People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, more commonly known as PETA, is an “animal rights” organization. They like to take their views and go after companies and individuals when they see problematic things regarding animals. PETA just made a controversial statement about Disney, however, they are not new to controversy. Back in 2020, PETA attacked Animal Crossing New Horizons because Blathers, the museum curator, encourages players to catch bugs and collect fish in the video game for the museum. As a reminder, Animal Crossing is a video game, it isn’t real.
PETA has just targeted Disney with their most recent attack and it is just as silly as the Animal Crossing attack. PETA has accused Disney of abusing animals. It is assumed they are talking about Disney World and Disneyland, since both Disney Parks have characters. They took to Twitter to call out Disney. PETA tweeted “Stop Disney’s animal abuse. Animals are not meant to stand outside in the hot sun all day long, just to take pictures with demanding guests. It is time to end character interactions at Disney.”
First off we want to make it clear that not all character interactions are animals. There are plenty of face characters at Disney World and Disneyland. Put that aside, it is unclear if PETA is aware the characters at Disney are not actually animals and rather people in animal costumes (spoiler alert) or if they just want to have a big PR moment. We would like to think the latter, but with PETA, all bets are off.
Regardless of what PETA’s rationale was for posting this, it certainly is not true. There is no animal abuse going on at Disney World or Disneyland. The characters at Disney are humans in a costume. They also take plenty of breaks throughout the day in order to keep the cast members healthy and safe. We have reached out to both Disney as well as PETA for comment on this. We have not heard back from either. We do not anticipate Disney coming out with a statement on this news. Where do you land on the Disney vs PETA debate?
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First off! Do some research in regards to animal abuse in Disney’s Animal Kingdom!