This is the most cynical, horrifying thing I’ve heard in ages. PETA has restarted a campaign to try and pretend there’s some link between “autism and dairy products,” in an attempt to scare people into going Vegan
And as Emily Willingham notes – the mere suggestion of a link is not sitting with some folks, at all. Here’s what she wrote on Forbes:
“In their fervor to protect cows from being milked and to make consumption of animal products look like the work of Lucifer instead of hungry, omnivorous primates, they failed to notice that they are campaigning on the backs of people. People with autism. Pro tip, PETA: It’s not a good idea to demonize people with disabilities to further your cause.”
PETA has since responded to the controversy that has erupted recently, and claims that they are not saying anything new – that in fact this was only recently “revived by the media.”
Here is what PETA Excecutive Vice President Tracy Reiman said:
“PETA’s website provides parents with the potentially valuable information that researchers have backed up many families’ findings that a dairy-free diet can help kids with autism. Dumping dairy—the consumption of which has also been found to contribute to asthma, constipation, recurrent ear infections, iron deficiency, anemia, and even cancer—is a healthy choice that the late Dr. Benjamin Spock recommended for all families, and it also spares mother cows from being repeatedly impregnated and forced to produce milk for humans after their calves have been taken away from them so that they will endure the same fate. Cow’s milk might be the perfect food for baby cows, but it might also be making kids sick.”
The posters they’ve been dishing out read in an entirely different way from what they, regardless of what they say they mean!
Hopefully this latest reaction will lead PETA to change up their ads and posters that may cause any confusion.
Agencies/Canadajournal