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PETA Using Games To Spread Its Message
Cooking Mama is a series of games for the Wii and the DS in which players go through a number of steps to prepare meals using a variety of recipes. Last week, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) created their own Flash-based parody of the game, highlighting the use of meat products by having a more bloody-minded Mama do things like pull the internal organs from a Thanksgiving turkey. Cooking Mama's maker, Majesco, issued a light-hearted response, pointing out the vegetarian meals in the game. PETA then said they plan to continue making parody games as a way of "engaging the public."
Somehow it would be funny if PETA sponsored Natural Fawn Killers.
Because as long as they aren't doing the whole "domestic terrorism" thing or going after kids while the parents aren't looking I don't really give a damn.
I know my food used to be alive, and I know it had internal organs. Some of them are quite tasty.
A bullet may have your name on it but splash damage is addressed "To whom it may concern."
We should respond by releasing a flash game targeted at 8-12 year olds entitled "Butcher Mama," showing a farm-life environment where you have to slaughter and butcher hogs, chickens, cattle, and fish (from a fishery!). Target the age when your grandpappy taught you about farming, and even have such heart-felt phrases like "this is the best part, they dance around after ya kill 'em" that you should be familiar with if you were raised around livestock.
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So I guess a remake of "Duck Hunt" is out of the question?
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That's it - every time they make one of those parodies, I'm eating a puppy.
Even as a vegetarian, I'll admit peta is out of control.
Vegetables are what food eats.
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If animals werent meant to be eaten, they wouldnt have been made so tasty.
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Of a game that involves showing how sausage is made. I seem to remember hearing that if you ever have seen it made you would never want to eat it.
Of course they would probably make a game of hiding the sausage over and over again too. I fits with their mantra of going naked to draw publicity.
I regret that I only have one mod point to give per post.
PETA = People Eating Tasty Animals
Remember, there's room for all of god's creatures... on the plate right next to the mashed potatoes and green beans.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
Of course it would be based on the actual experiences of PETA staffers: http://www.petakillsanimals.com/
As an animal lover - and I mean that in precisely two different ways - I believe that Peta is wrong in its philosophy, and its actions.
First, I believe you can treat animals ethically and humanely without assigning them "rights." Animals cannot claim their rights (as we understand them). If given, they cannot exercise them. (Except, of course, the right to life.)
Second, even though Peta has some right ideas, their love of shock theater can make even sympathetic people cringe. They are at their best when putting up billboards against chaining up dogs. And doing the most good, probably. Flinging fake blood at people, though...
Dark Reflection
There are a number of arguments against meat and whatever other cruelty to animals, but most of them center on the audience regarding animal cruelty as wrong. Without that basic level of common ground, no further rational argument is possible. Lucky for PETA, many people do have problems with cruel treatment of animals, and with the fact that much of the cruelty is not for any good reason. The question is where to draw the line, and I think that's the only question. PETA and I draw it pretty far back, others will trade lots of animal cruelty for some physical pleasure, stopping I guess just short of bestiality.
So PETA is in the awkward and unenviable position of reminding people of their own moral standards. Not PETA's standards, but the audience's. Most people avoid information about the cruel and inhumane treatment of their meat products. The only explanation I have for this is that they lack the willpower or perhaps the technical knowledge to make the decision they believe to be right. However, I know that slashdot has a ton of tough guys who pride themselves on having absolutely no compassion. Maybe they'll chime in on this post, overcompensating for their meat guilt by describing how little they care and how much they enjoy meat. I already see some of it in the thread, and they're making my point for me.
Over the years, after being asked to defend being vegetarian, I understand PETA's position pretty well. People ask, idly, "why" and expect an answer related to cholesterol or "energy" or some shit. That's not my reason at all. I was raised vegetarian, being from South India, so it's pretty easy for me to be all self-righteous and you can see some of that in this post too. It used to be a lot worse. At some point, how you were raised is not enough of an explanation, and you have to either figure out the real reasons independent of your parents or just shrug it off and start eating meat. So as soon as I even mention pain and suffering, people start the handwaving and cut me off because even though they asked, I'm the jerk for actually telling them. They don't want to make the decision independent of how they were raised, I guess. In fairness, I don't know if I could either.
PETA is, obviously, more militant than I am. Conscience can be like that. As always in these meat posts, I refer the reader to Hard To Swallow, which makes these points in a better way.
When the axe came to the forest, the trees said, "Look out - the handle was once one of us."
