Does this look like a suffering animal to you?
The word is out from Gobbler’s Knob, Pennsylvania—Punxsutawney Phil has seen his shadow and we can expect six more weeks of winter. As a New Englander, this amuses me no end. Six more weeks would be mid-March and if winter is over by then, New Englanders are as happy as, well, a groundhog in a heated burrow.
This brings me to one of the sillier protests in recent memory. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has issued a call for Punxsutawney Phil to be (literally) put out to pasture. According to PETA, shy groundhogs are traumatized by their once-yearly forced public appearances and the annual ritual could be more humanely enacted with a robot groundhog. PETA points to Phil’s several attempts to escape his home in the local library as proof that inside his tubby body beats a born-free heart.
Good grief! PETA has done fine work in the past—especially in raising awareness of the cruelty of leg traps, the fur trade, and animal testing by the cosmetics industry—but organizational leaders need a serious course in power and politics. Rule one: Never expend political capital on a Straw Man debate. Rule two: Never waste it on a lost cause. Rule three: Never spend it in such a way that it will make it harder to be taken seriously in the future.
Punxsutawney Phil is the most pampered rodent on the planet. While his cousins are shivering in the wild and trying to avoid being lunch for raptors, road kill, or target practice, Phil enjoys central heating, a team of handlers, and regular meals. He lives like a rajah! Of course he tries to get out. He does so for the same reason house cats go Stalag 17 on occasion: instinct. But would Tabby be better off left to dodge foxes and Volvos?
Groundhog Day, as it’s been known in North America since the 19th century, is actually much older than the little ceremony in Pennsylvania, which dates to 1887. In many Christian lands February 2 is Candlemas, a blessing marked by the lighting of candles to commemorate the Virgin Mary’s re-emergence in society after giving birth to Jesus. (Jewish law required women to live in isolation for forty days after childbirth.) But the lighting of candles is surely a holdover from Pagan religions. Everybody is anxious for more light about this time of the year. Tribal Celts often lit bonfires for the holiday of Imbolc in the belief that they were replenishing the sun. Pre-Christian Germans held their own versions of Groundhog Day using badgers or bears. Wonder what PETA would think of that? More to the point, PETA isn’t going to reverse centuries of cultural practice.
Mostly, though, PETA’s call is bad because it makes the organization look ridiculous, thus reducing the likelihood of being taken seriously in the future when it takes on a far more worthy cause. If I didn’t know better I’d say that PETA was being run by a group of sophomores whose zeal exceeds their intellect. It’s admirable that they care so much, but for heaven’s sake—get a grip! One cannot take on every cause and retain the energy to fight the Good War when it comes along. Are there any adults at PETA HQ? Do any of them comprehend the difference between good PR and publicity at any cost?
As noted, PETA has done great things in the past. But it will not do so in the future if it insists on making itself the punch line of cheap jokes. Chill out, gang. Go to Pennsylvania, have a few laughs, and be thankful that at least one woodchuck lives better (alas!) than a lot of tenement dwellers do. For the record, my Pennsylvania grandfather was a farmer. For him woodchucks were stew material.
This brings me to one of the sillier protests in recent memory. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has issued a call for Punxsutawney Phil to be (literally) put out to pasture. According to PETA, shy groundhogs are traumatized by their once-yearly forced public appearances and the annual ritual could be more humanely enacted with a robot groundhog. PETA points to Phil’s several attempts to escape his home in the local library as proof that inside his tubby body beats a born-free heart.
Good grief! PETA has done fine work in the past—especially in raising awareness of the cruelty of leg traps, the fur trade, and animal testing by the cosmetics industry—but organizational leaders need a serious course in power and politics. Rule one: Never expend political capital on a Straw Man debate. Rule two: Never waste it on a lost cause. Rule three: Never spend it in such a way that it will make it harder to be taken seriously in the future.
Punxsutawney Phil is the most pampered rodent on the planet. While his cousins are shivering in the wild and trying to avoid being lunch for raptors, road kill, or target practice, Phil enjoys central heating, a team of handlers, and regular meals. He lives like a rajah! Of course he tries to get out. He does so for the same reason house cats go Stalag 17 on occasion: instinct. But would Tabby be better off left to dodge foxes and Volvos?
Groundhog Day, as it’s been known in North America since the 19th century, is actually much older than the little ceremony in Pennsylvania, which dates to 1887. In many Christian lands February 2 is Candlemas, a blessing marked by the lighting of candles to commemorate the Virgin Mary’s re-emergence in society after giving birth to Jesus. (Jewish law required women to live in isolation for forty days after childbirth.) But the lighting of candles is surely a holdover from Pagan religions. Everybody is anxious for more light about this time of the year. Tribal Celts often lit bonfires for the holiday of Imbolc in the belief that they were replenishing the sun. Pre-Christian Germans held their own versions of Groundhog Day using badgers or bears. Wonder what PETA would think of that? More to the point, PETA isn’t going to reverse centuries of cultural practice.
Mostly, though, PETA’s call is bad because it makes the organization look ridiculous, thus reducing the likelihood of being taken seriously in the future when it takes on a far more worthy cause. If I didn’t know better I’d say that PETA was being run by a group of sophomores whose zeal exceeds their intellect. It’s admirable that they care so much, but for heaven’s sake—get a grip! One cannot take on every cause and retain the energy to fight the Good War when it comes along. Are there any adults at PETA HQ? Do any of them comprehend the difference between good PR and publicity at any cost?
As noted, PETA has done great things in the past. But it will not do so in the future if it insists on making itself the punch line of cheap jokes. Chill out, gang. Go to Pennsylvania, have a few laughs, and be thankful that at least one woodchuck lives better (alas!) than a lot of tenement dwellers do. For the record, my Pennsylvania grandfather was a farmer. For him woodchucks were stew material.
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