On PETA

Some months ago I jumped on the bandwagon and joined Tumblr, a social blogging site for posting photos, videos, links and so forth. It allows you to "follow" tags--any post tagged with a certain word comes up on that word's feed--and one side-effect of following the "circus" tag is exposure to a frequent barrage of Peta2 (PETA's marketing division directed specifically at children and teens) links about how circuses are apparently about nothing but abusing elephants.

Now, before you say anything, I know circuses have an animal welfare record that ranges from shaky to abysmal. I have no doubt that elephants are still mistreated, in some cases severely, because animal training methods change very slowly over time and the same abusive methods have been used in "breaking" elephants since before the birth of Christ. But I don't think training elephants is inherently cruel. Purely positive reinforcement, the only training method used with captive dolphins and other marine mammals, could provide an effective and humane alternative.

But even if elephant training was performed humanely, with no distress to the animal, PETA wouldn't care. They present themselves as being a crusading force against animal cruelty, and this gets them a lot of support, particularly among teenagers, who are easily swayed by emotional appeals even if the arguments don't quite add up. I know--I was one of those teenagers. But continual exposure to PETA's propaganda eventually clued me in that they and I weren't entirely in agreement. Consider the case of the elephants: Next to the understandably upsetting descriptions of physical abuse, PETA really likes to emphasize that the elephant's dignity is wounded by performing:

Elephants and other animals used in circuses are deprived of everything that is natural and important to them. They are forced to wear costumes and perform ridiculous tricks and stunts...

...as if this is anywhere near the neighborhood of beating and neglect when it comes to cruelty to animals. But this tells us something very important about PETA's perspective: They believe that the very act of training an elephant to perform tricks is a form of abuse. If the elephant performed of his own free will for positive rewards and was housed in a pleasant environment where he regularly received exercise, veterinary care and social interaction, PETA would still say it is cruel--they'd just leave the training methods out, and instead emphasize that an animal is being "enslaved" and "used for our amusement," even if that use is not unpleasant at all.

This is because their organization is based on the idea that any use of animals, however benign, is inherently unethical.

If all meat animals were raised humanely in fields and killed in a completely painless and foolproof way, PETA would still think it is wrong to eat meat.

If all laboratory animals were kept in large enclosures where they could be social and live happy lives and were hopped up on painkillers any time they could possibly be in pain, PETA still would not want scientists to use animals to help find a cure for cancer or AIDS or anything else.

This prohibition on animal use even includes maintaining a zoo or keeping a pet. They don't think you should let your dog loose in the woods so he can be free, nothing like that, but they think it would be better if there were no more dogs after yours dies. And if you gave your dog to a shelter for any reason, they would think it better that he be killed than spend more than a few days waiting to be adopted. If your dog is a "dangerous" breed, they would prefer your dog be killed before he has a chance to find a home at all, on the grounds that any person who adopts such a dog is likely to be abusive (yes, they support breed bans). PETA wants to kill the puppies to save the puppies. They frequently cite "pet overpopulation," and depending on where you are in the world, yes, there are often more pets available than people who want them. But remember, in the eyes of the animal rights movement, even one pet is more pet population than they want.

Does this seem extreme? That's because it is. "Animal rights" is code for "animal liberation"--the idea that all animals should be free and they should live separately from humankind. And PETA barely conceals it. Their surface marketing is almost exclusively appeals to emotion based on cruelty to animals (or, in some cases, simply gruesome practices that do not cause pain, like the dissection of dead animals), but occasional interviews with founder Ingrid Newkirk lay plain their actual intent. It is a fringe agenda that I think very few people actually agree with, and yet this organization receives a lot of money and is considered kooky, perhaps annoying, but harmless. It is not.

I think Ingrid Newkirk and many members of PETA do care about eliminating the suffering of animals, but the ways they propose to do that are, in the end, likely to be detrimental to animals, both human and non-human. If we eliminate all voluntary human contact with animals, human empathy for animals will evaporate. Part of why the modern animal rights movement exists in the first place is because, in the early 1800s, more people had enough wealth and spare time to bring animals into their homes as companions on a wide scale. The first humane societies and the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) emerged from the popularity of keeping pets and the realization that accompanies it: animals have feelings, too, and the abuse of animals, whether they live as companions, workers or future food, is wrong. Eliminate animals from our lives, and how long do you think it will be before people forget?

That argument applies even if you believe interspecies friendship holds no intrinsic value (though I would have to disagree with you on that).

If you want to support an organization working to reduce the suffering of animals, don't look to PETA. Instead donate your money or your time to a local animal shelter in your community or to the SPCA in your state, province or country.