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Peta.xxx: Will People Visit for the Porn and Stay for the Animal Rights Message?
For some time now, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals has used nudity to grab people's attention for its cause. The organization has had celebrities such as Pamela Anderson, Eva Mendes, Elisabetta Canalis, Khloe Kardashian, Amanda Beard and Chad Ochocinco serve as nude models for its "I'd Rather Go Naked than Wear Fur" and other anti-fur campaigns, for example. PETA has explained in the past that it uses nudity because it must rely on getting free "advertising" through media coverage, and activists "going naked instead of wearing fur" successfully grabs headlines.
Now PETA wants to further raise awareness by moving beyond its current PG-rated stuff (PG-13?) to some real XXX action. Indeed, The Virginian-Pilot reports that PETA has applied to launch "peta.xxx," a website that will use the new ".xxx" domain that is intended for pornographic sites. Lindsay Rajt of PETA says that the .xxx site will not be hard-core porn, but will be "erotica," i.e., nudity and "sexually suggestive content."
Rajit says peta.xxx may be up and running as soon as early November 2011, and she believes it will be "triple extra effective in helping us bring our important issues of animal rights and eating a vegan diet to a greater number of people." Others believe the porn strategy will backfire. Marketing professor Daniel Howard of Southern Methodist University, for example, believes that peta.xxx will reinforce the notion that PETA is an extremist organization. And Robert Peters of the anti-pornography group Morality in Media believes PETA's foray into porn "borders on insanity" and may end up offending people who would potentially support its cause. "There have got to be other ways to draw attention to their cause," he said.
PETA says it will be tracking the website to determine if people are viewing its animal rights messages as well as the nudity.
Posted by Bruce Carton on September 26, 2011 at 12:11 PM | Permalink
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