Sea Kittens: PETA's attempt to make fish more adorable

shapu · **Posted:** Wed Jan 14, 2009 3:10 pm

Blue wrote:

IHMO - Best quote from the article:

Quote:

“I don't see fish as sea kittens; I see them as food.”
Chastity Haskins, 12

Hmmm.. I think I'll have the fillet of sea kitten today.

I wonder what an underwater meow sounds like?

Mongrel · **Posted:** Wed Jan 14, 2009 4:57 pm

I feel the need to sum up this thread:

PETA = bad.
Taking care of marine ecosystems = good.

shapu wrote:

I wonder what an underwater meow sounds like?

"Bloop."

Kitten Medli · **Posted:** Wed Jan 14, 2009 6:00 pm

I saw this a bit ago. It didn't make any sense to me. It's honestly a good message, since fish are often disregarded as less important than other animals, but nobody really takes PETA seriously. Its a serious shame that they've given animal rights such a horrible reputation.

Siniri · **Posted:** Wed Jan 14, 2009 6:21 pm

Mongrel wrote:

shapu wrote:

I wonder what an underwater meow sounds like?

"Bloop."

I love you, Mongrel. This is the kind of thing that I can laugh about for days, every time I recall it.

unspecialfish · **Posted:** Wed Jan 14, 2009 10:23 pm

ahoteinrun wrote:

I think it's hillarious.
But I think it's also trying to make a very important point. The oceans are being seriously harvested and brutalized. The estimates on how long it will take the fisheries to collapse keep shortening. The amount of waste and destruction that is happening in the oceans right now is sickening.
Everyone thinks about whales and how nice they are. Who thinks about sharks? Or cod? Or other fish that aren't so pretty? At least PETA is trying.
It's more then I can say for a lot of other organizations.

I love Whales! I'm all for cleaning their environment and any other inhabitants in it xD

Christopher · **Posted:** Wed Jan 14, 2009 10:29 pm

unspecialfish wrote:

ahoteinrun wrote:

I think it's hillarious.
But I think it's also trying to make a very important point. The oceans are being seriously harvested and brutalized. The estimates on how long it will take the fisheries to collapse keep shortening. The amount of waste and destruction that is happening in the oceans right now is sickening.
Everyone thinks about whales and how nice they are. Who thinks about sharks? Or cod? Or other fish that aren't so pretty? At least PETA is trying.
It's more then I can say for a lot of other organizations.

I love Whales! I'm all for cleaning their environment and any other inhabitants in it xD

Nobody's listening until you change your username to unspecialseakitten.

unspecialfish · **Posted:** Wed Jan 14, 2009 10:44 pm

Christopher wrote:

unspecialfish wrote:

ahoteinrun wrote:

I think it's hillarious.
But I think it's also trying to make a very important point. The oceans are being seriously harvested and brutalized. The estimates on how long it will take the fisheries to collapse keep shortening. The amount of waste and destruction that is happening in the oceans right now is sickening.
Everyone thinks about whales and how nice they are. Who thinks about sharks? Or cod? Or other fish that aren't so pretty? At least PETA is trying.
It's more then I can say for a lot of other organizations.

I love Whales! I'm all for cleaning their environment and any other inhabitants in it xD

Nobody's listening until you change your username to unspecialseakitten.

Hahaha! I completely forgot my screen name was unspecialfish for a second xD

Blue · **Posted:** Thu Jan 15, 2009 6:22 am

Christopher wrote:

unspecialfish wrote:

Nobody's listening until you change your username to unspecialseakitten.

Thats funny... PETA apparently sent a letter to the principal of Spearfish High School asking them to change their name, too. I laughed out loud from this one...

PETA's letter to Principal Steve Morford follows wrote:

PETA has done some good things for animals, but its stuff like this that just makes them look ... ummm ... :loser:

Christopher · **Posted:** Thu Jan 15, 2009 8:51 am

Spearfish, Spearkitten, it's all the same great taste down at Ackbar's rotisserie!

Byakuya San · **Posted:** Thu Jan 15, 2009 8:31 pm

I think that PETA is going about this the wrong way. While it would be nice to raise a bit more awareness for fish like they're trying, doing so with such an absurd campaign probably won't get them very far.

