PETA Wants the Prison

PETA officials recently announced that it has requested the use of the near-empty, maximum security prison in Thompson, IL if the Guantánamo Bay prisoners do not end up being transferred there. PETA employee Tracy Reiman stated that the prison would be turned into an 'empathy center' which would provide visitors a chance to experience aspects of the painful lives of commercial farm animals. Guests would be able to be, "... crammed into a crate to simulate the life of a sow on a factory farm," walk with weights on their backs, and receive a stuffed chicken doll that reads 'I am not a nugget.'

I thought this article was interesting because we are learning about interest groups, and I think PETA is a bit of an interest group in that it is a united group of individuals all supporting a common cause of ethical treatment of animals. This group was exercising its right to make requests/appeals to the government. I think it is fully within PETA's rights to establish such a center, but I think it will be very difficult to convince the government to allow an interest group sole use of a facility that cost taxpayers $120 million. It also seems to me to be slightly unfair, for one such radical group to receive this kind of preferential treatment at no cost to them, and a lot of cost to the public that never intended to be paying for an 'empathy center' for animals.

PETA demonstration.

Links:

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/11/19/peta-eyes-prison-makeover/

http://www.peta.org/