Blackmoor Vituperative

I imagine that you’ve heard of PETA, the group that would prefer to kill animals rather than allow them to live as pets? Oh, yes: you heard me right. The funny thing is that I used to support PETA, back when I thought they cared about animals. Then, in the late 1980s *(see note below), I learned the truth: that PETA is a radical organization that fosters vandalism and even terrorism against legitimate medical research laboratories, and that they don’t even care for the welfare of animals all that much. They are just as likely to kill animals as they are to find good homes for them.

Hmm, let me re-phrase that. I don’t want you to get the wrong idea, and I’m being sloppy with my facts. It is not true that PETA is “just as likely” to kill animals as they are to find good homes for them. The fact is that PETA is over five times more likely to kill animals as they are to find good homes for them. PETA kills thousands of animals every year, animals which could have gone to good homes if PETA had just left them where they were. Not counting those that PETA held only temporarily — for spaying or neutering — the group killed over 85 percent of the animals it took in during 2003.

In 2003, PETA euthanized over 85 percent of the animals it took in, finding adoptive homes for just 14 percent. By comparison, the Norfolk (Va.) SPCA found adoptive homes for 73 percent of its animals and Virginia Beach SPCA adopted out 66 percent.

(from The Center for Consumer Freedom)

As I said before, this isn’t new. PETA has euthanized animals for years, and they are still at it. In Virginia last year, the activist group euthanized 2,278 animals, sterilized 7,641 and found homes for 361.

Of course, if killing animals by the truckload is your thing, or if you get a kick out of dumping animal carcasses into dumpsters by the dozen, then PETA might be the group for you. I happen to know that they’re hiring (those dead pets aren’t going to dump themselves).

* (Note: that was when I still lived in California, before I moved to Norfolk, VA — which is, oddly enough, the location of PETA’s headquarters.)