We're over the moon to report that the team working PETA's "Spay and Neuter Immediately, Please" (SNIP) mobile clinic met their goal to spay and neuter 10,000 dogs and cats by the end of 2010—by December 1. This means that SNIP will likely end the year having performed closer to a record-breaking 11,000 low-cost or free surgeries and sparing multitudes of their patients' future generations from winding up in animal shelters or suffering on city streets.

Consider that in six years, one unaltered female dog and her offspring can produce 67,000 puppies—and that in seven years, one female cat and her offspring can produce 420,000 kittens. The numbers of animals saved from suffering thanks to SNIP is astronomical—and way, way more than my calculator could figure.

Let's meet some happy recipients of SNIP's services:

George also enjoys his warm, dry doghouse from PETA.

Paris, the doggy of love

The ridiculously adorable Duckie and his Mama

Ring Eye and Papa catch up with their cuddling on the couch.

Content and cute: Coco and co.

Congratulations and a bazillion thanks to clinic manager Cindy Emanuel and the entire SNIP team for their tireless, lifesaving efforts in 2010—and here's to much more of the same in 2011!

Written by Karin Bennett

Pope Benedict's recent comments regarding condom use have some folks and followers confused, but there can be no mistaking the very clear message in PETA's new international campaign:

Visitors to the Vatican yesterday were the first to receive our new "Pope Condom" campaign leaflets, which we'll also soon be taking to cathedrals and churches across the U.S.

Simply stated: It's sinful that millions of dogs and cats are killed every year in animal shelters simply because there aren't enough homes for all of them—and that millions more are abandoned on the streets, where they starve, die of untreated injuries or illnesses, or fall prey to animal abusers. The simple solution is to always spay and neuter animals instead of allowing them to produce countless offspring. Please help us bring salvation to dogs and cats by singing the praises of spaying and neutering to everyone you know.

Written by Karin Bennett

Update: People have been alerted to this blog and were asked to express their dislike of our campaign. We've posted some of the comments that weren't inappropriate. However, PETA’s job is to draw attention to animal suffering, and we have found that provocative tactics yield more attention than the facts alone, which aren’t enough to attract interest in today’s tabloid media. We must push the envelope to get animals’ stories out there. By harnessing controversial issues like Pope Benedict’s comments about condom use, we have created a forum for discussion in the media and online, and even within the church. We welcome discussion about—and even criticism of—our ads and campaigns because we know that getting people talking is the first step in raising awareness.

We understand that some may consider our use of Pope Benedict’s image inflammatory, and we are sorry if these images have offended you. The pope is a compassionate man who has spoken out for animals in the past and is well known for his love of cats. We believe that he would support our lifesaving message and our efforts to prevent suffering and death.

Catholics—and all Christians—should be appalled by the degree of suffering that we inflict on animals. Jesus’ teachings say that we should show love and compassion for all of God’s creation—qualities that are notoriously absent in puppy mills and catteries. Bred to death, delivering litter after litter in conditions rife with filth and disease, these animals are doomed to their own hell. The solution is simple: Spay and neuter every animal and always adopt from an animal shelter—never buy from breeders or pet stores. More than 500 animals are euthanized every hour in the U.S. because there are too many of them and not enough good homes—that adds up to as many as 4 million animals every year. We won’t back down from our message that people who want to share their lives with an animal must always adopt a sterilized animal, never buy or breed.

meagan/CC by 2.0

In their fervor to avoid euthanasia at all costs, "no-kill" facilities sometimes enable animal hoarders and others who put animals in abusive situations. Last week, for example, more than 100 dogs and cats were rescued from a West Virginia animal hoarder. The animals were locked in cramped, rusty cages in an old schoolhouse, and many of the animals were sick and starving, lying amid their own feces with no access to food or water. According to one news report, "The animals cringed when rescue workers shined lights onto them."

Representatives from two "no-kill" organizations had visited this facility earlier this year. They found that the animals were living in deplorable conditions and suspected that the woman in charge was in fact an animal hoarder (d'oh). But they and others enabled her to continue hoarding animals: They cleaned up the property just enough to make it pass inspection by law enforcement officials, took a few animals with them, and never looked back.

Like many hoarders, the woman often acquired animals from local animal shelters, which may have been pressured to turn the animals over to anyone who would take them, rather than euthanizing them. This whole sad, twisted situation is another reminder that warehousing animals—that is, handing animals over to hoarders or others who don't have the ability to properly care for them—is not a humane solution to the companion animal overpopulation crisis. The only solution is to ensure that all animal companions are spayed or neutered.

Written by Lindsay Pollard-Post

What could be better than a "Hello Kitty" wrap around an itty-bitty Smart fortwo car? How about something just as cute and enormously meaningful?

PETA has asked Smart USA to offer our "Hello Doggy" wrap alongside its own Hello Kitty wrap. That way, caring fortwo owners can help save lives by driving home the point that spaying and neutering dogs and cats helps curb the companion animal overpopulation crisis. Additionally, we've suggested that Smart USA donate all the proceeds from the Hello Doggy wraps—which would be offered in full and half sizes—to spay-and-neuter programs such as PETA's "Spay and Neuter Immediately, Please" (SNIP) mobile clinics, which perform hundreds of free and low-cost sterilizations every week in Southeastern Virginia.

