Nickelodeon star Daniella Monet unveiled her new ad for peta2—in which she encourages young people to let fish off the hook by not eating them—at a star-studded reception at the wildly popular all-vegan Sublime restaurant in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, on Sunday.

In an interview that can be viewed on peta2.com, Monet explains why she went vegetarian at the age of 5: "I went to a dude ranch with my family, and I asked a lot of questions. And I got answers that I probably needed to hear." As for people who say that they're "vegetarian" but still eat fish? "Fish aren't veggies," she says. "Fish have feelings, too, and fish are trying to live a life as well." She adds, "You don't need fish. Let the fish swim with the mermaids."

Monet also presented 12-year-old Rose McCoy—a lifelong vegan and animal rights defender—with the Nanci Alexander Activist Award, named for the owner of Sublime and a longtime PETA member. Among Rose's many accomplishments, she has spoken (remember—she's 12) at a McDonald's annual meeting and at New York City Council meetings, has formed an animal rights club, and donates a portion of her cat-sitting money to PETA's spay/neuter mobile clinics. 

Also in attendance were Mexican soap star Pablo Azar, who showed off his dramatic new anti-circus PETA ad, and NY Ink star Ami James, who did likewise with a new ad starring himself and his adorable dog, Bella.

Among other stars lending glamour to the festivities was model and TV host Elisabetta Canalis, a vocal animal advocate who would rather go naked than wear fur and who memorably locked herself in a sweltering car last summer to illustrate the need to protect dogs from the heat. 

It might have looked to passersby like we were having a sleepover at the Bob Barker Building, PETA's Los Angeles office. Throngs of teens and kids came in toting blankets as well as bags full of leashes, collars, toys, and towels to donate to homeless animals at shelters run by L.A. Animal Services. But this wasn't your average blanket drive.

Some of the most compassionate young stars in Hollywood came out to support peta2 (PETA's youth division) and PETA Kids, the joint hosts of the event. Renee Olstead, Christian Serratos, Fivel Stewart, Haley Pullos, Pia Toscano, Miranda Mayo, Bret Lockett of the New York Jets, and Randall of "Honey Badger Don't Care" fame collected donations, took pictures with fans, and helped kids make buttons to take home and catnip toys for the shelters' cats. At the end of the day, we had collected more than 19 boxes full of donations and mountains of goodwill for animals.

Renee Olstead, who had the initial idea for the shelter drive, serenades the crowd with "At Last" by Etta James.

Christian Serratos helps sort donated items.

Haley Pullos greets rescued PETA pup Tyson.

Kids make catnip toys for the cats and buttons for themselves.

Bret Lockett tries out his Dancing With the Stars moves with PETA's Michelle Cho.

The kids had a blast with Randall.

Renee celebrates a successful day.

We all know that dead bodies should be buried, not eaten. So PETA is making Thanksgiving tables a little more relevant this year. We're offering teens these miniature tombstones to stick into the plucked turkey on the table:

If adults think tombstones are too macabre a sight for Thanksgiving, kids can tell them that what's really disturbing is that the decaying corpse in the middle of the table was once a gentle, smart bird until someone filling an order for a holiday meal shackled the bird upside down and slit his or her throat. 

Thanks to honest young people armed with the facts, maybe next year people will give turkeys something to be thankful for.

Young people can request their free turkey tombstones from peta2. 

Thanks to many, many kind people around the world, PETA's campaigns often reach even farther than the group's "official" campaigners can, as we were reminded when we came across this picture of a mural that someone had created in Szczecin, Poland, based on peta2's "Elephants Never Forget" campaign. In any language, the image of the bullhook and the sad, wounded elephant get the message across that circuses with captive animals abuse and beat them, so they're no place for pachyderms—or people who care about animals. Please join the worldwide movement to end circus cruelty today.

Jason Mraz

Jason Mraz just went vegan and wrote about it on his blog:

George Clooney

Just when you thought George Clooney couldn't get any sexier, check out what he told the media at the Golden Globes: "I've always had dogs. I've almost always had them out of the pound. Seems like a good place. They have a lot of them. It brings me a lot of joy to do it and they seem like the happiest dogs in the game. I only have one, but he eats for, like, four."

Jessica Chastain

Academy Award–nominee and vegan beauty Jessica Chastain was spotted walking her pooch, who doesn't seem to be slowed down a bit by having only three legs. We wouldn't be surprised if Jessica were an advocate of rescuing!

Kristen Bell

Gracing the February cover of Self magazine, Kristen Bell asked readers to tweet questions for her to answer in the mag. When a fan asked her about being vegetarian, Kristen responded, "I've been a vegetarian since I was 11, because I couldn't understand why if we didn't eat the dog I should eat a burger. I love animals, and I stand by my values."

Ke$ha, The Ready Set, Daniel Bryan, and More!

Another group of animal lovers just snagged big honors from peta2. Ke$ha, The Ready Set, Daniel Bryan, and many more celebs received Libby Awards for their work to protect animals. Check out peta2.com to see the winners and nominees.

Waka Flocka Flame proudly shows that he is a card-carrying member of PETA. Join him by becoming a member today!