I personally don't see a clear dividing line between an animal's right to life and a vegetable's right to life. There is a continuum of intelligence, for lack of a better word, from man down to microbe. Humans should clearly have rights because society requires it; beyond that, the decision to protect or purchase is based on an arbitrary value choice.
I'm not being entirely facetious, either; the bits I've read about the lives of plants (i.e. they communicate, actively respond to their environment, and actively defend themselves) puts them about par with some insects IMHO.
Given this, I don't see why PETA types couldn't be attacked from the left, so to speak, on their callous disregard for the feelings of lettuce.
They are a bunch of sick hypocrites with too much money and time on their hands.
Jesus was a compassionate social conservative who called individuals to sin no more.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0exLa6saV9o That's part 1. I leave it up to you to find the rest.
The heavens do not fall for such a trifle.
While a bit of a squeamish action if you're not a butcher or farmer or hunter, what message are PETA actually trying to get across? That it's bad to eat meat because it's... from an animal? Kind of redundant.
Okay -- I was being an asshole there. I know full well what they're trying to do, and that is simply to put people off eating meat because its "gross" and "its a doe-eyed living breathing animal". I would like to make my stance known now; I think this reasoning for being a vegetarian is retarded. I present to you, the flawed circular logic of the intelligent vegitarian/vegan.
Reason 1: I saw a baby lamb on a farm and I just couldn't bear myself to kill and eat that!
Go away. This isn't a reason. It's your squeamish stomach. If you're trying to convince people not to eat meat based on this reason alone then I despise you.
Reason 2: In this day and age it's unethical to eat meat when you can easily sustain yourself on plant sources.
This isn't a reason. The core argument here is "its unethical to eat meat". I'd like to know why.
Reason 3: It's unethical to cause suffering. Thus it is unethical to eat meat.
Now we're getting somewhere! So if in the future we hooked up newly born cows to a Virtual Reality system ala. the matrix, where there was no suffering, disconnected cows would remain virtually in the world (no percieved death or loss) and execution was done painlessly and with the cow blissfuly unaware, it'd be okay to eat meat? Somehow I don't think a real vegan's going to say yes. So what's the real reason?
Reason 4: It's unethical to kill.
What, now plants aren't life?
Reason 5: Plants aren't on the same level as human beings.
Then why are cows? Rabbits? Sheep? Birds? Insects? Where is this magical, arbitrary line that says it's okay to eat a pumpkin but not to eat a fish?
Reason 6: Meat is bad for you.
Citation needed. Last I heard you need a meticulous diet of a huge array of vegetables (something that no human could have done pre-civilisation) to maintain a healthy vegan life. We've been eating meat since the dawn of man, literally, and yet here we are living just as long as the average vegetarian. However, this is the only reason on the list I could accept as being non-retarded. If you honestly think you feel better on a vegetarian diet then hey, don't let me put you down.
On that note, there's another couple things that's always bugged me. Why do some vegetarians eat fish and/or chicken but not duck or lamb, and I'm not talking about the dietary-consideration kind? And why do some (ie. vegans) go as far as to not eat animal products like eggs, milk and the like, including from "ethical" sources? Because I have never had a rational, coherent argument with a vegan. I'm pretty close to just dumping them in the "ewww intestines" category.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, watch it -- I'm huge!
What's PETAs stand on human cruelty?
Don't quote me on this, but I believe that they are against the eating of human beings.
Reason 5: Plants aren't on the same level as human beings.
Then why are cows? Rabbits? Sheep? Birds? Insects? Where is this magical, arbitrary line that says it's okay to eat a pumpkin but not to eat a fish?
This seems to be the sticking point with most non-(seemingly-)dogmatic vegetarians I've met. I cannot understand this magic line that is drawn between 'sensory input->reaction' and 'pain->reaction'. They are one in the same. As humans we empathize with cry of a mammal. Is this not a reason FOR distant far-off slaughterhouses rather than for the removal of a (reasonably) critical fraction of our natural diet?
I'm also a biochemist - I know very well the processes involved. I understand that the pain I feel is simply a much more complicated variant of the sensing done in the amoebas I study.
I fear that this is simply an extension of the anthropocentric view that denies the fact that we are simply complicated versions of everything else - nothing less, nothing more.
I agree that PETA is out of control. They've even been parodied in World of Warcraft as the D.H.E.T.A (Druids for the Humane and Ethical Treatment of Animals), but I must refer back to Genesis in this respect. God gave Adam dominion of all life on the earth to use as he saw fit.
