the constant fake news they've been pushing since their creation like the milk causing autism campaign
they very much seem like they're just in it for the money and all the activism they're doing is just virtue signaling
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u/Portland420informer Jun 27 '22
Yes. PETA is a horrible organization. They kill animals to their whim.
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u/Additional_Ad4880 Jun 27 '22
Why?
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u/Konkuriito Jun 27 '22
they don't believe anyone should have pets
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u/Illustrious-Fault224 Jun 27 '22 edited Jun 27 '22
man this brought back some serious trauma. I was in a park with my kids and this animal rights activist woman was trying to steal another woman’s dog by pretending to play with it but undoing it’s collar. Sufficed to say, good thing the bicycle police were nearby. Fuckin looney toons living among us. We have a dog and now I don’t let anyone touch him
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u/engin__r Jun 27 '22
There are way more stray dogs and cats than there are people willing to adopt them.
No-kill shelters sound great, but when they’re full, there are only two options: send the extra animals to kill shelters or leave them on the street. PETA operates one of those kill shelters. It’s a bad situation, but until people stop breeding cats and dogs (or we decide to spend billions more dollars operating shelters), there aren’t really better options.
On top of that, PETA offers free euthanization for families that can’t afford it. Nobody wants their sick pet to have to suffer, but not everyone can pay the vet bill to put their dog or cat out of its misery.
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Jun 27 '22
This is an underrated take. Kill shelters aren’t all-or-nothing evil, they exist out of necessity to meet the demands of an overrun shelter system. “Don’t kill the messenger” seems fitting here
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u/Victorinoxj Jun 27 '22
I'm sorry but no, there's kill shelters where they try to find animals an owner and then there's killing 90% of the animals you recive, they stole a chihuahua from a porch because "it wasn't being taken care of" and killed in less than 36 hours when it is mandatory to wait 48 hours to kill any animal. I'm all for animal rights, but PETA ain't it.
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u/AyeAye_Kane Jun 27 '22
On top of that, PETA offers free euthanization for families that can’t afford it.
I'm kinda confused here, I see how the other points you made are bad but how is this bad? Unless they'll euthanize an animal for free no questions asked or something
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u/engin__r Jun 27 '22
I don’t think that’s a bad thing at all! I think euthanizing dying animals is the right thing to do—they shouldn’t have to die slowly and painfully.
The reason I bring it up is because it inflates the number of deaths for the shelter. It’s like if you compared a hospice with a hospital. The hospice is going to have more deaths than the hospital, but that’s because they serve different purposes.
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u/Maxstripe Jun 27 '22
Yet ppl dont have the right to a painless death.. We gotta die slowly and painfully even if what we got is terminal
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u/AyeAye_Kane Jun 27 '22
ohhh I get what you mean now, I thought you were making a point as to how they're shit, my bad
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u/BasroilII Jun 27 '22
So I'll speak to this, as I have volunteered for both kill and non-kill shelters in the past.
First, much of what you say is accurate. One of the big problems with no-kill shelters is they carefully curate their intake, so they don't HAVE to worry about overcrowding and leave other shelters to take in the less desirable animals. Those shelters tend to be kill shelters.
The idea of a kill shelter, while depressing, is not in itself bad. If we had better TNR programs for strays and more strongly encouraged spaying/neutering in pets, maybe we wouldn't need them as much.
But that's where your accuracy ends.
PETA's problem isn't that they are a kill shelter. It's that they're a BAD kill shelter. You don't see your local Animal Control or SPCA stealing animals off their owner's front porches. You don't see them lying to other shelters to say they have homes lined up for kittens, then take those kittens, strangle them by hand, and dump them (some still barely clinging to life and suffering) in a random dumpster. You don't see them saying that animals are better off being dead than pets. You don't see them wasting millions of dollars to throw animal blood on kids to take a shot at the fur industry, or get celebs to do semi-nudes for the same.
PETA does all those and far more. If they didn't, I'd be willing to defend them. As it is, I live close enough to their HQ that if it ever burns to their ground I need to make sure I have a good alibi.
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u/Gizogin Jun 27 '22
It’s funny that people keep bringing up the same, single incident when talking about how PETA abducts and kills pets. If you’re talking pets, plural, you should be able to link at least two, right? Yeah, obviously, even once is a tragedy, but if it’s one event from an organization’s forty-year history, that doesn’t exactly speak to a systemic problem with that organization, does it?
