Lansbricae / CC by 3.0

Media outlets everywhere are reporting that a home on New York's Long Island is for sale. Why all the buzz? This house is well known as the "Amityville Horror house," the infamous site of alleged paranormal activity brought on by gruesome murders at the home as depicted in the horror classic The Amityville Horror.

Whether or not you believe in ghosts, there's no denying the horrors that countless animals suffer in factory farms before they are cruelly killed in slaughterhouses. So enter PETA: We've written to the current owner to propose that we be allowed to rent the residence so that we can set up shop—er, haunted house.

PETA's "Amityville Slaughterhouse of Horrors" would guarantee chills (and likely some sleepless nights) for visitors who will experience what life and death are like for victims of factory farms and slaughterhouses. Of course, it wouldn't be all gore and horror: Our walk-through exhibit would also include an on-site café where visitors can learn about simple, tasty alternatives to butchered animal bits.

Will we be bringing the haunting real-life tales of tormented animals to Amityville? We'll let you know—in the meantime, make sure your own kitchen doesn't look like a murder scene by going vegan.

Written by Karin Bennett

My bad. I meant "Sex and the Kitty," PETA's hilarious ad promoting spaying and neutering. I guess I got a little Carried away because Sex and the City 2 hits theaters today. A funny take on a serious matter, SATK (like SATC) is an R-rated feature about girls in heat. The difference is that unlike SATC's lusty litter of sex kittens, real cats can't practice safe sex. Just one unspayed cat and her offspring can produce 420,000 kittens in seven years. That's almost as many men as Samantha dates during the same time period!

So sit back, sip on a cosmo, and get in the mood for SATC 2 by watching SATK. Then let me know whether you're on Team Big or Team Aiden (I'm on Team Fix-Your-Kitty).

Written by Amy Skylark Elizabeth

Over the years, Cloris Leachman has won numerous awards for her acting (my fave: Nurse Diesel). Her fancy footwork drew applause (and kisses) on Dancing With the Stars. And the longtime vegetarian turned heads everywhere when she became one of PETA's Lettuce Ladies.

Now Cloris is drawing rave reviews for her appearance in a hilarious public service announcement promoting spaying and neutering. Condoms may be effective birth control for humans, but they don't work for dogs and cats. She wants everyone to know that curbing suffering for millions of animals is a snap: One SNIP can prevent the birth of as many as 420,000 cats in just seven years or 67,000 puppies in six years. That's why she wanted to make this spot the performance of a lifetime. Watch the outtakes and try to tell me that this woman isn't a comedic genius:

Cloris is positively glorious, but she can't do it alone. She needs your help in educating the masses about the importance of spaying and neutering—from your front yard and beyond.

Written by Karin Bennett

Here's something you won't hear too often: Austrian nuns opened a health spa to raise money for their convent after their chicken farm "fell flat." The nuns even use high-pressure hoses to spray chilled water at guests to stimulate their skin. The whole thing might not sound very conventional (there's no buff masseuse in a muscle shirt), but, hey, it's better than a chicken-breeding business. You go, sisters!

Perhaps they'll inspire the monks at Our Lady of Calvary Abbey, a monastery in Canada, to shut down their despicable factory farm and open a Jazzercise club—or at least switch to some other non-animal venture, such as making preserves, brewing beer, or growing vegetables. The monks at Mepkin Abbey made the compassionate decision to shut down their egg-laying operation and start growing oyster mushrooms following a PETA investigation.

So before you post a comment about the church's massage technique (you know you want to), please take a moment to urge the monks at Our Lady of Calvary to follow the example of their brothers at Mepkin and their sisters at Marienkron and convert to a humane alternative.

Thanks to David Best for sending this story our way.

Written by Heather Moore

Many Canadians are against their country's annual seal slaughter—the biggest massacre of marine mammals in the world—but the Canadian government has yet to put a stop to it. Not only is the government supporting the barbaric acts of bludgeoning and shooting baby seals, it is also spending taxpayer dollars to do so. Canadians, it's your home and your hard-earned money, and we need you to speak up for seals now.

The Parliament of Canada needs to hear from Canadians who don't want this massacre to go on. Let's keep the ice floes (and Canada's hands) blood-free, shall we? We've created a call log that you can use to ask your members of Parliament to support Senator Mac Harb's bill, which would end the barbaric seal slaughter.

Download the log here and get a "No Fur" pin if you get 10 of your friends, family members, or coworkers to make a brief call. When you've filled out a call log sheet, e-mail a scanned copy to ActionTeam@PETA.org or send it to the address below. Make sure to include your full name, address, and phone number along with the completed call log:

Action Team501 Front St.
Norfolk, VA 23510
USA

It's easy for the Canadian Parliament to ignore this bloodshed because it doesn't see its country's ice stained red. This is your chance to show Parliament the reality behind the massacre.

It's summertime, and the living is easy—unless you're an animal who's killed for the grill. No one wants to be butchered, basted, and barbequed. For the love of hogs, let's kick this barbeque season off right by helping men kick their meat habit! And how better to do that than with John Joseph's book Meat Is for Pussies: A How-To Guide for Dudes Who Want to Get Fit, Kick Ass, and Take Names.

If the title doesn't grab your attention, then the subject matter will. More of a boot-camp type of book than a beach read, Joseph makes men face the horrors of factory farming before outlining a plan to guide guys toward a happier, healthier, and more humane lifestyle. Can you say cruelty-free cook-out?

