Written by Michelle Kretzer
Did Anne Hathaway purposefully schedule her wedding just before World Farm Animals Day? It's possible, since the committed animal advocate celebrated her nuptials with a vegan feast. To commemorate both World Farm Animals Day and Anne's big day, PETA is sponsoring a steer named Peter, who resides at The Cow Sanctuary in New Jersey, in Anne's name.
© StarMaxInc.com
Peter was just a calf when PETA investigated the filthy Pennsylvania dairy factory farm that he was living on. Cows on dairy farms must be repeatedly impregnated in order for them to produce milk, and their female calves are sentenced to the same fate as their mothers. But dairy farmers consider male calves to be useless byproducts and typically sell them for veal. That would likely have been Peter's fate, but after our investigation, we got cruelty charges brought against the farm and were able to purchase Peter and another male calf, Jerry, and send them to the serene Cow Sanctuary.
Right photo: © Kencredible
The calves were in terrible shape. Peter had pinkeye and ringworm and was infested with lice. After being confined to a pen in which he was drowning in urine and feces, his legs were so weak that he couldn't stand.
It took a lot of veterinary care and a lot more love, but Peter recovered and blossomed into an outgoing, confident steer. From the beginning, he looked out for Jerry, who was left disabled from the calves' ordeal. Peter is very affectionate, and he eagerly awaits his daily chin scratches.
What better day than World Farm Animals Day to recognize Anne Hathaway, a woman whose kind diet spares countless animals and inspires others to follow in her footsteps?
It's also the perfect day to protest cruelty on factory farms by going vegan. Order your free vegetarian/vegan starter kit here!
Written by Alisa Mullins
Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley is apparently anxious to show his campaign contributors that he will fight to the death (literally, perhaps) over Americans' right to be sick and fat. Sen. Grassley has attacked the conservative Meatless Monday program, which the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) was promoting as a way to encourage its staffers to eat healthier and protect the environment. But the USDA has withdrawn the initiative, opting instead to prove that it is the servant of agribusiness and let its employees pay the price. PETA has hit back with a "Meat-Free Mondays Through Sundays" campaign.
The USDA inadvertently set off a firestorm of controversy earlier this week when it promoted the Paul McCartney–endorsed Meatless Monday program on its website. But the move was publicly blasted by the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, after which the department yanked the promo, mumbling something about not receiving the proper "clearance," as if encouraging good health and environmental protection were a covert spy mission or something.
Apparently not content with that backpedal, Sen. Grassley, a legislator from a beef-belt state, vowed to "eat more meat on Monday" in an attempt to singlehandedly (forkedly?) make up for the meat that conscientious USDA workers might be planning to forgo on the first day of the workweek.
We're taking bets (place yours in the comments section below) on how long it will take Sen. Grassley to succumb to heart disease, diabetes, cancer, or some other meat-related disease.
"From his reaction, it seems like a pretty safe bet that he's already got high blood pressure," says PETA President Ingrid E. Newkirk. "Were he a physician instead of a politician who truly puts his rancher money where his mouth is, he'd be guilty of malpractice."
Don't let fat-cat government lobbyists win—celebrate Meatless Monday every day of the week by ordering a vegetarian/vegan starter kit today!
Martin Cathrae|cc by 2.0
Two PETA beauties transformed into Tomb Raider lookalikes to help gamers at L.A.'s E3 gaming expo fight off the real Resident Evil: meat.
Maddened by the fact that meat is contributing to obesity in the gaming community, the gals answered their Call of Duty (in ammo belts made of carrots) to help entice gamers to adopt a diet that will make them want to Dance, Dance.
Ready for it to be on like Donkey Kong?
It was a tough decision, but PETA has chosen the winners of our TeachKind Teacher Appreciation Contest! These two educators best exemplify the TeachKind goals of creatively inspiring students to help animals and encouraging students to use that inspiration to positively impact their schools and communities.
Here are the winners:
Every year, Molly Lile Taylor organizes "Critter Club," a group of students who meet at the Barren River Animal Welfare Association (BRAWA) to learn about humane treatment of animals, responsible animal guardianship, the animal-homelessness crisis, careers that involve working with animals, and many other important topics. The children are a huge asset to the animal shelter, collecting donations, helping with fundraisers, making toys for the animals, and helping to socialize them. Many "Critter Clubbers" choose to have their birthday parties at the shelter and collect items that the animals need instead of receiving gifts.
