Rosa Parks' Birthday Celebration Should Be Vegetarian—Just Like Her

Rosa
Parks
is remembered as one of the most fearless civil rights activists in history. So
it’s fitting that her birthday, February 4, has been deemed the National Day of Courage, when we are all encouraged to raise our voices against injustice.

The Henry Ford Museum in the Detroit
area, where Parks spent the latter half of her life, plans to pay tribute to her
with a day of special events. But the museum overlooked an important detail:
Parks didn’t harm animals
for food. She was a vegetarian. And a celebration of her life and her legacy should be, too.
So PETA raised our voices and asked the museum to honor all of Parks’ convictions by serving vegetarian food.

Parks is, of course, best known for her
work to end segregation and racism. But like her friend, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.,
Parks soon broadened her base to advocate for all socially disadvantaged
people. Dr. King’s widow, Coretta
Scott King, and his son, Dexter Scott
King, went on to embrace other disadvantaged species.
Believing that animals should also be free from being subjugated and abused, both
went vegan.

Not only did Rosa Parks refuse to give
up her seat on the bus, she also refused to go along with the idea that it’s OK
to inflict suffering on others for her own ends. In honoring her legacy, we
should do the same.