PETA has launched an attack on poet laureate Amanda Gorman for promoting a milk-sponsored run, accusing her of “pimping out raped cows” and “exploiting” the female species.
Amanda Gorman, 25, joined forces with MilkPEP to promote the first Every Woman’s Marathon – and was featured this week in a clip reciting a poem as women trained for the sporting event in the background.
The company, who is the brand behind ‘Got Milk?’ ads sponsor what is described as “the only American marathon designed for women, by women.”
But the collaboration isn’t sitting well with the PETA community, which criticizes Gorman for supporting the “rape of cows” and an industry that “exploits females and steals newborn babies from mothers.”
Amanda Gorman, 25, recently joined forces with MilkPEP to promote the inaugural Every Woman’s Marathon – and she was featured in a clip this week reciting a poem as women trained for the sporting event in the background
She said Gorman should realize that’all exploitation and harm to women of any kind in the name of greed is wrong.”
PETA urged the poet to stop working with the “wretched, cruel, environmentally damaging and anti-women industry.”
Lisa Lange, PETA’s senior VP of communications, wrote the scathing letter, saying she “would no more drink cow’s milk at the end of a race than I would smoke a cigarette.”
The letter read: “I am writing on behalf of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals – PETA entities have more than 9 million members and supporters worldwide – regarding your puzzling support of the Every Woman’s Marathon.
‘Our leadership now and always consists mainly of women. I’m a distance runner who participates in several marathons and 50Ks a year, and I would no more drink cow’s milk at the end of a race than I would smoke a cigarette.
‘The event sponsor, MilkPEP, is the marketing arm of the dairy industry, promoting a hugely problematic industry that exploits women and steals newborn babies from mothers.
‘You and every woman seduced by the fuss of this event are being used by the dairy industry to pimp a product that involves the metaphorical rape of the environment and the actual rape of cows and is linked to breast and ovarian cancer and more.’
Lisa Lange, PETA’s senior VP of communications, wrote the scathing letter, saying she “would no more drink cow’s milk at the end of a race than I would smoke a cigarette.”
Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman speaks at the inauguration of US President Joe Biden on the West Front of the US Capitol on January 20, 2021
Amanda Gorman arrives at the 65th Annual Grammy Awards in 2023
She added: ‘Farmers exploit the female reproductive system to keep milk flowing. Animals on industrial farms are forcibly sexually abused, what the industry calls “artificial insemination.”
‘To impregnate a cow, she is held in what industry insiders call a ‘rape rack,’ and workers insert their arms far into the cow’s rectum to position the uterus and then push a syringe of semen in her vagina.
“Rape is wrong no matter who the victim is.
‘Calves are often taken from their mothers within a day of birth so that the milk intended for them can be sold. This separation causes extreme distress to both the mother and the baby.
‘Frenzied mothers have been known to chase their stolen babies and can be heard calling for their calves for days. The value of a cow on a dairy farm is entirely related to the way the industry exploits its reproductive system.
“If she cannot get pregnant and breastfeed, she will be considered useless to the industry and will be killed.
“You stand for so much that is right, and you are the voice of a new generation, so you must understand that all exploitation and harm to women of any kind in the name of greed is wrong.
“Please reconsider your role in helping a wretched, cruel, environmentally damaging and anti-women industry that wants to promote itself through the Every Woman’s Marathon.”
Last year, a Miami elementary school banned children from reading one of Gorman’s poems. The ban only affected one school where a parent of two students complained that the reading material contained “indirect messages of hate” and was part of an attempt to indoctrinate children.
In response to the news that her book was being pulled from elementary school shelves, Gorman posted a statement on her Instagram: “I am devastated. Due to the complaint of one parent, my inaugural poem, The Hill We Climb, has been banned from an elementary school in Miami-Dade County, Florida.”
She went on to say that book bans are on the rise in the US and that “all it will take to remove these works from our libraries and schools is a single objection. And let’s be clear: most banned works are by authors who have fought for generations to get on the bookshelf. The majority of these censored works are from queer and non-white voices.”
She wrote that banning her poem is a way to “deprive children of the opportunity to find their voice in literature,” which in turn is “a violation of their right to free thought and expression.”