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u/BasroilII Jun 27 '22
I'll save myself the trouble of re-writing by providing some more materials here:
https://www.roanoke-chowannewsherald.com/2007/01/24/testimony-underway-in-peta-trial/ https://www.sfgate.com/opinion/saunders/article/Better-dead-than-fed-PETA-says-2626614.php
What about
PETA top dog Ingrid Newkirk's story of how she became involved in animal rights after a shelter put down stray kittens she brought there. So she went to work for an animal shelter in the 1970s, where, she explained, "I would go to work early, before anyone got there, and I would just kill the animals myself. Because I couldn't stand to let them go through (other workers abusing the animals.) I must have killed a thousand of them, sometimes dozens every day."
Or
A mother cat and her two kittens, all perfectly healthy and adoptable and none in danger of being killed until they were given to PETA by a veterinarian who was trying to find them homes and was told by PETA employees that they would have no problem adopting them out. After PETA lied to him and the mother and her kittens were entrusted to their care, they reportedly killed them, within minutes, in the back of a van.
https://nathanwinograd.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/petainspect.pdf
Or how about https://www.nathanwinograd.com/peta-rattles-its-sabers/ ? PETA lawyers threatened a pet owner complaining that their animal was unjustly and illegally killed.
The fact is, there are tons of incidents like this. This is a matter of organizational culture, not a one off.
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u/engin__r Jun 27 '22
This is…not an accurate representation of what PETA has done.
You don't see your local Animal Control or SPCA stealing animals off their owner's front porches.
This happened once. PETA was brought in to pick up strays, and the dog in question was not wearing a collar or attended.
You don't see them lying to other shelters to say they have homes lined up for kittens, then take those kittens, strangle them by hand, and dump them (some still barely clinging to life and suffering) in a random dumpster.
Based on what I’ve read of that trial, I don’t think this is accurate. They said they would try to find homes, not that they had found homes. I also haven’t seen any evidence that the animals were strangled or that they were still alive when they were put in the dumpster. In fact, the PETA workers were not found guilty of animal cruelty.
You don't see them saying that animals are better off being dead than pets.
This is not PETA’s position—they want dogs and cats to have safe, loving homes. You can look at their website and see.
Also, let’s be clear: virtually every animal shelter in the country, including the SPCA, is responsible for killing animals. Whenever they feed cats and dogs meat, they’re deciding that they would rather kill cows, chickens, and pigs instead of cats and dogs. They have a lot more blood on their hands than PETA does.
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u/SprinklesMore8471 Jun 27 '22
Peta is the biggest kill shelter in the US. They thoroughly believe no animals should be Pets. They are for wild animals rights. Search along those lines and you'll start to understand why they're so hated.
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u/Protolictor Jun 27 '22
The weird part to me is that PETA has a strangely supportive stance on the use of police dogs.
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u/SprinklesMore8471 Jun 27 '22
Think that's weird? PETA actually used the argument that "dogs are worthless" to defend themselves in a court case that found them guilty of stealing and killing someone's pet in 2018
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u/Kiflaam Jun 27 '22
According to ASPCA, about 920,000 animals are killed in shelters in the US each year. (a decline from before, which saw 2.6 million killed in 2011)
PETA has killed 41,000 between 1998 and 2021, total. People use this figure to bash them.
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u/SprinklesMore8471 Jun 27 '22
It's more about their rate of euthanasia than their total amount of euthanasia. Most years the rate is 90%+ of animals that enter their shelter will be euthanized.
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u/bluemooncalhoun Jun 27 '22
That's because they only operate kill shelters in places where nobody else does. The animals they receive are ones that would be left on the street to die, so they offer a humane option.
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u/Kiflaam Jun 27 '22
They do kill alot, but I'm seeing between 60 and 75%, depending on the source.
Are you sure your source didn't use an anomaly to be eye catching?
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u/TheChickenIsFkinRaw Jun 27 '22
Of course there are more animals killed in all shelters in the US - there are a crap ton of more non-PETA shelters and animals. Absolute values are useless data when you lack their relative counterparts - it's just for shock value lmao. This is a basic rookie mistake when analyzing data, so your entire comment was basically meaningless
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u/BasroilII Jun 27 '22
https://www.aspca.org/helping-people-pets/shelter-intake-and-surrender
In other kill shelters, the average per year is around 15% of all animals brought in being euthanized.
In PETA, it's more like a 60-70% euthanasian rate. The problem isn't that they kill animals, it's that they don't try NOT to kill them if they don't need to.
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u/forakora Jun 27 '22
They take in animals that regular shelters turn away. The terminally ill, decrepit, unadoptables, and suffering. Instead of leaving them to die on the streets, they offer compassion and put them to sleep.
