For Immediate Release:
May 5, 2023
Contact:
Nicole Meyer 202-483-7382
West Friendship, Md. – As the 50th annual Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival kicks off this weekend, a PETA mobile billboard will be right there, informing attendees that beating, kicking, and otherwise abusing sheep is “part of the job” for today’s wool producers, as undercover video shows. Circling the festival will be a 60-second video featuring a family visiting a cheery, “locally sourced” shearing operation—but things soon go horribly wrong when the farmer pulls out a pair of bloody shears along with a needle to sew up the sheep “when she gets cut.” The “ethically produced” placard by the door is “just advertising,” he tells a crying child.
When: Saturday, May 6, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
Sunday, May 7, 8:30 a.m.–4:30 p.m.
Where: 2210 Fairgrounds Rd. (near the intersection with Midway Boulevard), West Friendship
“There’s no doubt that once festivalgoers realize that workers cut sheep to ribbons before sending them to slaughter, many of them will think twice about wearing these gentle animals’ wool,” says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. “PETA encourages everyone to switch to luxurious and 100% animal-friendly vegan materials.”
PETA entities have documented cruelty to sheep at 117 wool industry operations worldwide, as revealed in 14 exposés. Even on “sustainable” and “responsible” farms, workers beat, stomped on, and cut into the skin of struggling sheep before slitting their throats while they were still conscious. Fortunately, many top retailers offer clothing made of natural eco- and animal-friendly vegan fabrics, including organic cotton, linen, Tencel, and modal.
PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to wear”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview.
For more information, please visit PETA.org, listen to The PETA Podcast, or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.
