Even when she temporarily strays away from animal rights ever so slightly, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals chief ignoramus Ingrid Newkirk still manages to spread falsehoods and nonsense wherever she goes. This week, Bruce Friedrich posted an article by Newkirk, “Violence at home,” to an animal rights news list. Within the first three paragraphs, Newkirk manages to make three demonstrably false claims about violence and the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack on the United States.
Newkirk opens her article by writing,
Is it a coincidence that, in the wake of the attacks on Washington and New York, most men speak of retaliation while most women express an urge to return to peace?
No, Ingrid, it is not a coincidence, its a complete falsehood. Zogby International interviewed 1,018 likely voters September 14-16, asking them, “Would you support or oppose an all-out war against countries which harbor or aid terrorists?”
Of those polled, 78.9 percent of men and 71.0 percent of women said they would support such an all-out war. When asked, “Do you agree or disagree that such a war would be worth it even if it involved substantial American casualties?” 77.0 percent of men said they agreed, while 64.8 percent of women did as well.
The number of men and women who outright oppose such a war on terrorism are almost identical. Only 16.1 percent of men said they opposed an all-out war on terrorism, while 18.7 percent of women said they opposed such a war.
Apparently when Newkirk writes that “most women express an urge to return to peace,” she’s talking about her and her 5 closest friends, rather than the general female population of the United States.
Newkirk then goes on to describe a speech by Colman McCarthy. Newkirk writes,
At the Washington Center for Teach Peace, Professor Colman McCarthy has fretted over the fact that, year after year, his female students are always more open than his male students to the concept of peace. A Georgetown law student thought she had the answer. “Women want to know about nonviolence more than men because we are more victimized by violence than men. And, victims always want solutions quicker.”
This is pure nonsense. Aside from rapes that occur outside of prison, the overwhelming victims of violent acts are men. The risk of being the victim of an assault, murder or other act of violence is much higher for men than it is for women.
Finally, Newkirk repeats an oft-repeated but completely fake factoid.
The leading cause of injury to women is being beaten at home. Some women have more fear walking into their homes than walking out of them.
This claim is one of those factoids that appears commonly in domestic violence literature, almost always, as in Newkirk’s case, unattributed. This is because both Justice Department and Centers for Disease Control studies suggest that about 1 percent of women’s injuries are caused by their male partners.
But, of course, the most bizarre part of Newkirk’s column is that she is living proof that women are often just as big supporters of violence as are men. After all, when an underground terrorist group calling itself the Justice Department sent packages loaded with razor blades to medical researchers a couple years ago, Newkirk wasn’t exactly in the mood for nonviolence, saying,
Perhaps the mere idea of receiving a nasty missive will allow animal researchers to empathize with their victims for the first time in their lousy careers.I find it small wonder that the laboratories aren’t all burning to ground. If I had a more guts, I’d light a match.
Apparently, that’s Newkirk’s idea of expressing an urge to return to peace.
Source:
Violence at home. Ingrid Newkirk, September 21, 2001.