Recently a forum thread I was participating in (not here) was deleted by the forum moderators. Not locked - deleted - and I trust you can see the severity of the difference. Outright deletion of threads is generally reserved for the "worst of the worst" offenders.  

The crime?  "PETA-like discussion."  

This is a forum with a  predominately rural demographic, a forum where several members have anti-vegetarian slurs and "jokes" permanently displayed in their forum signatures.  I have learned to tread carefully.  I habitually avoid passing judgment, and stick to simply stating facts.  I didn't say anything you wouldn't find inside the pages of Barbara Kingsolver's "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle" or Michael Pollan's "The Omnivore's Dilemma."

I am left to wonder what specifically I said that was "PETA-like."  Was it the part where I pointed out that the USDA allows downer cattle to be ground up and used for livestock feed, even though the FDA has ruled them unfit for human consumption?  Or when I said that battery hens spend their entire lives in a cage the size of a shoebox, and that most grocery store eggs come from battery hens?  

I bet it was the part about the battery hens. That always gets people.

But I can't help but wonder, when did a frank discussion of "where food comes from" fall into "PETA-like" territory?  Battery hens are a fact. Downer cattle being used in animal feed is a fact. Now tricking people into watching gory videos of downer cattle, or proclaiming that EGGS ARE TORTURE and throwing a bucket of red paint on the thread, I agree THAT would be "PETA-like."

When I hear the phrase "PETA-like," I think of two things: hysteria (in the running around throwing your arms wildly in the air sense), and of making morality an issue.  Personally I feel like the truth is bad enough, and trying to crank up the volume by taking a stand on animal rights is only going to push people away.  What need is there to elaborate on a (perfectly true) statement like "broiler chickens have been genetically engineered to grow so fast that by the time they're ready for slaughter - at about 16 weeks from the day they hatched - they have difficulty standing on their own feet."

PETA has also become associated with shock tactics.  And you have to hand it to their marketing directory - hardly anyone had even heard of PETA before she stepped into the position with a mandate to get PETA's name in the news by any means necessary. Whether that has been good or bad for the animal rights and vegetarian/vegan movements as a whole is an issue I wouldn't dare to pontificate upon!

Unfortunately, however you feel about PETA, the down side of their meteoric rise into the public consciousness is that they have sown divisiveness in their wake.  If talking about downer cattle being used in animal feed can be condemned as "PETA-like," I wonder what chance we really have to reform our industrial agriculture system?  

No one is going to say "battery cages are AWESOME," but people shrug and keep buying cheap eggs anyway, because what else are you going to do? As long as "PETA-like" is an epithet that can be effectively applied to even the most even-handed discussion of agribusiness practices, it's not likely that things will change.