Non-vegans can’t properly understand a vegan mindset, an ethical system that values animals’ lives, because they devalue animals’ lives at every meal.

(Just an FYI, I identify as a feminist and have a BA in Women’s Studies. And in fact, this website, Vegan Soapbox, began when anti-vegan feminist bloggers told me to “get off my soapbox” and stop talking about veganism. I realized that I needed a real soapbox and thus, the site was born.)

I’ve written about PETA’s sexy ads over and over and over… frankly, I’m tired of it. The “PETA is sexist” criticisms are almost always terribly shallow and virtually always simply a cover-up for deeper issues with PETA or animal rights in general.

My points in the post above is this:
Don’t listen to anti-AR people’s criticisms of animal advocacy because…
a) The criticism is often not valid,
b) even when valid, it is often just a cover-up for anti-animal beliefs
c) when valid, the criticism will be made by pro-AR people
d) All of which above are trumped by the fact that if animal advocacy weren’t so desperately needed, PETA (et al.) wouldn’t even exist.

However, I meant more that I don’t see a conflict in people voicing, or agreeing with, valid criticisms of PETA’s tactics or actions, irrespective of the lifestyles of their proponents. Where arguments against PETA are stretched to damn veganism as a whole, there’s obviously a problem with the use of that argument, but if a non-vegan has a valid objection to PETA’s actions, I think we should admit that they have a point, though only in the context of the organisation and not veganism itself.

For example, I might (and do) hate more or less everything the Centre for Consumer Freedom stand for, and they’re certainly not vegans, but if their claim that PETA ‘euthanise’ adoptable animals is true, then it’s a valid criticism of the organisation, however sordid their motives might be, and should be addressed as such. It does not follow that veganism itself is bad, and ultimately, I’m not in the business of defending PETA, so I see no conflict in sharing common ground with omnivores insofar as they have valid arguments.

I’m really sorry if I’ve misrepresented your views, but it seemed like you were saying that otherwise valid criticisms can be rendered invalid by their use by nonvegans for dodgy motives, as in your analogy you dismiss the anorexic’s arguments simply because the motivation for them is not the right one. However, I don’t think this is necessarily the case.

The only analogy I can really think of at the moment (and it’s not a great one!) is talking to someone about veganism – my motives for veganism, and encouraging others to go vegan, are purely moral ones, but I might choose to talk to a non-vegan friend about the health benefits of veganism, because, though it means nothing to me, it’s an aspect that I think might get through to them. That I, like the anorexic, have my own separate moral motivations, which I would probably bring up in a more extensive discussion, doesn’t matter – if my arguments about the health benefits of veganism are valid, they are valid on their own merit whether they are honestly what motivate me or not.

Similarly I feel that (though I don’t know the particular articles you were responding to), if some feminists have taken issue with PETA’s portrayal of women in their ads, then veganism should not be a prerequisite for them to be able to complain about it and be taken seriously. They might be the most anti-PETA, anti-vegan, people ever (though I really doubt they are!) and hate the cause enough that they say these things just to ‘whine’ at PETA, but from the responses here, a lot of (presumably unbiased) vegans think they have a fair point. I might be being too optimistic, but I think the objections from the majority of feminists about these ads are rooted in genuine concern for the status of women in society rather than defensive attitudes about meat, and I have yet to see any arguments from feminists that have used criticisms of PETA’s tactics to try to deride the animal rights movement or veganism as a whole. I never meant to make such a big deal of this, and I might be wrong, so I’d be interested in seeing the original articles and what everyone else thinks, but I think it’s probably an unfair oversimplification to call people with principled objections to PETA’s ads ‘whiners’, vegan or not.

Also, I don’t think we’ll ever have enough vegan punk bands! John Feldmann and Goldfinger were actually what really pushed me to research vegan theory as a teenager. =)

Analogy: anorexics who use veganism to hide/mask their eating disorders. They are not honest when they talk about veganism and when you get into more serious discussions with them about it, you can tease out their true motivations, which are NOT for people, animals, and the planet.

Sure, it might be the choice of the women involved, and it might get attention, but when that attention is focused on women’s bodies (as Jeff pointed out) rather than our views, I think PETA misses the point. I personally can’t see many people being swayed into long term veganism, or even into just looking into it, on the basis of suggestive footage like PETA’s superbowl ad, when the animal suffering involved doesn’t even get a mention. The omnivores I know, at least, would be far more likely to scoff at the idea that vegetarians have better sex and tease vegans for promoting sex with vegetables than to question any of their beliefs as a result of this ad.

