PETA Is At It Again

As reported on Itchmo.com and elsewhere, PETA has begun one of their publicity stunt campaigns, this one directed against "breeders" — presumably breeders of purebred dogs and cats. They currently have up a billboard in NYC which reads, "Breeders Kill Shelter Dogs' Chances," with a picture of a sad dog in a cage.

Please note that the sign makes no attempt to draw a distinction between someone who breeds 100 litters a year and someone who breeds one litter. It makes no distinction between someone who tries to improve a breed and someone who indiscriminately throws dogs together to mate randomly. It makes no distinction between people who take the best possible care of their dogs and people who don't. PETA doesn't care about those things and they don't expect or want anyone else to care. The only word that matters to them is "breeder," which they want to become a dirty word.

Well, "breeder" is not a bad word. The fact of the matter is that breeders and purebred dogs do not take homes away from dogs in shelters. In the first place, we all have the right to choose whatever kind of pet we want, whether that's a dog, cat, hamster, fish, or whatever. And, if we want a purebred whatever, it's really not anyone else's business. I don't think it's right for anyone or any organization to try to coerce people into getting a pet from a shelter out of guilt. Guilt is a terrible reason to get a pet. Honestly, if you are so weak-willed that you will allow yourself to be directed to get a shelter dog merely because PETA decrees it, you may not be ready to own a pet.

In the second place, somewhere between 58-71 million Americans now have dogs as pets. That's more than ever before. In 1994, according to Time magazine, "only" 36 million Americans had dogs as pets. The increase in dog ownership in this country in the last 13 years is phenomenal, and there is no sign that it is likely to diminish any time soon. With so many people wanting dogs as pets, why should we believe that one dog is stopping another dog from having a home?

Is this simply a competition? Well, then, say so! If PETA wants to compete on behalf of shelter dogs for homes, come out and be honest about it, but stop lying about breeders and stop claiming that dogs from breeders are taking homes and causing shelter dogs to be killed, because those statements are false. Instead, why doesn't PETA simply advertise the benefits of owning dogs from shelters? That would be a lot more honest than attacking breeders and purebred dogs with lies.

Now, I'm going to be very politically incorrect. Give me one reason why an accidentally bred puppy in a shelter deserves a home more than a puppy that I have planned for? If I have gone to the trouble and expense of raising dogs, testing them for every possible health problem, and spent weeks, months and perhaps years planning a litter; when I know the parents and the grandparents of the dogs involved and have put in a lot of work to carefully prepare to breed a litter, tell me why I should get a puppy in a shelter instead of a puppy I have worked so hard for? Why should other people prefer a shelter puppy to the carefully bred puppy — a puppy that has been raised in my home and treated as lovingly as a child? Because right now it looks like PETA is desperate and the only thing they can come up with to say is that if you don't adopt a dog from a shelter, it will die. It has nothing to do with snobbery. I don't care if you have a shelter dog or a purebred dog. They're all dogs. But it does have a lot to do with good health and knowing what you're getting. A lot of problems can be avoided if people don't get pets on impulse or because they feel sorry for a poor little guy in a cage. Any dog person will tell you not to get a sickly puppy, but your odds of finding sickly puppies are much greater at shelters than they are from good breeders. Don't get puppies and dogs because you feel sorry for them. It's a recipe for disaster, no matter how much it makes you feel good about yourself at the moment.

I didn't put that puppy or dog in the shelter. My dogs are sold with contracts which state that they can come back to me at any time in their lives if their owners are unable to keep them for any reason. I have also done breed rescue. I have rescued and fostered dogs that people said were English Setters and which turned out to have nothing more in common with my breed than four legs and a tail. Nearly every breeder I know sells their puppies with the same stipulations and they also help with rescue. We take care of our own. We even take care of field English Setters, bred and dumped by non-show breeders, just because they are, way back, the same breed. So, yes, I do get tired of hearing the same tired rhetoric from PETA about "greedy breeders" who are "cruel" to their dogs and only breed for money. It would be laughable if it weren't so out of touch with reality. You'll have to forgive me for getting heated about this subject.

We've already seen that PETA makes no distinction between a "hobby" breeder, such as myself, and a backyard breeder and a commercial breeder. It doesn't matter to them if someone produces one litter or 50. They are condemning all of us and attribute the same motives to all of us. Of course, nothing could be farther from the truth. For me, my dogs are an endless money pit. I work to support them. Backyard breeders, or "kitchen" breeders may produce a litter once. It may be an accident. Or they may want to dabble in breeding or have some puppies for their kids. Do they deserve to be condemned by PETA? Even commercial breeders play a role, supplying many puppies that people want as pets. Do you think they would produce these puppies if people did not want to buy them? Believe it or not, not all commercial breeders are puppymillers. USDA regulations have tightened considerably and the AKC, in particular, has insisted on having their own inspectors visit these breeders if they want their puppies to be AKC registered. I'm not defending them, but I am saying that conditions are improving. People are aware of the problems and trying to do something about them for the sake of the dogs.

With such an obvious demand for purebred dogs — approximately one million dogs registered annually — I guess it's obvious why PETA feels the need to attack breeders. They would be better off working on ways to find homes for shelter dogs via No Kill shelters.

Yes, I fight mandatory spay/neuter legislation, on principle. I oppose breeder licensing. I oppose licensing differentials and limit laws. Not one of these programs will do anything to reduce shelter populations. Quite the reverse. Mandatory spay/neutering results in lower income people abandoning pets and turning more cats and dogs in to shelters, which results in higher euthanasia rates. Besides being ineffective, each of these initiatives is an effort to elminate breeders, which I absolutely oppose.

PETA needs to stop trying to force its beliefs on everyone else. We're all individuals. We have different beliefs. We don't all want the same kind of dog, whether that's a hunting dog, a shelter dog, or a toy dog. Dogs are not interchangeable! You can't tell somebody to just go down to the shelter and get a dog when what they want is a particular kind of dog. Many breeders in this country devote their lives to improving the health of their breeds and providing new owners with loving, happy pets. PETA's own record of lying to owners and shelter workers, taking dogs and cats from shelters and euthanizing them in their van before they leave the parking lot — after promising to find homes for them — hardly encourages anyone to believe what they say.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 13th, 2007 at 3:00 pm and is filed under General Dogs' Topics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.