Social Media Influencers Star in peta2’s First-Ever Web Series

Daniella Monet Leads Vegan Roundtable As Stars Dish on Their ‘Coming Out’ Stories

For Immediate Release:
May 30, 2018

Contact:
Moira Colley 202-483-7382

Over vegan pizza and cocktails, a group of some of the highest-profile personalities on social media gathered at Los Angeles’ Little Pine restaurant for the first web series by peta2, PETA’s youth division: The Vegan Influencer Roundtable.

During the just-released inaugural episode, Daniella Monet of Victorious and D Takes Your V Card leads her fellow influencers in a discussion on their “coming out” stories—or the moment that they declared that they were going vegan. For Monet, it was after seeing a rodeo at the age of five—she refused to eat the steaks served for lunch afterward. “So I never ate meat ever again,” she says. “I [am] Italian—my grandma thought I was literally gonna die. …  Had I not gone to that rodeo, it would have taken me so much longer to figure out the truth. But you do not know the truth until you’re literally exposed to it.”

Kalel, Sophia Esperanza, and Jenné Claiborne (aka “SweetPotatoSoul”) also say that learning about the cruelty of the meat, egg, and dairy industries prompted them to go vegan. “When I was able to see the footage of those animals … there was no question,” says Esperanza. Kalel agrees, saying, “I watched a couple of documentaries, and I just felt like we should all live with as little blood on our hands as we possibly can.”

Yovana Mendoza (aka “Rawvana”), Cammie Scott, and Alexandra Beth also point to the health benefits of going vegan: “I wanted to clear up my skin. I wanted to feel better. I wanted to be more alive,” says Beth. Mendoza adds, “[T]hree days into eating vegan, I instantly felt, like, a peace of mind. … I felt good. I felt happy. And then two weeks later, I was, like, I have to keep going.”

Now, they all agree that there’s no going back. “[T]he thing is, once you know everything, once you know the reality, you don’t see it as food anymore, right?” points out Claiborne. “It’s, like, you don’t see a person walking down the street and say, ‘Boy, I’d like to eat that person.’”

New episodes of the series will be released every week on peta2’s YouTube channel. The group’s motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to eat.” For more information, please visit peta2.com.