Consequently, I don’t see how investing so much into advertising a pretty shallow reason for vegetarianism, in this very controversial way, is at all warranted or effective, especially as the ethical reasons for veganism are so strong, motivate the majority of vegans anyway, and can be promoted without discrimination of any kind. I don’t think it’s ‘whining’ to suggest that PETA would be doing much more to further animal rights if they moved away from these superficial sexual ads that alienate so many people, whether we agree that it’s sexism or not.

Eccentric Vegan wrote: “I simply can’t get behind any meat-eater’s criticism of PETA…. EVER” but I really think that a valid criticism of PETA is relevant whoever points it out – attacking the speaker ad hominem or for hypocrisy does not defeat their argument. In fact, if omnivores have (reasonable) criticisms of PETA, these are things that the organisation should really be trying to address, as omnivores are ultimately their target audience. I think most people assume that PETA’s beliefs are synonymous with vegans’ beliefs, and so if PETA leave themselves open to criticism, it’s easy for people to equate that with a fault in veganism itself and dismiss it. This, I think, is where rogue vegan outreach comes in. =)

The end doesn’t justify the means though, Jay. Partaking in reinforcing a cultural norm in which women are portrayed as sex objects more than as whole people (many of whom, yes, are very attractive to look at) is not okay for any cause. We live in a society where young women can hardly walk down the street sometimes without getting whistled at, ogled, made obscene gestures at, etc., where “no” is taken as “yes” in sexual encounters by some men, where rape, sexual abuse, and domestic violence are common, where (even though the majority of women on magazine covers are thin but not anorexically so) the rate of eating disorders among young women is significantly higher than it was a few decades ago, and where, despite much progress, women are still discriminated against in employment and many other aspects of daily life. PETA needs to have better gender balance in campaigns that feature people’s nude or semi-nude bodies, and they need to more frequently feature women in ways that aren’t focused on what they look like. Anything else is indeed unethical.

Take a look at the post “PETA: Please No Klansmen” in this blog (referenced at the bottom here) if you think that PETA folks have a good handle on what “sells” or generates more positive than negative attention.

And as important as animal rights are, that doesn’t justify an anything-goes approach where even techniques for promoting the cause that are harmful in other ways are okay. And make no mistake about it, a culture in which young, very thin, attractive women (typically not wearing very much, even in the women’s magazines) are ubiquitous in ads and on magazine covers but are rarely featured in such a way for other attributes such as their brains or athleticism, whereas that isn’t the way men are portrayed, is 1) very sexist and 2) harmful to women. Young women especially see these images and, if they don’t happen to look like that, often develop a poor self-image with respect to their appearance, and may develop eating disorders, get breast implants, or do various other things that are harmful to themselves because of their insecurity about their looks and the fact that society pushes looks as being what’s important so much. There are even studies that have found a significant correlation between how thin the average model in magazine covers and advertising was and how high the rate of eating disorders was at the time.

Do you really think it’s ethically acceptable and not a sign of extreme sexism that, for example, Sports Illustrated features far more skimpily clad women who often are not even athletes on the cover than it does female athletes? How is it any more acceptable for PETA to have the same sort of sex bias in its publicity?

No one is calling sex demeaning. They’re calling imbalanced portrayals of hypersexual, idealized women demeaning.

Matt wrote: “I think the old-school feminist theorists who were fighting against sexual oppression of women may have overstated their case and now too many people are stuck in the same old rut that if it involves a naked woman’s body that it must be “objectification” or “exploitation.””

I suppose even one person thinking a naked body must be exploitation is too many in this case, but it’s probably worth mentioning that almost nobody believes this. I mean really, how many radical feminists are there? (Of the sort who hate sex and penises, that is, not the enlightened “sex positive” sort.) I’ll wager there are fewer of them than there are vegans!

Anyway, it’s not really naked women per se that’s the problem. The problem is overwhelmingly imbalanced gender representation, hypersexuality and artificiality. The message, ultimately, is that a woman’s worth is defined primarily by her appearance and femininity. These sorts of images are inextricably linked to, for instance, the fact that women make up only 14% of Congress.

I’m all for PETA using whatever measures to promote its cause, but to think the way it uses women isn’t exceedingly sexist is absurd.

just from a practical standpoint, if you’re going to use sex appeal to make political points, why restrict your target audience to heterosexual men and gay women?

Go to the magazines at your local bookstore and visit the “Women’s Interest” section. Observe the covers and make note of the gender of the person on each cover. Then go to the “Men’s Interest” section and do the same. I think you’ll find women predominantly on all the covers (though somewhat less clothed on the men’s covers).

Women’s sexuality is used to market to both heterosexual men and to heterosexual women. Not defending it, but you’re off-base if you think these ads/images don’t market well to hetero women in our society.