In mid-March People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals targeted its anti-dairy campaign at young Hispanic with its Eche la leche, which roughly translates as “Dump Dairy.”
Of course the campaign got off to a bad start when some people pointed out the slogan in Spanish also has a double entendre meaning which we won’t go into here.
PETA also chose to hand out its Milk Trading Cards, but this time the cards had an ethnic theme. Here’s how Cloe Cabrera of the Tampa Tribune described the cards,
The new cards feature “Ear Infection Enrique,” “Diabetic Diane,” “Lactose-Intolerant Latoya” and “Milk-Stealing Ming,” [!!] all suffering ill effects from consuming milk.
. . .
The free cards he [PETA’s Hispanic Outreach coordinator William Rivas-Rivas] handed out to students made those points — in a way some might find offensive. “Milk-Stealing Ming,” depicted as an Asian, grabs a cow’s end as he sucks her teat; “Lactose-Intolernat Latoya,” a black girl, squats over a toilet; and “Ear Infection Enrique,” a Hispanic, pulls a gob of gunk from his ear.
And, of course, lets not forget this is the same PETA that Ingrid Newkirk insisted on national television does not target children. That claim, of course, was about as accurate as PETA’s claims about milk.
Sources:
PETA’s Having a Cow Over Milk Consumption. Cloe Cabrera, Tampa Tribune, March 16, 2003.
Anti-milk campaign’s Spanish translation hits sour note. Noaki Schwartz, Sun-Sentinel (Florida), March 31, 2003.