PETA vs. Mario: Animal Rights Group Takes On Nintendo Character For Tanooki Suit (PHOTOS)

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has been known to target celebrities for their purses, the royals for hunting and even shark attack victims, but the group's latest beef is with a videogame character: Mario.

Yes, that Mario, the one-half of the famed plumber duo Super Mario Bros.

PETA is upset with the videogame character because of the fur tanuki suit he wears in Super Mario 3D Land, the recently-released game for the Nintendo 3DS.

From USA Today:

The outfit, modeled after Japanese raccoon dogs called tanuki, allows Mario to float in the sky to collect coins or traverse difficult jumps.

"Tanooki may be just a 'suit' in Mario games," PETA says on its website, "but in real life, tanuki are raccoon dogs who are skinned alive for their fur." The organization writes:

When people learn that millions of innocent animals are beaten, boiled, hanged, and electrocuted for their fur every year; that each fur coat, each piece of fur lining or fur trim, and each fur cat toy represents the intense suffering of dozens of animals; and that furriers intentionally mislabel the fur of cats and dogs as fur from other species or as faux fur—then every decent human being will want to go fur-free.

The animal rights group has developed a videogame to communicate that they don't think it's okay to wear fur. On its homepage, PETA features a picture of a deranged Mario holding the bloody head of a tanuki next to the words "Mario Kills Tanooki."

The game, which is replete with classic 80s videogame music, consists of Tanooki attempting to "reclaim" his fur.

PETA has long used attention-grabbing methods to get its message out. Earlier this year, the animal rights group announced that it would be launching a porn site with graphic videos and photos.

"We live in a 24 hour news cycle world and we learn the racy things we do are sometimes the most effective way that we can reach particular individuals," PETA spokeswoman Lindsay Rajt told The Huffington Post in August.

WATCH the PETA video (scroll down to view some EXPLICIT ads from past campaigns):

To view some past PETA campaigns, check out the photos below (WARNING: Explicit Images)

Comments

[Doug Clement]

04:00 AM on 01/10/2012

This is the kind of stuff that makes PETA out to be a joke...maybe they are?

[Red Leaves]

01:03 PM on 12/31/2011

I would have thought PETA would go after a game like Red Dead Redemption, in which you can actually kill and skin wild animals.

[MonstersandVillians]

02:18 PM on 12/09/2011

A video game can't influence you to do something, if you play a game that supposedly suggests skinning animals and wearing fur, then the will and the craziness was in you long before you picked up the controller...

[christiex]

05:38 PM on 11/22/2011

Hey, thanks PETA. If it wasn't for you guys, I would have still thought it was a raccoon suit..

[Doug Clement]

04:07 AM on 01/10/2012

I preferred the Hammer Bothers suit myself

[Kyeshia Mundy]

02:00 PM on 11/21/2011

If PETA put this much effort into human issues like the homeless and starving children of the world rather then animals they would be so much respected. There are more horrid issues to worry about rather then this. If you worrying about the treatment of animals so much why dont u make vegan food for the homeless or something

[PattieB]

06:14 AM on 11/22/2011

Why dont you do something about the starving and the homeless? Put a little bit of your own effort in there. Why don't you make some of your food for the starving, or something?

[Kyeshia Mundy]

11:53 AM on 11/22/2011

Hun I do I volunteer as much as I can. But see this isnt about me its about PETA and there idiotic ways. I'm taking action and instead of doing what they are doing they should do the same with a different approach. This type of action is only giving them negative responses obviously if you have been reading the comments in this thread.

[Sara Blackburn]

07:19 PM on 11/17/2011

i think PETA is extremely misguided in it's attack of the Mario Brothers game. It is a game and just that. I believe these people need to look into REAL issues of animals being harmed in the REAL world and NOT in a video game. Shame on those who support this idiotic movement against video games.

[Andy Harris]

02:36 PM on 11/17/2011

Mario isn't our only childhood hero that PETA's going after! ;-)

http://thecomedycouple.com/2011/11/17/peta-hates-our-childhood/

[Pixiesnix]

06:06 AM on 11/17/2011

That game is terrible. The controls are useless.

[thecomedycouple]

05:36 AM on 11/17/2011

Here are some pics showing how PETA is destroying some of our other childhood favorites!

http://thecomedycouple.com/2011/11/17/peta-hates-our-childhood/

[WaPoFan]

04:58 AM on 11/17/2011

Shouldn't PETA be more upset that Mario jumps on turtles and kicks the shells around?

