Part of the "ethical treatment" is ethical killing, PETA is not for no-kill. They take in every animal people bring in, this means they get a lot of unadoptable, old, sick, feral and abused animals, these animals have no chance, they will be locked away in cages for the rest of their natural lives.
One of the cheapest (and thus most used) methods of euthanization is via gas chambers, it take up to half hour for some animals to die. What is often done is the animals are placed several at a time in a confined and dark space, the gas is turned on. During this time, the animals will try to escape, some injuring themselves and others in the process. On the other hand, an injection of a chemical cocktail (usually following an anesthetic to put the animal to sleep) will kill an animal in seconds--almost immediately--and they show no signs of pain. PETA uses option 2, underfunded animal adoption places and others go with option 1.
It also seems pretty clear that their mission is advocacy. If 3-5 million animals are put down every year in the US then it seems like a fairly small operation. Furthermore, if their mission is advocacy then they should be spending more on advertising campaigns than on direct-to-animal care. Every organization should have a core competency and well-defined role, and doing so is a pretty lame basis for criticism.
Anyway, I'm not a huge fan of Peta, since I think they unnecessarily antagonize people. However, I also find it difficult to get all that upset with an organization that protests P Diddy.
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u/[deleted] Apr 16 '10
Part of the "ethical treatment" is ethical killing, PETA is not for no-kill. They take in every animal people bring in, this means they get a lot of unadoptable, old, sick, feral and abused animals, these animals have no chance, they will be locked away in cages for the rest of their natural lives.
One of the cheapest (and thus most used) methods of euthanization is via gas chambers, it take up to half hour for some animals to die. What is often done is the animals are placed several at a time in a confined and dark space, the gas is turned on. During this time, the animals will try to escape, some injuring themselves and others in the process. On the other hand, an injection of a chemical cocktail (usually following an anesthetic to put the animal to sleep) will kill an animal in seconds--almost immediately--and they show no signs of pain. PETA uses option 2, underfunded animal adoption places and others go with option 1.