Do you plan to cook a cat this Fourth of July? How about grilling a canary? Maybe you’ll slather some barbecue sauce on a dog’s ribs and serve them with watermelon and corn on the cob? It sounds sick, I know, but it really isn’t much different from celebrating the holiday by eating cows, pigs, chickens and other animals, who can feel pain, love, joy and sadness, just as cats, birds and dogs can.

The euphemistic names given to many animal-derived foods—hamburgers and hot dogs, for example—belie what they really are: the flesh of sentient animals who were killed in violent, bloody ways. But why balk at the notion of a cat kebab or a barbecued dog if we don’t have a problem with throwing a chicken kebab or a hot dog on the grill?

After all, eating a “hot dog” is no less perverse than eating a dog. So why is it “acceptable” to eat some animals but not others?

Many Americans will be pondering this question over the holiday weekend because PETA members in cities across the Midwest will be barbecuing “dogs.” The “dogs” are just props, of course, but hopefully they will give meat-eaters some food for thought.

Animals who are commonly killed for food may not be as familiar to us as the dogs and cats we live with, but they’re sentient individuals with unique personalities. They form friendships and they love their families, just as our animal companions do.

When hens aren’t imprisoned in factory farms, they lovingly tend to their eggs and “talk” to the chicks who are still inside, waiting to hatch. Piglets run to their mothers’ voices, and mother pigs “sing” to their young while nursing. On dairy farms, grieving mother cows bellow and frantically search for their babies long after they’ve been sold for veal or beef.

It’s speciesism—a form of discrimination based on nothing more than species—to claim that certain animals deserve compassion and empathy, while others do not. Decent people realize that blacks shouldn’t be enslaved by whites, that women are just as capable as men, and that children shouldn’t be mistreated regardless of their citizenship status. So why is it so hard to acknowledge that cows, chickens and pigs don’t belong on a barbecue any more than dogs and cats do?

PETA wants everyone to give a thought to what (or rather, whom) they eat and the fact that eating one animal is no different from eating another. Seeing a fake Fido being cooked medium-rare might be just the thing to open people’s eyes to the cognitive dissonance of “loving” some animals while eating others. And it’s a message that has life-or-death consequences for billions of animals worldwide.

Right now, chickens are being shackled upside down, their throats are being slit, and many are being scalded and dismembered while they’re still conscious. Pregnant pigs are being confined to gestation crates so small that they can’t take a single step in any direction. Cows are being branded with hot irons, their horns are being cut or burned off, and the males are being castrated—all without any painkillers. These animals endure all this suffering just so people can eat a burger or a piece of cheese.

This July 4, please think of them, and declare your independence from meat and other animal-based foods. Today, there are endless tasty vegan options to enjoy instead, such as Atlas Monroe’s Vegan Apple Wood Fired Ribs, marinated vegetable kebabs, Beyond Burgers, and faux BBQ chicken. And if a grilled dog actually does make your mouth water, try a veggie dog.