Interview with PETA Co-Founder, Ingrid Newkirk

The Financial Times has published an interview with Ingrid Newkirk, Co-Founder and President of PETA, in which Newkirk addresses topics ranging from her childhood in India, to her own reproductive decisions (she had herself sterilized at age 22) and her search for a successor. While several animal abusers refused to comment for the article, the owner of a Manhattan fur store admitted, "Yes, she has the power to hurt businesses." The reporter also spoke with Peter Singer, the author of Animal Liberation, and got his mixed views on PETA's positions and campaigns.

Never one to shy away from controversy, Newkirk even had a zinger for the reporter:

When, after many hours in Newkirk’s company, over a snack of root vegetables, I flippantly ask her if I now ought to throw away my old rabbit-lined gloves, the air grows charged. “Would you use a lamp shade made of human skin?” she snaps. I am stunned into silence. “Look,” she adds, “what I am saying is that animals deserve equal consideration. An animal feels pain. The rabbit suffers at being separated from her babies and they cry when they’re murdered.”

I probably would have spared the reporter the withering retort, but I have to admire Newkirk's willingness to risk offending her to get the message across. That risk-taking is PETA's calling card, and is the basis for their headling-grabbing campaigns.

The interview is definitely worth a read. The Financial Times website may require you to register, but registration is free. Go read it. Now.

Links:

• PETA's Undercover Video of Factory Farm Cruelty
  
• I'd Rather He Go Naked . . .
  
• PETA's Undercover Video of Rabbit Slaughter
  
• PETA Names Carrie Underwood World's Sexiest Vegetarian