What do you think of PETA?

[ComradeDavo]

To be fair, that's what most PETA people do too.

If people would like to properly discuss PETA's tatics and what have you then I wouldn't moan, and i'd be happy to put in my own thoughts.

I mean for example I feel that at current it is pointless trying to get people to stop eating chickens, pigs and cows. However if PETA diverted the money they spend on stuff like that towards building boats and providing to help Greenpeace stop Japanese whaling, then the results would be alot more effective and they would get more support.

I honestly don't see what's wrong with posting humor.

There's a humour a jokes forum for that. If I where to open a thread in OT about George Bush where every post was 'he sucks' or 'he's rubbish' or whatever it would be closed, so why is it ok for a PETA thread like that?

 

[holy king]

because belittling the holocaust and comparing humans to animals makes them fair game.

 

[ComradeDavo]

because belittling the holocaust and comparing humans to animals makes them fair game.

I counter that 'You are either with us or against us' and so forth would thus make George W Bush 'fair game'. But i'd rather not descend to such a lack of intellect where posting insults is the point of the forum.

 

[Dida]

Meat-eating was essential for human evolution, says UC Berkeley anthropologist specializing in diet

http://berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/99legacy/6-14-1999a.html

 

[El_Machinae]

Which pro-lifers? All of them?

Well, both prolifers and people sympathetic to PETA come in gradients of intensity. So, not all prolifers are similar to PETA members, very few of them are. But the prolifer "visible minority" seems to have quite a bit in common with PETA members.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

I see what you mean.

In fact, it makes a lot of sense. Which is why I try not to define the animal rights movement entirely by the most radical PETA members.

 

[Phlegmak]

There's a humour a jokes forum for that. If I where to open a thread in OT about George Bush where every post was 'he sucks' or 'he's rubbish' or whatever it would be closed, so why is it ok for a PETA thread like that?

No humor in the Offtopic forum would make it painfully dull.

And your analogy is bad, since this thread (and George Bush threads) have more content than just "he sucks".

 

[El_Machinae]

I see what you mean.

In fact, it makes a lot of sense. Which is why I try not to define the animal rights movement entirely by the most radical PETA members.

That said, there seems to be much more terrorism (actual terrorism) from PETA-esque people than prolifer-esque people. Though I'd have to say that I've seen much more visible protesting from prolifers.

 

[MilesGregarius]

That said, there seems to be much more terrorism (actual terrorism) from PETA-esque people than prolifer-esque people. Though I'd have to say that I've seen much more visible protesting from prolifers.

PETA, as far as I know, hasn't killed anyone. The same can't be said for lunatic fringe pro-lifers. The similarites between the two are there, though.

 

[DNK]

Meat-eating was essential for human evolution, says UC Berkeley anthropologist specializing in diet

http://berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/99legacy/6-14-1999a.html

So then, after killing cashier-woman with rock thingy, I went back outside for fun bout of "chase the bear", but then the bear, it chase me! And I have no club! Oh no...

Thankfully, me find other people to ask for help, and they help kill bear. Then we all share in bear meat and make coat out of skin for cold since we no like natural gas heating systems - they not natural, so they no good. I finally pass out from protein poisoning from bear meat on comfy rock.

What a good, natural, primitive day for me...

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

If PETA was simply arguing that advances in technology makes it no longer necessary to eat meat, that argument would be quite effective.

 

[SuperBeaverInc.]

PETA are a bunch of lunatics

 

[woody60707]

What the hell is this PETA = prolifers crap????

dur dur, people have a different notion on what the value of life, so I'm going to make fun of them for it, dur dur.

PETA are a bunch of lunatics

uggg

 

[El_Machinae]

PETA, as far as I know, hasn't killed anyone. The same can't be said for lunatic fringe pro-lifers. The similarites between the two are there, though.

Well, officially, PETA will never kill anyone. The ALF and ELF take credit for any violent terrorism with regards to animal rights. It's a bit of the "No True Scotsman" fallacy, but not completely.