As it stands, up to 8 million unwanted animals enter our nation's animal shelters every year, and approximately half of them are euthanized simply because there aren't enough good homes. Add to that the countless animals who are abandoned in the streets to starve and suffer from untreated illnesses or injuries from encounters with cars or cruel humans. Still more staggering statistics: Just one unaltered female dog and her offspring can produce 67,000 puppies in only six years. In seven years, one female cat and her offspring can produce 420,000 kittens.

The answer to saving so many lives can be quick, simple, and inexpensive (or even free)—and is as obvious as clicking a seatbelt. Please continue to spread the word that spaying and neutering can help save lives. We'll let you know if Smart USA compassionately—and smartly—joins our efforts.

Written by Karin Bennett

Today, it's good luck to be a black cat or the guardian of one. That's because PETA's "Spay and Neuter Immediately, Please" (SNIP) mobile clinic will be performing spay or neuter surgeries on black cats all day free of charge.

Approximately three dozen black cats will have the good fortune of never having to give birth to litters of kittens who could end up unwanted, homeless, neglected, abandoned on the streets, or euthanized at a shelter for lack of a good home. The sterilized cats themselves will be immune to uterine, ovarian, and testicular cancer and less likely to suffer from other cancers of the reproductive system, such as prostate and breast cancer (yes, cats and dogs get those too). Altered cats are also less likely to roam, mark their territory with urine, get into fights, or become infected with deadly contagious diseases such as feline leukemia and feline AIDS.

And just a reminder for you folks whose homes are graced with a cat, black or otherwise: You should never let your precious bundle of perfection outside alone, but this is doubly important at Halloween. As my mother found out as a child when her favorite cat, Midnight, was tortured to death on Halloween, cruel people do horrible things to cats—especially black ones—at this time of year (and the rest of the year too).

Visit the Living page for more Halloween safety tips.

Written by Alisa Mullins

… to publicly thank The Pretty Reckless vocalist and Gossip Girl star for making the compassionate, responsible decision to have her pooch neutered.

It's no secret that we at PETA are nuts (geddit?) about the pluses of spaying and neutering—two safe, simple procedures that help to reduce the number of homeless dogs and cats.

So we at PETA would like to submit the following poem in Momsen's honor:

Oh, Taylor Momsen!
You're sure to see
A media spectacle
'Cause you lit your dog's (detached) testicles

But at PETA, we stand and applaud
The choice you made, it should be law
To neuter your friend
And help put an end
To the homelessness of millions who have paws

Written by Karin Bennett

Coming soon to a billboard in Big Pine Key, Florida:

PETA's offer to pay $1,500 for the right to erect the above image at a new dog park in Hampton, New Jersey, may have been rejected by fundraising Girl Scouts there, but organizers of a dog park in the Sunshine State who read about the rejection found our proposal irresistible. They asked for a similar deal—and now their new dog park will be getting the funding, and park visitors will be giving paws pause to consider the fact that a resolution to spay and neuter their companion animals would help decrease the number of animals who are forced to live in animal shelters or on the streets.

Meanwhile, our billboard could still grace Hampton's new dog park. City Council members there are currently mulling over our proposal.

Written by Karin Bennett

Starting this Sunday night, HBO's Entourage gets a whole lot sexier: Adult film star and PETA supporter Sasha Grey starts her recurring role, playing herself and cozying up to Adrian Grenier's character, Vince.

With this ad, Sasha Grey has turned on countless audiences to the importance of spaying and neutering. Now's your chance to turn her on. Will you?

Written by Karin Bennett

Countless consumers, knowing little to nothing about how to deal humanely with mice, buy the Ortho Home Defense MAX Kill & Contain Mouse Trap because it promises a quick, out-of-sight death, with "no mess." But not so fast! PETA is hearing that numerous people have been horrified to discover squeaking mice inside the traps, alive and conscious but bloody and writhing from their injuries.

After Scotts Miracle-Gro Company refused to respond to our letter detailing our concerns with these cruel devices, PETA filed a formal complaint with the Federal Trade Commission seeking action against the company for its misleading claims—and we've asked Scotts Miracle-Gro chair and CEO James Hagedorn to pull the traps from store shelves, as we believe that the company is violating the Federal Trade Commission Act, which prohibits unfair or deceptive acts or practices.

"Scotts' deceptive advertising is fooling people into thinking that they are buying a humane mousetrap when what they are actually getting is a miniature torture chamber," says PETA President Ingrid E. Newkirk. Indeed, mice who become caught in these traps die slowly from stress-induced struggling, dehydration, heat prostration, or starvation.

So until further notice, put Scotts Miracle-Gro with that other company that Lowesballs both truth in advertising and compassion for mice. We promise to keep you updated on developments regarding this case—and we ask that you promise to always be kind to mice by using this humane, effective trap.

Written by Karin Bennett

We've always said that meat is murder, but our demonstration in New York City this week literally turned that message into flesh and blood. Well, OK, the blood was fake, but the point was genuine: All meat comes from somebody. And when you show human bodies in those neatly plastic-wrapped supermarket packages, the point hits home and it begins to look like a grisly scene from Dexter.

The thought of chewing and swallowing the skin and muscle of a murder victim surely ruined some viewers' appetites for flesh food. It's the appropriate response to witnessing a gruesome display of the corpses of those who have been tormented and killed—you know, like in the butcher department of your supermarket. Let's face it, every piece of meat comes from an individual who suffered miserably and died violently. In other words, meat is … yup … murder.

Tired of being an accessory to a violent crime? Get your copy of our vegan/vegetarian starter kit here.

Written by Jeff Mackey