For many young people, college is a time when they are making their first independent decisions about what they will eat three times a day and, on a broader scale, what issues are important to them. The decisions that they are making now will shape the rest of their lives and, in fact, the course of the future of our country as they become our leaders. We talked to Ryan Huling, manager of college campaigns and outreach for peta2, about the impact that college students across the country are having on the animal rights movement.

What have college students done to make campuses more cruelty-free?
The number of vegetarian college students has risen by more than 50 percent since 2005, and the number of vegans has more than doubled, so it's no surprise that the demand for meatless options on campuses is high. And as a result of students' growing objections to dissection, more colleges are creating formal and informal policies that allow students to opt out of dissection and be provided with humane alternatives.

peta2 says that young people are leading the charge for animal rights. How so?
Young people, and college students in particular, have been an integral part of every social-justice movement in recent history, and animal rights is no exception. peta2's Liberation exhibit that we present on college campuses juxtaposes the abuse that humans have inflicted on each other throughout history (such as child labor, slavery, and the denial of basic rights) with the abuse that we currently inflict on animals. Students are highly motivated to correct this injustice as well.  

The peta2 Street Team (our youth activist network) has more than 70,000 active members who are signing petitions, making phone calls to companies that abuse animals, running student groups, and educating their friends about animal rights every day. Many who have visited a youth-focused concert, such as Warped Tour, lately will attest to the fact that every show attendee either is vegetarian or has friends who are. The idea of boycotting animal products has become mainstream in youth culture, and today’s young people will influence future generations.

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For more exciting news on the college-outreach campaign, see peta2's just-released list of 2011's Top 10 Most Vegan-Friendly Colleges.

"What I really want to share with people is the possibility of them having the most healthy and abundant joy they could ever imagine," Alicia Silverstone told UCLA's Daily Bruin newspaper, before she spoke to hundreds of students on campus last night at an event hosted by UCLA's Bruins for Animals and peta2.

Alicia shared with students how changing her eating habits changed her life. "Being vegan truly is the secret to my life's joy and peace," she said. Afterward, she answered questions and signed dozens of copies of her bestselling book, The Kind Diet.

While some of the students likely came just to see the lovely Alicia, her message and the "Glass Walls" video that peta2 staffers screened left quite an impression. peta2 staff were bombarded with questions from people interested in learning how to change their eating habits to improve their health, protect the environment, and prevent cruelty to animals.

The vegetarian/vegan starter kits that flew off the tables and Native Foods Café's vegan Thanksgiving feast that they sampled got them off to a great start.

It's here! "Hug a Vegetarian" Day has arrived, and it's the perfect time to show some love to the people who are showing love to animals. The average vegetarian saves about 100 animals every year from cruelty and abuse on factory farms. That's definitely worth a few X's and O's.

PETA's youth division, peta2, held hugging events across the country. If you didn't make it to one of the hug fests, you can still spread appreciation for people who are fighting cruelty to animals, climate change, and the obesity epidemic by posting and tweeting virtual hugs. That's what Victorious star and vegan Daniella Monet will be doing—she's ready to hug it out with one enthusiastic peta2 supporter.

© iStockphoto.com | Piotr Gatlik

Don't forget to tweet-hug your favorite vegetarian celebrities too. Will it be animal champion Lea Michele; Sexiest Vegetarian Celebrity winners Russell Brand and Kristen Wiig; everyone's favorite vegan president, Bill Clinton; or funniest vegan Steve-O? What the heck, just hug 'em all.

Written by Michelle Sherrow

For the 10^th year in a row, peta2 is traveling the country with the largest rock concert event of the year, the Warped Tour. At each of the tour's 44 stops, the youth outreach concert crew is reaching thousands of young people with information about animal issues. We caught up with peta2's Paige Snyder to get the highlights from the road:

What are some of the most rewarding encounters you've had with people this year?
Each conversation we have with a young person is incredibly rewarding. Some of the best moments are when we meet young people who went vegetarian or vegan from meeting us in previous years and have come back to find us and share their stories. This kind of excitement and win for animals never gets old.

What are some interesting stories from the road?
We are always the go-to people when any animals are found on-site, and this year, we have rescued five baby birds and a puppy. The puppy was found in Ohio tied to a metal barricade by a 3-foot choke chain with no food or water in 100-degree heat. We also get to work with some really great bands like A Skylit Drive, D.R.U.G.S., and Terrible Things, who do meet and greets with their fans at our table.

How many young people has peta2 reached on this year's tour?
So far, we have collected 166,942 pledges to go vegan, given out almost 550,000 pieces of literature, and raised funds to support PETA's lifesaving programs—and we still have three shows left to go! peta2 has a lot to be proud of this summer!

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To fund youth outreach programs such as the Warped Tour, PETA relies on donations from our members. Please make a donation today to effect change for animals now and in the future.

Written by Michelle Sherrow

We took a dip into peta2's files and surfaced with this great picture of Hanna from Bidwell, Ohio, that had to be the picture of the month.
 

 
As part of peta2's campaign against SeaWorld, Hanna is showing that cramming whales and dolphins into tiny tanks instead of letting them swim freely in the vast ocean is like forcing a person to spend his or her life in a bathtub. We're sure that whales and dolphins would love Hanna's clever campaigning, and we're loving her  "Meat Sucks" tee too.   
 

Written by Michelle Sherrow