As it stands, this original mandate, before being cast from Eden, allows us to do what we will with these animals. Later, in Leviticus, certain restrictions on diet and deviate sexual practices (bestiality) were later forbidden, but the original mandate was never completely rescinded.
For the record, I am an Animal Control Officer for a local city and have to deal with this issue on a daily basis. I deal with cruelty as it is defined by the State of Texas and have to carry out my duties according to the statues. Some of these are lock-step with PETA's beliefs, but we also have laws in place about vandalism, criminal mischief, breaking and entering, trespassing, burglary, coercion and theft. I find that PETA crosses those lines far too often and I personally regard them as a criminal organization.
PETA has previously handed out graphic pamphlets to school-age children in an effort to convince them that their parents are murderers.
From the pamphlet:
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
I promise to try to answer this question in a way that's not preachy. However, I *am* vegan, so filter my post in whatever way suits you.
On that note, there's another couple things that's always bugged me. Why do some vegetarians eat fish and/or chicken but not duck or lamb, and I'm not talking about the dietary-consideration kind? And why do some (ie. vegans) go as far as to not eat animal products like eggs, milk and the like, including from "ethical" sources? Because I have never had a rational, coherent argument with a vegan. I'm pretty close to just dumping them in the "ewww intestines" category.
While I can't speak for all vegans, the general consensus is that we don't eat byproducts (milk, eggs, honey, etc) from humanely raised animals because it's not freely given. It's still unnecessary exploitation, in our opinion. This is why breastmilk is vegan (it is freely given), but cow's milk is not. I'm quite happy that you didn't come out with the "cows would be in pain if we didn't milk them" argument. I get that one a lot, from people who haven't done much research on biology (this wasn't a dig, I promise).
As for your other points, I'll touch on a couple of them, if you don't mind.
Reason 3: It's unethical to cause suffering. Thus it is unethical to eat meat.
Now we're getting somewhere! So if in the future we hooked up newly born cows to a Virtual Reality system ala. the matrix, where there was no suffering, disconnected cows would remain virtually in the world (no percieved death or loss) and execution was done painlessly and with the cow blissfuly unaware, it'd be okay to eat meat? Somehow I don't think a real vegan's going to say yes. So what's the real reason?
Er... no. Again, in my own personal opinion, it's about reducing exploitation. Would it be ethical to do this to people? Most people would claim that it is not. When one asks why it's okay to kill an animal but not a person, one often gets the answer that humans are smarter. Yet, when you ask if they would treat a mentally retarded person as an animal, it seems to be out of the question.
In general, my stance is that we should grant, to as many beings as *practical,* the "rights" of life and self-ownership. I don't want rabbits to be able to vote, because they're not capable (so far as we know) of agreeing to societal contracts. However, we generally afford those basic rights to anyone.
Frankly, the decision to grant the rights of life and self-ownership to humans only seems a bit arbitrary. At one point there was certainly a practical aspect to this, but I doubt many people (at least in the USA where I am, and many other parts of the world) would be able to claim much hardship if they gave up animal products.
Reason 4: It's unethical to kill.
What, now plants aren't life?
Reason 5: Plants aren't on the same level as human beings.
Then why are cows? Rabbits? Sheep? Birds? Insects? Where is this magical, arbitrary line that says it's okay to eat a pumpkin but not to eat a fish?
Again, the objective is "as much as is practical." It's fairly easy to live without eating animals, or their byproducts. As far as I know, it's not at all practical to live without eating plants.
As for the ethics of killing plants: If you're really concerned about it, the best way you could reduce the killing of plants is to stop eating animals. The energy conversion rates are astoundingly bad. Look it up if you don't believe me.
Reason 6: Meat is bad for you.
Citation needed. Last I heard you need a meticulous diet of a huge array of vegetables (something that no human could have done pre-civilisation) to maintain a healthy vegan life. We've been eating meat since the dawn of man, literally, and yet here we are living just as long as the average vegetarian. However, this is the only reason on the list I could accept as being non-retarded. If you honestly think y
How about we ignore bronze age mythology and have a rational discussion about this matter?