 

[MilesGregarius]

What the hell is this PETA = prolifers crap????

dur dur, people have a different notion on what the value of life, so I'm going to make fun of them for it, dur dur.

uggg

Lunatic-fringe types who push an agenda with shock tactics - even to the detriment of said agenda - display certain similarities in psychological make up. It has nothing to do with what they're actually espousing. Pro-life, animal rights, it doesn't matter. Provoking extreme, usually negative, reactions and claiming vindication because of the hostility they themselves have engendered often seems of greater import to some people than making any actual progress towards their stated objective.

My beef (no pun intended) with PETA isn't their ideals - about which I have no opinion either way - it's that the VISIBLE face of PETA, whatever the percentage of non-crazy members the group has, are the loons who seem care more about making extravagant statements than making effective ones.

 

[MilesGregarius]

Well, officially, PETA will never kill anyone. The ALF and ELF take credit for any violent terrorism with regards to animal rights. It's a bit of the "No True Scotsman" fallacy, but not completely.

Not arguing that, just pointing out that the extremists among the pro-life crowd have a weel-documented history of terrorism that out does even ALF and their ilk.

 

[El_Machinae]

People often underestimate the terrorism done by ALF et al., mostly because we think of them as hippy kids (or whatever). In your case, an abortion doctor was shot: you had to go back ten years.

A University of California-Santa Cruz biologist whose home was firebombed this weekend feared for his family's future on Sunday while a spokesman for a radical animal rights group said the attacks were the consequences for performing research on animals.

The volatile rhetoric left UC-Santa Cruz on edge Sunday, a day after a pair of firebombings on two university biomedical researchers had authorities looking for clues and tightening security around scientists named in a pamphlet left at a coffeehouse last week.

Just before 6 a.m. Saturday, molecular biologist David Feldheim's home was firebombed, forcing him, his wife and their two young children to flee down a fire escape.

About the same time, a car belonging to a different, unidentified researcher was destroyed by another firebomb.

Santa Cruz police described the explosives as a "Molotov cocktail on steroids," and said the attack on the Feldheims' house was being investigated as an attempted homicide because the family was at home

http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_10091249 this year

I'm more prone to notice animal-rights-based terrorism, but I really do think that there's actually more terrorism done for animal rights. I also believe that there are more prolife protestors. I see them outside the hospitals quite often.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Yeah, ALF are much worse. Here in England they dug up some old lady's corpse because she was involved with a company that bred guinea pigs...

Here is a link I found anyway...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4708677.stm

 

[MilesGregarius]

Attempted homicide, bad as it is, doesn't hold a candle to actual homicide, of which the pro-lifers have pulled off more than half a dozen. Try googling Drs. David Gunn or Bernard Slepian. Or lunatic "pro-lifers" like Michael Griffin, John Salvi (gunned down two receptionists at a women's clinic), or Eric Robert Rudolph, not to mention a host of lesser lights.

I don't see ALF types as "hippy kids" in the least. However, nutjob lefties rarely have the same capacity for ultraviolence that right-wing nutjobs do.

 

[DNK]

If PETA was simply arguing that advances in technology makes it no longer necessary to eat meat, that argument would be quite effective.

Certainly. It is a pretty effective argument by the way

I was just responding to the attacks against PETA (transparent attacks on vegetarianism in general) that were making [that nature fallacy] fallacies.

And, again, for the record, I don't like PETA for most of the reasons outlined in this thread.

You think PETA is bad, try being vegan and having to deal with it, because then you're on the other end of all this crap, having to see what a s---ty image PETA gives anyone with an animal rights bent.

My feelings are: I don't like marketing, marketing is a large part of the problem when it comes to AR and modern farming, so why is PETA resorting to rather lowest-common-denominator marketing to try to fix a problem largely perpetuated by similar l-c-d marketing?

It's nice that at least here I don't have to deal with PETA apologists.