Pink’s ‘Raise Your Glass’ Video Showcases Anti-Bullfighting Message

23
by Michael Parrish DuDell November 4, 2010
Categories: Animals, Music
Tags: .
Photo: prphotos.com

Pop singer Pink is once again using her musical abilities to speak up for important social issues.

In her latest music video for the song “Raise Your Glass,” the rocker touches on hot topics like same-sex marriage and animal abuse, specifically bullfighting.

In one segment, Pink steps out in front of a bull during a rodeo and raises a sword to the matador execution style. Yikes!

Although Pink hasn’t participated in any anti-bullfighting campaigns that we know of, the singer is a passionate animal advocate and has worked with PETA on numerous occasions.

“It’s little wonder that Pink’s video is so cutting-edge and thought-provoking,” says PETA. “After all, it was directed by another PETA friend—the fabulous (and vegan!) Dave Meyers, who directed our sizzling Alicia Silverstone public service announcement.”

Check out the video on MTV.com and tell us what you think? Is Pink’s political message up your alley? Chime in and share your thoughts!

  • Sonia

    Kinda confused about the dairy reference seeing as that she’s only vegetarian. Other than that I liked it. I like her too, even though she still wears leather:(

  • julie

    I think it’s obvious at this point she’s a vegan. You don’t put a reference to the absurdity of the dairy industry in your video while still consuming its products. We just need to use our common sense on this. Also, perhaps she’s not down with leather anymore either. And is it any coincidence that a vegan directed the video?

  • kerri

    I heard Pink is doing her own non-leather but leather look line
    “hope thats true xx’
    vegan diet/lifestyle is the greatest lifestyle’

  • Rach

    Ermm, pink doesn’t wear leather – she’s explicitly spoken out against fur, leather and the wool industry. She wears fake or ‘faux’ leather – maybe it looks so real that you can’t tell the diff ;)

  • Sarah

    I’m all for turning the tables on oppressive institutions, but I found that Pink’s new video sacrificed the political interests of females for the sake of animal and gay rights. Not that there is a hierarchy of civil rights groups and causes, but women’s rights are being trampled on in this video for the sake of animals and male homosexuals. At no point does Pink show a pair of women kissing in any other context than a sexual one. The gay couple she shows at the beginning are presumably at their own wedding; Pink’s hook-up in the middle of the video is blasphemous (she’s just coited a nun), and it’s purely for shock effect. The milking scene is another point of contention. Yes, it is fascinating that she turns the dairy industry around, but to do it under such violent, brutal circumstances, treating women like cattle, Pink participates in a long tradition of brutality against women in the media. The fact that the scene has no place in the song only affirms that it was added purely for shock value, to make a political point. But the political point is that women are somehow less than animals, yet another narrative society has perpetuated since time immemorial. I can appreciate what the director is trying to do, but I don’t appreciate the way he tried to do it, nor do I appreciate Pink’s willful participation in it. Her agend(er)a has never been unproblematic, but that scene is really offensive.

    • georgina

      Hmmm, the video is supposed to shock people and make them think. Pink killing the matador when matadors kill bulls, Pink sleeping with representatives of different religions, Pink fighting against a really fat Uncle Sam, Pink as a member of ALF feeding the baby cow with women’s breast milk…it goes against everything people are used to see.
      What is the big deal? Women are not being sexualized, but that scene should make us think what if? What if women’s breast milk was used to feed other species just like cow’s milk is stolen from them to make cheese and butter for humans?

      That was an awesome video. Going against the current; nothing wrong with that.

    • veganme

      YOU totally missed her point. It was suppose dto make you realise that if it’s disgusting to explot women like that; then it is disgusting to explot cows like that. This is why the world will struggle to all go vegan; some people are too thick to see sense.

  • http://feelgoodagain.co.uk feelgoodagain

    A cow drinking the breast milk of human women…strange, alien, incorrect [Flip Side] A human drinking udder milk from a cow….strange alien, incorrect. Go Figure….

    As a vegan (and athlete) convert of 6 years, I spent my life consuming a lot of milk, eggs and various other dairy products including stacks of meat (until I almost became diabetes type 2), I then watched the Michael Klaper video and converted….even Oxford University in a recently commissioned study [2010] bought to the forefront, just how much of a lie we have all been fed….protein requirement = 35/40g per day max, which can be sourced from plant based foods….including all known vitamins and minerals…we are just pawns of the money making establishment [farming subsidies] known as government, who pedal this tripe of “you need protein, meat and dairy”…

    Pink will really touch a nerve of the giant dairy industry with this video and hope it really really hurts this industry that causes the suffering of millions of animals every year!!!

    • http://www.facebook.com/people/Anna-Wagner/510937337 Anna Wagner

      Suffering? Really? As if dairy cows wouldn’t all be much worse off (and really suffering) if farmers didn’t care for them and provide them with proper shelter and feed? Right. I really wish those against any industry would take the time to truly research them. There are reasons farmers do things that people perceive to cause suffering and it is always to cause less suffering. For instance, separating a calf from its mother as soon as possible causes much less suffering than allowing the calf to stay with the mother because there is less separation anxiety

      • michael

        the problem with dairy is why do we have to cause any suffering at all?

