• Would You Name Your Baby World Peace?

    Written by Michelle Kretzer

     © StarMaxinc

    A new report found that celebrities and their children often inspire baby names among the rest of us. For example, pop singer and PETA supporter Pink's daughter's name, Willow, made a list of top celeb-inspired names.

    With the plethora of animal-friendly celebrities out there, people who want to name their baby after someone whose heart is as big as his or her star power have many options to chose from, such as Portia, for a vegan role model who embodies cruelty-free beauty; Taraji, in honor of someone who wears her heart (but never animals) on her sleeve; and Kellan, for a boy who's not afraid to show his sensitive side, especially when it comes to helping animals.

    Who knows—maybe next year's top baby names will be Lea or Steve-O or even Metta World Peace

    Which animal-friendly stars do you think have names worthy of consideration for a new bundle of joy?

  • Baby Food Made Out of … Babies?

    Written by PETA

    This just in from an alert PETA member: Gerber is selling baby food made out of veal. For some reason, this struck us at the PETA Files as especially spit-up-inducing. Feeding babies to babies just seems sort of … I don't know, cannibalistic? Want some puréed fava beans with that, Junior?

                                  Would you feed me to your baby?


    But then we started thinking: Veal is one of those foods that even many carnivores shy away from because of the horrors that are now widely known to be involved in its production—horrors such as tearing babies away from their mothers and locking them in up boxes for a few months before prodding them on wobbly, atrophied legs to slaughter. But the truth is that most animals who are killed for food are still babies when they are strung up on the slaughter line.

    Because of "modern" innovations such as feeding animals growth-promoting drugs and selectively breeding them so that they'll grow fatter faster, pigs and turkeys are on average just 6 months old when they are killed, and chickens are just 7 weeks old. By comparison, steers who are raised for beef are old-timers when they are killed at between 1 and 2 years of age.

    It's enough to make strained carrots sound downright … grown-up.

    There's been some online chatter that the Veal and Veal Gravy baby food has been discontinued, but it's still listed on Gerber's website. Have you seen this "baby cruelty in a jar" at your local market?

    Written by Alisa Mullins

  • SeaWorld's 'Baby Boom'

    Written by PETA

    orca

    Two female orcas at SeaWorld Orlando are pregnant—one is expected to give birth later this month or in early June—but we're not celebrating.

    If the calves survive, what do they have to look forward to? Swimming endless circles in barren concrete tanks, doing circus-type tricks, and dying an early death. Twenty-one orcas died in U.S. SeaWorld facilities between 1986 and 2008—an average of nearly one each year for 22 years. Their deaths were caused by severe trauma, intestinal gangrene, acute hemorrhagic pneumonia, pulmonary abscesses, chronic kidney disease, chronic cardiovascular failure, septicemia, and influenza. In some cases, the cause of death could not even be determined, but it is clear that none of these animals died of old age.

    The father in both of the pregnancies is Tilikum, the same orca who attacked trainer Dawn Brancheau—ripping off her left arm and part of her scalp, crushing her ribs, and breaking bones throughout her body before drowning her. Despite knowing about the extreme danger posed by Tilikum—including the fact that he had killed humans twice before—SeaWorld refuses to "Free Tilly" most likely because he's a valuable and prodigious breeder. Tilikum has already sired 13 calves for SeaWorld.

    Enough is enough. Please take a moment to write to the Blackstone Group—the company that owns SeaWorld—and ask that it send Tilly and the other animal inmates in its facilities to sanctuaries.

    Written by Paula Moore

  • If It Was Good Enough for Jesus

    Written by PETA

    Got breast milk? In the wake of a recent report that says the nation could save billions on healthcare costs if more mothers breastfed their babies, we're running a billboard in Lexington, Kentucky, that encourages people to DLJD (Do Like Jesus Did):

     

    Breast Milk

     

    Kentucky has one of the lowest percentages of women who breastfeed their babies, and according to this new report, the state's children have an increased risk of falling victim to sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), necrotizing enterocolitis (the death of intestinal wall tissue), lower respiratory infections such as pneumonia, and other illnesses.

    Our billboard aims to show Kentucky residents that by fortifying human babies and saving the lives of cows, breast milk is also the blessed milk. Seriously—if it was good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for any baby.

    Written by Logan Scherer

REPORT CRUELTY

If you have a general question for PETA and would like a response, please e-mail Info@peta.org. If you need to report cruelty to an animal, please click here. If you are reporting an animal in imminent danger and know where to find the animal and if the abuse is taking place right now, please call your local police department. If the police are unresponsive, please call PETA immediately at 757-622-7382 and press 2. 

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Chicken Photo: © Rommel Manuel