PETA Announces 2019’s Person of the Year: Joaquin Phoenix
Joaquin Phoenix‘s dedication to animal rights has nabbed the Joker star the title of PETA’s 2019 Person of the Year. A vegan since the age of 3, when he saw a fish caught and killed, Joaquin never misses an opportunity to turn the spotlight away from himself and onto animals’ plight and to set a great example of walking the vegan walk.
PETA is proud to kick off awards season by honouring his dedication to spreading the message that when it comes to feeling fear, pain, and love, a human being is no different from a hen or a hamster.
“I don’t want to cause pain to another living, empathetic creature. I don’t want to take [their] babies away from [them]. I don’t want to force [them] to be indoors and fattened up just to be slaughtered. It is absurd and barbaric.”
– Joaquin Phoenix
In just the last year, Joaquin appeared on PETA US “We Are All Animals” billboards in New York’s Times Square and on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles, joined California lawmakers to announce legislation banning travelling wild-animal circuses, and cradled a dead chicken as he led a memorial service at a National Animal Rights Day march.
He’s the executive producer of The Animal People, a documentary that follows animal rights activists who were suppressed by powerful industry interests and comforted pigs with a drink of water at their last stop before the animals entered an abattoir.
Joaquin’s activism for animals goes back years. He narrated the groundbreaking animal rights documentary Earthlings in 2005 and presented the director, Shaun Monson, with the first-ever River Phoenix Humanitarian Award at PETA US’ 35th Anniversary Gala in 2015. He produced the pro-vegan documentary What the Health in 2017 and was among the narrators of the animal agriculture exposé Dominion in 2018.
Here are just some of the campaigns by PETA and our international affiliates that Joaquin’s been part of during our decades-long partnership.
Turkeys (1998):
Exotic skins (2010):
Fishing (2013):
Dog leather (2015):
Wool (2016):
Inspired by Joaquin?
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