Report card for PETA: D+

I’m no scientist—lab coats aren’t exactly fashionable—but I do know that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. So, the more you advocate and protest against something, the more opposition you will create against yourself.

While their strategy has since changed since they days of throwing paint on fur coats, PETA is the perfect example of an organization that had problems making friends. In the past PETA often resorted to very negative, and often violent (although unphysical) tactics, such as the example given above. Ask anyone what their initial thoughts of PETA are and, unless they’re a member, they’ll most likely paint you a picture of a stereotypical animal rights activist from the 60’s and 70’s.

While this strategy garnered their organization a lot of attention then, it has been an uphill battle in trying to get people to take them seriously now.

I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a huge animal lover, and I feel awful giving an animal welfare organization a less than phenomenal grade, however, I think we all can learn from the mistakes they made in the past. As I said in my physics lesson above, if your actions are negative, you will be met with a negative force. Now, I’m sure PETA didn’t view their actions as negative, because after all, they were doing it for a good cause. However, the majority of people would say that it’s a negative way to engage with people.

A good rule of thumb, before protesting or acting in anyway to promote your cause, is to ask yourself “Would a person still be interested in being or want to be friends with me after I acted this way?” Most people probably wouldn’t want to be your friend if you ruined their clothes (even if they were made from poor, defenseless animals), but I think we all could agree that someone would still want to be your friend if you handed them a pamphlet about how inhumane fur companies are to animals. In fact, they might even want to go cruelty-free coat shopping with you…

PETA has been working hard to abolish the remnants of their old image, and this is what starts to save their grade. They’ve refocused on crafting a message that promotes values, such as compassion, justice, equality and care for animals. Instead of promoting what not to do, they often promote little steps that people can take to protect animal rights, such as becoming a vegetarian, writing a letter to Congress or switching to cruelty-free beauty products. Which is a great strategy because often enough baby steps will lead to very big steps.