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"In the
end, animals in shelters are not being killed because there are too many
of them, because there are
too few homes, or because the public
is irresponsible. Animals in shelters are dying for one reason—
because people in shelters are killing them."--Nathan
Winograd
Most people, when they learn of the killing that goes on
in the pounds, euphemistically referred to as
“shelters”, are
saddened, but are resigned to believing that it is “necessary” and
“humane”, and that the
institutions we have all grown up with are
doing the right thing by killing animals. We as a society are
programmed to believe that the problem is “overpopulation”, and that
the solution is spay/neuter, and that
somehow spay/neuter is
going to lead to an end to the killing in the pounds. This is a scenario
that is
universally believed without question.
The
problem
The standard reason as to why the pounds kill all the
animals is universally believed to be that all those
horrible,
irresponsible individuals out there are abusing their animals, and dumping
them, and reproducing
them, and all blame and accountability is
laid at the feet of this amorphous mass of unidentified, uncaring
individuals. We can say that society is the problem, and blame it on
the "irresponsible owners" out there, or
vent our fury on
specific owners, but it gets us nowhere. It is fashionable to blame the
owners who discard
their animals for the deaths of the animals,
never the pounds. Yet it is not the owners who are killing the
animals. And there is often not enough that owners can do to keep
their animals from ending up in the
slaughterhouse, or getting
them out if they wind up there.
The pounds provide places that
society can simply dump their animals and then wipe their hands of them,
the pounds giving them ambiguous promises of "adoption", when of
course there is pretty much zero
chance of the animal getting out
alive, unless the animal happens to be a tiny puppy or little fluffy or
rare
purebred. And the vast majority of animals in the pounds
have been dumped as strays by owners who did
not want them to go
to the pounds, yet the pounds eagerly seek out and pick up all animals
they can find.
The animals are then simply imprisoned in dungeons
where few people go, and the kill rooms and freezers
are hidden
away thoroughly.
Society does not hold these killing organizations
accountable for their actions. And now that most pounds
in
California (and elsewhere) have incorporated "temperament testing" in
their protocol, to try to
circumvent compliance with the Hayden
law, it is an even more effective way of hiding away virtually all of
the impounded animals, not even permitting them to be seen, let alone
adopted, so the pounds are even
more powerful and autonomous, and
their PR machines portray them as the good guys; and all other
government agencies, as well as the press, paint them in glowing
terms, and label reformists who try to
hold the pounds
accountable as “terrorists”.
The source of the immediate problem IS
the killing in the pounds. Humans may discard their animals, but it
is the pound that kills them. The idea of mass murder as a solution
to living beings who are deemed
undesirable in a particular
society was tried in Germany in the 20th century, as well as in Russia.
Just
because our society is mass murdering a different species
does not make it any less insane or morally
unconscionable.
Those evil, horrible people out there who
don't take proper care of their dogs, dump their dogs on the
streets, precisely because there is NOT a safe place for them to take
an animal--most people who for any
reason can't keep their
animals, do NOT want them killed. And those who dump their animals into
the pound
directly, often do not know that the animals will be
killed in the pounds. The problem is the killing itself. That
is
the real problem, and it is approved of and excused by society and the
“humane community” as being
necessary and right, because of
everyone’s unflagging belief in “overpopulation”.
"We cannot expect
traditional shelters, try as they might, to get the message across that
animals have
value, that they are a lifetime commitment. Why?
Because their message is contradictory: ‘animals are not
disposable and we will dispose of your animals’! By rescuing people
from the consequences of their
irresponsible behavior,
institutional killing enables that behavior. ‘Shelters’ have become
dumping
grounds, and their unintended message is loud and clear:
‘animals are disposable’.”
-- http://www.animalsave.org/nokill2.htm
The myth of
“overpopulation”
Ask virtually anyone why the pounds kill, and you
will immediately get back a one word answer:
“overpopulation”. We
all have this idea emblazoned in our psyches so thoroughly, that no one
even thinks
to question it. But what the heck is this idea of
“overpopulation” that everyone keeps talking about, and so
firmly
believes in? Is it trying to say there are too many animals to be absorbed
into the number of available
homes? Is it saying that it is
impossible to get the animals in the pounds adopted? Is it implying that
no one
wants the animals who are in the pounds? How many animals
is “too many”? How many animals constitute
“overpopulation”? What
magical number of animals can be permitted to exist before people will
stop
believing that they constitute “overpopulation”? Just how
few animals are to be allowed to exist before
people will be
willing to demand an end to the killing in the pounds? How many deaths of
animals will it take
before people finally decide that enough
animals have been sacrificed to the idea of “overpopulation”, and
it’s time to force the slaughterhouse pounds to stop the
killing?
