This is rediculous and disturbing

[Doug]

Ok, I am all for the ethical treatment of animals and against animal abuse. I also hunt and eat meat. For my English class in college we have to write an 8-12 page position paper, I chose to write mine on how PETA and other animal rights groups are hypocrites and go to unnecessary extremes. I don't mean to offend anybody here who may be a member of PETA but I stumbled across something that is disturbing.

Apparently PETA targets children as young as five with "comics" if that is what you want to call them. They hand these out at schools and other places where children are commonly present. Here is a link to one of the "comics" but I must tell you it is somewhat graphic so proceed with caution.

http://www.consumerfreedom.com/downloads/reference/docs/040726_mommykills.pdf

They fact that they distribute this to children is unacceptable in my opinion. I think it just got really easy for me to write this paper.

[KLB]

You'll have to do a Google search for it, but a month or so back I saw some news articles about individuals at a chapter of PETA who were picking up stray dogs and cats from local animal shelters with the understanding that the animals were going to be placed in loving homes. Instead they were being euthanized and dumped into a dumpster behind a grocery store. The justification was that they were making sure that they were more humanely euthanized than was happening at the shelters. There was a big flap about this issue and several key PETA people were fired over the incident.

During her research for a series of prairie dog articles that my mother was writing for my site she discovered that there was protest and outrage about some of the relocation of prairie dogs (not necessarily PETA but animal rights groups in general) because the colonies they were being relocated to were part of an effort to reintroduce black footed ferrets, which are on the endangered species list.

Black footed ferrets ONLY feed on prairie dogs and live in prairie dog burrows. They were driven to the brink of extinction by efforts to poison prairie dogs (the ferrets ate poisoned prairie dogs and died). In order to reestablish a stable black footed ferret population and there by allow nature to naturally regulate prairie dog populations, protected prairie dog colonies had to be set up to act as a safe food supply for the black footed ferrets. Animal rights activists were upset because prairie dogs being sent to these colonies stood a good chance of being killed (never mind it is by their natural enemy).

Basically many animal rights activists care more about the well being of individual animals than they do the well being of an entire species (even if it is an endangered species). The problem is they try to place the morals and rights we have for humans onto animals and fail to understand that in nature (unlike in human society) the needs of the species outweighs the needs of the individual. Or to put it another way, the wellbeing of a species often needs to trump the wellbeing of individuals in that species. Yes black footed ferrets kill prairie dogs, but without the black footed ferret to kill of sick, injured or otherwise weaker prairie dogs and without the black footed ferret to help keep prairie dog populations in check, the overall health of prairie dogs as a species will suffer.

My series of articles on prairie dogs will end up being a four part series with two articles already published. The first article is "Prairie Dogs: A Threatened Species or Public Health Nuisance? (http://environmentalchemistry.com/yogi/environmental/200703prairiedogs.html)" This article basically sets the stage for the next three articles. The second article is "Prairie Dog Control Part I: Non-Lethal Control Techniques (http://environmentalchemistry.com/yogi/environmental/200704prairiedogcontrolnonlethal.html)." This article touches on the black footed ferret issue.

Happy hunting, err I mean research on your paper and good luck, it sounds like a very good topic. I'd be interested in reading it once you get your grade back on it.

[Chris]

http://media.putfile.com/petaBS

[Selkirk]

You may already be aware, but PETA was one of the early domain name dispute cases. Some guy put a site on peta.org called "People for Eating Tasty Animals." Here is an archive of the site from 1996 (http://www.mtd.com/tasty/), when PETA filed a complaint with the registrar and the domain name was put on hold. A lawsuit was filed, then the domain was turned over to PETA in 2000.

I remember visiting the tasty animals site when it was still located on the peta.org domain and finding it amusing. I may have even showed it to a couple people.

[KLB]

WOW!! Chris, that was AWESOME!

[Chris]

Oh ya, Penn & Teller have a great show. If you don't get showtime try getting it on DVD:

http://www.amazon.com/Penn-Teller-Bullsh-First-Season/dp/B00019PDNY/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2/002-0819536-6880818?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1175710366&sr=8-2

They've got like 4 or 5 seasons out.

Of course anyone really far to the left or really far to the right politically will probably hate it, but a common sense libertarian like me eats it up.

[Doug]

Yea, I downloaded the entire Penn and Teller Peta Episode (I know, its stealing but all it did was make me want to buy all thier other seasons and I plan on it). I think that show is great, I am actually going to reference it in my paper.

[KLB]

My one suggestion would be to make sure to be extremely careful with your documentation and avoid passion as much as possible. Put simply make sure to defend your position with facts and reliable documentation. For example, Pen & Teller's use IRS tax records and court documents was great.

[paul]

From the "Dune" science fiction series "The purpose of the predator is to improve the prey."

[Doug]

Yea, I'm going to do my best to make sure I am using facts and not just my opinion. What I am finding, though, is there is a whole bunch of surprising facts out there. It shouldn't be too hard to get my position across with facts at all.

[KLB]

From the "Dune" science fiction series "The purpose of the predator is to improve the prey."