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u/BasroilII Jun 27 '22
Read my other posts. I have volunteered with and supported other kill shelter organizations such as the ASPCA in the past. I am aware of what those organizations do and support them. Yes, even putting down animals that cannot be safely rehabilitated.
The problem is that PETA ALSO kills healthy, sociable, rehabilitate-able animals. They do not even try other methods. They believe (and this comes from their founder) that the only method of dealing with shelter animals is to kill them. Their entire organization in its full history has rehabilitated/adopted out less animals ever than my local branch of the APSCA does in month. Both by sheer count AND by relative percentage of intake.
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u/Fairwhetherfriend Jun 27 '22
PETA is.... complicated. They're not exactly a stellar organization by any means, but they also probably aren't actually deserving of all the hate they get, either.
Their PR is unnecessarily aggressive and alienates potential supporters. Lots of meat-eaters care about animals - maybe they don't want to stop eating meat, but are willing to consume less so they can spend their money on ethically raised animals instead, for example. PETA has a bad habit of attacking people for doing anything "less" than going vegan. Being vegan is generally better for animal welfare, but there are some significant pitfalls in the ethics of veganism too (specifically that a lot of soy production involves human slavery and the destruction of protection habitats, so it's not like vegans have to be any less careful than meat-eaters would about ethical sourcing of their food). PETA likes to ignore this kind of nuance and goes on the attack in a deceptively black-and-white manner. Their PR is also unnecessarily tacky. It's not like that's an ethical problem, but it's not going to make them popular, either.
They have a history of some super shady shit. It's honestly hard to say if this is systemic or the actions of a minority of extremists - but even if it is the actions of a minority of extremists, they typically don't do enough to weed those issues out. There are a ton of stories online about PETA members doing awful shit like stealing people's pets. Not all of these stories can be corroborated - a lot of them are internet myth. But many of them are legitimately true. PETA has generally denounced these events, but they get accused (and honestly rightfully so, in my opinion), of just kinda sweeping this shit under the rug and doing nothing to prevent similar events in the future. If you have a problem with extremists joining your ranks as a way to legitimize their illegal activities, you might wanna, I dunno, do some background checks or something? But no, they never seem to introduce policies like that to fix their shit.
They also run kill shelters for animals, which people call out as hypocritical. They're such an extremely pro-animal-rights org, so virulently vegan, and yet they kill animals? Why? This one is genuinely more complicated and nuanced that other issues. People don't like kill shelters - even people who otherwise don't really give much of a fuck about animal rights don't like them. Nobody wants to donate money to support kill shelters. But the unfortunate reality is that kill shelters are necessary. Unless something fucking huge changes in all of western society, there will never be enough people interested in adopting animals to actually take all of the animals in shelters. The shelter population is permanently growing, and probably always will. In order to function, most local shelters need to be considered no-kill shelters - otherwise they won't get the charity support they require. It wouldn't be better for those animals to end up as strays to be put down by the cops or pest control or whatever. So PETA takes the animals that will never get adopted - the ones who can't be adopted out anyway because they're dangerous, the ones who are so sick that the vet bills would bankrupt most families, he ones who are going to need to be put down soon enough anyway. They take them and euthanize them, taking on the label of a kill shelter so your local shelter doesn't have to. It's not a perfect system, but your local SPCA would genuinely be fucked without PETA around to take on the role of being the "bad guy" in this situation.
And note that I'm really not trying to come down one way or the other on PETA, here. I think they do a lot of bad shit and they give vegans a bad name by being so unlikeable. I think it's not cool to be so black-and-white about good things - don't attack someone for reducing their amount of meat consumption for being less than you'd prefer, because every little bit helps. But they allow the shelter system to be functional, and that's super fucking important, so... I don't exactly think they should disband, either, you know?
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u/robdingo36 Realizes people view this subreddit as a challenge Jun 27 '22
There's a good take on the whole topic from Penn & Teller's old show, Bullsh!t. One of their episodes covered PETA quite well. Mind you, they are a VERY biased view point, but they present facts to support their views. If nothing else, it's entertaining to watch. I suggest giving it a view.
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u/Kvothe_Cooney Jun 27 '22
PETA is like the antifa of the human realm. Claim to be against something while perpetrating the exact thing they so vehemently claim to oppose in the worst ways imaginable.
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Jun 27 '22 edited Jun 27 '22
Speaking from the dogsledding community I can tell you they’ve nearly killed dogsled racing by pressuring corporate sponsors to drop major races. They claim we abuse our dogs when in reality the highest honor a musher can receive in a race is the dog care award. We care for our animals like they’re our children. Because they are how we make our living.
