Joaquin Phoenix has launched a campaign calling on people to ‘reject animal cruelty … [and] explore the many benefits of being vegan’.
The Oscar-winning actor has partnered animal protection charity PETA to promote the ‘Change the World From Your Kitchen’ initiative.
Phoenix stars in a video created by PETA, featuring footage from both UK and US farms, which shows the conditions birds live in. The video shows animals packed into loud, dirty sheds.
‘Reject animal cruelty’
“We are not a society that believes it’s okay to abuse animals,’ he says in the video. “We intuitively recoil at the very thought of animal abuse because the suffering of an innocent being is too much to bear.
“Recent undercover footage exposes how the factory farming industry maligns our values and exploits our trust. These animals are in a living hell and under the guise of deceptive unregulated labels like cage-free and free-range consumers are led to believe that they are making a kinder choice.
“They are not. There’s so much pain in the world that we are powerless over, but being party to animal suffering is not one of them. It’s easy to escape personal responsibility by actively avoiding the truth. But I hope you will join me in rejecting animal cruelty … [and] explore the many benefits of being vegan.”