‘Marmoset Funeral’ to Haunt UMass Graduation Ceremony

For Immediate Release:
May 24, 2023

Contact:
Amanda Hays 202-483-7382

As University of Massachusetts–Amherst (UMass) graduates and their families arrive at the school’s commencement ceremony on Friday, PETA supporters in funereal garb and marmoset masks will pose in coffins to call attention to the monkeys killed in the school’s cruel “menopause” experiments. A PETA “mourner” will play video footage recorded inside the laboratory where these experiments are carried out, revealing how the animals there are tormented in costly and useless studies.

When:    Friday, May 26, 8:30 a.m.

Where:    Outside Warren McGuirk Alumni Stadium, Stadium Drive, Amherst

UMass experimenter Agnès Lacreuse cuts into and screws electrodes onto monkeys’ skulls, cuts into their necks, deprives them of water, restrains them for hours at a time, and torments them in various other ways, purportedly to study menopause—which marmosets don’t even experience. To simulate menopause, Lacreuse surgically removes the monkeys’ ovaries, administers hormone-manipulating drugs to the animals, and uses hand warmers on the monkeys’ bodies to mimic hot flashes.

“These pointless experiments on marmosets won’t help a single UMass graduate, but they do cause immense suffering and death,” says PETA Senior Vice President Kathy Guillermo. “PETA is calling on UMass to make alums proud by ending invasive experiments on monkeys who value their lives as much as we value ours.”

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to experiment on”—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.