A faulty syllogism is the basis of the beliefs of the
entire “humane community”, including animal rights
activists and
organizations, in “overpopulation”. What the heck is a syllogism? It is a
term used in logic, it is
a form of deductive reasoning and it
goes like this: If premise (a) is true, and if premise (b) is true, then
conclusion (c) must be true. The syllogism with regard to the
killing done by the pounds is the following.
Premise (a): The
pounds kill because of “overpopulation”, i.e., too many animals, not
enough homes.
Premise (b): Spay/neuter is the way to reduce the
number of animals. Conclusion (c) The pounds will stop
killing if
we spay/neuter enough animals. This is the syllogism that EVERYONE, with
almost no exceptions,
believes in, with the fervor of an
evangelical religion.
What is wrong with this syllogism? What is
wrong is that premise (a) is FALSE. It is false on not just one, but
TWO points: (1) there are not “too many animals”; and (2) there are
plenty of homes. In short, there is no
such thing as
“overpopulation”. So it should be no surprise that conclusion (c) is
incorrect: Since the
pounds do not kill because there are “too
many” animals, obviously no matter how many or how few animals
are spayed/neutered, it will not affect the killing in the
pounds.
In truth, “overpopulation” is an idea everyone firmly
believes in, but no one looks at. No one examines this
belief in
there being “too many” animals, and no one looks at the statistics, the
actual numbers of animals in
relation to the space in the pounds
or the number of homes available. Though of course we can stand to
decrease the animal population further via spay/neuter,
“overpopulation” is simply an idea, a belief used to
get the
public to excuse and to approve of the killing of all the animals by the
pounds. “Overpopulation” is
simply a myth, indoctrination,
propaganda, a concept without any meaning that we have all grown up with.
While everyone is busy frantically pushing spay/neuter, no one is
stopping to look at the real situation, the
real problem, which
guarantees that the killing will continue unabated forever.
Just
the facts, ma’am
Let’s talk numbers, plain and simple. That’s one
thing that the hysteria about “overpopulation” NEVER
addresses.
According to PETA, “Approximately 2,500 kittens and
puppies are born each hour in the U.S.--70,000 each
day. One
unspayed dog can lead to 28,244 puppies in nine years. One unspayed cat
can lead to 14 million
kittens in nine years!” Now that’s a
pretty scary statement. And other large institutions, both public and
private, into which people put their credibility, such as the HSUS,
issue similarly alarming purported
statistics. But let’s take a
look at these figures. In the first place, NO ONE KNOWS how many animals
are
born in the US! It’s simply impossible to give accurate
figures, or even ball park figures, because there is
no census,
there is no way to count or to know how many animals exist, or how many
are born. These
figures given by the organizations to the public
are simply extrapolations, they are nothing but abstract
calculations and guesswork. It’s impossible to estimate in reality
how many kittens and puppies are born
each hour or each day or
each year. And the exponential extrapolations regarding how many puppies
or
kittens can result from one animal in nine years, that’s in a
theoretical never-never land. Theoretically,
every female animal
out there can give birth twice a year to litters of 15 babies each. But
the fact is that they
don’t. Many animals have false pregnancies,
or are infertile, or have very small litters. And in fact, the infant
mortality rate among dogs and cats is very high—seldom do more than a
few survive out of litters by the
time they reach adulthood,
given birth defects, disease, weak immune systems. That is the sad
reality, most
infants die before adulthood even despite the most
optimal care and under ideal conditions. Perhaps that is
precisely why animals have large litters, they are Nature’s way of
ensuring that at least a few survive to
carry on the species. And
in fact, so many of the animals now “out there” are already spayed or
neutered.
But the wildly inflated sensationalistic theoretical
speculations about the number of animals that maximally
could be
born and survive in a fictional scenario sure can scare people, and the
tragedy is that, without
presenting ANY facts to back up the
speculation, it gets people to accept the myth that there are “too many
animals”, and thereby give their approval to the mass killing of
animals by the pounds.
