BEER…IT ISN’T JUST FOR BREAKFAST ANYMORE
Brace yourselves, folks. I’m afraid I have some shocking news.
I may have to break down and join PETA.
My old pals at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals are at it again, except this time the PETA folks are going right for the weak spot. PETA has released scientific studies showing that people should start drinking beer instead of milk. They’ve taken their crusade to—where else—college campuses. They’re giving away bottle openers that say, "Drinking Responsibly Means Not Drinking Milk—Save a Cow’s Life," to college students who visit
www.MilkSucks.com.Boy, talk about your mixed emotions. On the one hand, I’ve said for years that PETA is a bunch of wackos. On the other hand, I think college coeds and beer are the greatest combination since the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup.
Now, I must admit, when I first heard this, I though that it was some kind of early April Fools’ joke. Either that, or that PETA had finally developed a sense of humor, which I’m pretty sure is one of the signs of the Apocalypse. After visiting the above website, I’m still not sure. They appear to be serious, but it’s hard to tell with them sometimes. PETA claims, among other things, that:
And it’s not just good for college-age kids. Scientific studies show that beer may even be better for children than milk. In one study, a group of eighteen-month olds was given beer and a similar group was given milk. After several hours in the lab, the toddlers in the milk group were cranky, incoherent and had trouble walking. The beer group was better behaved, perhaps because they were asleep.
To be fair, I think PETA has ignored some of the real benefits of milk. For one thing, milk doesn’t make you drive your car into swimming pools. And milk doesn’t make you stand in the middle of a crowded, brew-soaked dance floor and scream the lyrics to Billy Idol’s "Rebel Yell" at the top of your voice. Okay, maybe that last one should go into the "plus" column for beer.
Of course, PETA being PETA, this campaign is not being waged purely for the benefit of human beings. They’re all misty about "taking" the milk from the cows. Poor Bossy, they say, is "chained by her neck in a concrete stall for months, her udders genetically modified to produce so much extra milk that they sometimes drag on the feces- and urine-covered cement. She is kept pregnant by artificial insemination to keep milk production high," and so on. Sounds almost as miserable as the job I had when I first got out of law school. And no, I don’t want to talk about it.
Maybe we should send some beer to the cows. I know it always helps me get through times like that. If you agree, send your cans and bottles of beer to "Brews for Bossy", care of this newspaper. All contributions will be sent to the appropriate bovines, after some small deductions for, ah, administrative costs.
So, as I’m surfing around the PETA website, I notice another intriguing program of theirs. PETA now sponsors a group known as the "Lettuce Ladies." From the website: "Wearing nothing but strategically placed lettuce leaves, PETA’s Lettuce Ladies raise eyebrows and open minds as they travel the country, educating people about vegetarianism and serving up delicious veggie food." And they’re not half-bad looking, either. They’d look even better with a little ranch dressing and a few croutons, but then hey, who wouldn’t?
Boy, now they’re just fighting dirty. They’ve learned the secret to successful marketing in America: half-dressed women and beer. It’s worked for the beer companies, it’s worked for Hooters, and now maybe it’s PETA’s turn.
I feel myself weakening. Somebody get me a cheeseburger, quick!
(Note: In the short interval between PETA's announcement and the publication of this column, they cancelled the program. Cowards. )
Dusty Rhoades is a Southern Pines lawyer, who assures us that no cows were harmed in the writing of this column. Several beers, however, were not so lucky. R.I.P.
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COPYRIGHT 2000 BY JERRY D. RHOADES, JR.