No paint was splattered on fur coats and no one went nude, but the founder of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals delivered a strong message to the hundreds who attended her talk in Scotts Valley.
“Please do something for animals,” urged Ingrid Newkirk, the co-founder and president of PETA, the international and often controversial animal rights organization.
Newkirk, a vegan, and her group advocate for both vegetarianism and veganism. She visited Scotts Valley on a West Coast swing, arguing that all animals should be on a level playing field with humans.
“They have thoughts and feelings that are identical to ours,” she told about 200 people at the Hilton hotel in Scotts Valley. “We treat them as sub-humans, but they are not humans at all.”
Newkirk characterized humans as another species of animal, saying that we are no different, except in taking advantage of other species by keeping them captive, eating them and using them for testing, clothing and other products.
“It’s our hideous superiority,” Newkirk said.
Newkirk was invited to speak by Ben Lomond-based Center for Animal Protection and Education, an animal-rights and -rescue agency with a presence up and down the Central Coast.
“Ingrid has been my hero forever,” said CAPE’s founder, J.P. Novik. “There’s nobody else that has gotten the word out so massively.”
Newkirk said it’s a common misconception that PETA is against having pets. Rather, she said, the organization stands against breeders and pet shops and advocates for fixing house pets and choosing pets from animal shelters.
Newkirk spends much of her time on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., lobbying for animal rights.
The 31-year-old organization has been influential in California, too.
PETA recently sued over the “happy cows” cheese ads in California and stopped the advertising campaign. The organization promotes the use of alternative “milk” made from oats or soy, rather than dairy milk from cows held in captivity.
PETA’s newest initiative includes a triple-x website, www.peta.xxx, that will soon be launched. Typically, sites with the .xxx suffix are pornographic in nature, and it is yet to be seen what PETA will unveil.
“It’s a free country ,” Newkirk said. “If people want to look at a triple-x site, they can. We will show graphic videos, but they will be graphic in a different way.”
In the past, she said, the organization has worked with porn stars Ron Jeremy and Jenna Jameson on ad campaigns to draw awareness to animal rights.
“We won’t disappoint, but we don’t do porn,” Newkirk said.
Newkirk said nudity can be used a tool to earn press for animal rights.
“We take our clothes off,” she told the crowd. “The press likes to cover that, and that’s why we do it.”
Alexis Krostue, a Felton resident in attendance, said she went to reinvigorate her vegetarian ways and to hear Newkirk.
“I read a lot about (PETA),” Krostue said. “I just wanted to come and hear what they have to say. I think it’s awful how animals are treated (by some companies).”
Newkirk said there has been great progress in the world of animal rights over the past several decades, including vegan foods in almost every store. Many companies have signed agreements against testing products on animals.
In the next several years, she said, PETA hopes to get all elephants out of circuses, where they are “shackled and beaten,” and continue to get animals completely out of movies, which she said exploit them for viewers’ entertainment.
Newkirk pointed to the success of digital and mechanical entertainment as the future and said consumer buying power is the best way to encourage animal rights.
“You don’t have to throw your things away, but when you buy new, use that power and get something that does not hurt animals,” she said.
“It really does matter where you spend your money.”
