Posted on 05/13/2005 8:06:46 PM PDT by CHARLITE
Hypocrisy is the mother of all credibility problems, and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has it in spades. While loudly complaining about the "unethical" treatment of animals by restaurant owners, grocers, farmers, scientists, anglers, and countless other Americans, the group has its own dirty little secret.
PETA kills animals. By the thousands.
From July 1998 through the end of 2003, PETA killed over 10,000 dogs, cats, and other "companion animals" -- at its Norfolk, Virginia headquarters. That's more than five defenseless animals every day. Not counting the dogs and cats PETA spayed and neutered, the group put to death over 85 percent of the animals it took in during 2003 alone. And its angel-of-death pattern shows no sign of changing.
On its 2002 federal income-tax return, PETA claimed a $9,370 write-off for a giant walk-in freezer, the kind most people use as a meat locker or for ice-cream storage. But animal-rights activists don't eat meat or dairy foods. So far, the group hasn't confirmed the obvious -- that it's using the appliance to store the bodies of its victims.
In 2000, when the Associated Press first noted PETA's Kervorkian-esque tendencies, PETA president Ingrid Newkirk complained that actually taking care of animals costs more than killing them. "We could become a no-kill shelter immediately," she admitted.
PETA kills animals. Because it has other financial priorities.
PETA raked in nearly $29 million last year in income, much of it raised from pet owners who think their donations actually help animals. Instead, the group spends huge sums on programs equating people who eat chicken with Nazis, scaring young children away from drinking milk, recruiting children into the radical animal-rights lifestyle, and intimidating businessmen and their families in their own neighborhoods. PETA has also spent tens of thousands of dollars defending arsonists and other violent extremists.
PETA claims it engages in outrageous media-seeking stunts "for the animals." But which animals? Carping about the value of future two-piece dinners while administering lethal injections to puppies and kittens isn't ethical. It's hypocritical -- with a death toll that PETA would protest if it weren't their own doing.
PETA kills animals. And its leaders dare lecture the rest of us.
I'm a little confused. So they operate this "shelter" (so to speak) which is actually a dog and cat killing field?
Do people bring them to this shelting thinking the animal will get adopted or does PETA go out and round up strays? Both?? Where do they get the dogs and cats?
not shelting, shelter
Your use of the term, anarchist, is both inaccurate and somewhat offensive. A true anarchist wants neither to be controlled (by government) nor CONTROL OTHERS. He or she merely wishes to be left alone and is willing to fight for that right. NO ONE who wants more/bigger/stronger government can ever properly be called an anarchist. Nor would a true anarchist be interested in the wanton or wilfull destruction of either people or private property. Please choose your terms more carefully.
WRT PETA, they are as socialist/marxist as any old line Stalinist, which is hardly a revelation. They represent the total antithesis of anarchy.
Thanks for pointing out the article talking about the hypocrisy of PETA.
They spend very little time trying to find homes for animals brought to them. They DO leave the people with the DIRECT impression that they try to find homes for the animals. Many even bring animals to them with a donation.
Most of the animals spend about 3 days at the facility and are put to sleep.
PETA is about money, lobbying, trafficking. They do spend time stocking shelters underneath their affiliates with animals to justify them staying open for the grants, donations and adoption fees. But the fuzzy animals are more of a front.
It is so much more fun telling other people what to do than actually doing it yourself.
I knew they lobbied, supported eco-terrorism, and were a front for leftist/socialist activism etc. But I'd never heard of the "shelters". Thanks.
Well, goodness, the last thing any of us on FR want to do is to give offense to anyone! The very last!
May we assume from your careful definition and defense of the term "anarchist" that you are yourself an anarchist, by your definition of the term?
Actually, no, though I am close. An anarchist believes in a complete absence of government, which undoubtedly is not as bad as some would have us believe by making the term anarchist a perjorative. However, I believe that we do need a referee to iron out disputes and an authority to house criminals and PROTECT OUR BORDERS. However, well over 90 percent of what FedGov AND the States do is utterly out of bounds to them, constitutionally speaking. I would ELIMINATE that 90 plus percent and then we can debate the rest of it. If we could shrink government to the size it was in 1775, I'd pretty well be happy.