[bbaileykmg]

10:06 PM on 11/16/2011

I always thought fur was gaudy. But PETA makes me want to go buy a fur coat with matching gloves and a hat.

[PattieB]

05:28 AM on 11/17/2011

So to get at PETA you would support the skinning of live animals? To follow that through, then someone who had it in for Comic Relief would go to Africa and take food out of the mouths of the hungry. Please take a few moments to watch the video of what happens on a fur farm. You would have to be hard core insensitive to want a fur coat and matching gloves after that. The only people with that level of insensitivity are sociopaths who lack the neural pathways to feel empathy

[bbaileykmg]

12:53 PM on 11/17/2011

Animals are not People. Video games are not real. Comic Relief is not PETA. I would go to Africa and give them animals to eat. The fact that People care more about animals than they do People baffles me. But I would never wear fur I was being hyperbolic, fur is pointless and tacky.

[N0NDescript0]

02:39 PM on 11/17/2011

PattieB said:

"So to get at PETA you would support the skinning of live animals?"

Do you always jump to such ridiculous and illogical conclusions?

Who said anything about "skinning...live animals"? Guess what PattieB: animals can be skinned AFTER THEY ARE DEAD!
: 0
OMG!
Surprise!!!!

I know: startling, but true!

[mszksg]

04:00 PM on 11/17/2011

LOL

[Pat Fenton]

08:36 PM on 11/16/2011

PETA may have been started with good intentions, but this is ridiculous. I've been playing the new Elder Scrolls game pretty hard this week and as part of the game I am constantly killing wild game (sheep, goat, rabbit, wolves,elk) and the game rewards me for my efforts by letting me harvest their fur and meat. Shouldn't this concern PETA?

Apparently not, they have chosen to attack mario for smashing his head against a "?" block and taking an item that comes out of it turning him into a flying racoon thing. A device that first appeared in mario almost 20 years ago for mario3 (nes). This doesn't sound like any reality that I know. If this is reality to you you should know those mushrooms your eating don't make you bigger, you just feel giant. (Can i have some?)

Your lack of picking valid causes and getting upset over nothing is why nobody cares what you have to say anymore PETA.

[PattieB]

05:44 AM on 11/17/2011

The "positive" impact video games are said to have on children and adults, is that they may improve a player's manual dexterity and computer literacy. Ever-improving technology also provides players with better graphics that give a more "realistic" virtual playing experience. This quality makes the video game industry a powerful force in many adolescent lives. However, numerous studies show that video games, especially ones with violent content, make teens more aggressive.
Video games encourage players to identify with, and role play their favorite characters. This is referred to as a "first-person" video game (Anderson & Dill, 2000, p. 788) because players are able to make decisions affecting the actions of the character they are imitating. After time, playing a violent video game, a player can "automatically prime aggressive thoughts" (Bushman & Anderson, 2002, p. 1680). The researchers concluded that players who had prior experience playing violent video games responded with an increased level of aggression when they encountered confrontation.
It follows then that subliminally, the wearing of fur by your favourite avatar will send an under the radar message that fur is acceptable.
It doesnt matter what you think about PETA. PETA is not the issue here. The promoting of the vile fur trade in this insideous way is having an impact on the way people view the fur trade. All of you on here are prime examples that prove my point, you don't care about the animals that are tortured you only want to take a swipe at PETA

[durandalleelatycho]

09:13 AM on 11/17/2011

This is one of the worst argued, most factually inaccurate pieces of trash I have read on the debate against violent computer games.

As a long term Vegan and computer game player, I can say that PETA IS the problem here. They have long been a stain on animal rights and give every vegetarian and vegan a bad name with their presumptuous, arrogant, sensationalist, fact evading propaganda.

[NVRSLPS]

10:11 AM on 11/17/2011

"It follows then that subliminally, the wearing of fur by your favourite avatar will send an under the radar message that fur is acceptable."

No it doesn't. Please show me some quantitative data that shows this. The reason PETA is going after Mario is because it's one of the most popular games of all time. Like Pat (above) said there are other games that are far more graphic and would rightly cause more concern. If you're going to go after one go after all. I don't agree with the fur trade at all, but I also don't agree with some of PETA's tactics.

[hazbro24]

08:04 PM on 11/16/2011

I might have to break out the old NES and play duck hunt tonight. Maybe tonight I'll finally be able to get the dog.

[PirplePashn]

07:13 PM on 11/16/2011

Peta, Peta, Peta... You are making a serious cause into a serious joke.

[BuffaloBills222]

06:44 PM on 11/16/2011

God I hate PETA