PETA also makes the following statement:
“More than 70 percent of people who acquire animals end up
giving
them away, abandoning them, or taking them to shelters, which receive
about 27 million animals
annually. More than half-- about 17
million--must be destroyed for lack of homes. Most are under 18 months
of age, and 90 percent are healthy and adoptable.” While it is likely
true that 70 percent of people get rid of
their animals—a result
of the pounds supplying them with the infant animals they demand, which
they want
as nothing but toys to be discarded as they begin to
grow up--and while it’s true that many to most of the
animals
discarded--between 39 percent and 78 percent—are under one year of age,
the rest of the statistics
presented by PETA are outdated. These
statistics, that 17 million animals are killed in the pounds, were true
10 years ago—at that time the statistic for the number of animals
killed in pounds in the US was between 16
million and 20 million.
All credible sources, and there are many, estimate the number of animals
killed in
pounds today in the US to be between 2 million and 4
million. This is a huge drop in numbers of animals
killed. But
still NEARLY EVERY animal the pounds can get their hands on continues to
be killed! The
NUMBER of animals killed is only ONE-FIFTH of what
it was 10 years ago, but the RATE of killing has not
changed,
because the policy of the pounds has not changed—they still kill nearly
all the animals, and will
continue to do so as long as no one
makes them stop. The only reason that there are 80% fewer animals
being killed in the pounds is because there are so drastically fewer
animals being impounded. And that’s
because there are drastically
fewer animals in the world, because people ARE spaying and neutering their
animals. Yet the spaying/neutering has not affected the RATE OF
KILLING IN THE POUNDS at all, because no
one has addressed the
killing itself, which is precisely what must be addressed directly; no one
has held
the pounds responsible, no one has forced them to stop
killing.
The eminent authority on no-kill, Nathan Winograd,
says:
“This year [at the time], four and one half million dogs and
cats will be put to death. For far too long, we
have accepted it
as a ‘necessary evil.’ In reality, for the 3,000,000 or more who are
hardly suffering, it is just
evil.
“First of all, stop
lamenting the ‘bad public’ and start taking responsibility for the
animals. They are
depending on you. To do that, ignore the myths
and lies that we have accepted as gospel for too long. The
first
is that there are ‘too many animals and not enough homes.’ My favorite is
the answer most often given
to every reporter's question: ‘Why do
you kill animals in your shelter?’ The answer often heard is that ‘for
every three animals we get in, we adopt one, you do the math’. Type
in ‘you do the math’ at www.google.com
and you'll get 48 hits
from shelter directors across the country trying to deflect blame for
their failure to
achieve lifesaving results. There are others:
‘If you increase the quantity of homes, we have to reduce the
quality;’ ‘You can't find homes for older animals, sick animals and
those with special needs;’ ‘We must kill
because the public is
bad.’ Take responsibility!
“In just one American city, Los Angeles,
of 25,000 cats who come in through the doors every year, 21,000 will
be put to death. Over 80% will die, most never even offered for
adoption. Multiply that by every city, every
county in the United
States and the picture is bleak. But the irony is that much of this
suffering is conducted
under the watchful eye of self-described
‘animal lovers’ who feel they are doing the right thing. In fact, it is
often these ‘animal lovers’ who administer the ‘cocktail’ to
disorient the animal, who bring the dog or cat
into the
‘euthanasia’ room, hold him down while he struggles to make sense of what
is happening, and then
administer the fatal dose -- day in and
day out, until the numbers simply become staggering.
”While most
shelter workers simply believed there was no other way, for the
bureaucrats who had spent
the prior two decades overseeing a
national infrastructure that killed 5 million dogs and cats per year, No
Kill hits a darker, more raw nerve. If it succeeds, the changes
would mean a fundamental alteration in their
public standing.
Never before had the killing in animal shelters really been questioned,
most accepting the
killing as a necessary evil. In fact, shelters
could kill most of the animals in their care, and their directors
and presidents were still being paid handsomely, upwards of $100,000
per year and more, often giving
national conference workshops,
hailed as pillars by colleagues.
“For far too long, animal shelters
have swallowed and accepted the thoroughly discredited notions
perpetuated by the old guard national animal organizations that
claimed to speak on behalf of animal
shelters.
