Peta

"When entertaining, it is always best to have an elephant," said Phineas T. Barnum. I watched the unloading of the animals the other night by the Ringling Brothers Circus in back of the B.&O. Railroad Museum. The elephants all seemed well fed and quite happy. The horses are quite magnificent, and all of the handlers seemed very proud and professional. There was no sign of abuse of any kind, and you could tell that the handlers loved their animals. Perhaps the PETA people should attend the circus like me and have a good time.

Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake wasn't exactly jumping when Jada Pinkett Smith asked for her help in protecting elephants earlier this week. The mayor more or less says she had bigger fish to fry -- that and the actress didn't help her out when the city needed it. But Friday Pinkett Smith's aunt, who runs the Baltimore-based charity of the actress, said her niece has done quite a bit for the city -- and she's surprised that the mayor doesn't...

A day after Jada Pinkett Smith sent a heartfelt letter to Baltimore's mayor, pleading for her to stand up for circus elephants she believes are being abused, circus officials called the actress "completely misguided. " "She doesn't know the first thing about elephants or about how to take care of them," Stephen Payne, the spokesperson for Ringling Bros., told Baltimore Insider Wednesday. "She's completely misguided. " In a letter dated Tuesday, Jada Pinkett Smith wrote to the mayor, "as a mother and proud Baltimore native," asking her to stop the circus from using devices called bullhooks to prod the elephants into performing.

Actress Jada Pinkett Smith is appealing directly to Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake on behalf of elephants. In a letter dated Tuesday, the actress said she was appealing to the mayor "as a mother and proud Baltimore native. " Pinkett Smith wanted to make sure no elephants were jabbed with bullhooks during the upcoming performance of Ringling Bros. Circus' at 1st Mariner Arena. She reminded Rawlings-Blake of the city's law against any “mechanical, electrical, or manualdevice that is likely to cause physical injury or suffering” to a performing animal.

Ravens linebacker Terrell Suggs is used to chasing down opposing quarterbacks. Now Suggs is joining PETA in going after fur farms that kill foxes, minks and rabbits -- even dogs and cats -- to make coats out of their pelts. Suggs will appear in an ad for PETA. He won't be butt naked like Willis McGahee was in his PETA ad back when he played for the Ravens, but hey ladies, he's shirtless. You can check out the Suggs PETA ad here . "Once I saw what they do to the animals, you know, to get the fur, it just seemed cruel and evil," Suggs said.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) apparently has a bone to pick with Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti. The animal rights group is trying to start a beef with Bisciotti over the team's relationship with KFC, and they are urging the Ravens to reconsider their official chicken sponsor . The folks at PETA contacted The Baltimore Sun as well, and they passed along the letter they say they sent to Bisciotti to us in email with...

Please allow me to clarify People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals' position on pit bulls in light of Sal Grifasi's letter to the editor ("When pit bulls have more rights than humans," June 12). PETA supports measures that protect both pit bulls and humans, including bans on breeding or acquiring new pit bulls (provided that such laws grandfather-in registered, well-cared for, spayed and neutereddogs) and strict regulations on the keeping of pit bulls. Such laws would only have a serious impact on people who are exploiting pit bulls.

PETA and Poe? Oh, woe. The always outrageous People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals made the always financially strapped Edgar Allan Poe House an offer last week that, apparently, the latter can refuse. PETA officials pledged an unspecified amount of money to help keep the Poe House open now that it's lost funding from Baltimore City and is subsisting on the kindness of strangers. The catch, though, is that the house would have to display a PETA poster, one that plays off a famous Poe short story: "The Tell-Tale Heart of a Meat-Eater," goes the ad, which features a drawing of a rather distressed Poe-like man clutching his chest.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is offering to help keep Baltimore's city-owned Edgar Allan Poe House open, provided the group is allowed to display an ad promoting a vegan diet. In a letter sent Monday to Poe House curator Jeff Jerome, PETA officials offered to "help a little bit" in the effort to keep the financially strapped Poe House open. In return for that help, PETA proposes, the house would display a sign featuring a man clutching at his chest; the accompanying message would read, "The Tell-Tale Heart of a Meat-Eater.

In his years as a chef, Chris Shoul had never thought much about the feelings of a lifelong vegetarian, unable to enjoy the cheesesteaks his buddy scarfed down. But last year, after Towson University began offering a vegan version of the sandwich made with substitute beef, the campus' top chef got a note from just such a student. "Because of you, I got to have my first cheesesteak!" the student raved to Shoul. Such moments are the reasons why Towson and the University of Maryland, College Park rank among the most vegan-friendly campuses in the U.S. and Canada, according to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.