Written by PETA
Dave Warwak, an art teacher at Fox River Grove Middle School in Illinois (and, if I'm not mistaken, a regular commenter on this here blog), has been dismissed from his classroom by the school after teaching his students about factory farming and the other forms of animal abuse that made him go vegan. Apparently, the school's principal ordered Warwak to leave the classroom after he showed his students photos of animals in factory farms and gave them the book The Food Revolution by Pulitzer Prize-nominated author John Robbins.
Let me go over that again, real quick. An Illinois principal just kicked out a teacher for talking to his students about veganism. Does that disturb anyone else as much as it does me? You can read PETA's letter to the school here. Unbelievable.
In the meantime, keep fighting the good fight, Dave. We're all 100 percent behind you.
Hunting has been on the decline for years, and CNN just reported that the latest numbers are that it’s down another 10% over the last ten years. Hunting in the water, err, I mean fishing, is also down around 15%. And call me crazy, but I don’t believe it’s a coincidence that while hunting and fishing numbers are steadily on the decline, new federal data shows surging numbers of birdwatchers, wildlife photographers and other wildlife watchers. They increased from 62.8 million in 1996 to 71.1 million in 2006.
Of course, as the numbers of hunters and fishers decline, so does the money in state wildlife agencies’ coffers, since most of their revenue comes from hunting and fishing licenses. And of course hunters and the agencies themselves are quick to go into panic mode, saying that “conservation” will suffer if these agencies don’t receive the money from hunting licenses, when in reality the only “conservation” they actually pay for is breeding more animals for hunters to blast into oblivion. So, perhaps it’s time for a policy shift here. I think it makes much more sense that wild areas be paid for out of regular taxes, since they sustain the earth and they are vital to life itself. It should be free and encouraged to watch birds and appreciate nature, and our state wildlife agencies shouldn’t be begging people to go out and kill animals simply so they can stay in business.
Man, it really is a bad time to be a hunter. First, CNN reports these new declining numbers, then the news that hunting may put men’s hearts at risk.
And perhaps most disturbing is the recently released DMGDRO report on the link between hunting and, how shall I put this … diminutive male genitalia, which, now that I think about it, may explain Dick Cheney’s obsession with playing with really big guns . . .
Scantily clad in sexy pleather uniforms, high-heeled boots, and police hats and holding signs that read, "Animal Skins Are a Fashion Felony," PETA's pair of sexy "fashion police" are taking New York fashion week by storm. They’re handing out violation notices resembling citation tickets to fur-, leather-, and wool-wearers for "violating the code of common decency." This dedicated duo is staking out the shows at Bryant Park and anywhere else suspected violators—including designers—gather. And get this, at their first outing yesterday, they even gave a citation to the notorious pelt pushing fur hag Anna Wintour.
Here are a few pics of their first outing.
Unfortunately, they weren’t able to get a shot of them ticketing Wintour, but I like this shot of the hag getting a pie in the face in Paris a couple of years ago better anyway . . .
PETA's Marketing Department (myself included) is in love with Blog ads. Advertising your site or your campaign on a good blog with a sympathetic audience is a fantastic tool for getting your message out there. So we're all very excited about the contest we have running for people to create their own blog ad about one of PETA's websites for a chance to win a $500 Apple gift card.
Well, this was all fun and games until Amy Cook, the upstart writer for PETA's Veg Cooking blog, posted this incendiary little entry on her blog. You want war, Amy? You got it. But let me tell you a couple of things first: For a start, just because your last name is Cook doesn't mean you know how to cook. And more importantly, your daddy apparently didn't tell you that you NEVER bring a knife to a gun fight. Steppin' to Jack'izzle is like steppin' to death row, straight up.
Amy is asking people to enter PETA's contest by creating an ad for The Veg Cooking Files, or whatever her blog is called, so let me be the first one to step up with an example:
And now that we've gotten that out of the way, onto the big guns. Here's my sample blog ad for The PETA Files. Try and keep this one in mind when you enter the contest.
