PETA vs. Pokémon

I love animals. Would save every one of them if half didn’t taste so good. That said, PETA manages to piss me off every single month. If you don’t know them, they’re the ones who poison dogs in trucks and mock video games while claiming to give a shit about the world. Real charity work apparently got boring, so now they spend their time splashing people with fake blood and making parody games about Nintendo franchises.

Their latest thing is a flash game called Pokémon Black and Blue, timed to the release of the new DS games. In it, a furious, bloodied Pikachu takes revenge on his captors. The premise is that Pokémon trainers are basically running an animal torture ring, trapping creatures in balls and forcing them into fights for sport and entertainment. PETA’s statement compares it directly to circus elephants stuck in cages, given electric shocks to perform tricks. Which, okay, I see what they’re doing. The metaphor isn’t totally insane.

But here’s the thing. I genuinely respect the WWF and the real animal protection organizations doing unglamorous work in the field. I’m not being ironic—I think improving conditions for captive and endangered animals should happen fast and comprehensively. No bullshit. But pouring money and effort into embarrassing PR stunts instead of going where help actually matters, instead of doing anything that requires patience and real work, that shows PETA gave up on reality years ago. They’re not activists. They’re performance artists who decided animals were the right subject.

Protesting a video game about fictional creatures while real animals suffer in real cages is so perfectly on-brand that I almost respect the commitment. Almost.