Sep 15 2011
HSUS CEO: Eating Meat is “Speciesist”
We’ve got a bombshell to drop.
In 1985, Humane Society of the United States CEO Wayne Pacelle was a student at Yale, where he founded a group called the Student Animal Rights Coalition. We obtained a copy of a letter Pacelle wrote to well-known animal rights philosopher Tom Regan, asking him to speak at Yale.
Here’s what young Pacelle wrote as a self-introduction:
I am a Yale University undergraduate hoping to establish an animal rights group here this academic year, 1985-6. … After realizing that I too had been a speciesist, I changed my lifestyle by halting my consumption of meat products and my use of other animal derivatives. These actions have been extremely self-satisfying on a personal level, yet frustrating because I would like to help protect animals on a larger scale. (Emphasis added.)
Got that? Pacelle believed that eating meat, drinking milk, or even wearing a leather belt was “speciesist.”
Welcome to the inner Wayne’s World. Let’s take a closer look.
As you might have guessed, “speciesism” is the fringe animal-rights movement’s version of racism and sexism. By using animal products, we’re “discriminating” against other species. Or something like that. It’s all tied into the madcap notion that, in the words of PETA co-founder Ingrid Newkirk, “a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy.” It certainly appears that Pacelle was a full-fledged kool-aid drinker of this extreme philosophy.
But more concerning to us is that Pacelle links his belief in “speciesism” with “protect[ing] animals.”
Does that sound familiar? If we had a nickel every time Pacelle called the Humane Society of the United States an “animal protection” group, we’d have as much money as HSUS stuffs away in its pension plan. (That’s money, of course, that doesn’t make it to pet shelters.)
Words matter. To most Americans “animal protection” means animal welfare. To Pacelle, “animal protection” means eliminating the use of animals, which is an animal rights concept. And Pacelle, a slick politician, knows this. (He now refers to the Student Animal Rights Coalition group he founded at Yale as an “animal protection group.”)
Does Wayne Pacelle still believe today that eating meat is “speciesist”? He’s made mention several times on his book tour about how he’s been vegan for 26 years (which roughly dates back to the time when the letter was written). And if his initial reason for giving up animal products was based on the notion of “speciesism,” it’s quite possible he still holds those oddball premises today. We realize it’s an old quote, but it fits into other fringe animal-rights ideas Pacelle spouted years later, when he was no longer just a college kid.
For too long Pacelle has been able to wage a subtle campaign of semantics to push HSUS’s agenda. It’s about time an intrepid reporter will press him on what he really believes, so that donors know what they’re funding. Getting Wayne to be forthcoming, though, is another matter entirely.
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Comments
You no he has to eat meat,, you cant survive just on green grass,, when will this pepole ever open there eyes,,, Dont send them money,, MAKE THEM GET A REAL JOB,,,, and I bet all this will stop,,,
WE’VE GOT ANOTHER BOMB SHELL TO DROP!!!!!
W. Pacelle, HSUS, PETA, ASPCA and other radical animal rights groups are preaching veganism in an attempt to shut down all animal agriculture—including food, service and companion industries.
This is America. If adults want to go vegan they should have that choice. However, some immoral crazy nuts are beginning to experiment on children/babies with their vegan lifestyle. This week a vegan bomb exploded in Georgia.
AP, 9-12-11, Atlanta—“The Georgia Supreme Court upheld the murder convictions and life sentences given to an Atlanta vegan couple who were charged with allowing their baby to starve to death. The couple lived a vegan lifestyle and ate no animal products”. The couple gave birth to a baby boy. Police say the baby’s diet consisted only of soy milk and apple juice. The baby died of starvation at 6 weeks, emaciated and weighing less than 4 pounds.
The Georgia Supreme Court’s opinion was unanimous.
Sad, immoral and criminal. Mr. Pacelle should try speaking to this. “No milk cows; no babies”.
Reference: “Ask.com”—Atlanta—“Vegan Parents’ murder conviction upheld”
C. Bill - I don’t know if you followed the case at all when it first broke, but the reason the kid starved to death is that not only were these two brainwashed wingnuts feeding him less than 8 oz a day of either soymilk or apple juice (because otherwise he’d “get obese and die”), but his “loving” mother REFUSED TO LET HIM NURSE, even though she was lactating just fine.
Why, you ask? BECAUSE… Wait for it… Wait for it… Wait… For… It… Her breast milk was “animal protein”, and therefore, if she allowed him to ingest it, he would “get cancer and die”.
Admittedly, Vegans usually can’t reproduce because their nutritionally defunct diet makes the he-vegans sterile, but cases like this make it clear they should also be spayed and neutered, just to be on the safe side…
Pacelle and co. are nuts.
WTF? people need to get a grip..
“no milk cows; no babies” is fine with most of these nuts because many of them are also radical environmentalists who believe population control measures should be implemented as well. The news report of a starving baby due to stupid choices will upset main street USA but won’t rock the animal/environmental rights world much. Animal Rights/veganism = SOCIAL IRRESPONSIBILITY!
Is a lion being speciesist for eating a zebra? To me the saddest thing about this philosophy is that it denies and distorts the interconnectedness and interdependence of all life on the planet.
BadKarma:
No, I just picked it up. I don’t think my heart could have stood 6 years of this kind of heartbreak. I think it would have taken me out.
You will remember a few weeks ago, Doris and the “almost vegan” 14 year old took me on and said I was rude because I was telling someone else how to raise their child. Doris did have sense enough to breast feed her daughter the first year.
I suspect if this couple continues their “no-meat” vegan lifestyle while serving the rest of their life in prision—LIFE WILL BE SHORT.
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I think when Pacelle was in Kansas City I saw him eating some BBQ ribs