For now, I'll just stick to supporting the manatees.

Asthaloth · **Posts:** 4284 **Joined:** Mon May 31, 2004 4:48 am

On a side note, I would gladly apply my considerable energy and willpower to saving the whales or whatever, if they let me wipe out the [Bottle nose] dolphins.

Hear me PETA?
One species, that is all I ask.

ahoteinrun · **Posted:** Fri Jan 16, 2009 12:56 am

What exactly is the right way?

If you were doing a campaign to gain general knowledge about the decimation of ocean life how would you go about doing it? Putting out reports, or papers hasn't worked, so what will? A few reports released in my province a few weeks ago barely garnered a mention in the paper.

What will it take? (too little too late IMO anyways, but whatever).

Pudding · **Posted:** Fri Jan 16, 2009 4:24 am

It's bad that I saw this while I was having a conversation with my roommate about maybe being a pescatarian for a while, isn't it?

ahoteinrun wrote:

What exactly is the right way?

If you were doing a campaign to gain general knowledge about the decimation of ocean life how would you go about doing it? Putting out reports, or papers hasn't worked, so what will? A few reports released in my province a few weeks ago barely garnered a mention in the paper.

What will it take? (too little too late IMO anyways, but whatever).

I'd do some advertisements that represent the problem well visually, rather than loud invitations to ridicule. Most people who know about overfishing at least lay off the orange roughy and the Pacific salmon; it's probably worthwhile to increase the size of that group before you break out the weird terminology. A TV commercial (or even an online banner ad) about the depletion of oceanic resources could direct people to a website with more facts about the issue and what they can do about it.

This is just kind of weird and silly and designed to appeal to 11 year-old non-Alaskan girls.

ahoteinrun · **Posted:** Fri Jan 16, 2009 4:58 am

Pudding wrote:

It's bad that I saw this while I was having a conversation with my roommate about maybe being a pescatarian for a while, isn't it?

ahoteinrun wrote:

What exactly is the right way?

If you were doing a campaign to gain general knowledge about the decimation of ocean life how would you go about doing it? Putting out reports, or papers hasn't worked, so what will? A few reports released in my province a few weeks ago barely garnered a mention in the paper.

What will it take? (too little too late IMO anyways, but whatever).

I'd do some advertisements that represent the problem well visually, rather than loud invitations to ridicule. Most people who know about overfishing at least lay off the orange roughy and the Pacific salmon; it's probably worthwhile to increase the size of that group before you break out the weird terminology. A TV commercial (or even an online banner ad) about the depletion of oceanic resources could direct people to a website with more facts about the issue and what they can do about it.

This is just kind of weird and silly and designed to appeal to 11 year-old non-Alaskan girls.

Money money money money... Putting something on a website is cheaper. And how many people pay attention to commercials? For getting the word out, the world wide web, does a wonderful and frankly cheap job. And this is at least, getting the word out there, ridicule or not. It is absolutely ridiculous. And yet... it's working. To get the spread and breadth of advertisement that this is, I doubt they could have done it with serious articles.

And I hate myself right now for defending PETA. But I think I get why they're doing what they did.

Siniri · **Posted:** Fri Jan 16, 2009 5:07 am

Pudding wrote:

I'd do some advertisements that represent the problem well visually, rather than loud invitations to ridicule. Most people who know about overfishing at least lay off the orange roughy and the Pacific salmon; it's probably worthwhile to increase the size of that group before you break out the weird terminology. A TV commercial (or even an online banner ad) about the depletion of oceanic resources could direct people to a website with more facts about the issue and what they can do about it.

The best tactic I saw was a little wallet-sized card that briefly explained the problem and color-coded fish according to "okay to eat copiously," "eat rarely" and "please avoid" -- with little shapes and names of many popular fish. It helped change my fish-shopping. Now, where did I put the darn thing?

Yes, "sea kittens" is gaining attention, but much of that is eye-rolling instead of education -- I'm quite sure my brother and dad would laugh at those nutters at PETA going crazy again, but if they were given one of the cards and some scientific (i.e., peer-reviewed) facts, they might just change their behavior. Which is really the point.

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Sea Kittens: PETA's attempt to make fish more adorable

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