An open question to those members of PETA:
Where is the line drawn as to what animals have the right to live and those that don’t?
Does a die-hard PETA member not swat mosquitoes and rather open windows to free stray flies in their homes?
Is it a matter of cold blooded animals versus warm blooded?
Mammals versus non-mammals?
Size?
I’d like to know exactly where the line is drawn on animal rights, why it’s there, and why the lowly tics and fleas don’t get the respect of the domestic cow.
Well, I’m not a PETA member, but I am a vegetarian and I do feel strongly about animals. So, maybe I can add a viewpoint here.
I don’t think that all animals are equal in terms of what rights and protections they deserve. Obviously, there’s a difference between swatting a fly and shooting a dog and killing the bacteria in your toilet. Animals that we know can feel pain and can suffer shouldn’t be tortured or hurt needlessly, in my opinion.
All the same, though, I do try to avoid killing when it accomplishes nothing, though I usually do kill things that are destructive and parasitic (like ticks). With spiders, flies and other harmless things, I usually put them outside, though sometimes panic gets the better of me and I scream something along the lines of “Stupid bug! You go squish now!” and, alas, end of bug.
I guess that’s why I’m a vegetarian. I don’t need to kill cows, pigs, chickens, and so on to survive, so I choose not to do so.
Not to me. What is the difference?
Shooting a dog in your toilet makes an awful mess.
Nobody has emotional connections with a fly.
I remember an old (Pre-internet, no cite) newspaper interview with the head of PETA and he was asked this question. He replied that there was room in PETA for a variety of different levels of commitment to animal rights. A sensible, if unsatisfying, answer to a direct question.
Whoever that person was, he sure as hell wasn’t the head of PETA, seeing as the founder and current head of PETA is a woman.
The New Yorker did a profile of her and PETA a few weeks back, well worth checking out.
As for the OP, from what I read, there is no line, every single animal from the tiniest ant right on up to the blue whale is supposed to be treated with care and not abused in any way, shape or form.
But its easy to clean up - just flush.(I assume this is a small dog, as a larger breed would be difficult to stuff into a toliet.)