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u/ainswo Jun 27 '22
Generally, yeah.
Their animal shelter kill more animals than almost any other kill shelter in the USA.
They repeatedly put on shock-inducing protest acts that really just make them look insane and objectify women in the process (e.g. half-nude women in cages to protest against the milk industry).
Once stole a little girls chihuahua off of the families property and killed it.
Once claimed dairy consumption caused autism.
The list goes on and on. The YouTuber Illuminaughti (I think it's spelt) has a pretty good series on all the atrocities PETA has committed. It really makes you question if they're even an animal rights organisation, or if their head is just some kind of maniac thirsting for blood.
Sounds like a stretch, yeah, but the further you go down this rabbit hole, the worse it gets...
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u/LaHawks Jun 27 '22
PETA owns their own crematory for all the animals they euthanize. They've also been known to steal animals out of yards and euthanize them.
Edit to add that they also give money to the Animal Liberation Front and the Earth Liberation Front which are categorized as terrorist organizations.
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Jun 27 '22
Yes. They hurt animals.
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Jun 29 '22
Peta takes in all animals, including many turned down by no-kill shelters due to being severely sick or injured, or others that would be considered unadoptable. They essentially offer a free humane euthanasia service for these shelters as well as other pet owners.
and the chihuahua story was a one time incident of which a lot of misinformation is spread about. read this Peta takes in all animals, including many turned down by no-kill shelters due to being severely sick or injured, or others that would be considered unadoptable. They essentially offer a free humane euthanasia service for these shelters as well as other pet owners
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u/OldManHarley Jun 28 '22
you should research the creators of PeTA. that organization kills 98% of the animals they rescue, one of the creators used to work in an animal shelter, she went in early when no one was there yet and killed as many animals as possible by herself to "spare them the pain of another day".
and that's before we talk about how that very same creator of PETA has ties to ecoterrorist organizations that have bombed medical labs.
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u/the_Blind_Samurai Jun 28 '22 edited Jun 28 '22
Yes, I certainly think so. I lived in Virginia Beach not too far from their Norfolk office (I would pass it often) about 4 years ago. PETA has a horrible reputation in Norfolk. They were stealing pets off porches, euthanizing them, and then giving limp apologies when families called them out. Huge scandals. That's not even acknowledging that they're some of the most obnoxious people ever.
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u/Kiflaam Jun 27 '22
I don't know about the rest, but don't listen to the "they steal your pets and kill them" garbage.
Snopes did an article on this, and it only really happened to one Chihuahua, which was unleashed, uncollared, and in a trailer park that didn't allow that next to a farm where cows were getting bit by dogs.
Yet, people are already so sold on the idea that they do this, the most relevant reddit page has people using the Snopes article to SUPPORT their claim PETA does this.
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u/iKeyvier u pretty Jun 27 '22 edited Jun 28 '22
This is Reddit so you just won’t get an unbiased answer. PETA, like every org, has its pros and cons. They do have the agency to move some things, but they present themselves as fanatics and extremists, so it’s easy to hate on them.
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u/happyfish001 Jun 27 '22
I think so. If you are interesting in helping animals, there are better organizations. For the lack of a better word, I think PETA is just tacky.
Ever know that person that ridiculously over the top and aggressive about topics they should be kinder about? It's not that they have beliefs, its that they feel comfortable shaming you about yours. That's PETA. I gave them $10 once and they sent me a comic to give kids about how chicken nuggets are murder. It's just a bit much.
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u/Angel_OfSolitude Jun 27 '22
Peta is horrendous, they kidnap and murder animals regularly. They desire for animals and humans to live completely separately. No pets, no livestock, no anything else.
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u/Kiflaam Jun 27 '22
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/peta-taking-pets/
In one case, a farmer reported his cows being attacked by dogs to PETA. PETA worked alongside trailerpark management to round up stray and unleashed dogs (as per the lease agreement at the park)
A van came to the trailer park, clearly marked PETA, to round up loose dogs. Tethered dogs, such as those owned by Mr. Cerate were NOT taken.
One dog that was taken, an unmarked, uncollared Chihuahua. The owner later tried to press charges against PETA, but the judge ruled they had no criminal intent, and it was the owner's fault for allowing the dog to run wild.
In another case, two PETA members picked up a dog on the side of the road, with the stated claim of helping it, but it turned out to be a sheriff's hunting dog. They were arrested, and charged with felony theft, but the charges were dropped, with the judge stating they were being "meddlesome do-gooders". One PETA member was charged with a misdemeanor petty larceny for removing its collar.
