In response to my article exposing PETA’s killing, PETA claims I am a “man with an agenda.” My only agenda is to stop their killing.
My Huffington Post expose about PETA’s systematic slaughter of animals has received 160,000 “likes” and has been shared over 50,000 times. In a response issued by PETA yesterday, they do not discuss why they call for the killing of all pit bulls. They do not mention why they call for the round up and killing of healthy feral cats. They fail to address the puppies and kittens they put to death and encourage others to put to death. They do not discuss why Ingrid Newkirk claims they do not support the right to life, her admission that PETA kills “healthy” animals, her staff admitting that the puppies and kittens they killed were “adorable” and “perfect,” nor her belief that animals want to die and that killing them is “a gift.” They do not address their defense of some of the most abusive shelters in the country. They do not address the fact that their “shelter” is too small for the volume of animals they seek out, nor that 90% of those animals are killed within 24 hours, nor the fact they have no adoption hours and do not promote animals for adoption. They do not address the fact that rescue groups have given them healthy animals after PETA promised to find them homes, only to have PETA employees put the animals to death.
And, of course, there is no mention as to why PETA employees walked into a veterinary office, lied to the people working there about promising to find a healthy mother cat and her kittens a home and instead took those animals into the back of a van where they perhaps heard them purr, perhaps watched the kittens play, and then grabbed each one, restrained them, injected them with a fatal dose of poison, put their dead bodies in a garbage bag and then threw them in a dumpster. Without guilt, without remorse, without shame or anguish, they simply moved on to the next lie and the next victims. All told, PETA killed roughly 2,000 animals a year every year for the last 11 years, including those they labeled “healthy,” “adoptable,” “adoprable,” and “perfect”: 29,426 animals in all.
Rather than respond substantively to all the photographs I posted, PETA is doing what they always do: create a diversion by shooting the messenger. According to PETA, I am a “man with an agenda.” They claim I am a front for Agri-business, particularly the Center for Consumer Freedom, when in truth, my only agenda is to stop the killing and give animals what they deserve: the right to live.
I have worked in the animal rights movement for over 20 years. I am a graduate of Stanford Law School, an attorney and former criminal prosecutor, and have held a variety of leadership positions including director of operations for the San Francisco SPCA and executive director of the Tompkins County SPCA, two of the most successful shelters in the nation. Under my leadership, Tompkins County, New York, became the first No Kill community in the U.S. I have also spoken nationally and internationally on animal sheltering issues, have written animal protection legislation at the state and national level, have created successful No Kill programs in both urban and rural communities, and have consulted with a wide range of animal protection groups, including some of the largest and best known in the nation. I am the author of four books, Redemption, Irreconcilable Differences, All American Vegan, and Friendly Fire (the latter two co-written with my wife, Jennifer). Redemption won five national book awards and redefined the animal protection movement in the United States. I am also the director of the No Kill Advocacy Center. I have been an ethical vegan for over 20 years. I write a vegan blog. I’ve written a vegan cookbook. I’m raising two vegan kids. And I am a former PETA volunteer, until I learned the truth. (Click here to read about my efforts to end shelter killing, promote veganism, stop vivisection, and more).
I am also not alone in coming forward to expose PETA. Others have, too: A veterinarian who gave PETA healthy kittens after they promised to find them homes only to kill them immediately in the back of a van; a former member of PETA’s inner circle who found a healthy dog but would not give the dog to PETA because experience had taught her that they would have killed him; a former staff member who was fired for openly disagreeing about the killing of healthy animals; another employee who quit because of PETA’s killing; and a former intern who also quit in disgust after he saw healthy puppies and kittens in the PETA “kill room.” I am also joined by countless animals lovers, animal rights activists, and vegans who will not accept the hypocrisy that it is wrong to kill chickens and cows (it is!) but ok to kill dogs and cats (it is not!).
Furthermore, I am not affiliated in any way with the Center for Consumer Freedom, nor have I ever received money from individuals or groups who exploit animals, including the Center for Consumer Freedom. The root of this lie is that, in 2007, they posted answers to questions about the causes of shelter killing in America. You can read the questions and answers in their entirety here. Sadly, the fact I truthfully answered questions about how better to save animals in shelters has been used to misrepresent who I am. That does not mean they support me (they do not) and it does not mean I support them (I do not). In fact, PETA is the one that benefits from the Center for Consumer Freedom by using them as a shield to deflect any criticism.
Moreover, for speaking the truth about PETA’s systematic slaughter of thousands of animals every year, PETA’s defenders and others have called me a “piece of shit,” wrote an article called “Nathan Winograd Should be Beheaded” and have threatened to kill my dog.
Here is my story: www.nathanwinograd.com/?p=11902
And this is my vision: http://vimeo.com/48445902