PETA has a long history of vicious racism, and now they have drawn their celebrity shill, Bob Barker, to join in one of their white supremacist crusades. They are actually meddling in the affairs of the Cherokee people. From the Asheville Citizen Times 7/29/09 (Hat Tip IDiosyntocracy):

Bob Barker and the People for Ethical Treatment of Animals will take their campaign to free the bears in captivity to the nation’s animal lovers, Barker said in a press conference today.

“Things are going to change on the Cherokee Reservation, I promise,” said Barker, the game-show host and animal advocate.

Barker became involved at the request of the wife of Rep. Bill Young of Florida. The Youngs visited Cherokee last summer on a family vacation, and Beverly Young said she was outraged when she saw bears kept in concrete pits.

The Cherokee dispute the farcical claim that the bears are being treated badly.

It is an outrageous example of white supremacist hate and an assertion of white privilege for Barker and PETA to think that they have a right to get even slightly involved in the matter. The racist attitude that the Cherokee people are colonial subjects to be dictated to is offensive and absolutely unacceptable.

I would find this offensive enough as a matter of bigotry and social injustice. Being part Cherokee, I find this personally insulting. Here is my message to PETA and Barker:

Shut the fuck up you racist scum!

I also find it interesting that the wife of a Republican politician is involved. The Goppers have used racist hate against indigenous peoples in rural areas as a political tactic for generations. Ms. Young's conduct is part of an evil and bigoted history this country needs to overcome.

As for PETA, PETA has huge problems with racism. Remember when PETA threw a psycho temper tantrum just because President Obama killed a fly? This was part of the rightists' strategy of throwing the metaphorical kitchen sink at Obama, and is comparable in intent to the birther crap. No one can honestly dispute the fact that PETA never would have gone off the deep end over something so petty and trivial as a white President killing a fly.

PETA's racism goes deeper than that. PETA still opposes using animals for medical research to fight AIDS. By doing this, they are placing a lower value on the lives of people of color and queers than those of non human animals.

In order to try to get away from accountability for their racist and homophobic conduct, the PETA propagandists use Hitler's Big Lie tactic, saying that animal research isn't scientifically valid when it is a proven fact that animal research is scientifically useful and valid.

The Cherokees have every right to tell the PETA bigots where to go.