“Chief
among these precepts was that [‘shelters’] were required to kill the bulk
of the animals because
there were simply ‘too many animals and
not enough homes.’ This view, a gospel upon which the bedrock of
animal sheltering depended, was a truth so ingrained, it was simply
beyond question. A corollary of that
governing principle was that
the public, in failing to have their animals neutered and, subsequently,
failing
to make a lifetime commitment to them by surrendering
them to shelters, was to blame for this sorry state of
affairs.
As a result, shelters—through no fault of their own—were merely performing
the public's dirty work.
“At the same time, the public saw most
shelters, and they were in fact, the place where animals were killed.
If the pet loving public was slow to support shelters financially,
and was even slower to visit to adopt
animals, it should have
come as no surprise. Animal lovers hated to go shelters to adopt animals
because
the pet they didn't choose was likely to get killed.
Instead, they went other places to get animals—to friends,
to
neighbors, to newspaper ads, to pet stores, to rescue groups, even to
breeders (if there are truly not
enough homes, how is it that pet
stores, puppy mills and breeders continue to make money?)
“While
people's reluctance to visit the shelter seems obvious to any pet lover,
to many within the shelter
industry it is not, and, in fact,
still isn't today. As the vast majority of shelters do now, they simply
tally up the
number of people who came to the shelter to adopt
animals and tally the number of people who came to
surrender
animals and came to the conclusion that since more animals were being
surrendered every day
than people who came to adopt, the number
of animals exceeded the community's ability to care for them. If
there were more homes out there, they were nowhere to be
found.
“The problem, of course, was that the [‘shelter’] wasn't
looking for them. In fact, the [‘shelter’] was simply
expecting
them to come to the shelter. So as the cages became full and the adopters
failed to come, the
remainder were simply executed.
“And
so the ‘not enough good homes’ myth was perpetuated, when there were/are
plenty of good homes in
the community. The homes are so good, in
fact, that potential adopters refused to go into a shelter that did
little more than exterminate the occupants because they didn't want
to look into the eyes of the animals
they left behind to be
killed. But with national agencies vindicating their point of view,
thousands of
shelters nationwide continue to kill dogs and cats
under the belief that there are no alternatives—except at
some
mythical time in the future.
“That is, in short, a whole lot of
BUNK.
“But that doesn't mean that cages do not get full. They do.
What to do about it is what separates an
executive director who
is earning his/her money from one who should be looking for other work.
Most
shelter directors appear content to shrug their shoulders,
blame the public, fall back upon the myths, and
continue the
killing, as if they have no power to effect change.
“When I first
took this job in animal control, I did not know what to expect. I had my
ideas, but the animals
kept coming, day after day, 10 a day, 20 a
day, 30 a day, more, I had never seen that many kittens. But I took
killing off the table. We started with a few cats in foster care,
then twenty, then fifty, then one hundred, then
two hundred, and
it kept going. What the hell was I ever going to do with them? To be
honest, I did not have
a clue. But killing was not an option.
Eventually, we found a rhythm--foster, rescue groups, offsites, more
publicity, adoption incentives, pleas for help, you name it. And
almost two years later, we still have not killed
for
space.
“So ‘what happens to the animals that cannot be accommodated
by the shelter because the shelter is full?’
They go to rescue
groups, foster parents, offsite adoptions, they are in some cases (if the
person agrees)
put on a waiting list, they are put on your
website for adoption. Anything and everything creative but
KILLING.
“So ‘what is a shelter to do when twice as many
animals come in as go out?’ Be proactive in adoptions so
that
more animals are adopted over the short-term, and provide affordable
spay/neuter, TNR and neuter all
animals before adoption to reduce
intake over the long term.
“So what of the scenario when hundreds
of kittens come in but only 20 get adopted’? Fire the person in
charge of adoptions because they are doing a miserable
job.
“So, what is my ‘immediate answer’? I quote my mentor: ‘What
is unconscionable, abominable and
outrageous is that animals,
healthy and well-behaved, are being killed because someone says there are
too
many. That is something we do not accept. That is something
we find intolerable.’"
How many animals, how many homes?
