PETA President Ingrid Newkirk Celebrates 70th Birthday: “Technology Is Our Friend” [Interview]
It was a pleasure to speak with the President and cofounder of PETA, Ingrid Newkirk, who celebrated her 70th birthday this month. She has led PETA, for more than 35 years while helping to create massive change and landmark victories such as getting new laws passed in favor of animal well-being, getting international household brands such as Gap to stop the purchase of international leather due to instances of industry cruelty, persuading many cities and brands such as Calvin Klein to stop the sale of fur, persuading food chains such as Burger King and Wendy’s to implement better animal treatment standards in factories along with numerous other milestones. She has served as the deputy sheriff in Maryland and goes the extra mile by continuing to put herself on the forefront for animal rights.
How has PETA helped the vegetarian and vegan movement?
When we started in 1980 no one had even heard the vegan word and from our inception, we said; “Vegan! Vegan! Vegan! Vegan! Don’t drink milk, don’t eat cheese, don’t eat eggs, don’t have honey,” and people thought that was the strangest, weirdest, maddest thing they had ever heard, and we endured decades of ridicule; but we kept going. We served the very 1st vegan hot dogs on the national mall in Washington D.C. We came out with I think the 1st vegan starter kit, we gave out soy milk before there was oat milk or almond milk or anything else, you know, all over the place and we actively pushed anti dairy tying it to veal; people didn’t want to eat veal. That was the one thing they understood in the early days and we said then, “there’s a little bit of a veal calf in every slice of cheese and every glass of milk,” and we really went all out to say, “Vegan is what you wear, what you eat, it’s a life.” It’s not just being vegetarian, we said; “being vegetarian is not good enough.” And so, it just escalated.
Today, if people are young, they have no idea of course of the struggle, they just go into a store and everything’s marked vegan. [Laughs] But, in the old days, it wasn’t like that; we had to work hard to even get people to go vegan for ethical reasons, environmental reasons; people laughed at that… no more. And for health, we worked very hard on health with physicians and pediatricians who were telling people you have to have dairy for you child. We did outreach, everything you can imagine; hung banners, did demonstrations, gave away things, did investigations, and finally like the overnight comedian; we’re a success. But nobody knows about all the years it took.
What can be done to help the vegetarian and vegan movement grow?
Well for individuals, I think one of the most important things is to feed people. If because, if people taste vegan food and they like it, they’ll overcome any worries or hesitation and if they like it, they’ll carry on eating it. So I advocate that you pay it forward, if you go to a fast food place that has beef and bean tacos for example, like Taco Bell; buy yours and then tell the cashier, “I want to buy some for whoever is behind me.” And if you have a workplace, please take tasty food for people to share and bring the recipes and if your giving a gift; make sure it’s a food gift or a vegan cook book or something that helps people go vegan and share the videos so that people with a heart see how sad the mother cows are to lose their calves, see how awful it is for chickens to have their throats slit. And I know they don’t want to look but ask them as a favor from me, will you please just watch 30 seconds and then I’ll think it’ll change your view; and for your birthday or for your anniversary, if people say to you; “What would you like?” Say, “I’d like you to go vegan for a week.” And that might change their lives. And give them a vegan starter kit too!
What has been some of the most meaningful goals you have accomplished?
Oh, well we’re still accomplishing them and there are victories every single week but the enormity of animal abuse means it’s never ending and that’s why we are so grateful to every single person who gets involved; no one should ever think that they’re unimportant, every single person is vital in this so that we can grow this movement of kindness and change. Certain things for example, our youth outreach program; getting colleges and high schools to have vegan dining options. Getting pizza chains to offer vegan cheese, getting companies to stop using sticky glue traps in banks and shopping malls. Getting signs put up in shopping malls to stop people leaving dogs in hot cars… It’s just endless but it’s all wonderful and everything is needed, but I think youth is the thing that excites me most.
Do you think technological advances will help end animal cruelty and abuse?
Yes, they already are. We say that nowadays, you have high speed computers programmed with human data that are replacing mice, and monkeys, and dogs in the labs. We have lungs on a chip, organs on a chip; someone is even making a human heart from human cells in the laboratory. We have technology like in vitro meat and bioreactor meat that’s coming along and bioreactor fish and cheese. We have like the eco-tractors; automating things is technology and that is wonderful. We even have instead of the canary being sent down into the coal mines to smell, to die from poisoned gases; there are detectors now that are mechanical that you send down there and they are read out and the reading is on a computer. So yes, technology is our friend… The animals friend.