Bear in mind that this country originated on the notion that each individual was his own sovereign and that government was granted VERY LIMITED authority to do certain specific things on our behalf and in our names. HOWEVER, there are two caveats to that: First, that the government, acting as our agent, can do NOTHING that is not spelled out in the founding documents (see Amendment 10); and, Second, that we cannot grant ANY power or authority to government which we ourselves do not possess. In other words, if I, as an individual, do not have the legitimate power to compel you to pay for some medical treatment or other for my mother, I cannot grant that authority to a third party (government) to do in my name. I cannot give what is NOT MINE TO GIVE.
Actually, no, though I am close. An anarchist believes in a complete absence of government, which undoubtedly is not as bad as some would have us believe by making the term anarchist a perjorative. However, I believe that we do need a referee to iron out disputes and an authority to house criminals and PROTECT OUR BORDERS. However, well over 90 percent of what FedGov AND the States do is utterly out of bounds to them, constitutionally speaking. I would ELIMINATE that 90 plus percent and then we can debate the rest of it. If we could shrink government to the size it was in 1775, I'd pretty well be happy.
Bear in mind that this country originated on the notion that each individual was his own sovereign and that government was granted VERY LIMITED authority to do certain specific things on our behalf and in our names. HOWEVER, there are two caveats to that: First, that the government, acting as our agent, can do NOTHING that is not spelled out in the founding documents (see Amendment 10); and, Second, that we cannot grant ANY power or authority to government which we ourselves do not possess. In other words, if I, as an individual, do not have the legitimate power to compel you to pay for some medical treatment or other for my mother, I cannot grant that authority to a third party (government) to do in my name. I cannot give what is NOT MINE TO GIVE.
Would it not be more useful, then, to define yourself as a libertarian? You are certainly correct in saying that "anarchist" has such pejorative connotations, irresistably reminding the listener of anarchy.
I cannot disagree with much of what you say, particularly your feeling that you would be happy if modern government were to be shrunk to the size it was in the late eighteenth century. I only ask that government do for the citizens what they cannot do for themselves. We can build our own roads and even secure our borders, as has been demonstrated in the past few weeks, but building aircraft carriers may be a little beyond our reach.
bttt
I am not a Libertarian because I disagree strongly with them on the open borders issue. I believe that there is a Constitutional mandate to protect our borders and many Libertarians believe that it's OK for foreigners to violate them with impunity. My feeling is that it matters not WHERE someone comes from (my wife's an immigrant); it only matters that they follow the rules set up for entry and do NOT try to sneak in, especially with the connivance of their own government, which is an act of war by any standard. I believe that illegal border violations will come to a halt and then become pointless when we STOP handing out goodies such as "citizenship" to anchor babies and welfare, drivers' licenses, favorable college tuition to border jumpers and their illegal offspring, etcetera. After we remove the incentives for the illegality, we can probably remove restrictions on entry, since the sick, lame and lazy won't bother to come here, as there won't be anymore freebies to be had. The ones who DO come here will be the ones who want to PRODUCE and make something of themselves, to build a new life here and ASSIMILATE into our country. The ones we do NOT need are the ones who merely want to send remittances home (milk our economy) and not become AMERICANS. The ones who want to escape the brutality and hardships of their original country, then try to turn OUR country into a duplicate of what they went to some effort to leave. My ancestors have been here since the Pilgrims landed. We became AMERICANS. Anyone else who wants to come here to live is welcome, AS LONG AS they come in the front door, like honest folks have done since doors were invented.
this isn't new... but always worth reminding people.
People always uphold their core principles. They just don't always say it in so many words.
Good point
Everytime I hear the word PETA I suddenly get the urge to throw on a fur coat, jump into a SUV and go out for a big dinner of VEAL...
um... that seems be a contradiction. That definition is closer to libertarian.
Don't worry about it. Some people just have to pick nits off the elephant in the living room.
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