Vick takes class in respect for animals

Yahoo! Sports

The course was given by PETA, the funloving group of animal lovers who abjure publicity. Dan Shannon, PETA publicist said: “We made it clear to [Vick] that this was something he needed to try to get something out of. We weren’t interested in some kind of PR ploy.”

The source for this story is clearly PETA, which isn’t a problem. Just funny.

Funloving, funny, prone to show pictures of slaughtered animals. It doesn’t quite add up. I agree with PETA about our need to recognize when we’re hurting animals. As a society we’ve shunted the abatoir into the shadows. We eat meat, but we don’t often think about what that means, for the dead meat or us.

PETA is constantly finding ways to dramatize what it means for us humans and the animals we like to eat (or fight) because Ingrid Newkirk and Dan Shannon are most excellent PR people who are putting their passion to their skills. This story about Vick is part of that practice, and it doesn’t bother me at all.

Not until they start messing with my local cockfight.