Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: While the field of ecofeminism has exposed the relationship between animals and women as a function of oppression, leaders in the animal rights movement continue to pursue pornographic marketing strategies that objectify, exploit, and ultimately condone violence against women. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), the most visible animal rights organization in the US and worldwide, continues to market women’s bodies as a resource to end animal exploitation, failing to address commonalities of injustice between women and the animals they seek to liberate. Consequently, both women’s and animal rights movements are undermined and discredited.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper focuses specifically on the need for animal rights (AR) campaigns and movements to embrace a feminist epistemology and to reject all forms of oppression under patriarchy and capitalism. We argue that an AR campaign that does not do these things is actually subverting its own aims. To demonstrate this point we examine two advertisements produced by the international non-profit organization, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). Using these images as examples, we will investigate and demonstrate how a rejection of feminism actually bolsters the oppression of animals and subverts these campaigns. We argue that an AR campaign that does not embrace the eradication of all forms of oppression cannot achieve its goals. We hope this paper will serve as a potential opening point for a dialogue concerning how subordinate groups operate under hegemonic oppression.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Little existing research explores the special ethical challenges most applicable to social movement organizations as they struggle to use persuasive communication campaigns to redefine accepted social practices into social problems. As a case study, this paper evaluates People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals' (PETA) controversial 2003-04 international “Holocaust on Your Plate” vegetarian campaign to determine its strengths and weaknesses from the standpoint of public relations ethics, using TARES principles and ethical theory as a guide. Issues of respect and minimizing harm take center stage.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper theorizes the rhetoric of graphic display, a rhetorical strategy utilized by the most prominent animal rights group, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). In this paper, I argue that in spite of its controversial nature, this rhetorical strategy is powerful insomuch as it provides a visual discourse of experience for consumers in spite of extreme otherness and invisibility.

Publication Type: Invited Paper
Abstract: In June of 2005, Adria J. Hinkle and Andrew B. Cook were arrested as they approached a North Carolina Piggly Wiggly to dump nearly 30 dead cats and dogs into a dumpster. Although the case raised a few eyebrows in the local community, it became an instant lightning rod for media attention and public controversy when it was discovered that Hinkle and Cook were acting on behalf of the outspoken animal liberation organization People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). Once the link between PETA and the killings was established, a vigorous anti-PETA campaign was launched by the Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF). The “PETA kills animals” controversy is a specific set of social interactions from which communication scholars can examine the concrete ways dominant ideologies engage ideologies of resistance. This paper illustrates how the “PETA kills animals” campaign was successful in garnering widespread attention from news sources and the public not because of the merits of its claims, but because it engaged in the rhetorical construction of ideological confusion. Implications for scholarly understanding of ideological criticism in animal rights controversies are discussed.