Bernie Manning Billboard Goes Up In Manchester Despite Legal Threats

‘The White Stuff Ain’t the Right Stuff’, Says PETA of Milk and Manning

For Immediate Release:
4 December 2003

Contact:
Sean Gifford 020 7357 9229, ext 226

Manchester – PETA’s spoof of the dairy industry’s multimillion-pound ‘The White Stuff – Are You Made of It?’ ad campaign has risen as a billboard despite legal threats from Bernard Manning’s agent for using his image ‘without permission’. The ad – on the A665 at the Miller Street car park, opposite the CIS tower, in Manning’s hometown of Manchester – depicts the comedian, who is known for his racist ‘humour’, sporting a milk moustache next to the tagline ‘(Lactose) Intolerant? The White Stuff Ain’t the Right Stuff!’ and steers motorists to PETA’s Web site MilkSucks.co.uk.

Most of the world’s people – including most of those of African, Hispanic or Asian descent – become lactose intolerant after infancy. A new study by British researchers points to undetected lactose intolerance as the culprit for many ailments, including arthritis, bowel problems and chronic fatigue. Consumption of dairy products has also been linked to heart disease, strokes, diabetes, obesity, cancer and even osteoporosis – the very disease that milk is purported to prevent. Manning, 73, who responded to PETA’s ad by saying, ‘I love milk. I’ve drunk it my whole life’, has had a stroke and suffers from angina, which suggests that dairy products might hold some responsibility for his health problems.

The dairy industry’s abusive treatment of cows is also hard to stomach. Dairy cows are genetically manipulated to produce milk at many times their natural capacity, leaving them ‘used up’ after just a few years, when they are transported to abattoirs and ground up into burgers and mince. Newborn male calves are torn from their mothers, causing acute distress to both calf and cow.

Says PETA UK’s Sean Gifford, ‘Dairy cows suffer from chronic lameness, forced impregnation and having their beloved calves taken away from them, which makes the dairy industry even worse than Mr Manning’s bad jokes’.

For more information, please visit our Web site MilkSucks.co.uk.