We have to take the flower by the thorns and cut the animalism out of our everyday language.

That is the message this week from PETA, or the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Good on them. More ethical treatment of millions of humans in totalitarian countries would be a good thing, too.

So when you want to motivate your colleagues to real action, PETA does not want you to talk about taking the bull by the horns. It is advocating the not-so-stirring flower and thorn metaphor.

While this particular suggestion does not strike me as motivational, the anti-animalism concept has motivated much wise-cracking in the blogosphere.

PETA has long been a busy publicity-seeking bee. It doesn’t monkey around with half measures. It really pins the tail on the donkey.

A bull in a china shop doesn’t muck around, either.

When there is an elephant in the room, it calls a spade a spade.

It attacks carnivores with the courage of a lion. They are like snakes in the grass who want to bring home the bacon. Vegan is good.

Instead of pointing out the opportunity to kill two birds with one stone, we should be telling our colleagues they could be feeding two birds with one scone. (I kid you not, that one is true and it is not the only one that is.)

Don’t tell a Machiavellian politician he is like a wolf in sheep’s clothing; tell him he is like an elf wearing a flax mat.

Don’t tell him he has a face like a frog; tell him he has a face like a log.

And don’t tell anyone that curiosity killed the cat; the cat probably ran out of its nine lives.

PETA is clearly flogging a dead horse on this one – sorry, a dead lettuce leaf.