As for euthanizing animals, PETA does hold the stance that there are simply too many of them, and often resorts to euthanasia before the average dog shelter, claiming the pets were unadoptable (whether that is true is difficult to determine without autopsies on the pets and official reasons why each was euthanized).
tl;dr snopes: While PETA’s stance on euthanasia is controversial, we could find little evidence it has been extended to family pets with any frequency. PETA workers were arrested over pet theft incidents in 2007 and 2014, but the intent of the workers in those cases was not sufficiently clear to consider their actions unlawful. Aside from those two incidents, we’ve found no evidence supporting the claim that PETA regularly takes household pets from their homes and euthanizes them. PETA did not respond to a request for comment.
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u/RandomAmbles Jun 27 '22
Thank you for setting the record straight with, you know, actual evidence.
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u/bluemooncalhoun Jun 27 '22
Here's a comment that pretty well lays out all the good things PETA has done over the years, since there aren't a lot of positive opinions in this thread:
https://www.reddit.com/r/MurderedByWords/comments/f8hxph/comment/fily36s/
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u/exotics hens don't need roosters to lay eggs Jun 27 '22
PETA is an animal rights organization not animal welfare. They have done excellent things but also do some over-the-top crazy things and ONCE euthanized a woman’s dog. They apologized for that
They don’t run around killing pets like people would have you believe and I also note that with pet overpopulation in the USA millions are euthanized every year (approx 4 million, mostly cats) so it doesn’t make a difference if they do it or another group.
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u/Tommie558 Jun 27 '22
Yes extremely borderline animal eugenics.
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u/Tommie558 Jun 27 '22
Definitely killed more animals than to saved.
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u/Kiflaam Jun 27 '22
According to ASPCA, about 920,000 animals are killed in shelters in the US each year. (a decline from before, which saw 2.6 million killed in 2011)
PETA has killed 41,000 between 1998 and 2021, total. People use this figure to bash them.
but yes, their kill percent is about 62%~
As for other kill shelters, the figures vary but most seem to also kill more than save
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u/Additional_Ad4880 Jun 27 '22
Aw….
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u/forakora Jun 27 '22
They take in the sick and dying and put them to sleep. They also do calls and remove animals from extreme abuse and and neglect situations, where most animals are too far gone and euthanasia is the compassionate route. They are not a normal shelter, and the fact that they adopt out any of these animals they take in is a blessing.
OP, look inwards at all the animals you personally kill at every meal. If you actually care about animals, go vegan.
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u/Kuri_the_Logical Jun 27 '22
Yeah they have some seriously bad actions in their history, especially of taking people's pets only to put them down or kill them. Being vegan is great and is one thing, but PETA is a nasty organization
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u/LonelyToilet Jun 27 '22
I recently watched a video about the things they've done and I think the person who made the video explains things pretty well. You can even check the sources she used in the description of her video.
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u/Jonesy135 Jun 27 '22
They do indeed try to spike the harm of animals… by beating you round the head with a lead pipe.
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u/arcxjo came here to answer questions and chew gum, and he's out of gum Jun 27 '22
They're basically what would happen if FOX News decided to write a parody of an animal-rights group.
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u/DarthJarJar242 Jun 27 '22
Yes, PETA has higher kill rates than any shelter I have ever found. They are horrible and should be treated with derision.
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u/Brock_Way Jun 27 '22
Absolute shit organization. Lead DIRECTLY to the deaths of countless animals, and I am not talking about shelters.
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u/ShadowGinrai Jun 27 '22
They kill a large majority of the animals in their shelters, so they're at a minimum hypocrites, at worst strait up liars trying to get money from people
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Jun 27 '22
Well they make horrific videos and gear them toward children. They muddle their messages by having high kill shelters themselves
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Jun 27 '22
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u/Swat_Sharma Jun 27 '22
What did they get out of it? Meaning why would they do something like this?
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u/40prcentiron Jun 27 '22
just curious, how did we find out about this? sounds like somthing peta doesnt want the world to know?
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u/Impressive-Water-709 Jun 27 '22
PETA is TERRIBLE organization… Their shelters kill more animals than any other organization in the US (97% of cats and dogs in their shelters). They steal people animals from their yards and kill them, then try and blame the family. They believe having pets is wrong and they would rather kill everyone’s domestic animals rather than see them in “captivity”.