As
stated above, 10 years ago, there were between 16 million and 20 million
animals being killed in the
pounds per year in the U.S. That
number steadily declined, and had gone way down to 5 million as of a
couple of years ago. By a year ago it was just over 4 million, and
now (2005-2006) it's most often estimated at
between 3 and 4
million (HSUS stats) per year, though some sources place it as low as 2.1
to 2.5 million this
year. The numbers keep decreasing steadily,
precisely because there is so much spay/neuter being done.
It is
estimated by the HSUS that there are currently approximately 143 million
owned dogs and cats in the
U.S. As for the number of animals killed in
the pounds--and remember this includes not only dogs and cats,
but rabbits, birds, reptiles, guinea pigs, rats, mice, wildlife,
etc.—the number is currently between 2 million
and 4 million per
year in the U.S. So if we take the 143 million owned dogs and cats--and of
course if we
knew the stats on owned animals other than dogs and
cats, the number of owned "pets" might be 200
million or 300
million or even higher--and then we take the 2 to 4 million figure of the
number of animals
killed in the pounds currently, the whole idea
of "overpopulation" becomes ludicrous. Come on, folks, how
difficult is it to get 2 to 4 million animals adopted per year in a
country that already has homes for 143 million
to possibly 300
million or more animals??? And 70% of all households in the U.S. own dogs
or cats, most of
which own one animal and are willing and able to
adopt additional animals.
Here are the actual figures from many
reliable sources:
“…Gary Patronek of Purdue University School of
Veterinary Medicine and Andrew Rowan of Tufts University
School
of Veterinary Medicine have … compiled statistics from the pet industry,
the American Kennel Club,
the American veterinary Medical
Association, the Humane Society of the US, the American Humane
Association…The compilation did not include information about feral
dogs, because … ‘the data indicates
that this population is very
small’ and ‘it appears as though there are very few feral or unowned dogs
in the
USA today.’ (Cats may be a different story, although there
are no figures available to make that judgment,
according to the
report.)
…About 6.2 million dogs die each year, 3.8 million in
homes, veterinary hospitals and under the wheels of a
vehicle,
and an additional 2.4 million in shelters. Each year, owners acquire about
7.3 million dogs, including
5.8 million puppies from pet stores
and breeders, one million dogs from animal shelters, and 500,000 as
adult strays or previously owned pets.”
What the above tells
us is that not only does the number of animals in pounds drastically
decrease each
year, but that there are THREE TIMES AS MANY HOMES
ADOPTING DOGS EACH YEAR AS THERE ARE DOGS
BEING KILLED IN THE
POUNDS. Clearly, THERE ARE PLENTY OF HOMES! There is no “overpopulation”,
there
are more than 3 times as many homes available each year as
it would take to adopt all the animals in the
pounds each
year!
Nationally, the average ratio of animals killed in pounds per
year is 1.5 animal per 100 humans. Here in Los
Angeles, CA, it's
even fewer animals--1.0 animal killed in the pound per year per 100
humans. Now, how
difficult can it be to get 1 animal adopted to 1
out of every 100 people per year? And remember, that
includes not
just dogs and cats, kittens and puppies, but also rabbits, birds, iguanas,
turtles, snakes,
guinea pigs, rats, mice, etc. Just one of these
animals adopted to one person out of every 100 persons per
year,
and we would empty out the pounds.
And finally, we need to keep in
mind that whenever there is a situation that is widely publicized in the
media
regarding an animal who needs a home, between 100,000 and 1
million people generally step up wanting to
adopt that animal! So
you can see, there is no shortage of homes. There is not "overpopulation"
at all,
instead it would be more accurate to say there is
UNDERpopulation of animals, since there are MORE THAN
PLENTY of
good homes available out there. That is why every 3 months, Best Friends
can organize an
adoption event at which HUNDREDS of animals are
adopted in one venue, in one city, in one day. Less than
a year
ago, at the Best Friends adoption event at the wonderful Johnny Carson
Park in the valley, there
were 400 animals adopted in one day,
and recently, one year later at the same event, there were over 500
animals adopted in one day—the number of adoptions just keeps
increasing. This could be happening all
the time, there is no
shortage of homes!