C'mon, you know you want to win this must-read for men. So guys, tell us why you need this book. Ladies, tell us how your brother, father, boyfriend, next-door neighbor, or any guy in your life can benefit from it. The three people who leave comments that most make us want to whip a guy into shape will win a copy of this aptly titled how-to guide.

Here are the deets: The contest ends on June 9, 2010, and we'll pick the winners on June 11, 2010. Be sure to read our privacy policy and terms and conditions, as you're agreeing to both by commenting.

Good luck!

Written by Amy Skylark Elizabeth

Sometimes I consider myself a hardened PETA veteran. With each new investigation I force myself to watch, I convince myself that that I've seen the worst abuses that animals are subjected to. But then something like this new video, which was shot by an undercover worker at an Ohio dairy factory farm, hits my desk, and I am again moved to tears by the way people exploit and abuse animals:

In the video, which was recorded over the past few weeks by Mercy For Animals, workers at Conklin Dairy Farms are seen beating cows with crowbars and stabbing them with pitchforks. One worker wires a cow's nose to a metal bar and then repeatedly beats the cow with another bar as she bleeds.

These findings are similar to what PETA revealed when we went undercover at a Land O'Lakes supplier in Pennsylvania. Over the course of several months, PETA's investigation documented that cows who had trouble standing were kicked and electro-shocked. One cow's gangrenous, infected teat ruptured while she was being milked by a machine. Another cow collapsed in a deep pool of liquid manure and was left to languish there for hours as the urine and manure covered her body and coated her eyes, nose, and mouth.

The next time someone asks you, "What's wrong with eating dairy products?" tell them, "Everything!" and then show them these videos.

Please take a minute to share this investigation via e-mail, Facebook, and Twitter. Then let your friends and family know that the best way to help prevent cows from suffering these abuses is to go vegan. If you haven't already taken that leap, check out these cruelty-free alternatives to dairy foods to get started.

Update: A man who police believe to be one of the dairy farm workers who was recorded on video beating cows with crowbars and poking them with pitchforks was charged yesterday with 12 counts of cruelty to animals!

Billy Joe Gregg Jr., 25, was jailed in Mechanicsburg and was to be arraigned on Thursday. Each cruelty-to-animals charge he faces carries a maximum penalty of 90 days in jail and a $750 fine.

Written by Shawna Flavell

My "Things That Make You Go Aww" folder is thick with the obvious and the not-so-obvious.

Today that file is bursting at the seams, thanks to Sergeant Mark Fry, a caring cop in Toledo, Ohio, who raced to respond to a call about a pregnant deer who'd been hit by a car. Because of her severe injuries, the doe was euthanized, but her fawn was saved, thanks to Fry's swift, decisive action. He not only performed a C-section at the scene, he also administered CPR to the surviving fawn and then instinctively knew to nourish the weak baby with the doe's milk. Later, during a media interview, he admonished the unknown hit-and-run driver for fleeing the scene and abandoning the injured animals.

Sergeant Mark Fry's heroic efforts reflect his belief that "[a] life is a life, it doesn't matter if it's an animal or if it's a human being." For his compassionate actions, we're presenting him with PETA's "One Can Make a Difference" award. Please leave Sergeant Mark Fry a note of thanks in the comments section, and then read up on how to help deer and other animals in your city.

Written by Karin Bennett

Animal abusers, be warned: You do not want to mess with PETA cruelty caseworker Kristin DeJournett. Not only is she relentless in pursuing justice against people who hurt and kill animals, she's also a second-degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do.

After a rigorous series of tryouts that tested competitors' stamina, technique, and expertise, Kristin was recently chosen from among thousands of black belts across the country to participate in a prestigious international Tae Kwon Do tournament in England.

To prepare for the competition, Kristin and her teammates met twice weekly for grueling practice sessions that lasted up to four hours. Kristin also trained daily for at least an hour with jogging, sprinting, and calisthenics—all fueled by a vegan diet, of course.

"I was able to build lean muscle and shed fat by eating lots of vegetable protein (tofu, beans, and faux meat), whole grains, and a ton of leafy green vegetables and fruits," says Kristin. "I've noticed that a vegan diet helps me feel quicker and lighter on my feet."

Kristin reports that Team USA cleaned up—all the teams earned gold medals in their age groups—and Kristin captured the bronze in an individual event!

Are you a vegan athlete? Post a comment below to tell us how you fuel your workouts.

Written by Alisa Mullins

At PETA, we sometimes embrace things that others might call "bizarre," like Andy Dick's interview as Ronald McDonald with Jiminy Glick.

So when people started ringing our phones wanting our reaction to the recent news that Mike Myers is "kind of obsessed" with painting KFC's Colonel Sanders, we might have puzzled some callers who assumed we'd be alarmed or offended to learn about his muse. We're not. Monet may have had his water lilies but, hey, not all artists are inspired by foliage.

Besides, at the recent premiere of Shrek Forever After, the actor/funnyman/artist told our own Senior Vice President Dan Mathews that after watching a PETA video, he doesn't eat chicken anymore.

That's no surprise, really—after all, like art, many individual's attitudes are ever-evolving—and countless caring people have kicked KFC's unhealthy buckets from their diets.

So we're thankful that one more person has chosen not to support the appalling cruelty that's imposed upon billions of chickens, and we'll daydream that Mike Myers might one day honor us with a gift of one of his renderings of the Colonel. If we paired it with our crippled KFC chicken statue from artist Harry Bliss, we could add immeasurable artistic flair to our Kentucky Fried Cruelty campaign.