PETA: The Fight For Animal Rights

1. PETA by Josephine
2. There have been people who cared about animal rights in the past. In the 18th century, there were writers and poets that displayed their feelings on that topic in their works. One of them, Jeremy Bentham, one said,
“... the right question for animals is not ‘Can they reason?’ ‘Can they talk?’, but ‘Can they suffer?’ ”
Jeremy Bentham
3. PETA stands for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. It is a worldwide organization with over 3 million members. It fights for Animal Rights.
PETA Logo
4. What is Animal Rights? Animal Rights is the thought of letting animals get the basic rights. They don’t want animals to be caused pain, or be exploited/killed by humans. It does not mean equality between humans and animals.

Animal Rights Revolution
5. PETA also fights for Animal Welfare, which more people fight for. It is the thought of not causing animals more pain than necessary, but it’s okay if they be used by humans. It is more popular because it will be less of a dramatic change of how our society works.
6. PETA was found in March 1980 by Ingrid Newkirk. The motto of the organization is “animals are not ours to eat, wear, experiment on or use for entertainment or abuse in any other way.”
Ingrid Newkirk
7.

Members would do undercover investigations into slaughterhouses or laboratories. It works with celebrities and government officials in campaigns to spread the message and get free media coverage. They pass out flyers and talk with people one-on-one. Some also acts as “field workers,” which means they go to neighborhoods and offer dog houses, toys and neutering/spraying services to (owners of the) dogs that seem neglected. The organization uses many methods to fight for their cause, but haven’t succeeded much in getting laws made.

Timeline of major events
1. 1980: PETA was created and organized the first World Day for Animals.
World Day for Animals
2. 1983: U.S. military would laboratories no longer shoot dogs and cats to use as medical training.
3. 1991: The Silver Spring Monkeys case becomes the first animal cruelty case to be examined by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Monkey
4. 1993: After PETA target General Motors, car companies around the world stopped using animals in crash tests.
5. 1994: Calvin Klein becomes the first popular clothing designer that says he won’t use any fur in his design, after PETA supporters’ protests and meeting with PETA representatives.
6. 1996: Because of PETA’s campaign, NASA agrees to stop Bion - experiment organized by the U.S., France and Russia to send monkeys to space wearing straitjackets.
Nasty

Nasa
7. 1998: Taiwan passes its first law concerning animal cruelty, after PETA rescues bunch of dogs that would’ve been “beaten, starved, electrocuted and drowned” (PETA)
Dogs in a pen
8. 1999: White House and EPA prevented 800,000 animals from chemical testing after PETA campaigned, gave scientific documentation and Congressional testimony.
9.

2004: PETA persuaded chemical companies and US Environmental Protection Agency stopped plan for chemical testing, saving tens of thousands animals.
10. 2009: It took a month of campaigning from PETA, after a video showing violence in military training against dogs, for the Bolivian Ministry of Defense created the military’s first law, which forbids any behavior that causes the death of an animal.
11. 2010: Utah passes law that government-run shelters don’t have to sell animals to labs, after PETA does undercover investigation at University of Utah.
University of Utah
12. 2011: PETA filed a lawsuit against SeaWorld asking for the release of orcas caught in the wild, that they are slaves and violates the 13th; first time the 13th was asked to apply to not humans.
Sea World
13. Due to PETA’s campaign, US military no longer uses monkeys in “cruel chemical-attack training course.” (PETA)
14. 2012: Egypt stops using animals for trauma training after PETA gave them simulators.
15. Supreme Court of Puerto Rico cancels Bioculture corporations plan to create a monkey breeding facility that sells them to US labs, after campaigns and lawsuits for at least 2

years
Puerto Rico Supreme Court
16. New rules are brought to horse racing, like “softer whips and limitations on whipping, increased drug testing, and mandatory horse ambulances on the track” due to investigation campaign.
Horse Race
17. 2013: U.S. Army will now have less animals in trauma training, and try and keep training to methods without using animals. Result of decades of campaigning from PETA.
18. Los Angeles City Council bans bullhooks after PETA’s undercover footage of baby elephant mistreated was shown. Goes affect in 2017.
Baby Elephant with Bullhook
19. 2014: India no longer allows cosmetics that were animal tested in the country.
20. Very recently, in January of 2016, the FBI took a big step for animals. Before, animal abuse was put in the “Other” section, but they now list it as a Class A felony. They decided to also start collecting data on the known offenders, like they do with murders. With this data, they can figure out

7. There are a lot controversies around PETA and how it is evil. One of the most popular claims is that PETA slaughters animals.
8. Dr Daniel Kovich visited the PETA headquarters in Virginia in July 2010 for an inspection.
9. “Kovich noted that PETA’s shelter did not meet PETA’s own published guidelines for operating a humane animal shelter.” (McWilliams)
10. Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services requires shelters to provide data of animals they take in, gets adopted and euthanize. According to it, PETA’s adoption rate is lower than the statewide data. The euthanizing rate is also a lot higher than average.
11. Graphs
26. Not only that, under 10% of the animals are adopted and over 80% are killed.
12. Data Table
13. “PETA’s shelter dropped from an embarrassing 14 percent in 2004 to an abysmal 0.7 percent in 2009. In other words, of the 2317 dogs and cats in PETA’s shelter 99.3 percent were killed.” (McWilliams)
14. There is also another claim that PETA target kids and traumatize them as weapons against their parents. In 2003, PETA was caught handing out “Your Mommy Kills Animals” flyers to kids accompanying mothers wearing fur.
Your Mommy Kills Animals.