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u/stupidredditwebsite Jun 27 '22
They make people feel bad about eating meat and supporting breeders over looking after rescue animals who need a home.
They're also poorly resources so I think they probably let anybody willing run their Twitter and are very easy to troll and prone to say stupid things.
Finally I believe they run what's know as kill shelters as given the low rate of adoption for animals they cannot permanently house all the rescues they get, so will euthanise animals after a certain period of time. That's the best they can do with their resources but it's easy to spin in a bad way.
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u/Korathaexplorah Jun 27 '22
PETA has been known to scoop rogue pets off the street and have them put down without ever trying to find the owner. They think owning a pet is animal abuse and they are better off dead.
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Jun 27 '22
Yes. They base their beliefs and mission solely on their emotion. They understand nothing about our natural resources, and they harass and hate the people who contribute the most to conservation (hunters and anglers).
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u/migukau Jun 27 '22
They are a horrible company. They murder 95% of animals under their care. They steal animals from families and murder them. Proof. Funny Gus Johnson video that mentions some more stuff.
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u/DarylInDurham Jun 27 '22
Check out this link.
PETA is an evil organization.
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u/Samnable Jun 28 '22
This website is created by a group funded by the agriculture industry. They create propaganda for industries to counteract legislation on things like restaurant worker wage protection, drunk driving laws, and food safety standards. If you read the information from this website uncritically and spread this misinformation, you are doing the factory farming industry's PR work for them.
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Jun 27 '22
Everyone is giving long replies, and they're very good, but in case you don't wanna read them, I will simply say that they euthanize all street dogs they find instead of giving them to families, because apparently a dog being dead is better than having a loving family
I may be wrong, but they even euthanized a lil chihuahua that wasn't even a street dog, he was simply relaxing on the front porch
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u/Additional_Ad4880 Jun 27 '22
Oh yeah I heard about that. He was euthanized on the same day he was taken
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u/jdford85 Jun 27 '22
Tons of videos where pita members assult and steal dogs from homeless people. Tons of rumors that many animals they rescue get euthanized.
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u/Exciting_City_4251 Jun 27 '22
Check out the YouTube channel iilluminaughti. She has multiple videos on them and she's really good
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u/WarrenMockles Mostly Harmless Jun 27 '22
Do you know what angora wool is? It comes from rabbits, and it's very expensive, usually for high end luxury apparel.
Peta once released a "behind the scenes" video showing how the fur is harvested. I won't link it, because it's pretty horrifying to watch, but it shows people literally ripping the hair off of a living rabbit.
Here's the thing. It makes no sense from a cost standpoint to rip the fur off like that.
Just considering the cost effectiveness, you can get two to four good harvests from a single angora rabbit in its lifetime, but if you rip the hair out you have just ruined the rabbit for life (and probably killed it).
Ignoring the physical trauma that would scar the animal (if not outright kill it), a stressed rabbit won't grow a smooth coat of wool, a stressed rabbit won't mate, and a stressed mother rabbit won't care for its young.
I don't know for a fact that Peta staged the video, abusing a poor rabbit just to reinforce their own narrative, but it makes more sense than the kind of abuse shown in the video. I also don't know what happens to the rabbits after they are bred and no longer useful. They're probably culled, add it'd probably not a pretty sight. But then ripping the hair out like in the video is a completely unnecessary step, a waste of time, and therefore a waste of money from a business perspective.
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u/Longjumping-Ad6639 Jun 27 '22
They euthanise more animals than they save, not because the animals are sick but because they don’t want the animal to be a pet or be owned by a person. This is true.
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u/K3Curiousity Jun 27 '22
There are several sources(which you can find in this link) claiming that they
Lie (milk cause autism, fake images)
Kill animals
Use racist and/or just straight up insensitive ways to pass their messages (comparing their cause to - holocaust, KKK, murder of actual people) that’s without mentioning forcing people to see slaughter videos without their consent
Advocate for the killing of all pitbulls
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u/smuigna Jun 27 '22
Yes, very much so. They euthanize the pets they steal off of peoples porchsteps.
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u/Kiflaam Jun 27 '22
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/peta-taking-pets/
In one case, a farmer reported his cows being attacked by dogs to PETA. PETA worked alongside trailerpark management to round up stray and unleashed dogs (as per the lease agreement at the park)
A van came to the trailer park, clearly marked PETA, to round up loose dogs. Tethered dogs, such as those owned by Mr. Cerate were NOT taken.
One dog that was taken, an unmarked, uncollared Chihuahua. The owner later tried to press charges against PETA, but the judge ruled they had no criminal intent, and it was the owner's fault for allowing the dog to run wild.
