PETA mocked over ‘ridiculous’ tweet saying calling someone a chicken is ‘supremacist language’

PETA, or People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, has had its fair share of controversies. The animal rights group has come under fire for its campaign claiming drinking cow’s milk causes autism, a tweet suggesting meat consumption caused the Covid-19 pandemic, plus numerous other incidents that caused backlash.

Once again, the group is facing ridicule after it shared a tweet that claimed using animals like pigs, rats and snakes as insults is an example of “speciesism”.

The organisation argues that “calling someone an animal as an insult reinforces the myth that humans are superior to other animals and justified in violating them”.

The tweet is accompanied by a graphic suggesting alternative words to animal-based insults. One example directs people to say “lazy” instead of “sloth”.

PETA continues by saying that “anti-animal slurs” are harmful because they apply “negative human traits to certain species”. It adds that giving animals connotations “normalises violence against other animals”.

People swiftly mocked the organisation for the tweet, and pointed out the fact that PETA euthanises animals.

PETA is notorious for putting down a majority of the animals at its Norfolk, Virginia centre. In 2017, a family settled a lawsuit against the organisation after it took a young girl’s dog and euthanised it within the same day.  

In fact, when someone called out PETA for killing animals, the organisation attempted to defend itself by blaming “society’s casual acquisition and breeding of dogs and cats”.

But most people were just baffled.

This is just the latest in a long string of controversial incidents for the animal rights group – and it probably won’t be the last.