  • Alt

    That is totally awesome that she does such a video! I have personally never seen a mv for animal rights. And, yeah, quite surprised that she denounces the dairy industry as well! <3

  • Morello

    Sarah, I see and understand your point but I think that you are taking the video a bit literally. Yes, these ‘milked’ women are depicted being aggressively exploited but that is the crux of the vegan message: why should we cruelly use one species to benefit another? The reason the scene is so hard-hitting is that we would never wish to see women being put through such a barbaric process so why do it to animals when it has been proven (by Oxford University no less) that it is unnecessary? The women are not sexualised beyond their breasts being prominent. This is a statement about the dairy industry and is miles away from the misogynistic, scantily clad girls that adorn every Akon video ever made. I know Pink is not the ultimate poster girl for female emancipation but she does a great deal more for ‘us’ than Lady Gaga and to even have touched on such unusual and important issues, despite them not having been voiced lyrically within the track is fantastic. I am impressed and so happy to see that things may be beginning to change.

  • Amy

    No other species drinks milk passed infancy, except humans, especially not another species milk. Honestly, it’s gross and it’s not like she had a choice in choosing between me and women in that scene… it’s not like men produce milk. I agree completely with Georgina on this one.

    Pink is such a beautiful woman and so talented <3

    • Dino Farerra

      No other species can create music videos, or use the internet. Just because other species don’t do something, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t. Also, other species (e.g. cats, dogs) will drink cow’s milk when given the opportunity.

      • veganme

        Not in nature! Only because dumb humans give it to them!

  • SCTW19

    I think the segments in Pink’s new video are not appropriate by any means and it should not be aired.

    • veganme

      What because it upsets you to be shown the truth?
      There is nothing inappropriate about the video; there is everything inappropriate about animal abuse.

  • Tizzy

    bieng an omnivore i dont see why vegetarian or vegans don’t drink milk. It’s not like the farmers kill the cows for it. And its not like the cows are harmed in anyway. Killing the matador was ok. For the religous leaders i thought it was pretty funny because there have been prominent religous leaders that have blasphemized and it was covered up. Really i just dont like the women in the “dairy farm” because they were shown like their were kidnapped. Also women have to be pregnant to produce milk and none of them had a bun in the oven.

    • veganme

      Oh tizzy your poor uninformed person, let’s educate you!
      No you don’t need to BE pregnant to produce milk; you need to have BEEN pregnant to produce milk! My milk came in when my baby was born.
      The farmers don’t kill the dairy cow for milk (until her milk production slows; then they slaughter her becuase she’s no use any more..) but they DO torture her – by taking her babies away at hours, minutes or days old!! The dairy cows physically and vocally show their distress at having their new borns ripped away from them like any human mother would! The baby cows also pine for their mother… that is, until they are murdered for veal! So with every glass of milk there is a pound of veal; the cruelest meat in the trade, kept in disgustingly small ‘veal crates’ to create a texture humans want, while hurting and depriving the animal.
      Oh yes, see no harm in dairy now?!
      We are the ONLYanimal to carry on consuming milk in to adulthood; it’s not natural or needed! We are also the only animals to consume another animals milk; also far FAR from natural!!

  • Robert

    OK, I get that lots of people think they are somehow “outside” of their environments, but what do you think opportunist omnivores (like bears and pigs), eat when their favored berries and/or roots aren’t nearby? Mostly, other animals and frequently tourists because they’re easy to catch. Humans are opportunist omnivores, just like those bears and pigs. The fact that we as a species are able to change our environment to suit our needs rather than changing our needs to suit the environment is not a human-specific monopoly either. Look at army ants, grasshoppers and elephants. These creatures (all natural!), devastate their environments. Have you ever seen how fast any of these creatures can destroy a stretch of woods or strip an area of any but the most hardy plants and most of it’s megafauna life? Well, humans follow much the same pattern: we eat everything in sight then move on to greener pastures and repeat. Fact of the matter is that we as humans are top predators who happen to be opportunist omnivores. Populations in those types of creatures boom and bust regularly, usually controlled by pandemic plagues caused by population pressures.

    I can see how short term (say a century) thinking may see humans as not just another creature with its own boom-bust population cycles, but looked at in the long term, we really are nothing more than another form of creature, just like all the others. We’re not removed from our environments just because we can think that we are, we just have a more variable termite mound that happens to include wi-fi. (Which is also nothing new, what do you suppose pheromones have been used for?)

  • James

    What of Bullfighting? last time I checked that was a Spanish tradition not an American one. Oh right I forgot Americans just can’t seem to keep their nose out of how other people lives and need to constantly play the role of World Police.

    • gayle

      James, Pink has every right to be against bullfighting!! its barbaric, cruel and outdated! Bravo to her for making a stand! We should all be speaking up for bulls!
      R.i.P bullfighting

    • Veganme

      So James, if the Spannish were abusing children instead of Bulls, woudl you suggest Pink just shut up and let them get on with that too?! Animals, where EVER they are in the world, deserve our protection.

« PREVIOUS POST
NEXT POST »