The irony of nature is that often times the prey doesn't become stronger at defending against the predator, rather the predator often times helps prevent of bad genetic traits unrelated to the predator/prey relationship, helps reduce the spread of disease and help maintain a stable population size. Often times the prey has evolved a reproduction strategy that offsets predation. If the predator is removed, the population of prey explodes beyond what the habitat can support, then as a result of disease and starvation the prey's population crashes precipitously. Sometimes the prey species can not readily recover from the resulting population crash.

[demosfen]

The fact that they distribute this to children is unacceptable in my opinion.

What is wrong with someone expressing his opinion? It doesn't matter how wrong or extreme. Isn't it what freedom of speech is about?
I do believe that as a parent, you should have a right to censor what your child is influenced by. Something that we don't always have, but nevertheless it's not a reason to undermine freedom of speech.
When Jehovah Witnesses knock on my door, I won't talk to them, but I sure want them to be able to say what they want. I have a right to close my door and not talk to them, and I excercise it every time. No harm done
I am far from being a PETA supporter, but just because their views are unpopular doesn't mean they don't have a right to speak out. Say, I don't support the President, so I just walk out of the room when Fox channel is on, so that I don't have to hear it. Everyone should be able to say whatever he wants whenever he wants to say it

[Chris]

I think its more about impressionable children being indoctrinated into parental beliefs without being given the opportunity to decide for themselves.

[KLB]

What is wrong with someone expressing his opinion? It doesn't matter how wrong or extreme. Isn't it what freedom of speech is about?
He didn't say it should be illegal, he said it was unacceptable in his opinion. There is big difference. Just because something is legal doesn't mean it should be considered socially acceptable and I'll agree that PETA's targeting of children in this manner is a classic example of this.

One thing I saw from the quotes from people within PETA and the ALF is that they are every bit the threat to our country and society that certain individual hiding in a cave in you know where is to us. In their own words they endorsed violence and acts of terrorism to force their cause. This is about as amoral as one can get.

[agua]

I think its more about impressionable children being indoctrinated into parental beliefs without being given the opportunity to decide for themselves.In a roundabout way it is similar to Mcdonalds and their happy meals :)

[Chris]

Oh... you know in the peta show where they talk about that guy who firebombed an MSU research building? I actually was attending the school at the time and then later when I was working in this lab they had to change all their security about who they let in to see the research and stuff. (although we worked on plants, not animals).

[Doug]

Animals are just the first step, I'm sure they'll move on to plants soon enough. Then what will we eat?

[KLB]

Animals are just the first step, I'm sure they'll move on to plants soon enough. Then what will we eat?

Don't you get it? Their goal is the total elimination of the Human species from planet earth. Well at least from vast parts of it as we are basically an invasive species like Kudzu.:p

[Cutter]

Look at the positive side, PETA does a great job at putting a large group of society's nutjobs to work at impossible goals. I would be more concerned if their goals were achievable.

[Generalissimo]

I'm a vegan myself, but I'm not fan of PETA. I think if I'd come across them I'd have freaked, they're idiots who seem to care more about Canadian seals than important human issues. There's much better vegetarian groups that are their to help those who have chosen to be vegetarian learn how to cook vegetarian meals, get all vitamins, etc, rather than spend millions on stupid propaganda aimed to make vegetarianism seem cool to teenagers like peta seem to do..

[KLB]

Take a load of the pet laws that were just passed in Louisville, Kentucky:
http://equestnetwork.com/equest_life_publication_view.php?id=102

It will blow your mind.

Dough you will certainly have more than enough material for your paper.

[KLB]

Here's another link for the Louisville Kentucky ordinance:

http://www.louisville-pets.com/

Looks like the city ticked off a lot of their residents. Can you say "throw the bums out at the next election"?

[Cutter]

Completely unrelated to PETA, but did any one catch this week's Pen & Teller? Good stuff :lol:

[KLB]

Well yes it wasn't directly an PETA issue, but it is an animal rights related issue and an example of someone writing "animal rights" ordinances without thinking about the consequences.

Something to think about with pet dogs and cats. At least with dogs they became domesticated some 25,000 years ago (depending upon who you talk to). It didn't happen overnight, but it was a mutually beneficial event. In technical terms it is called a symbiotic relationship. What became the domestic dog probably started off by following humans around as an easy source of food (the scraps left behind, not the humans). In time humans found them to be good guards particularly at night so they encouraged the "dogs" to stick around by feeding them. Each species depended upon the other to improve their own life. In time the relationship continued to grow until what we have today.

Let's face reality, even a hard working dog like a sled dog or working Border Collie has a much easier, safer and longer life than their counterparts in the wild. Lord knows, my mom's dogs have a pretty plush life.

[Chris]

Completely unrelated to PETA, but did any one catch this week's Pen & Teller? Good stuff :lol:
I'm suprised they didn't mention Janet Jackson.

[Cutter]

I guess if it came down to Janet Jackson and footage of their own models running around topless it was an easy decision.

[Cutter]

Just ran into a very interesting article (non-PETA.)

http://www.americanthinker.com/printpage/?url=http://www.americanthinker.com/2007/04/ban_the_bulb.html

[Chris]

heh, the future is in ultrabright LED technology anyways.