Glenn E. Meyer
New member
From the Chronicle of Higher Ed:
Facing Criticism, Animal-Rights Group Adopts
a Sober Approach to Saving Dairy Cows
By NINA WILLDORF
Bowing to pressure from Mothers Against Drunk Driving,
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals on
Wednesday withdrew a planned national campaign aimed
at encouraging college students to drink beer instead of
milk. The campaign was to begin today.
The campaign, "Got Beer?," was intended to alert students
to the evils of the dairy industry, and was timed to coincide
with St. Patrick's Day. PETA officials had already sent out
news releases to a network of 2,000 student activists, who
were to write columns promoting the campaign in their
campus newspapers. The organization had already
introduced a Web site, MilkSucks.com, on which it
attempted to show that beer is more nutritious than milk.
In a news release criticizing the campaign, MADD called
PETA's efforts "shocking" and "illegal," pointing out that
the association, in advocating that students drink beer,
was showing "blatant disregard" for the minimum drinking
age of 21. The group also said that the timing of the
campaign's start -- on St. Patrick's Day and during spring
break, "when drinking tends to be on the rise" -- "only
enforces irresponsible messages."
Sheldon E. Steinbach, vice president and general counsel
for the American Council on Education, called the
campaign "outrageous and misguided," saying that it "had
a subliminal effect of giving college students a further
license to imbibe." Mr. Steinbach denounced PETA's move
to "encourage alcohol consumption when colleges have
been making a concerted, sophisticated effort over the last
two decades to reduce the amount of alcohol consumption
on campus."
On the Web site, PETA stated that while milk is loaded
with cholesterol and fat and often contaminated by
hormones and antibiotics, beer is not, and is high in fiber.
"There's a myth that milk is a health food," said Bruce
Friedrich, PETA's coordinator for the campaign. "It's
horrible for human health," he added, citing a litany of
milk-caused ills, including obesity, asthma, heart disease,
and cancer.
PETA officials acknowledged, however, that they were
most concerned that dairy cows are treated like "widgets"
-- crammed into dark stalls and sent off to slaughter after
they lose their ability to produce milk.
Mr. Friedrich insisted that the campaign didn't advocate
alcohol abuse. It was merely a "fun and interesting way to
grab people's attention," he said. Though PETA lost $500
in mailing fees, Mr. Friedrich said the situation was
"win-win."
"We've raised awareness in millions and millions of people.
And MADD has raised awareness about the horrors of
drunk driving," he said. PETA is not abandoning its effort,
but has simply renamed it "Dump Dairy." As of Thursday,
however, its Web site still compared milk to beer
unfavorably.
Now the tie into to guns is that one shoots better after drinking milk than beer.
Facing Criticism, Animal-Rights Group Adopts
a Sober Approach to Saving Dairy Cows
By NINA WILLDORF
Bowing to pressure from Mothers Against Drunk Driving,
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals on
Wednesday withdrew a planned national campaign aimed
at encouraging college students to drink beer instead of
milk. The campaign was to begin today.
The campaign, "Got Beer?," was intended to alert students
to the evils of the dairy industry, and was timed to coincide
with St. Patrick's Day. PETA officials had already sent out
news releases to a network of 2,000 student activists, who
were to write columns promoting the campaign in their
campus newspapers. The organization had already
introduced a Web site, MilkSucks.com, on which it
attempted to show that beer is more nutritious than milk.
In a news release criticizing the campaign, MADD called
PETA's efforts "shocking" and "illegal," pointing out that
the association, in advocating that students drink beer,
was showing "blatant disregard" for the minimum drinking
age of 21. The group also said that the timing of the
campaign's start -- on St. Patrick's Day and during spring
break, "when drinking tends to be on the rise" -- "only
enforces irresponsible messages."
Sheldon E. Steinbach, vice president and general counsel
for the American Council on Education, called the
campaign "outrageous and misguided," saying that it "had
a subliminal effect of giving college students a further
license to imbibe." Mr. Steinbach denounced PETA's move
to "encourage alcohol consumption when colleges have
been making a concerted, sophisticated effort over the last
two decades to reduce the amount of alcohol consumption
on campus."
On the Web site, PETA stated that while milk is loaded
with cholesterol and fat and often contaminated by
hormones and antibiotics, beer is not, and is high in fiber.
"There's a myth that milk is a health food," said Bruce
Friedrich, PETA's coordinator for the campaign. "It's
horrible for human health," he added, citing a litany of
milk-caused ills, including obesity, asthma, heart disease,
and cancer.
PETA officials acknowledged, however, that they were
most concerned that dairy cows are treated like "widgets"
-- crammed into dark stalls and sent off to slaughter after
they lose their ability to produce milk.
Mr. Friedrich insisted that the campaign didn't advocate
alcohol abuse. It was merely a "fun and interesting way to
grab people's attention," he said. Though PETA lost $500
in mailing fees, Mr. Friedrich said the situation was
"win-win."
"We've raised awareness in millions and millions of people.
And MADD has raised awareness about the horrors of
drunk driving," he said. PETA is not abandoning its effort,
but has simply renamed it "Dump Dairy." As of Thursday,
however, its Web site still compared milk to beer
unfavorably.
Now the tie into to guns is that one shoots better after drinking milk than beer.
