Teaching compassion to the next generation is one of PETA?s most important priorities. We show children, teens, and young adults exactly how animals are exploited and what they can do about it through the exciting and one-of-a-kind work of our Youth Outreach Department, peta2. We now have more than 800,000 peta2 members, which is the largest youth membership of any animal rights organization?ensuring a kinder future for animals.

We sparked enormous student interest with our college tour of "Liberation: A Project by peta2"?a compelling display that conveys the message that slavery, child labor, genocide, and sex discrimination all resulted from the same mindset that allows animal exploitation. Colleges hosting the display included the University of California, Los Angeles; the University of California, San Diego; the University of Florida; Salisbury University (Md.); George Mason University (Va.); Princeton University (N.J.); and others.

As a result of calls and e-mails from peta2 activists, Burton Snowboards?the number one snowboard and outerwear manufacturer?will no longer sell fur. This means that thousands of animals will be spared from the horrors of the fur industry, including having their necks broken and being electrocuted.

In a victory that took only 24 hours to organize and achieve, peta2 activists persuaded a huge New England music chain called Newbury Comics to stop selling figurines made from rabbit fur.

After students hung 17 cat cadavers intended for use in dissection from trees at San Luis Obispo High School (Calif.), PETA asked the principal to consider adopting alternatives to dissection (e.g., computer simulators, interactive CD-ROMs, and lifelike models), which he agreed to do.

In 2007, through peta2?s presence at popular youth events?including spring break in Panama City Beach, Fla. (which attracts tens of thousands of college students), and 13 concerts and tours of today?s hottest music groups (including the hugely popular Vans Warped Tour)?peta2 reached more than 1 million young people with literature and videos of our investigations of laboratories, slaughterhouses, circuses, and fur farms.

Popular musicians helped us inform young people about animal rights. Donating their time to star in peta2 ads were soul singer Joss Stone, indie rocker Ted Leo, metal band Lamb of God drummer Chris Adler, and indie rock duo Mates of State. Appearing in interviews for peta2.com were rock bands Bloc Party, The Used, Fall Out Boy, Cobra Starship, Rise Against, and Silverstein and hip-hop trailblazer Chuck D.

“Even its fiercest critics have to grant, however, that as a brand, PETA is an unqualified success. In just 27 years, a ragtag few D.C. suburbanites have morphed into a global network embraced by Hollywood, allied (or at war) with the famous and beautiful, and known to millions, if not billions, of the planet’s humans.”

—The Virginian-Pilot, May 2, 2007