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its about being disconnected from the sources of your food, about being coccooned from the roots of the highly processed products that define your life from infancy, and having no bearings or anchor to the larger, natural world
we eat animals, we evolved that way. if you want to talk morality, that's natural morality. vile horrendous forms of suffering happens every minute on this globe, predators squeezing the air out of animals as they slowly suffocate, bovines having their throats ripped out after a terrifying all out race across the grasslands, baby birds being swallowed alive whole... its all completely normal and natural. what is there to argue with about that?
how we treat other human beings matters, because it forms a basis for human morality. morality is important in the realm of HUMAN interaction, to maintain social coherence and cohesion. if humans break moral codes amongst themselves, they represent dangers to us all that must be punished. this is the reason for human morality
but extending morality outside human-human interaction is some sort of rich isolated child's game
its the kid in their SUV driving by a mack truck hauling pigs and looking in the slats and making eye contact with the swine, and having an auschwitz moment. its contrived, maudlin, self-pitying foolishness from feeble minds unaware of the larger world
we need to care more about human beings in the third world, a million times longer before we even care one tiny bit about some future hamburger. now THAT'S a moral statement
i saw a chick walking down the sidewalk once in manhattan, wearing a t-shir that read "animals are people too"
that succinctly sums up the delusions of peta
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
(You might be like to know this long-time reader just created an account to reply to your post. So... first psot!)
Reason 1: I saw a baby lamb on a farm and I just couldn't bear myself to kill and eat that!
Go away. This isn't a reason...
To be precise, that isn't a reason to preach vegetarianism. It's a perfectly fine reason to be a vegetarian. I don't eat raisins because I don't like the taste, but I wouldn't demand the same of you. (I'm just being precise, but I know the OP understands this perfectly. S/he says as much in reason 6.)
Reason 2: In this day and age it's unethical to eat meat when you can easily sustain yourself on plant sources.
This isn't a reason. The core argument here is "its unethical to eat meat".
You're right that "its unethical to eat meat" is at the core of this argument, but if you believe eating meat is unethical, then the ease with which you can avoid meat, I think, augments the culpability.
Reason 3: It's unethical to cause suffering. Thus it is unethical to eat meat.
Now we're getting somewhere!
I can't speak on behalf of all vegetarians, but you hit the nail on the head here. It IS unethical to cause suffering, and yes, we are getting somewhere :)
So if in the future we hooked up newly born cows to a Virtual Reality system ala. the matrix, where there was no suffering, disconnected cows would remain virtually in the world (no percieved death or loss) and execution was done painlessly and with the cow blissfuly unaware, it'd be okay to eat meat? Somehow I don't think a real vegan's going to say yes.
Well, I'm a real vegetarian (and a vegan in my own home), and I say yes.
Reason 4: It's unethical to kill.
I actually have no problem with killing qua killing.
Reason 5: Plants aren't on the same level as human beings.
Then why are cows? Rabbits? Sheep? Birds? Insects? Where is this magical, arbitrary line that says it's okay to eat a pumpkin but not to eat a fish?
There is no magical line. I'd say capacity for suffering goes something like:
Humans > cows > fish > bivalves > trees
This is why I will eat fish on rare occasion*, but I haven't had a hamburger in 14 years.
* - I know, I know, "then you're NOT A VEGETARIAN!" they always scream. I am a vegetarian, but I'm not a social ass. Sometimes they conflict. When my brother and his wife invited me to dinner at their place a few months ago, we compromised with salmon. And you know what happened a decade ago when a kind family invited me to their home in Israel and made me "vegetarian" soup that had bits of chicken in it? I ate it.
Reason 6: Meat is bad for you.
The perfect human diet would include meat. (Though much, much less than the average American eats.) Having said that, I think I'm very healthy, partly because I have to watch what I eat.
On that note, there's another couple things that's always bugged me. Why do some vegetarians eat fish and/or chicken but not duck or lamb, and I'm not talking about the dietary-consideration kind?
I hope this was answered already.
And why do some (ie. vegans) go as far as to not eat animal products like eggs, milk and the like, including from "ethical" sources?
Simple: the animals from which we get our eggs and milk lead wretched lives, and we don't want to support the institutionalization of cruelty to animals.
One last thing I should mention for folks to keep in mind:
Being a vegetarian is NOT 100% consistent, and we know it.
It's not just that I eat fish on occasion. I also can't give a great reason for refusing to
The ticker (50,000 chickens killed since you opened this web page!) on that site makes me hungry for meat.
Eat the rich.
I see a lot of replies to this AC post crying "Foul, he mentioned religion"
Take a look around you at the rest of the world outside your basement. The majority of the world is religious and follows those "bronze age mythologies" as truth, regardless of what we think of them.
If they are going to use their religion against us, and try to cram it down our throats, the smartest move would be to learn to use it back, both to defend, and protect our beliefs and rights.
I feel it is a right for me to eat meat. No one should have the ability to remove that right from me. If I have to use their own holy books against them, so be it. Get past your own idiology and mental restrictions to look at the place everything has in this world, and listen fairly and with an open mind or you will NEVER rise above their level.