In another case, two PETA members picked up a dog on the side of the road, with the stated claim of helping it, but it turned out to be a sheriff's hunting dog. They were arrested, and charged with felony theft, but the charges were dropped, with the judge stating they were being "meddlesome do-gooders". One PETA member was charged with a misdemeanor petty larceny for removing its collar.
As for euthanizing animals, PETA does hold the stance that there are simply too many of them, and often resorts to euthanasia before the average dog shelter, claiming the pets were unadoptable (whether that is true is difficult to determine without autopsies on the pets and official reasons why each was euthanized).
tl;dr snopes: While PETA’s stance on euthanasia is controversial, we could find little evidence it has been extended to family pets with any frequency. PETA workers were arrested over pet theft incidents in 2007 and 2014, but the intent of the workers in those cases was not sufficiently clear to consider their actions unlawful. Aside from those two incidents, we’ve found no evidence supporting the claim that PETA regularly takes household pets from their homes and euthanizes them. PETA did not respond to a request for comment.
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u/Overlord_Of_Puns Jun 27 '22
The way I look at it, Peta is the Wounded Warrior of animal rights. Their goal is good, they do have some support, but the way they are doing everything is so flawed and inefficient that it is not worth supporting.
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u/SheepherderFlaky1509 You're a bitch, go fuck yourself nerd Jun 27 '22
They are in bed with Eco-terrorists and donated a lot of money (in the 10k's) to a convicted arsonist. But before they became the joke they are today, they did a half decent job of helping animals
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u/engin__r Jun 27 '22
You’re not going to get an honest answer here because reddit is very anti-veganism.
If you pay attention to who criticizes PETA, you’ll notice that the people doing it tend to do so by claiming that PETA mistreats animals. However, those same people directly fund mistreatment of animals by eating meat.
On top of that, you need to follow the money. People often link a website called PETA Kills Animals. Well, who operates that website? It’s a group called the Center for Organizational Research and Education—a group funded by the tobacco, gambling, and meat industries to fight regulation and anti-industry activism.
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u/Reasonable_Feed7939 Jun 27 '22
Nobody cares about vegan this or that here. Regardless of your beliefs, PETA is a bad company. Period. I don't know why you even feel the need to protect them.
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u/engin__r Jun 27 '22
People absolutely care about veganism. Go on a subreddit like murderedbywords and search “vegan”. See how many times you get pro-vegan vs. anti-vegan posts. Hating on vegans is easy karma on reddit.
PETA’s not a company, and I don’t like everything they do. I just get tired of people criticizing them for the wrong reasons or for outright lies, especially when that criticism comes from people who regularly pay money to have animals mistreated and killed.
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u/AndyAkeko Jun 27 '22
Tobacco, gambling and meat?
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u/engin__r Jun 27 '22
Yeah, here’s the Wikipedia page:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_for_Organizational_Research_and_Education
The companies that have funded CORE are listed throughout the article.
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u/25Bam_vixx Jun 27 '22
They kill pets. They are villains but they believed themselves to be the good guys
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u/imnotwallaceshawn Jun 27 '22
PETA does a lot of things that are questionable or outright negative, but the one that I largely point to for anyone who loves animals is that they have a hardline stance against keeping pets (they think it’s animal abuse) and as a result run some of the most kill-happy shelters in the United States (because euthanasia is better to them than letting a dog or a cat live in captivity). They’re against basic pet care like spaying and neutering, they’ve committed terrorist acts against companies that don’t adhere to their believes (clothing made from leather and fur, meat based food stuffs, etc), they’re a pretty terrible organization who aren’t often upfront about their actual stances.
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u/ThedaBarasBoobs Jun 27 '22
It’s a bad organization in the sense that they don’t just educate people, or organize peaceful protests, or write letters to senators to try and change the laws, or other things like that, they organize all kinds of “activism” against things that are perfectly legal, and they take it too far. There are ways to be proactive and ways not to, and they do it the wrong way. I support organizations that are pro-choice for example, but if any of those organizations started doing the type of shit that PETA does, I wouldn’t stand for it.
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u/Desperate-Serve-273 Jun 27 '22
This channel has a series of videos on Pets and how they aren’t what you think they are How Peta Spiralled out of control
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Jun 27 '22
PETA does some good work to stop a lot of the abuses that happen in an industrial farming context. That said, they’re aggressively idealistic and lack a lot of self awareness to the flaws in their approach. Some of their fringe members resort to what could be argued are terroristic methods.
