Patrick McDermott is a senior majoring in journalism and history and is The Daily Collegian's Tuesday columnist. His e-mail address is pfm5010@psu.edu.
Ah, the scenic views on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.
Look to your left at the towering obelisk that is the Washington Monument. To your right is the large, cream-colored dome of the U.S. Capitol. And imagine, in front of you sits a large exhibit comparing dead pig carcasses to the Cambodian group Khmer Rouge's reign of terror in the late 1970s.
Not exactly a postcard image.
This is exactly the scene set before me two weeks ago. An exhibit, titled "Liberation is Coming," set up by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), sat right between two of America's most famous landmarks. The graphic pictures juxtaposed a pile of dead pigs outside of a pork producing factory to a heap of dead human bodies found during the Cambodian regime's slaughtering of 1.7 million citizens over a four year span.
The recent media frenzy surrounding newly-signed Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Michael Vick's animal crimes have brought animal rights back to the forefront without demeaning and, frankly, disgusting campaigns.
The photographs were printed to show how many pigs are slaughtered each year; however, when countless people around the globe rely on pork as a means of cheap meat, the comparison failed to line up when contrasted to innocent deaths. These awareness campaigns, which do more to offend the general public than to inspire them to change, shows PETA has a major issue in terms of appealing to the general public.
Other pictures in the exhibit, while just as graphic, show how animals around the world are treated poorly, without disrespecting people who were brutally murdered. One depicts how calves are forced to stand in dark stockades all day to produce soft meat. These deplorable conditions should be known and, although its comparison was a scene of child labor in Pennsylvania coal mines, PETA did not compare dead pigs to dead human beings.
Obviously, the exhibit is designed to raise attention to the issues for which PETA fights, something the organization is well-known for. Demonstrations in large cities across the United States consisting of PETA protesters covered in fake blood are commonplace, but not all of the organization's statements are made with graphic photographs or demonstrations.
In mid-June, President Barack Obama let loose the fly swat heard 'round the world when he killed the insect during an interview. In response, PETA sent him a humane bug catching device for the catch-and-release of a fly rather than the squashing of it. While the gesture seemed like a harmless attempt by the organization to prevent the murder of helpless flies, it underlined PETA's penchant for staying in the public eye through its radical persistence.
PETA has been in the news recently regarding Vick, who was imprisoned for 19 months on dogfighting charges. The organization canceled a television advertisement that would have featured Vick speaking out against animal cruelty and wants NFL commissioner Roger Goodell to make Vick take a psychological examination and a brain scan before being allowed to play football again.
After comparing dead pigs to murdered human beings and chastising the president for swatting a fly, PETA must seriously reconsider its strategy when dealing with the public. Using offensive images and overreacting to insignificant events is not the way to get public support on a topic as important as animal welfare.
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