Barbecued ‘dog’ stunt masks a more serious issue campaign
PETA’s recent barbecued dog stunt may have raised some eyebrows, but it’s a sign of an issues campaign wider than the animal activist group, writes crisis management expert Tony Jaques.
A stunt by PETA to barbecue a fake dog in the CBD of Sydney last week created predictably outraged headlines around the world. PETA’s message was: “If you wouldn’t eat a dog, why eat a lamb?”
However the barbecue street theatre was just the ‘click bait’ end to a much more serious international effort to force less consumption of red meat.
Shouldn’t a stunt like this amplify the underlying issue, not mask it?
Great piece. A much more insightful look at PETA’s BBQ dog stunt then the previous article by Nicole Reaney, who looked at the stunt purely through traditional PR lens and just repeated the same lines as the embattled meat industry. Taking on the meat industry is a far more difficult task that selling a product. PETA is opposing a multi billion dollar industry with alot to lose. The meat industry is a big spender on advertising as well, PETA isnt. Like I mentioned in my previous comment on Nicole’s article, every social justice/environmental campaign needs a variety of opinions and players to achieve change. History shows that. PETA pushes the edge of the debate and does so very successfully. The results speak for themselves, because of stunts like this PETA had 365,000 requests for vegan information just in last 12months and has more than 165,000 members of its youth division PETA2 (one of the main markets for vegan food). PETA has been covered in the last 12months by every major news outlet around the Globe, all for free. Not many NGOs or even corporates can boost those sorts of figures. http://features.peta.org/annua...../year.aspx
What were they looking to achieve here? Outrage? Because that helps who exactly?
PETA, by conducting such a disgusting stunt you’ve done nothing but prove to me that your opinions are illegitimate.
I’m sick and tired of people trying to tell me how I should live my life. One of the only freedoms we get in this world is the freedom to choose how we live, and that is constantly under attack from just about everyone.
Any scientist worth their degree will tell you that a well balanced diet includes eating a portion of meat, anything beyond that is a personal choice that is up to that individual and no one else has any right to judge them because of that.
A recent Cornell/Harvard study found the optimal amount of meat in a healthy person’s diet is precisely zero.
https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/cutting-red-meat-for-a-longer-life
I find it hard not to judge people who don’t care about the murder of millions of harmless, defenseless animals. It’s not like your choice of how to live your life isn’t hurting anything, it’s my right to judge you for that.
There is absolutely no difference between eating a dog or a cow to the animal.
great piece – thanks for your insight Tony. I doubt many of us had any clue re the global campaign against meat and the subversive means by which this could be achieved. It beggars belief that an idealogically-driven dietary fad such as veganism (yes, zealots, it’s a fad – like gluten-free, low-carb, no-carb/keto, carniviore etc) could be used to constrain a basic freedom such as the ability to eat meat. How is this not fascism?
Veganism is fascism? I do not think that word means what you think it means; maybe someone (hint: Svetlana) needs to re-read Animal Farm. PS Carnivore’s tears add delicious salt my faddish felafel.
The blood of innocent animals add delicious salt to mine.
I was horrified years ago I saw the deeply disturbing graffiti in a Melbourne University toilet, ‘Casserole a Vegetarian’.