Ingrid Newkirk on twenty-five years of pushing the envelope for animal rights

On Wednesday, November 9, WBUR's nationally NPR syndicated show "On Point," aired an interview with Ingrid Newkirk, head of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

Here is the station's web promotional blurb on the show:

PETA's Mastermind
By host Tom Ashbrook:

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, has been called the most successful radical organization in America. The group's animal rights commandos are famous and infamous for their high-drama stunts and claims.

PETA activists have thrown paint on fur coats, gone naked for animal rights, thrown a dead raccoon on Vogue editor Anna Wintour's plate at the Four Seasons in New York, and compared America's treatment of animals in factory farms to slavery and the Holocaust. Behind it all stands Ingrid Newkirk, who started the movement twenty-five years ago in revulsion at the sight of dead kittens.

Hear a conversation with Newkirk on twenty-five years of pushing the envelope for animal rights.

You can listen to the interview on line at http://www.onpointradio.org/shows/2005/11/20051109_b_main.asp

It is a terrific interview. Newkirk is briefly joined by Wayne Pacelle, CEO of HSUS, who tips his hat to PETA's success at bringing attention to animal protection issues and points to some of the ways in which the two organizations agree and differ. And Ingrid Newkirk takes questions from callers. I urge anybody interested in animal protection issues, whether you tend to agree with or oppose PETA tactics, to listen. And please thank "On Point" for giving an hour to these issues. On Point takes comments at onpoint [at] wbur.org


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