PETA Contest for “In Vitro” Meat

Oh brother: PETA claims to be about ending all human use of animals, but its first priority is grabbing attention. The newest gimmick is a contest that will award $1 million to the scientist who first develops in vitro meat that can be sold to the public in place of steak or bacon. From the story:

The organization said it will announce plans today for a $1 million prize to the “first person to come up with a method to produce commercially viable quantities of in vitro meat at competitive prices by 2012.”

The idea of getting the next Chicken McNugget out of a test tube is not new. For several years, scientists have worked to develop technologies to grow tissue cultures that could be consumed like meat without the expense of land or feed and the disease potential of real meat. An international symposium on the topic was held this month in Norway.

The tissue, once grown, could be shaped and given texture with the kinds of additives and structural agents that are now used to give products such as soy burgers a more meaty quality.

The chances of this happening in 4 years are pretty low, and so there is little worry that PETA will have to pony up the mil. Moreover, the chance that most meat eaters will switch to test tube grown protein is also pretty low—as is the likelihood that in vitro meat will be significantly cheaper than animal flesh. Besides, those who adhere to the maxim, “If it has a face don’t eat it,” are unlikely to switch back to meat from vegetarianism.

Then, there is this: Developing in vitro meat requires using animals instrumentally, which I thought was a violation of the PETA creed. Moreover, it does nothing to wean us off of our “addiction” to meat.

Interestingly, I asked Gary Francione his view on this, and it is strikingly similar to mine. He told me:

The likelihood of having commercially viable quantities of in-vitro meat by 2012 is very low. So PETA is not really putting anything at risk but is getting publicity. And the primary goal of PETA is to promote PETA—animal rights is only an incidental part of the equation. Moreover, as far as I am aware, PETA has not placed any restriction on the prize that would prohibit the use of animal-based growth mediums or vivisection as part of the research into the development of in-vitro meat. If that is the case, then you have a purported animal rights organization promoting animal exploitation through offering the prize in addition to the problem of PETA encouraging this sort of thing at all. But as PETA has in the past given awards to slaughterhouse designers and to those who produce and sell “happy” meat and and animal products, this most recent gimmick is nothing out of the ordinary for the organization.

PETA says that the goal of all of this for fewer animals to suffer. But that is a pipe dream. The PETA in vitro meat contest is really just a gimmick to garner publicity—PETA’s addictive substance of choice.