I just need to vent…

[These Eyes]

This is my first post, so please bear with me.

Last week here in DC, an 18 year old young woman was sitting outside her home chatting with friends while eating a hamburger. A young man comes up to her and asks for her phone number. She refuses. He then asks her to make him a hamburger. She again refuses. He then goes to her home and asks her mother to make him a burger. The mother tells she doesn't cook for people she doesn't know. He gets angry and leaves. He comes back and shoots through the door of the young lady's home, killing her and wounding her mother. A link to the story is here… http://www.wjla.com/news/stories/0908/555489.html

While searching to find out if there has been an arrest made in the case, i found this… http://www.peta.org/mc/NewsItem.asp?id=12009

Just in case the link doesn't work (I'm new at this), here's an excerpt of a letter to the Director of DC Corrections from Tracy Relman, Executive VP of PETA…

<snip>

September 25, 2008

Devon Brown, Director
Department of Corrections

Dear Director Brown:

I am writing on behalf of PETA's more than 2 million members and supporters--including many thousands in the Washington, D.C., area--in regard to inmate Terrence J. Jones, who has been imprisoned for allegedly killing Tanganika Stanton after she refused to cook him a hamburger. Jones' alleged desire for meat is murder for animals and apparently for humans as well. The only way to stop his involvement in senseless killings is to provide him with exclusively vegetarian meals… <snip>

I'm trying to write this without cussing a blue streak, but I can't understand how someone can try to capitalize on a tragedy such as this to promote vegetarianism. Ms. Relman has missed the point completely. It's not about the hamburger. It's not about meat eaters. It never was. It's about violence against women! In this jackass's twisted reasoning, this young woman is dead is because everyone was eating meat. So, using that same twisted logic, if we would all just put our meat sandwiches down, we could achieve world peace.

I had to make a delivery to the church the morning of the young lady's funeral. I was still there when the family car pulled up and her mother, with her leg in a cast, hobbled out of the car. Her face was ashen, and she looked so small and frightened that I started to cry. This woman lost her daughter, her baby, as a result of senseless violence. But Ms. Relman feels that her killer should should be fed a meat-free diet to keep futher violence -- this time against animals -- from occurring. How crazy and insensitive can a person be?

PETA may have legitimate concerns about the mistreatment of animals, but this has totally turned me off to them. There is NOTHING PETA has to say that I want to hear.

[billyoc]

1. In PETA's defense, they ARE insane, down to the last member.

My condolences to the womans family.

[dixiegrrrrl]

2. Actually, it seems to be your 22nd post.

[These Eyes]

3. Maybe I should have said this was the first time I started a thread…

Sorry!

[dixiegrrrrl]

10. no..forgive me...I fell into cranky librarian mode this morning.

Was bummed out over election fraud issues.

and I agree with you about PETA..they got a great idea and lousy ways of expressing it.

[dana_b]

4. seriously - they are one of the worst organizations to promote"rights" of ANY species!

I'm a vegetarian but these people are off their rockers. That was totally insensitive and loony.

my sympathies to her mother and family.

[tpsbmam]

5. Welcome to DU, TE! I'm an animal lover, not a PETA lover.

That said, their work over the years has had an impact....both positive and negative. They're too out there for me. This is the dumbest damn thing I've seen today (I see lots of dumb things these days). But it's standard PETA -- they'll try to capitalize on anything and they use tactics that have turned a lot of people off, me included.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

6. Welcome to DU!

PETA has always made me crave steak. And leather. And fur.

They're a self-serving arrogant bunch of intolerant bullies who think only they know the way. I live in the DC area, and read about this murder a few days ago. Horrible, just horrible. The guy's nuts and ought to be locked up forever.

Tracy Reiman needs to be put to sleep. Humanely, of course.

[Brazenly Liberal]

7. Please don't assume they speak for all vegetarians

Quite a few of us think they're a big pain in the ass. Their intentions are good, but they have lost track of how to relate to other human beings with dignity and respect. They are convinced that all attention is productive attention and that it's worth alienating thousands of people for every one they reach with these tactics.

I've been vegetarian for several decades and vegan for a good portion of that time. I am sick to death of having to explain that I have no connection with PETA and no interest in defending them every time someone finds out I don't eat meat.

[chimpyissatan]

8. welcome to my nightmare

...try doing modern biomedical science (I develop vaccines) and not worrying about the safety of your family.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-080408-animal-rights-aug05,0,1550071.story


By Joshua Molina | San Jose Mercury News
11:41 AM CDT, August 4, 2008
SAN JOSE, Calif. - A University of California-Santa Cruz biologist whose home was firebombed this weekend feared for his family's future on Sunday while a spokesman for a radical animal rights group said the attacks were the consequences for performing research on animals.

[uppityperson]

9. k&r. That is outrageous, taking advantage of someone's misery in a false way to promote own agenda

[Gin]

11. they should have added ...give him breast milk.....Peta has done some good

work...but they have jumped the shark like Nader.

[These Eyes]

15. OMG!!! I forgot about that one!

You made me have a good laugh. Thanks!!!


:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

[QueenOfCalifornia]

12. Most of us here know

that PETA is a nutso bunch of fucktards. Posting an anti PETA thread is always cause to sit down and have some popcorn :popcorn:

[QueenOfCalifornia]

13. Oh....

I forgot to add - must of us cuss a blue streak in here... We are immune to it.

And yes, you are correct - the idiot missed the point and meat is not the reason sociopaths kill women who refuse to cook... Jebus.

[These Eyes]

14. Thank you all!

I appreciate you all taking the time to respond. You've confirmed what I've always suspected -- that PETA is bat poop crazy. Sad thing is I want to do something - write a letter, make a phone call, something - but I don't believe it would do any good. You can't reason with an irrational mind. How can any group justify firebombing a house and potentially killing people, including children, so they can save some rats?

I'm an animal lover too. Just about every pet I've had since a child was a stray I found and nursed back to health. But the philosophy that 'a rat is a dog is a boy' is a bunch of crap. If I had to chose between a child and a dog whose life to save, the dog is going to come up short.

Again, thanks for letting me vent.

[Berry Cool]

16. Would it be so wrong to say that PETA is to animal rights

as Fred Phelps and Westboro Baptist Church are to Christianity?

The strains of blindness and utter self-righteous tastelessness seem similar.

[El Pinko]

17. PETA has got to be the worst promoter of vegetarianism ever.

I personally admire a lot of vegetarians, and although pure vegetarian is not for me, I am certainly not opposed to it.

But PETA's activism so frequently ventures into the lunatic fringe that it pretty much cancels out all the admirable work they do in exposing factory faming cruelty practices, etc.

Why so many vegetarians are willing to fund such a flakey group is beyond me...