I'm sure there are many well meaning, sensitive people in PETA. But
the organization is not content with appeals to individual morality
and sensibility. It has a political agenda, and will do or say
anything to get its way. It will seize on any issue with emotional
appeal to tighten the ratchet another notch, while downplaying or
concealing its ultimate goal. Click, click, click, our freedom is
nibbled away. The issue is _not_ cruelty, or even discourtesy, to
animals -- PETA wants to use government to coerce the rest of us into
becoming vegans who can't even have a pet. I object, vigorously.

We're being tied down with a thousand threads, like Gulliver in
Lilliput. There's some crank group clamoring to regulate every aspect
of our personal lives. Ban tobacco, ban meat, ban smoking, ban
drinking, punish people for not wearing a seatbelt or a helmet, ban
perfume, tax fatty food, punish insensitive speech (unless it's about
Republicans or President Bill's female victims), don't flush, don't
take long showers, don't drive for pleasure, don't spray that roach,
don't cut that tree (every single tree on the face of the earth is
unique and precious), don't spray swamps (mosquitoes and plasmodium
have rights), and on and on. When one thread is in place, they start
stringing another. When will the morning tooth brush inspectors start
arriving?

As for the irreverence of the TV contestants, what would one expect of
products of our secular, irreverent culture, especially when put in
front of a camera? Would PETA have been satisfied if they'd paused to
say grace before eating the rats? Hardly.

We have an image of Native American reverence for the buffalo; as far
as I know, it's true enough, and admirable. However, I've heard that
people who live close to the land tend generally to be less
sentimental about animals. Did all Native Americans have similar
attitudes toward food animals? Did the Eastern nations have reverence
for the deer, rabbit, and squirrel? How about fish? (Honest questions
- I'm not sneering). How about other hunter-gatherers today? How do
they behave after a successful hunt? Besides, the millions of
Americans who thank God for each meal show reverence for the creatures
they consume; but media culture shows no reverence for _them_.

I'll confess that I don't hunt or fish. I used to fish, but disliked
cleaning them. I had to kill some mice in the house once, and felt a
little bad about even that. But I regard my sentimentality as an
irrational emotion; I'm a city boy, divorced from the land, and I
guess Disney made an impression on me as well.

Let me retract one thing: the PETA crowd are not stupid, just
emotional and arrogant. The media are stupid and crass for giving PETA
so much play.

Bill