Well, that was quick! Here’s what she said on The View this morning:
"Let me really just reiterate this for everybody: I was not condoning nor was I saying I thought Michael Vick did anything right—I did not say that I thought he was good in what he did. … I watched the show on another network that is a sports show, and what I saw made me take a minute to think about what happened with this kid, because they were talking about the culture of dogfighting, and so I thought to myself—well, if you're raised in it, that may be a reason why you're acting the way you have been acting. So I went on to pose this as a discussion, and somehow—I don't know how this happened, if you read the papers today—I'm eating dogs, I'm swinging them by their tail. … I love my animals. I have cats. I've adopted cats from various shelters, but I also believe that if there's a problem out there that we can address by checking out where it stems from, that we need to take a look at this in this high-profile area so we can mark it for the future. That was my point, and I'm very, very sorry—PETA and I are very close and we’ve talked about it a lot.
Thanks for clearing that up, Whoopi, and keep up the great work. Your fans appreciate it.
"He's from the South, from the Deep South ... This is part of his cultural upbringing"
I have no idea where she got that one from, but I can tell her right now that there are an awful lot of people in the South who'd be pretty upset by the implication that electrocuting animals is somehow "part of their heritage." Or, as PETA President Ingrid Newkirk put it in the letter she wrote to Whoopi yesterday,
"Those who fight dogs do so in New York, Chicago and even the Republic of Ireland, and what unites them is lawlessness and callousness, not whether they eat grits or Belgian waffles for breakfast."
Michael Vick needs a lot of things right now—some serious counseling for a start—but he doesn't need anyone to give him lame excuses for his decision to torture dogs for pleasure and profit. He needs to face that horrible fact all by himself.
Ingrid spoke with Whoopi on the phone last night after she received the letter, since Goldberg actually has a good track record with animals outside of this incident, and Whoopi explained that she had never intended to appear accepting of cruelty. Let’s hope she makes up for it with some positive comments about animals on The View after this rocky start.
For readers who may be unfamiliar with the British vernacular, a "21 bum salute" is a charming, classically understated English way of saying "Hey chaps, we respectfully disagree with your actions. Any chance you might reconsider?" By way of an example, here's a pic from PETA UK's recent protest against the Queen's Guards' use of bearskin hats. Note the lovingly painted Union Jacks and the looming rainclouds in the background. Makes me proud to be British.
You can read more about the protest in this weekend’s Sun.
At a weekend religious youth rally in Italy, Pope Benedict XVI told the more than 500,000 attendees that young Catholics should take the lead in the fight to save the earth. Check out what he said, “Before it's too late, we need to make courageous choices that will recreate a strong alliance between man and Earth … We need a decisive 'yes' to care for creation and a strong commitment to reverse those trends that risk making the situation of decay irreversible.” Amen to that.
Makes this ad even more apropos, eh?
Last week, handbag company Hogan found themselves in a bit of an awkward spot after releasing promotional materials proclaiming that they had named a new pony-skin handbag "The Chrissie," after Pretenders singer and anti-leather crusader Chrissie Hynde. The folks at Hogan are backpedaling furiously, but Chrissie Hynde is not pleased about the situation in the least. You can read the letter she sent them this morning here.
In other Chrissie news, if you have a moment, you should definitely check out this article in The Miami Herald about how a badass like Chrissie Hynde deals with those endless nonsensical questions vegetarians often get from die-hard meat-eaters about their diet choice. Priceless.
Who the hell sends their friends Labor Day cards? Well, we do, I guess. For some reason I feel duty-bound to post PETA's official "Labor Day E-Card" for your edification and viewing enjoyment. After all, we did go to all the trouble of making it back in the day. I'd just like to point out that this one was made before they put ol' Jack in charge of making e-cards for PETA. If it puts you in the mood for some Jacktastic e-card action, you may want to check out last year's Santa Got Run Over by His Reindeer e-card. It's a classic, and, well, Christmas is right around the corner …
Anyway, Happy Labor Day. For reals. Now get to work surprising and confusing your friends by sending them their very own PETA Labor Day e-card!
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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