Beg Your Pardon? Courtney Stodden Offers Vegan Spin on Turkey Tradition

For Immediate Release:
November 9, 2022

Contact:
Robin Goist 202-483-7382

According to media personality Courtney Stodden, it isn’t the turkeys who need to be pardoned this year at the White House—it’s all the humans who have ever eaten the gentle birds but who now pledge to give them a break. So this Thanksgiving, the longtime PETA pal is joining forces with the group to offer pardons to any former meat-eater who pledges to enjoy a bird-friendly “ThanksVegan.”

“Given that turkeys just want to care for their young, take dust baths, build nests, and live their turkey lives, it’s unjust to treat them like criminals on Thanksgiving,” says Stodden. “Harming animals is the real crime here, so I’m helping PETA give turkey-eaters a chance to start over and enjoy a holiday that’s kind to all.”

Part of PETA’s nationwide campaign urging people to celebrate a vegan Thanksgiving, or ThanksVegan, Stodden’s pardons follow the news that 12 former workers at Plainville Farms, a self-described “humane” turkey supplier, were recently charged with more than 100 counts of cruelty to animals after a PETA investigation into their physical abuse of the birds.

Turkeys raised for food are normally slaughtered when they’re between 14 and 18 weeks old, and more than 45 million turkeys are killed each year for Thanksgiving alone. Workers hang the young birds upside down, drag them through an electrified bath, slit their throats, and dump them into scalding-hot defeathering tanks—often while they’re still conscious. In addition to sparing nearly 200 animals a year daily suffering and terrifying deaths, everyone who goes vegan shrinks their carbon footprint and slashes their risk of suffering from heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and other ailments.

Stodden is part of a long list of celebrities—including Natalie Portman, Paul McCartney, Thandiwe Newton, Joaquin Phoenix, Jermaine Dupri, Pamela Anderson, and Woody Harrelson—who have teamed up with PETA to encourage people to stop eating animals.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to eat” and which opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview—offers a ThanksVegan guide packed with recipes, cooking tips, and lists of the best hearty meat-free roasts. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.