Controversial Prize Divides Animal-Rights Group
April 21, 2008 | Read Time: 1 minute
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals has announced plans to support a $1-million prize for anyone who can mass produce tissue cultures that can be eaten like meat, but the prize has created divisions within the organization, reports The New York Times.
The prize is for the “first person to come up with a method to produce commercially viable quantities of in vitro meat at competitive prices by 2012.”
However, some staff members of the animal-rights group say that the organization shouldn’t promote the consumption of animal tissue, even if no animals are killed. The disagreement has caused a “near civil war” within the group, the organization’s founder, Ingrid Newkirk, told the newspaper. Lisa Lange, a vice president at the organization, says, “I remember saying I would be much more comfortable promoting eating roadkill.”
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