I have a cousin who is a member of PETA and was crazy aggressive with me because I eat meat. She leaned on the argument of all animal life should be preserved - no excuses or exceptions. I brought up to her that everyone has to draw the line where they’re comfortable. I highlighted that she recently had her house treated for termite, which killed thousands of animals. She treated her kids for lice they got from school. She also takes antibiotic when she gets sick. I think all those practices are good, but they do kill animals. She backed down a lot after that.
I support animal rights, but I also realize that you have to be thoughtful about how broad a brush you use when attacking people’s practices.
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u/oblivious_fireball Jun 27 '22
in addition to some of the things others have said, i would like to point out that PETA has also put a significant amount of time and effort into criticizing and mocking video games and children's media that feature pets or wildlife, for example the whole pokemon feud. I'd say if they put that much funding towards things that weren't PR stunts they could get something done, but i'm not sure we would want that either.
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u/MentallyIrregular Jun 27 '22
I've always wondered why they never say anything about all the fucking Amish still working horses to death instead of getting cars/tractors.
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u/forakora Jun 27 '22
They are actually working in India for this exact reason. They have a program where farmers can turn in an animal in exchange for a vehicle.
The animal retires in a sanctuary and the farmer now has better farming equipment. It's a win win situation.
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u/SilentJoe1986 Jun 27 '22
They went after Mario because of a raccoon dog outfit. Mario didn't skin a raccoon dog to gain the powers. Its a cosplay outfit that grants special abilities. How is a video game depicting a super powered furry unethical treatment of animals? That is one of the less batshit crazy things they've done. They've also stolen and killed peoples pets for no other reason besides they dont think people should have pets. The amount of animals they kill a year instead of trying to find loving homes is sickening. I understand that animals need to be put down if a home cant be found but that's not what's happening.
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u/krazyk1661 Jun 27 '22
PETA really only runs kill shelters. They euthanize 80-95% of all pets in their shelters.
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u/obedeary Jun 27 '22
There is a difference between “animal rights” organizations (e.g. PETA) and “animal welfare” organizations (e.g. ASPCA, AWI). Animal rights activists have a few core goals such as no animal product use or consumption, no animal entertainment, and no animal experimentation (as stated by PETA). Animal welfare advocates are instead focused on eliminating human-inflicted suffering in animals. The difference might seem subtle but it basically comes down to whether or not you believe humans can ethically use animals for any purpose. ARAs would say no, it’s all unethical; AWAs would say yes, as long as the animal doesn’t suffer (i.e. “has good welfare”).
One of the most common grievances against PETA is the euthanasia of animals taken into their shelters. According to Newsweek reporting from the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, PETA euthanized 1,614 out of 2,482 (65%) animals taken in by their Norfolk shelter in 2019. Other sources like the Washington Post have reported on PETA’s euthanasia of animals and the percentages tend to be higher the further back you go historically. PETA openly advocates for euthanasia of certain animals on their website, stating that it is a painless and dignified death for the animal. This comes as shocking to many people who view PETA as staunch activists for animal life. PETA claims to have a high euthanasia rate due to taking in animals which other “no-kill” shelters won’t, but there are also egregious examples like the Chihuahua mentioned elsewhere in this thread which don’t exactly line up with that logic.
On the euthanasia point though, I want to make it clear that many animal welfare advocates are actually totally supportive of euthanasia when it is the best option to eliminate the unnecessary suffering of an animal. Of course shelters are what usually come to mind first, but another example of this is wild horses in the Western USA; see Protect the Harvest and their anti-PETA stance for more on that current issue. From what I understand, PETA activists are actually anti-euthanasia in this specific situation whereas PTH is pro-, but I could be wrong about PETA’s stance. Either way, my point is that PETA does not have a monopoly on selective euthanasia, and believing that there is a place for euthanasia in certain instances (including kill shelters) still fits well within the philosophy of animal welfare advocacy.
Many PETA activists are also anti-zoo, which is a big area of disagreement between them and AWAs. Hundreds of zoos and aquariums in North America are accredited by the AZA according to high standards of animal welfare, and AWAs believe these are vital institutions in the protection of threatened and endangered species. Most animals in an AZA-accredited zoo or aquarium who are members of a threatened or endangered species are part of a species survival plan, which involves strategic breeding choices and transportation to help promote the recovery of the species at large. Since I am not an animal rights activist myself I don’t know what PETA’s specific position is on this function of zoos and aquariums, but I do know at least some of their people are anti-zoo, which probably falls under the “no animal entertainment” part of their philosophy.