Critter Club was so successful that Taylor extended it into the summer with Camp BRAWA. "As educators, we enjoy watching this interaction and feel a sense of accomplishment knowing we helped facilitate the relationships between the kids and the animals," she says. "Our goal for 'Critter Club' is to foster compassion in the children so that they can grow up to be responsible, compassionate adults."
Maru Vigo teaches Spanish with a side of animal rights. She has included humane-education lessons in her curricula every year since beginning her career and says she has seen a profound difference in the students' lives. This year's lessons centered on vegetarianism and greyhound racing. The class sampled vegan foods and used PETA's vegetarian/vegan starter kit to learn how to choose plant-based foods at the supermarket. And after the class learned about the cruelty behind greyhound racing, which is part of the TeachKind lesson plans, it welcomed a rescued former racer to its classroom.
The kids left Vigo's class determined to educate others about cruelty-free eating choices and about why they should not patronize greyhound races. Other educators are starting to notice the effects that the humane-education classes have had on Vigo's students. She says, "As educators, it is our job to inspire young people and to instill values and compassion in them. If we want a better world, we must start by teaching kids about kindness, respect, and empathy for all."
Congratulations to Molly Lile Taylor and Maru Vigo!
Teachers, administrators, and parents who home-school can join the TeachKind Network to receive free resources to help them implement their own humane-education programs.
Fighting for truth, justice, and the cruelty-free way, PETA's caped crusaders descended on the Ottawa Comiccon to ask fans to be superheroes for animals by going vegan.
The meat and dairy industries are colder to animals than Mr. Freeze, but all people can fight for good every time they sit down to eat.
Ready to fly faster than a speeding bullet, be more powerful than a locomotive, and leap tall buildings in a single bound? Just get rid of the kryptonite, er, animal products.
Written by PETA
PETA is seeking current or former Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agents who are also vegan or vegetarian to volunteer as models for our new "Look Bomb in Your Underwear: Go Vegetarian!" poster, which will be released nationally. The models will be photographed in sexy skivvies while posing in front of an airport body scanner.
As frequent fliers, PETA staffers appreciate the TSA's job of helping to safeguard America's skies. And in the same way that Charlie Chaplin famously deflated Hitler in The Great Dictator, we would like to make a mockery of the Al Qaeda mindset and lighten the mood. Our ad will also be a public service, reminding people that we can all live longer by avoiding a far more common threat to our national well-being: a meaty diet that is associated with illnesses such as cancer, diabetes, heart disease, and obesity.
(c)iStockphoto.com/Bart Sadowski Last time, PETA put passengers who were proud of their veggie bodies on our ads. Now it's the TSA's turn to step out from behind the scanner.
As PETA Files readers know, vegetarians and vegans are significantly healthier and trimmer and less prone to the major killer diseases than their meat-eating counterparts are. TSA agents (and others!) who want to look bomb in their underwear can check out PETA's vegetarian/vegan starter kit.
If you are a current or former TSA agent and would like to be considered for this explosive, lifesaving ad, please comment below.
Written by Jeff Mackey
PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman, who's also the mother of a child in the California public school system, has written to the administrator of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Food and Nutrition Service asking that the service pull all beef and cow's milk from school lunches after mad cow disease was discovered in an animal at a California rendering plant.
A group of parents who are "DAM MAD" (Dads Against Meat and Mothers Against Dairy) also converged on the Sacramento headquarters of the California Department of Food and Agriculture to urge it to protect children by pulling meat and dairy products from school lunches.
What's truly mad is continuing to feed beef and cow's milk to students, especially because "spent" cows, whose milk supply is exhausted by the dairy industry, are the primary concern when it comes to mad cow disease and are likely to end up as the kind of cheap ground beef that is fed to schoolchildren.
Given that the USDA has expanded its quarantine to a second dairy farm, that it still has not located the infected cow's mother or siblings (who may also have the disease), and that it doesn't even know what the California dairy industry is feeding its cows (because that's considered a "trade secret"), the USDA must stop risking our children's health and remove beef and cow's milk from school cafeterias right away.
