PETA at Large!

Papers won't run PETA ad linked to Pickton case

Papers won't run PETA ad linked to Pickton case
Updated Thu. Nov. 14 2002 12:41 PM ET

CTV News Staff

Two Vancouver newspapers have refused to run an advertisement that likens the treatment of animals to the fate of women allegedly murdered on a British Columbia pig farm.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) is a U.S.-based advocacy group with a history of creating controversial ads denouncing the eating of meat. Its latest campaign makes reference to the case of 63 missing women abducted from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside neighbourhood and alleged evidence found on Robert Pickton's Port Coquitlam pig farm.

Pickton has been charged with 15 counts of first-degree murder in connection with the case.

One section of the ad that was to have run Thursday, reads: "They were drugged and dragged across the room... Their struggles and cries went unanswered... They were slaughtered and their heads sawed off... Their body parts were refrigerated... Their bones were discarded."

It's thought the PETA campaign was intended to coincide with Pickton's preliminary hearing, which had been scheduled for Monday but has been put on hold.

Pickton is not mentioned by name in the ad but he is mentioned in a news release issued by PETA.

"PETA has just released a print ad that illustrates the well-established connection between animal abuse and acts of severe violence against people, and compares what is done to animals on factory farms and slaughterhouses to the ways in which accused serial killer Robert William Pickton apparently dealt with his human victims," says the press release.

"PETA believes that Pickton’s job as a pig killer could easily have numbed him to the cries of animals who felt his knife," the release continues.

The group says the ad is similar to one that PETA ran in the Des Moines [Iowa] Register a decade ago during convicted serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer’s trial.

Family of victims are disgusted by the association.

"All they're talking about is the pain of the animals, they don't care about the pain of the families," said Laurie Isberg. "They're torturing us. They're torturing us like they say everybody tortures animals."

"The parallels in this case are very clear," said PETA spokesman Andrew Butler. "What happened to the unfortunate victims of this crime are happening every single day in pig farms around the world where animals are routinely mutilated."

PETA bought a full-page ad in Thursday's edition of The Vancouver Province. But the company that publishes the newspaper, Pacific Newspaper Group, said Tuesday it would not run the ad in either the Province or The Vancouver Sun.

It's believed to be the first time a Canadian company has refused to run a PETA ad. The newspaper says it will refund PETA in full. Simon Fraser University marketing professor Lindsay Meredith said pulling the ads was the right decision.

"This is in poor taste," he said. "You don't take the destruction of 50 lives and use that to push your product."

PETA says it will try to force the newspapers to run the ads.

PETA Compares Murdered Women to Meat
Run Date: 11/30/02

(WOMENSENEWS)

--An animal rights organization, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, recently launched an ad campaign that compared the deaths of 15 Canadian women murdered and dismembered to animals killed for meat.

An alleged serial killer Robert Pickton is currently facing trial for the deaths of the 15 women who disappeared in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside in the mid-1980s. Pickton is accused of dismembering his victims and storing their body parts in a freezer on his small, non-commercial pig farm.

While the ads did not specifically name Robert Pickton, they mentioned alleged details of the crimes of which he is accused, and suggested the actions were akin to farm animals killed for food, according to Canadian newspaper reports.

PETA pulled the print ad campaign this week--along with plans for upcoming television spots--after receiving negative comments from the public. At least one Canadian newspaper refused to run the ads.

In a statement, PETA President Ingrid Newkirk said the ad was meant to show the "horror and fear of the 'serial killings' going on every day in slaughter houses and on pig farms."

PETA is best known for running ads of barely concealed, naked women in their anti-fur ads, which feature the slogan: "I'd rather go naked than wear fur."

Why Most Vegans Are Usally Stupid

First off - sorry sorry sorry I have not written anything on here for a long time. I just kind of ran out of important things I felt motivated to write about but now all that has changed and I'm back with a buzz!
There's something I have been wanting to put into writing for quite sometime and that is why most vegans are usually stupid. I don't mean they have a brain the size of a pea or anything no - it's more that they don't use their brain (however big it may be) to consider their ecological footprint. The vegans I have met are fairly self righteous about their lifestyle and often feel certain that the way they live their life leaves the smallest ecological footprint on the earth. Usually I find they have failed to consider several major factors. Just because you eat vegetables and no animal products doesn't mean your diet is totally eco-friendly. While it's true that for every pound of meat you could grow many times more vegetables therefore using up less resources - eating a carrot for example may have required an unknown number of unenvironmentally friendly things (including animal cruelty) to happen before it got to your mouth.

