Peta Bearskins Protest Girls

Founded in 1980, the organization is a non-profit, tax-exempt corporation with 187 employees, funded almost entirely by its members. In its campaigns and investigations, it focuses on four core issues—factory farming, fur farming, animal testing, and animals in entertainment—though it also campaigns against fishing, the killing of animals regarded as pests, the keeping of chained backyard dogs, cock fighting, dog fighting, and bullfighting. It aims to inform the public through advertisements, undercover investigations, animal rescue, and lobbying.
The organization has been criticized for the confrontational style and content of its campaigns, and for the number of animals it euthanizes. Critics including U.S. Senate Environment Committee chairman Jim Inhofe further said in 2005 that PETA had donated money to the legal defense of Animal Liberation Front (ALF) and Earth Liberation Front (ELF) activists accused of violent offenses. PETA has said that it has no involvement with ALF or ELF actions, and does not support violence.