Holy Cow, PETA ... Please Tell Us You're Kidding

PETA doesn't want you to use phrases like "Bring home the bacon" or "Take the bull by the horns" or "Kill two birds with one stone." They represent "Anti-Animal Language," PETA tells us via Twitter.

And they're racist and anti-gay too.

"Just as it became unacceptable to use racist [or] homophobic language," PETA tweeted, "phrases that trivialize cruelty to animals will vanish as more people begin to appreciate animals for who they are and start ‘bringing home the bagels' instead of the bacon."

Yes, you read that right. From now on, unless you want to foster anti-animal language and be compared to someone in the KKK, you should say, "Honey, I'm going to work now so I can bring home the bagels."

Oh, there's more.

Instead of saying, "Kill two birds with one stone," PETA suggests, "Feed two birds with one scone." Get it? Stone. Scone. Hilarious, right?

Instead of "Beat a dead horse," you should say, "Feed a fed horse." Whatever that means.

Instead of "Take the bull by the horns," try, "Take the flower by the thorns." This raises a question: Huh?

"Words matter," PETA tells us,"and as our understanding of social justice evolves, our language evolves along with it.”

PETA is right about that. Words do matter. So try these words, PETA people:

You're nuts!

And you're trivializing real bigotry. Does PETA really think that telling someone to "bring home the bacon" is in the same moral universe as calling a black man a you-know-what?

Well, maybe the PETA people think just that. PETA has some history with overkill. Back in 2003 they ran a campaign comparing the slaughter of animals to the slaughter of 6 million Jews in the Nazi Holocaust.

"To Animals, All People Are Nazis" was the caption over a split screen graphic: On one side, starving Jews cramped together at a death camp. One the other side, chickens in coops.

At least this latest PETA campaign is merely ridiculous.

Are they weasels over at PETA – or merely pig-headed? Are they serious or just trying to get your goat? Or do they simply want to give vegans a bad name? Holy cow, who knows?!

(COMMENT, BELOW)

JWR contributor Bernard Goldberg, the television news reporter and author of several bestselling books, among them, Bias, a New York Times number one bestseller about how the media distort the news. He is widely seen as one of the most original writers and thinkers in broadcast journalism. Mr. Goldberg covered stories all over the world for CBS News and has won 10 Emmy awards for excellence in journalism. He now reports for the widely acclaimed HBO broadcast Real Sports.

He is a graduate of Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey and a member of the school's Hall of Distinguished Alumni and proprietor of BernardGoldberg.com.