It is a pack of dangerous radicals who have raised misanthropy to a fine art and hope to dislodge man from the top rung of the evolutionary ladder. To PETA and the animal rights crowd, human beings are walking, talking viruses that not only inhabit the Earth, but also infect it. A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. At least I wouldn't be harming anything. An author pen-named Les U. Knight apotheosized this world view in Wild Earth magazine.
Controversial groups add plenty to serious debate.
While the AFL-CIO and American Association of Retired Persons advance some zany concepts, they are formidable players with views that must be engaged and refuted rather than dismissed with a wave of the hand. In one sense, this is a shame. The impressive energy, creativity and passion of PETA's 700,000 members would be beautiful if they busied themselves by finding homes for all the creatures crowding America's animal shelters. And just imagine the good they could do by teaching illiterate children to read, guiding welfare moms back to work or caring for shut-in seniors. New York commentator Deroy Murdock is a columnist with the Scripps Howard News Service and a Senior Fellow with the Atlas Economic Research Foundation in Fairfax, Virginia.