Even for those who ardently believe in animal rights, who loudly protest the cruelty endured by millions of unfortunate creatures in factory farms, PETA’s latest move is bound to ruffle some feathers.
It has to do with an ill-thought-out marketing scheme?one that is in such poor taste they have yet to find a media platform willing to run it.
There are no graphic images, no bludgeoned seals. Instead, it is a simple block of text?but one that compares the slaughtering of animals for food to the senseless murder of 22-year-old Tim McLean as he slept on a Greyhound bus.
The ad closes like this: ?If this ad leaves a bad taste in your mouth, please give a thought to what sensitive animals think and feel when they come to the end of their frightening journey and see, hear, and smell the slaughterhouse.?
There are many who will object to this ad simply because they see nothing wrong with eating meat. They have already dismissed the claims of PETA, as well as many other reputable, academic sources who have documented the very real brutality on many factory farms and slaughterhouses.
But let’s leave them out of it. Let’s look, instead, at why this ad should indeed leave a bad taste in the mouths of those who choose a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle because they believe the alternative is inhumane.
PETA’s position is that they are against cruelty to animals, whether that comes in the form of physical abuse or emotional anguish. And although they are proudly known for their ?uncompromising views on animal rights,? It’s not a stretch to say that any deliberate cruelty is wrong?whether It’s directed at humans or animals.
In short, people should not knowingly cause suffering, whether physical or emotional, to other creatures in order to suit their own agendas. But That’s exactly what PETA has done with the advertisement equating Tim McLean’s murder with the slaughter of animals.
Right now, there are family members who are in unimaginable pain because they have lost their child in a horrific, random killing. There are close friends who have expressed shock, sadness, and deep emotional distress. And almost before they have been able to digest the tragic loss (much less begun to heal), PETA has capitalized on that suffering to fulfill their own agenda.
Perhaps, following the plea in their ad, PETA should have given ?a thought to what sensitive [families] think and feel? when they see their child’s murder reduced to a marketing ploy.
Eliminating the torture, abuse, and neglect of animals is a worthy cause and one that, as a vegetarian especially, I support. But in this case, PETA doth protest far, far too much.
