BLOG: Ok, sure, obviously it’s that special day of the year when tongues are firmly in cheeks, but PETA’s latest joke press release does give us a great topic to write about this April Fools’ Day - the history of paint throwing in animal rights activism. Andrew Gough writes.

“The PETA and Crayola Little Animal Rights Activist’s First Paint-Throwing Kit is a fun way to help animals—just stand back and shoot! By creating large spatter marks with the paint sprayer, your child can advise anyone wearing animal skins, wool, or hair that cows, sheep, rabbits, alpacas, and other animals didn’t give it up voluntarily. In other words, it doesn’t belong to the wearer,” joked PETA in its April Fools’ Day press release.

Not everyone agrees with it, but the supposedly prolific tactic of throwing red paint on unsuspecting fur wearers - particularly during the 90s when PETA’s high-profile, supermodel-endorsed anti-fur fashion campaign was in full swing - did seem to be pretty effective in drawing attention to the horrors of fur production.

That’s not us encouraging anyone to run down to the hardware store for a tin of burgundy Dulux, by the way, but as a child of the 80s and 90s with little awareness of animal welfare let alone animal rights, the fact that I remember the abject fear that fur coat wearers had for red paint attacks is testimony to its notoriety.

The red paint of course was supposed to represent the blood of animals like foxes, rabbits, racoon dogs and coyotes, brutally trapped or farmed and killed in the most disgusting ways. Today, paint attacks on people may be rare, but the red paint symbolism endures in actions carried out by grassroots activism groups like DxE and Animal Rebellion.

That being said, there’s actually some doubt as to whether it was all that common, or if it even happened at all. In a 2016 blog article for the Truth About Fur website - called Will Red Paint Be Thrown on Me If I Wear Fur? - the author claimed the tactic was actually something of an urban myth with only two known examples:

So prevalent was this myth in the 1980s and ’90s that some North American furriers offered to clean their customers’ furs for free if they were attacked with paint. But they never had to follow through on their pledge because it never happened. In fact, some animal activists even complained that the myth of attacks with red paint was invented by the fur trade to discredit them!

Never miss an article

Stay up-to-date with the weekly Surge newsletter to never miss an article, media production or investigation. We respect your privacy.

Two examples of it happening include the late comedian Joan Rivers, who was attacked with red paint in 1997 when wearing her 18-year-old sable coat. Rivers accused Peta of orchestrating the attack, but with little evidence other than to question which other “whackos” would do such a thing. If indeed the red paint attacks were exaggerated, this probably helped associate the myth with PETA. The other example was Vogue editor Anna Wintour, who was attacked with fake blood and “at least one dead racoon” according to the Daily Mail.

However, the Truth About Fur writer couldn’t have looked very hard. In Febuary 2000, the New York Post reported on three red paint attacks at that year’s New York Fashion Week. Runways at the Randolph Duke, Oscar de la Renta and Michael Kors all saw the spilling of red paint, with responsibility for each attributed to PETA.

“As long as people are continuing to show fur on the runway, designers might as well be wearing a target,” said PETA spokeswoman Rae Leann Smith at the time.

Myth or not, the tactic has entered popular culture and our collective consciousness, forever associating fur with barbarism and bloodshed. In 2011, comedian Tina Fey sought to evoke the spirit of the 90s for her show 30 Rock, in a scene where her character is covered in red paint by extras posing as PETA activists. And then in 2014, Khloé Kardashian went out for lunch in New York City wearing a floor-length, faux fur coat with the words "F--k Yo Fur" scrawled on the back in bright red spray paint.

And regardless of whether it ever happened on the scale many assume, today’s animal rights activists owe much to the symbolism made famous not only during the fur campaigns, but also the actions of clandestine animal liberation groups. In 2014, for example, so-called “extremists” daubed red paint across the front door and walls of the offices of Carter2 Systems Inc, a manufacturer of lab animal cages. The website of magazine Bite Back has no fewer than 66 hit reports involving paint going back to 2018.

No doubt the history of red paint as symbolic of blood in protest actions goes back further and touches on many other justice issues, but recent animal actions spring to mind, including Animal Rebellion dying the fountains outside Buckingham Palace red last year.

Andrew Gough is Media and Investigations Manager for Surge.

Your support makes a huge difference to us. Supporting Surge with a monthly or one-off donation enables us to continue our work to end all animal oppression.

LATEST ARTICLES