Beasts of Boredom

Just when you thought you couldn't possibly take PETA any less seriously...

PETA offers Hamburg, PA $15,000 worth of veggie patties to change its name to Veggieburg.

A national animal rights group has offered Hamburg, New York officials $15,000 to change the town's name to Veggieburg.

"The town's name conjures up visions of unhealthy patties of ground-up dead cows," said Joe Haptas, spokesman of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), in a letter faxed Monday to Hamburg Supervisor Patrick Hoak. PETA offered to supply area schools with $15,000 worth of non-meat patties for the name change.

[...]

In 1996, PETA proposed that the Hudson Valley town of Fishkill change its centuries-old name to Fishsave, since the group believed the name conjured up violent imagery of dead fish. The town was named by Dutch settlers in the early 1600s. "Kill" is the Dutch word for "stream."

And in Utah, PETA says they intend to disrupt Saturday's March of Dimes fund-raising walk in Salt Lake City, claiming the birth-defects research charity pours millions of dollars into cruel experimentation involving laboratory animals."

And just for good measure, the president of PETA in her will donates her body to PETA, with a few stipulations.

The leader of a prominent U.S.-based animal rights group said she had drawn up a will directing that her flesh be barbecued and her skin used to make leather products in protest at man's ill-treatment of animals. [...] Newkirk also suggested her feet be removed and made into umbrella stands similar to those made from elephant feet that she had seen as a child. [...] In the document she also suggests her liver be vacuum-packed and sent to France to be used in a campaign to persuade shoppers not to buy foie gras, made from the livers of force-fed ducks and geese.

Ten years ago, I'd never seen an advocacy group do so much damage to the legitimacy of their own cause. Now, they do far less damage, but only because nobody even bothers to pay attention any longer. As veterinarian Baxter Black observes, "It's almost like PETA is being ignored. Like a baby in a crowded room that has soiled its diaper and is stinking up the room, but no one wants to change it."