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Annapurna Interactive—publisher of the viral video game Stray—has won PETA’s 2022 Company of the Year award. The game broke records on Twitch, inspired countless animal shelter fundraisers, and showed thousands of players that the “great outdoors” is a perilous place for cats. It was released to overwhelmingly pawsitive reviews, won PlayStation Game of the Year at the Golden Joystick Awards 2022, and is a 2022 Game Awards Game of the Year nominee, alongside Elden Ring and God of War Ragnarök.

Earlier this year, PETA France awarded Stray’s developer, BlueTwelve Studio, a Prix des Champions des Chats for its work on the game. The “small team from the south of France mostly made up of cats and a handful of humans” was inspired by Murtaugh (a stray cat who was rescued from under a car) and the family who rescued and adopted him. Both BlueTwelve Studio and Annapurna Interactive get two paws up from PETA for the compassion Stray inspired in a generation of gamers.

Stray follows an orange cat—whose appearance and movements were based on the designers’ own feline companions—as he journeys through a post-apocalyptic landscape to find his way home. Along the way, the purrtagonist battles some of the same threats faced by real cats who are left outside, including disease and attacks from predators. The game allows players to channel their inner cat, smashing speciesism by allowing humans to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes—or, in this case, on four feline legs.

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At its July release, Stray drew more than 62,000 players concurrently on Steam, became the most-downloaded game in the U.S. on PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5, and attracted more than 285,000 Twitch stream viewers. Annapurna Interactive’s marketing director said he hoped Stray would raise awareness of the importance of adopting companion animals rather than buying them. The company didn’t stop there: Annapurna Interactive, as well as streamers and members of the online community, facilitated numerous events and giveaways to raise funds for multiple cat-related charities.

A Life on the Streets Is Not a Game for Cats in the Real World

Around 70 million cats and dogs are homeless in the U.S. at any given time. Animal shelters with “no-kill” policies turn dogs away when they inevitably reach capacity and often refuse to accept cats altogether, leaving the most vulnerable animals with nowhere to go.

Like Stray’s hero, many cats end up abandoned on the streets, where they risk being hit by cars, infected with diseases, or hurt by cruel people—and those who reproduce make the companion animal overpopulation crisis worse. That’s why PETA urges shelters to accept all animals in need, asks everyone to adopt animals instead of buying them, and advises guardians to have their animal companions spayed or neutered.

Past winners of PETA’s Company of the Year award include Good Catch, Support + Feed, Save the Duck, WeWork, Netflix, Beyond Meat, Ogilvy & Mather Advertising Bangkok, Daiya, and Emulate.

 California’s fur ban, which applies to the sale and production of new products made from animals’ fur, will finally go into effect at the start of the new year, making 2023 a huge year for dogs, cats, minks, foxes, and the many other animals humans torment and kill for their fur.

The law, which passed in the California legislature in 2019, was championed by over 600,000 PETA supporters in the state. In addition, we wrote to California’s Senate Committee on Natural Resources and Water strongly urging its support of the measure. Over a dozen countries in Europe have taken action to shut down fur farms, and it’s clear now more than ever: Fur is dead.

Fur Factory Farms and Trappers Destroy Lives

On fur factory farms, where 85% of the fur industry’s skins are obtained, animals are often crammed into filthy wire cages with no space to themselves. They can’t express any of the normal behavior essential to their well-being, and they quickly go insane.

PETA entity eyewitnesses have documented that workers gas minks en masse, electrocute foxes and rabbits, skin raccoon dogs alive, and more. PETA’s exposé of a now-defunct chinchilla farm in California revealed that the owners never provided animals with veterinary care and would amputate chinchillas’ legs with “wire snips” and “six drops of brandy.”

Humans also steal skin from fur-bearing animals in the fur-trapping industry, in which cowardly trappers set barbaric traps in animals’ home turf, checking them daily at best. The trappers then wait for their victims to spring the traps, and animals endure protracted and excruciating deaths while trying to escape. Steel-jaw traps, which clamp onto and mutilate animals’ legs, are the most commonly used device in the industry. Trappers litter the planet with these hazardous, indiscriminate objects, which may be forgotten about, ruining the lives of unintended targets, all in the ruthless pursuit of profit.

Fur Kills the Planet, Too

The fur industry also wreaks havoc on the environment. Fur coats and trim, just like other animal skins, are loaded with toxic chemicals, including ammonia and formaldehyde, to keep them from decomposing. The negative environmental impact from producing a fur coat and trim can be three to 10 times greater than from making a faux-fur coat.

Take Action Against Fur Profiteers!

If you spot someone selling animals’ fur in California, we want to know about it. For the sake of all animals killed for their fur, reporting violations of the new law is crucial to its impact.

Now is also the perfect time to urge LVMH—the owner of Louis Vuitton, Fendi, Dior, and other fashion brands—to ban fur. Every day it delays going fur-free is another day it loses sales from conscientious customers.

A trophy hunter is facing the death penalty after a jury found him guilty of murdering his wife while the pair were on a 2016 hunting trip in Zambia. The man, a dentist from Pennsylvania, and his slain wife were reportedly in Africa hoping to kill a leopard when the murder occurred. Previously, the trophy hunter had shared a photo online in which he posed with the corpse of a ram he had shot and killed.

