Canada Bans Pam Anderson's "Sexist" PETA Ad

by Annie Hartnett · 2010-07-19 12:30:00 UTC
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Last week, the city of Montreal banned Pamela Anderson's new PETA ad, slamming it as "sexist." In the advertisement, Pamela's bikini clad body is divided and labeled as various cuts of meat. This image is coupled with the slogan: "All Animals Have the Same Parts." A Montreal official explained the ban: "[The advertisement] is not so much controversial, as it goes against all principles public organizations are fighting for in the everlasting battle of equality between men and women."

PETA senior vice president Dan Mathews responded: "I think that city officials are confusing 'sexy' with 'sexist.'"

Anderson has been on the cover of twelve Playboy covers, making her their most popular model. And Baywatch isn't the most watched television show of all time because of the show's writing.

Pamela Anderson is using her career as a "piece of meat"  to comment on the fact that neither she, nor any other animal, is just a sum of food parts meant for grilling.

Pamela Anderson has been an animal activist for years, and is fully aware of PETA's mission. Anderson responded to the banning of the advertisement in Montreal: "In a city that is known for its exotic dancing and for being progressive and edgy, how sad that a woman would be banned from using her own body in a political protest over the suffering of cows and chickens."

Canadian officials missed the message entirely, unable to locate why the advertisement made them uneasy. The ad makes us uncomfortable not because it's particularly risque (most of us have seen more of Pam), but because it points out the similarities between people and animals. Eating animals that have been tortured all their lives in factory farms is denying what we know: animals and humans have the same capacity for pain.

As PETA's president Ingrid Newirk once said: "When it comes to having a central nervous system, and the ability to feel pain, hunger, and thirst, a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy."

The factory farming industry does not comport with our knowledge of animals as thinking, feeling creatures. We know we shouldn't treat women as mere "pieces of meat," and I think if we really thought about it, we know we shouldn't treat animals that way either.

Photo Credit: PETA

Annie Hartnett is a writer and animal advocate who has worked for several wildlife rehabilitation centers and environmental programs.
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