Tracy's letter and the demonstration by the DAM MAD parents coincided with another PETA appeal to the USDA urging Secretary Tom Vilsack to correct misleading statements that he made regarding the detection of the disease—also known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE)—that created a false and dangerous sense of security by erroneously claiming that the nation's human and animal food supply is safe.
In the letter to Vilsack, PETA points out that there is no way to know how many other animals are infected with mad cow disease because only a tiny fraction—about 0.1 percent of the nearly 34 million cows who are slaughtered every year—are tested for BSE. It's also likely that milk from the cow who tested positive entered the food chain, and contrary to the USDA's assurances about the safety of milk, studies have already shown that another form of the disease can be spread from mother to baby through milk.
Worried that tainted milk or meat may be on your child's lunch tray? Don't wait for the USDA to act. Protect your kids (and yourself) by packing healthy and humane vegan lunches—and keep it up at breakfast, dinner, and snacktime, too!
For helping race fans rev up their own engines on healthy vegan food, NASCAR, IndyCar, track owners Speedway Motorsports, and food-service provider Levy Restaurants are each driving off with PETA's first-ever High Octane Award.
All four racing aficionados have teamed up to offer fans animal-friendly food at Atlanta Motor Speedway, Bristol Motor Speedway, Charlotte Motor Speedway, Infineon Raceway, Kentucky Speedway, Las Vegas Motor Speedway, and New Hampshire Motor Speedway.
Whether they're for Team Lally, Earnhardt, Hamlin, Stewart, Patrick, or anyone else, race fans always have a reason to cheer when they're treating animals and their bodies well with racetrack fare such as the Going Green Salad With Fried Green Tomatoes, the Summer Vegetable and Tofu Flatbread, or the ever-popular Sloppy Jane made with tempeh, peppers, onions, and molasses and brown sugar barbecue sauce.
Ready to leave meat behind in the pit? Gentlemen (and ladies), here's how to start your engines.
Ever wonder what persuaded self-described "professional idiot" Steve-O to adopt a vegan diet? Believe it or not, it was a religious experience.
"I heard a Krishna Consciousness guy in a YouTube video ask 'How can you expect to be saved if you eat meat?' I became terrified of having to 'answer' for all of the suffering that I was causing for animals and immediately stopped eating meat …," wrote the sexiest vegetarian finalist Steve-O in a recent posting on his blog.
A few weeks later, with the help of his friend, Johnny Knoxville, Steve-O kicked his drug habit and started to realize how much better he was feeling. Gradually, he stopped eating eggs and fish, and finally he bought what he calls an "experimental carton of soy milk," which convinced him to abandon all animal products.
Since then, Steve-O has put his money where his mouth is, speaking out in defense of frogs who are killed for classroom dissections, lonely elephants in zoos and circuses, and animals who are killed for their fur. He even walked out of a diabetes fundraiser when he learned that meat was on the menu.
I got into being vegan because I was simply looking to benefit from being more compassionate. I have since come to learn that it is an animal-based diet that is responsible for the overwhelming majority of cases of cancer, heart disease, diabetes, obesity, multiple sclerosis, and all kinds of other problems.
Wanna be like Steve-O? Do try this at home: Order a vegetarian/vegan starter kit and get started eating like a jackass.
Some pictures may say a thousand words, but satellite pics showing cattle ranchers' destruction of 4,000 hectares of remote Paraguayan forest that is home to indigenous people say just two: You're busted! Two Brazilian ranching companies have been charged with illegal deforestation and their "herd" honchos could go to jail if convicted.
Considering that cattle ranching is the leading cause of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon—in addition to causing unimaginable animal suffering—here's hoping that these beef barons get sentenced to a little alone time in the "hole" to reflect on the impact of their continued wrecking of the rainforest.
Because forests are cleared all over the western hemisphere to create grazing land and because all forms of animal agriculture gobble up vital resources, generate waste, and contribute to climate change, every ounce of meat we eat contributes to environmental destruction. Get started saving the planet today by ordering a vegetarian/vegan starter kit.
Written by Amy Skylark Elizabeth
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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