PA trophy hunter dentist killed this ram, then killed his wife: https://t.co/ejNCQjgYGQ

— Ingrid Newkirk (@IngridNewkirk) December 9, 2022

Those Who Harm Animals Often Go On to Harm Humans

The FBI has identified cruelty to animals as a warning sign of more violence to come. Psychology Today reported that 70% of criminals in a prison who had a history of being the most violent to humans also had a history of animal abuse, and other studies have found that 43% of school shooters have a history of abusing animals.

PETA also keeps an updated list of reported incidents in which young people have committed acts of cruelty to animals. It’s meant to illustrate how prevalent the problem is and provide educators with tools to teach students what it means to have compassion for all living, feeling beings, and it can be shared with your local school district and community members.

Please urge UPS to ban the shipping of hunting trophies.

By allowing hunters to ship decapitated heads and other body parts home as “trophies,” UPS is supporting the slaughter of magnificent animals. The company proved that it can do better when it banned the transport of not only shark fins and certain live animals but also ivory—and if it can ban shipments of an animal’s tusks, it can surely do the same for the head and other body parts.

Last weekend, U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin joined PETA in handing out 150 bags packed with the makings of a hearty “ThanksVegan” feast—including vegan roasts, fresh produce, and tofu—in Maryland. His wife, Sarah Bloom Raskin—former deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Treasury—also participated. The food bank that hosted the giveaway, originally known as the Takoma Park Food Bank, changed its name to Tommy’s Pantry in 2021 to honor the memory of the Raskins’ son, Tommy, who was vegan and grew up in Takoma Park.

“It brings our family a lot of joy to be part of this collaboration between Tommy’s Pantry and PETA to share a beautiful vegan Thanksgiving option with people in our community,” said Raskin. “More and more Americans are eating sustainably while caring for animals and the planet, thanks to initiatives like ThanksVegan from PETA and Tommy’s Pantry. It’s a great pleasure to start the holiday season this way.”

PETA and Raskin’s ThanksVegan food distribution followed news of record-breaking judicial progress for tormented turkeys. Twelve former workers of Plainville Farms, a self-described “humane” turkey supplier to major grocery stores, were recently charged with more than 140 counts of cruelty to animals following a PETA investigation—the most charges in any case of cruelty to factory-farmed animals in U.S. history.

Turkeys raised for food are normally slaughtered when they’re between 12 and 26 weeks old—and more than 45 million turkeys are killed each year for Thanksgiving alone.

“Rep. Jamie Raskin has always been a friend to those in need of a helping hand, and we are delighted to join with him in assisting local families by providing healthy, vegan Thanksgiving meals,” said PETA President Ingrid Newkirk. “PETA encourages everyone to leave gentle turkeys off their plates this holiday and every day.”

CELEBRATE THANKSVEGAN

We teamed up with @RepRaskin & @tommyspantry to pass out delicious #ThanksVegan roasts and more to folks in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Leave gentle turkeys off your plate this holiday season pic.twitter.com/iD7XWuYLE0

— PETA (@peta) November 12, 2022

Celebrating ThanksVegan at Home

Having a wonderful ThanksVegan at home is a compassionate and fulfilling way to embrace holiday tradition. Most supermarkets stock a variety of animal-free options at wallet-friendly prices—from dairy-free butter to vegan turkey roasts—so swapping ingredients is a snap.

PETA’s ThanksVegan guide will help you cook the meal of your life—whether you’re hosting, traveling, or hunkering down at home for a small-scale feast, we’ve got you covered.

On October 30, PETA Latino and Acho Sin Toros made their voices clear in Lima, Peru, to defend bulls at the Plaza de Toros de Acho, the city’s most famous bullfighting ring. Over 30 bull defenders gathered to put on a striking, peaceful protest—dressed in black, some wore bull masks and held signs and others lay “dead” in the silhouettes of bulls on the concrete beneath them, with prop evidence markers revealing what bulls endure so that humans can watch the twisted blood sport.

With live music, red smoke grenades, and lively speeches, the demonstration reached plenty of engaged members of the public, who observed, took pictures, and talked with the activists.

Bullfights aren’t actually “fights.” They’re archaic, ritualistic murder, in which several humans mutilate confused, maimed, psychologically tormented, and physically debilitated bulls over two hours. The events are always staged on unequal footing: The bulls are often disabled before the fight. They leave the ring paralyzed but not dead.

Lima: Play by the Rules and Ban Bullfighting

Carlo Angeles, a member of the Lima City Council, participated in the protest—as an outspoken anti-bullfighting activist, he has debated the practice on live television. PETA Latino and Acho Sin Toros are urging Lima’s new mayor, Rafael López Aliaga, to respect the city’s rules: City Council Agreement No. 288 (Acuerdo de Consejo No. 288) established that Lima won’t allow any property under its jurisdiction to be used for animal torture.

You can help bulls in Peru today by signing PETA Latino’s petition demanding that bullfighters and their cohorts not be enshrined as artists, under new Peruvian legislation, but be seen for the wicked murderers they really are.

Thanks to PETA Latino, condemnation of cruel and deadly bullfighting is only growing in the Latine community. The Mexican states of Coahuila, Guerrero, Sinaloa, and Sonora have imposed bans on the so-called “sport,” and—after PETA Latino, supporting Animal Heroes, and other local animal rights defenders spoke out—Quintana Roo banned bullfighting, too, as well as cockfighting and horse-drawn carriages. Now it’s time for Lima to step up.