Direct Action Everywhere (DxE) has invited PETA President Ingrid Newkirk to speak in Berkeley on October 20. Newkirk is the architect of PETA’s campaign of companion animal extermination which has claimed the lives of at least 32,744 over the last 13 years. These animals are often acquired through trapping, lying, and even, outright theft, and most are killed immediately, without ever being made available for adoption.
Last year, after I learned that DxE had been partnering with PETA, I reached out to DxE chapters across the country and Wayne Hsiung, the group’s founder (and a fellow vegan) to share the evidence about PETA and to ask them to stop partnering with, and therefore, legitimizing, an organization responsible for so much harm to animals.
I showed them photos of dogs, cats, puppies, and kittens PETA has killed and thrown into supermarket dumpsters.
I told them the story of Maya, the beloved Chihuahua a PETA employee was caught on camera stealing from her porch and admitted to killing with a fatal dose of poison that very day.
I shared with them records submitted to the Virginia Department of Agriculture by PETA showing that they kill and cause to be killed thousands of animals a year, upwards of 99% of the animals.
I shared records received under the Public Records Act which show PETA rounds up young, healthy kittens to have them killed within minutes.
I shared with them the deeply disturbing statements Newkirk has made in defense of killing dogs and cats, including that she does not believe in the right to life for animals and that killing animals is a “gift.”
I shared letters sent by PETA to public officials and OpEds they have penned defending cruelty and neglect in pounds, calling for the killing of all pit bull dogs and the trapping and killing of community cats.
I shared with them statements by former PETA employees who describe the daily, routine killing of healthy puppies, kittens, dogs, cats, and other animals such as chickens (which DxE most often claims to speak for).
And more.
To view the evidence and documents, click here.
Tragically, DxE has refused to end their collaboration. Tragically, though DxE condemns the violence against animals raised for food (a cause I embrace), when asked to stop their own support for violence against animals by divesting support for a group that slaughters thousands of dogs and cats every year, they will not do so. Indeed, Hsiung claims Ingrid Newkirk is “brilliant,” shows “astounding strength of character,” and is “the leader this movement needs.”
This outspoken embrace of Newkirk not only condones and amplifies PETA’s views that dogs and cats should be killed, it lionizes an animal killer to a whole new generation of animal rights activists, increasing PETA’s power, wealth, and influence which are used to the great detriment of companion animals in shelters, in homes, and in our communities.
As my attempts to appeal to DxE’s sense of decency, integrity, and the values I embrace but which they cynically pretend to be motivated by have failed, I have abandoned what has proven to be a naïve hope that DxE leadership would not want to support the killing of dogs or cats nor publicly appear as the hypocrites they have proven themselves be. Instead, I will be opposing Newkirk’s speaking engagement by reaching out directly to the other people in my community who do care about what happens to dogs and cats.
In addition to contacting local pit bull advocacy groups, rescue groups, and local politicians to inform them that DxE has invited one of the nation’s loudest voices advocating for the genocide of pit bulls, community cats, and other animals in our community, I will also be running ads in local publications to this effect, and I need your help to do so.
PETA’s killing will never end as long as we are silent and complacent about it, and, most upsetting of all, as long as the very people who should be the fiercest critics of PETA’s killing are instead its greatest enablers. Please help me spread the word by donating to fund newspaper ads. I need to raise $2,420.
Because partnering with PETA is not advocacy. It’s violence.
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