PETA: 7 Things You Probably Didn't Know
Posted: Sunday, May 17, 2009 - 9 comment(s) [ Comment ] - 0 trackback(s) [ Trackback ]
Category: Politics
I was debating on whether or not to post this information so quickly behind the post on 7 Things
You Probably Didn't Know About the Humane Society.
Primarily because CattleGrower.com's primary purpose is to promote fellowship and networking
opportunities for livestock producers rather than to become a political forum.
However, given the strong appeal and subsequent readership of 7 Things You Probably Didn't
Know About the Humane Society I just couldn't help myself in posting and sharing this with you as
well ....
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1) According to government documents, PETA employees have killed more than 19,200 dogs,
cats, puppies, and kittens since 1998. This behavior continues despite PETA’s moralizing about
the “unethical” treatment of animals by farmers, scientists, restaurant owners, circuses, hunters,
fishermen, zookeepers, and countless other Americans. PETA puts to death over 90 percent of
the animals it accepts from members of the public who expect the group to make a reasonable
attempt to find them adoptive homes. PETA holds absolutely no open-adoption shelter hours at
its Norfolk, VA headquarters, choosing instead to spend part of its $32 million annual income on
a contract with a crematory service to periodically empty hundreds of animal bodies from its large
walk-in freezer.
2) PETA president and co-founder Ingrid Newkirk has described her group’s overall goal as “total
animal liberation.” This means the complete abolition of meat, milk, cheese, eggs, honey, zoos,
aquariums, circuses, wool, leather, fur, silk, hunting, fishing, and pet ownership. In a 2003 profile
of Newkirk in The New Yorker, author Michael Specter wrote that Newkirk has had at least one
seeing-eye dog taken away from its blind owner. PETA is also against all medical research that
requires the use of animals, including research aimed at curing AIDS and cancer.
3) PETA has given tens of thousands of dollars to convicted arsonists and other violent criminals.
This includes a 2001 donation of $1,500 to the North American Earth Liberation Front (ELF), an
FBI-certified “domestic terrorist” group responsible for dozens of firebombs and death threats.
During the 1990s, PETA paid $70,200 to Rodney Coronado, an Animal Liberation Front (ALF)
serial arsonist convicted of burning down a Michigan State University research laboratory. In his
sentencing memorandum, a federal prosecutor implicated PETA president Ingrid Newkirk in that
crime. PETA vegetarian campaign coordinator Bruce Friedrich has also told an animal rights
convention that “blowing stuff up and smashing windows” is “a great way to bring about animal
liberation,” adding, “Hallelujah to the people who are willing to do it.”
4) PETA activists regularly target children as young as six years old with anti-meat and anti-milk
propaganda, even waiting outside their schools to intercept them without notifying their parents.
One piece of kid-targeted PETA literature tells small children: “Your Mommy Kills Animals!”
PETA brags that its messages reach over 1.2 million minor children, including 30,000 kids
between the ages of 6 and 12, all contacted by e-mail without parental supervision. One PETA
vice president told the Fox News Channel’s audience: “Our campaigns are always geared
towards children, and they always will be.”
5) PETA’s president has said that “even if animal research resulted in a cure for AIDS, we would
be against it.” And PETA has repeatedly attacked research foundations like the March of Dimes,
the Pediatric AIDS Foundation, and the American Cancer Society, solely because they support
animal-based research aimed at curing life-threatening diseases and birth defects. And PETA
helped to start and manage a quasi-medical front group, the misnamed Physicians Committee
for Responsible Medicine, to attack medical research head-on.
6) PETA has compared Jewish victims of the Nazi Holocaust to farm animals and Jesus Christ to
pigs. PETA’s religious campaigns include a website that claims—despite ample evidence to the
contrary—that Jesus Christ was a vegetarian. PETA holds protests at houses of worship, even
suing one church that tried to protect its members from Sunday-morning harassment. Its
billboards taunt Christians with the message that hogs “died for their sins.” PETA insists, contrary
to centuries of rabbinical teaching, that the Jewish ritual of kosher slaughter shouldn’t be allowed.