The things I try to consider are:


1) Were any chemicals used which may have had detrimental impacts on the surrounding environment? - most artificial fertilizers and pesticides are damaging to wildlife and humans so I buy organic produce whenever possible. However, although a product may be "organic" that does NOT mean that dead animals were not used to grow it (fish and bone fertilizer - hmm?) and that the fertilizers used were from sustainable sources.


2) Is the product fair trade? - it's often difficult to find fair trade products but I when I see them I always buy them instead of similar items which are not fair trade.


3) Are there any genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in it? - I avoid GMOs because the potential and proven environmental disadvantages outweigh the mostly unproved advantages.


4) How far has this product travelled? - I try to buy local produce as much as possible and avoid imported foods from a long way away. The environmental impacts (most notably C02 emissions) of food transportation are a major factor when considering your ecological footprint.


I also try to apply similar ethics to buying clothes and other products although it's not so easy finding things like organic cotton in local shops - especially in small places like Bermuda. Vegans however, boast about the fact that they don't wear wool or leather but what about their plastic shoes and their cotton shirts? There is more to being an ethical consumer than simply drawing a line between plants and animals. I do take my hat off to any vegan who buys local organic produce and wears natural organic clothes. However, most of the vegans I have met do not consider the things I have listed to be as important as the issues involved in livestock farming.

I am totally against livestock farming on land (especially factory farming but when it comes to the sea - as long it's sustainable and doesn't involve needless cruelty - I'm buying it! Of course my oceanic diet is fairly restricted because these days we're overfishing and depleting the oceans of life *rolls eyes* so there isn't much you can eat from the sea without a guilty conscience. However, local line caught fish together farmed mussels and tilapia are usually the best options. I'll talk more about them another time - but trust me on this - mussels - unless they are dredged - are like ZERO ecological footprint seafood ;-) and in my opinion are way better to eat than most vegetable sources of protein.

I know that vegans think I am cruel for eating fish that have no doubt suffered pain but when you destroy native flora and fauna in order to grow vegetables - is that not cruel and shouldn't it be avoided as much as possible? Sure we waste a lot of land growing animals and I am against that but it's even better to eat mussels and locally caught fish than it is to eat tofu... unless you consider killing fish and mussels a terrible sin - in which case - you would really need to find out where all your vegetables are coming from because you'll find that lots of animals died or suffered along the way - and I just don't know how you could justify eating anything unless you were a fruitarian that grew all your own organic fruit and if you were - I'd want to meet you and shake your hand to make sure you were real!)

Scientists Prove Plants Feel Pain, Vegans Face Starvation

DALLAS--Research scientists at Baylor Medical Center have proven that plants, including vegetables, feel pain when subjected to trauma such as being yanked out of the ground, peeled, cooked, and eaten. "Veggies and plants initiate a massive hormone and chemical barrage internally when they suffer any kind of injury," says professor Barry Lindzer. "This response is akin to the nerve response and endorphin release when an animal is injured. We cannot ignore the similarities." When Tarnish asked professor Lindzer and his research team what they thought this finding might mean, they responded unanimously, "Nobel prize, baby!"

Other agencies, namely People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and the sum total of the world's hard-core vegetarians (known as vegans) registered formal complaints against the research. Their team of lawyers has already submitted a motion to have the results of the research destroyed or sealed. Others fear the damage has already been done. A spokesman for PETA said, "This is bad for us. Most of our members haven't eaten anything since hearing about the results. Our lawyers are looking into suing Mother Earth for false advertising, but concede that the suit will probably be inconclusive. In the meantime we'll be surviving on vitamin supplements and water."

In an ironic related story, a dozen PETA protesters picketing the Hungry Carnivore Steak House in New York City were allegedly assaulted by three patrons of the restaurant. Eyewitnesses say that the picketers were making their typical nuisance display of scorn and righteous indignation over the willful consumption of "the flesh of murdered animals" outside the Hungry Carnivore when two unidentified men and a woman stepped out of the establishment and sprayed the picketers with several gallons of what appeared to be blood. Victims and bystanders alike were surprised to discover that the liquid was actually V-8 juice. The truly shocking result of the alleged attack was the reaction of the picketers. All of the PETA protesters were wracked with convulsions and suffered hours of dry heaves while many of the bystanders merely laughed. This reaction within vegetarianism's great bastion of faith has many true believers reconsidering their dietary requirements. Others are quietly making funeral arrangements and the Environmental Protection Agency is considering declaring vegans an endangered species.