THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, June 19, 1996 TAG: 9606190028
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DIANE TENNANT, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: 148 lines
NORMA REYES of the Texas border country was thrilled to find her new East Coast home so close to the national monuments of Washington, D.C.
The White House. The Smithsonian. The headquarters of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.
``I didn't care about the White House,'' Norma recalled. ``I was so anxious to see the headquarters of PETA. After we finished visiting there, we went to the White House.''
Priorities, you know.
Animal rights. Children's rights. Hispanic heritage. Norma has always had her priorities.
Lately, Norma can't believe her good fortune. PETA is moving its headquarters to Front Street in Norfolk, and Norma will be able to volunteer her activism every day, if she wishes. And she is no stranger to activism.
She has made telephone calls against bullfighting, used pen and paper to protest the circus, faced down a dinner speaker in front of her husband's military superiors when she objected to the speaker's mocking of homosexuals.
``That's just the way my wife is,'' Francisco Reyes said. ``She's just a person who goes straight ahead.''
There are those who don't like straight-ahead people, especially those employing PETA's tactics. PETA protesters shout into car windows on public streets, pitch their animal-rights agenda to children getting off school buses, caper about in animal suits hoping to get on the evening news.
Free speech gets lots of lip service in America, but when it clashes head on with personal choice, things can get rude.
``The first time I took up a sign, I was kind of scared,'' Francisco said. ``Some shout, `Get a life.' I wonder if people stop and think. Get a life. Like we don't have children, we don't work? They don't realize we are just like them.''
Maybe they're not. Few of us really fire off that angry letter, and even fewer of us stand on street corners with banners, chanting, ``Hey, NASA, lay off the monkeys, not the workers.''
The Reyes are, in many ways, average Americans. Middle-class house. Two kids and a dog. Just like your neighbors. And they're PETA people. How can they be so annoying, and how can they stand the abuse that is hurled their way?
``I think I always have compassion to animals since I was a little girl,'' said 38-year-old Norma, her words flavored with an exotic Mexican accent, her eyes glancing occasionally at Francisco to ensure she has chosen the right Anglo word.
``If I see something wrong, I speak out. I notice that children and animals are the ones that need our help. They are. . . not voiceless,'' she glanced at her husband.
``They're the most dependent on others for survival,'' he supplied.
Norma continued: ``If you really believe in something, you don't think about it. I think the worst thing for animals is to do nothing at all. It's going to be a very slow process until humans understand the suffering of animals.''
Norma's dog, Susy, is suffering - but not silently - behind a closed door in the back of the house. Susy believes she has a right to address a visitor's ankle with her teeth, and she loudly demands permission to exercise that right.
The Reyes aren't biting. Susy has a right to free speech, but not to violence. She fits right in.
``People do say nasty things,'' Francisco said. ``The best thing is to just ignore them. They feel strongly about their beliefs. The important thing is to let them know how you feel without being nasty.''
And what the Reyes family feels is that both humans and animals deserve respect, on fairly equal levels.
``What gets me is,'' Francisco said, ``is that people would think `It's just an animal.' I feel strongly. I think mammals are in the same hierarchy as humans, because we're all mammals.''
Norma was the first to believe that. In 1992, when the Reyes family lived in El Paso, Texas, they were offended by advertisements for bullfighting. The sport - which often results in injury or death to the bull - is illegal in the United States, but advertisements appeared in stateside media, luring people across the Mexican border.
``I think humans should avoid animals in entertainment,'' Norma said. ``They can argue for eating the animals, but I don't think animals are necessary for entertainment.''
Norma began writing complaint letters to local TV stations, newspapers, government officials.
It was just a short step further to the picket line and other animal rights issues. A laminated article from the El Paso Times shows the Reyes' daughter, then 7, holding a sign in protest of fur.
Francisco found himself involved, too. ``I'd never done anything like it,'' he said. ``We just had the compassion for animals in our own personal lives and wanted to get the word out to the rest of the world that there is inhumane treatment.''
Norma decorates her dining room with whimsical Holstein cows and her walls with glamour shots of herself.
On the picket line at NASA Langley one morning this May, she didn't wear the wrinkled monkey-in-spacesuits costumes her fellow protesters wore. Norma selected a jacket and high heels. It was, of course, a synthetic fabric.
``One of my goals is to ban circuses with animals right now. Not circuses. Circuses with animals,'' Norma said. ``Why? The elephants. I see the eyes of the elephants.''
Elephants in the wild have close-knit families, Francisco elaborated. They have compassion for herd members and babies, and don't deserve a life in captivity, standing on their heads in the circus.
The Reyes didn't stop Virginia Beach public schools from taking students to the circus in February, although 6-year-old son Dorian wrote a letter to the editor and his parents spoke to school administrators. A PETA protest on school grounds also didn't halt the trip.
``We went to - what do you call those meetings? - the School Board and I had my three minutes of fame,'' Francisco said.
Afterward, a school board candidate handed Francisco a card and promised that, if elected, he would stop circus trips during school hours. The existing board did not.
``The biggest thing is we at least put that seed in people's minds - maybe there is no need to take children to the circus,'' Francisco said.
Norma had more success with the School Board when she lobbied for Hispanic recognition. The board passed a resolution in 1995 to recognize National Hispanic Heritage Month. The lobbying was necessary, Norma said, because she and her family felt they met with racism when they moved from heavily Hispanic west Texas to Hampton Roads in 1994.
Norma wasted no time that year. In her house, she displays photos of the family protesting on Waterside Drive in support of beavers in Lake Whitehurst that the city wanted to kill. ``Norfolk: the Up and Coming City of Cruelty,'' the sign reads. She lost the fight.
She also lost fights over ``sick'' school buildings that she feared were harming children.
She is not discouraged. Change comes slowly.
Even the family's transition to vegetarianism is still just that - a transition. The treatment of animals raised for meat prompted the Reyes' decision. And people who mistreat animals are more likely to mistreat humans down the road, Norma said.
``We must not forget humans,'' she said.
Francisco nodded. ``That's a misconception among people, they think animal activists don't care about people.''
Francisco doesn't consider himself a bona fide PETA member, but he says its literature is educational. Norma plans to volunteer at PETA headquarters, once it moves to downtown Norfolk.
To Front Street, near the site of the Reyes' first Hampton Roads protest. Norma has no regrets about that losing battle over beavers.
``I never feel like I didn't win,'' Norma said. ``I never feel like I lose. I feel I gain at least attention or thinking. How you say?''
Said Francisco: ``You never lose.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
CHRISTOPHER REDDICK/The Virginian-Pilot
Photo
CHARLIE MEADS/The Virginian-Pilot
The Reyes family, which supports animal rights, includes, from left,
Francisco; Dorian, 6; Norma; and Lorena, 11.
KEYWORDS: ANIMAL RIGHTS ORGANIZATIONS PETA by CNB