And its infamous “Holocaust on Your Plate” campaign crassly compared the Jewish victims of
Nazi genocide to farm animals.
7) PETA frequently looks the other way when its celebrity spokespersons don’t practice what it
preaches. As gossip bloggers and Hollywood journalists have noted, Pamela Anderson’s Dodge
Viper (auctioned to benefit PETA) had a “luxurious leather interior”; Jenna Jameson was
photographed fishing, slurping oysters, and wearing a leather jacket just weeks after launching an
anti-leather campaign for PETA; Morrissey got an official “okay” from PETA after eating at a
steakhouse; Dita von Teese has written about her love of furs and foie gras; Steve-O built a
career out of abusing small animals on film; the officially “anti-fur” Eva Mendes often wears fur
anyway; and Charlize Theron’s celebrated October 2007 Vogue cover shoot featured several
suede garments. In 2008, “Baby Phat” designer Kimora Lee Simmons became a PETA
spokesmodel despite working with fur and leather, after making a $20,000 donation to the animal
rights group
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Unpacking the HSUS ( Humane Society of the United States) actually
PETA Gravy Train
There are only two things certain in life, as the saying goes, and a byproduct of one of them requires nonprofit
organizations to file paperwork with the IRS. So now that the deceptively named “Humane Society” of the United States
(HSUS) has submitted its "Form 990" for 2008, we thought it was time to take a close look. The tax filing itself is a bit
more detailed than ones in the past, thanks to some new IRS rules. And more detail equals a clearer picture of exactly
what HSUS is doing -- and what it's not doing -- with all its money. [Click here to view the full document.]
HSUS reported spending almost $20 million on “campaigns, legislation, and litigation”—enough to worry any livestock
farmer or hunter looking to keep their chosen lifestyle alive. The group collected over $86 million in contributions, and
spent more than $24 million on fundraising, including $4 million on professional fundraisers. Think about it: 28 cents of
every dollar contributed to HSUS goes back out the door to raise more money. HSUS even paid a single “lockbox”
company more than $4.2 million to count and process its cash hauls. We won’t comment on that company’s curious
"ALF" initials (for Arizona Lockbox & Fulfillment).
The bottom line is the same as it ever was: HSUS rakes in millions from unsuspecting Americans who may confuse the
animal rights group with an unaffiliated local humane society. And with all this cash flying around, it’s no surprise that
41 HSUS employees made at least $100,000 last year. All told, HSUS paid out over $30.9 million in salaries, wages,
and other employee compensation.
HSUS CEO Wayne Pacelle earned more than $250,000 in salary and benefits in 2008. We wouldn’t begrudge him a
large salary, of course: He runs an animal-rights business “charity,” after all.
But the real trouble lies in where most HSUS money doesn’t go: to pet shelters. In contrast with the group’s
extravagant spending on people, HSUS’s total grant allocation was less than $4.7 million. And of that, almost half went
to a political campaign committee called “Californians for Humane Farms,” the main lobbying organization responsible
for California’s “Proposition 2” ballot initiative.
For all the cute pictures of puppies and kitties on HSUS paraphernalia, you’d think it would operate a pet shelter, or at
least give a substantial portion of its money to one. But HSUS has lobbying to do, a PETA-inspired agenda to push,
meat eaters to stigmatize, and livestock farmers to put out to pasture. Lobbying? Oh, yes. HSUS takes four full pages
to detail its lobbying activities on the state and federal levels.
With all the politicking going on, the animals—remember them?—seem to get lost in the shuffle. We added up the
totals, and HSUS gave only a little more than $450,000—that’s just half of one percent of its total budget—in grants to
organizations providing hands-on care to dogs and cats. That’s less than 11 percent of what it paid “ALF” (see above)
just to count its money.
We’re musing today about HSUS’s next big self-marketing blitz, and some new slogans it might want to use. Our
favorite? “HSUS: Feed the lawyers, save the fundraisers, screw the pets.”
Reprinted With permission from the The Center for Consumer Freedom