How amazed would you be to suddenly find that you just forgot what I wrote and you needed to reread my post.... again.
> There are people out there who REALLY think milk comes from the factory. That
> meat is produced in a machine. They really have no idea where an egg comes from.
Sure, and there are also people who think that spaghetti noodles might grow on trees, that buying a sticker to put on their cellphone can improve the battery life, that homeopathy works, that the government could make us all rich just by printing more money if they were only willing to do so, that they won't need to work for a living or pay their mortgage anymore if Obama[1] is President, and all manner of other nonsense. What's your point?
[1] Note to Obama fans: it's just an example. I'm not blaming Obama for the fact that there are idiots in the world. Obviously, if Obama had never run for President, there would be idiots in the world anyway. That's not his fault. It's an immutable fact of life. And I'm sure you can think of an idiotic claim someone has made in support of a candidate from the other party. As I said, people believe all kinds of nonsense.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
> I must refer back to Genesis in this respect. God gave Adam
> dominion of all life on the earth to use as he saw fit.
Umm, before you cite Genesis in support of your ideas, maybe you should read Genesis more carefully so you can get your citations right. God instructed Adam to look after the animals, but he gave him plants for food. Adam was a vegetarian. Genesis is very clear on this point.
Animals *were* given as food also, but not until the time of Noah (i.e., hundreds of years later) and even then one of the conditions was that you not eat meat with its lifeblood still in it, a restriction many people today no longer observe.
Later, even more dietary restrictions were placed on the Jewish nation, such as not eating pork, but those things never applied to Gentiles, unless they became proselyte Jews. The instructions given to Noah apply, presumably, to the entire human race, since we're all descended from Noah.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
Are they going to do a clubbing baby seals one? I always wanted to try that in the comfort of my own home, and shipping from Alaska is a bitch! They're always dead when they arrive. Personally I think the shipping guy might be clubbing them before they get here. Either that or maybe I should spring for overnight one of these days...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
...and, at the same time, PETA is killing a bunch of dogs it 'rescues' from animal shelters. Placing none of them in homes.
This is because it disapproves of pet ownership. So it thinks pets are better off dead. So it collects animals from unknowing animal shelters and kills them.
Oh, and it thinks we should 'liberate' cows. Despite the fact that cows can't survive in the wild. They'd all die giving birth. So it, essentially, wishes every cow dead, which fits nicely with it wishing every dog and cat running feral so we have to shoot them. (Horses, at least, would be fine, although I have to question where the hell they'd all live.)
PETA is completely insane. Everyone should oppose them at every turn. It doesn't matter if you happen to agree with some point of theirs. Don't support them, don't give them money, don't help them in any manner whatsoever. They are fucking lunatics.
If you want to help animals out, write your representative and ask him to require more humane ways of slaughtering animals for food, and donate your money to the local animal shelter.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
Because as long as they aren't doing the whole "domestic terrorism" thing
They are. They say it's just their members, but that's like Sinn Fein saying they didn't bomb, it was the IRA.
or going after kids while the parents aren't looking I don't really give a damn.
Using video games would probably reach children directly and, even though this shouldn't be the case, there probably won't be much parental oversight. Most parents will just see a flash game featuring animals.
PETA believe that anyone who is involved in the use (even keeping pets) of animals is equivalent to a Nazi. That's not an overstatement or a strawman, it's exactly what they believe. The only thing someone who honestly believes a holocaust is being perpetrated can do is hope to have the courage to fight to stop it. Because they've made the basic mistake of thinking human rights = animal rights a lot of PETA members believe violent struggle is needed.
So, whilst they're not really a threat now they have the potential to be. They're well funded by clueless celebrities and so have the potential to win over lots of new recruits with their propaganda. Anyone who uses or produces any animal products whatsoever should be wary; whenever PETA is mentioned we need to spread the message that meat != murder.
Nick
I was never raised on a farm. I grew up in seattle. I've never gone hunting or killed any animal larger then an insect.
But after I got married, we decided to move into the country, and eventually started raising and slaughtering our own animals.
I started with chickens, and moved up to rabbits and goats. Several had names and use to be breeders, but later turned into stew.
It did take some practice to learn to kill a chicken or rabbit with a single stroke, but I didn't let failure hold me back. I learned by talking to other farmers and practicing.
Personally, I think if more people butchered their own meat, there'd be fewer vegetarians. I'm actually more open try trying out new meats after raising my own.
"That's so plausible, I can't believe it!" - Leela