“Millions of dogs and cats are euthanized every
year in United States shelters. Mackie (1992) estimates 7 to
15
million animals are euthanized, Thornton (1991) estimates 16 million, and
Carter (1990) estimates 13 to 17
million… A more recent estimate
of euthanasia of companion animals is 4.2 million dogs and cats euthanized
a year or 14.8 animals per 1,000 Americans (Animal People, 2003)…
The death rate continues a downward
trend found in annual surveys
by Animal People and is lower than that found by Arkow in 1994 and
considerably lower than that found in prior decades. Rowan (1992) has
also reported that the number of
animals being euthanized is
significantly down from 13.5 million to between 5 and 6 million animals.
Looking
just at New York City data from the late 1800's on,
Zawistowski, et al. (1998) indicate a peak in
euthanasia rate per
person at around the time of the depression, followed by a
steep
decline to about a tenth of the peak rate in the 1990's… They
identified 4,700 shelters in the United States
which each take in
100 or more animals a year. For the 22% of shelters responding in the
latest survey
(1995), about 45% of dogs came from animal control
officers, 27% came from guardian relinquishment, and
the
remainder came from other or unknown sources. Approximately 26% of dogs
were adopted, 16% were
reclaimed by guardians, 55% were
euthanized, and the remainder had unknown or other
dispositions.”
The most important fact that all these statistics
show us is that the population of animals being killed in the
pounds continues to decrease, each year, by approximately 1 million.
Currently the number of animals killed
in the pounds nationally
per annum is between 2 and 4 million, and the above quote from Patronek
and
Rowan gives us the most accurate current number of animals
being killed in pounds nationally: 2.4 million. It
is clear that
if the number of animals killed each year continues to decrease at the
same rate as it has been
doing—even without any more aggressive
spay/neuter campaigns than are in place now—in a couple of
years,
there will be virtually zero animals available for the pounds to
kill!
Best Friends writes:
“We know perfectly well that
there are still more homeless animals each year than shelters feel capable
of
placing in new homes. But the number of animals being killed
in shelters has dropped from about 17 million
just 15 years ago
to less than 5 million today. And we can now look forward to a day, quite
soon, when there
will be No More Homeless Pets in this
country.
“This remarkable goal is being accomplished through the
work of increasingly progressive humane groups
and shelters,
where good people are working to save lives, not destroy them. Any
organization that's
aspiring to a leadership role in relation to
companion animals needs to be encouraging people to save
more
lives, rather than to go on repeating the failed policies and practices
that helped create the problem
in the first place.”
From
the Los Angeles Times, June 15, 2005, in an article entitled “Adoption
Option”:
“’As many as 12 million pets are relinquished to shelters
and rescue groups each year in the United States,
according to
the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA). And
some 4 million
animals are euthanized in the country each year,’
said Betsy Saul, founder and president of Petfinder.
Com…Things
were worse 10 years ago when Saul and her husband started the site. ‘At
that time, the annual
euthanasia rate was 14 million animals, so
we’ve come a long way since then. But we still need to
encourage
adoption,’ she said.”
Spay/neuter
While spay/neuter is
important, it has nothing to do with the killing in the pounds. People are
so sold on the
idea that the problem is "overpopulation", and
that the solution is spay/neuter, and so people endlessly
repeat
the tired old clichés they have been taught, which never have and never
will have anything to do
with the killing in the pounds: All
those irresponsible people out there allowing their pets to reproduce. All
those people who refuse to get their animals spayed/neutered. The
fact is that most of the people out
there, regardless of
socio-economic profiles, DO want to spay/neuter their animals. Many people
come to
the pound asking about getting their animals
spayed/neutered, yet the pounds tell them there is no
assistance
for them! No vouchers, no free spay/neuter, no referrals to organizations
that can help them, no
nothing! There is a free spay/neuter van,
but one has to qualify, and also they are limited hours and
locations. If people are serious about doing spay/neuter, the logical
solution would be free spay/neuter to
anyone upon demand. A
recent spay/neuter campaign, jointly done by a private group and South LA
pound
had as its goal to spay/neuter 100 animals, yet 140 animals
showed up to be altered, and they were all taken
care
of!
But regardless of the availability of spay/neuter or lack
thereof, it is irrelevant to the killing in the pounds.
The great
mistake people make is to think that spay/neuter is a solution to the
killing in the pounds. They
seem to believe that the pounds are
benevolent organizations that don’t want to kill, and that if you
spay/neuter enough animals, then the pounds will stop killing. That
is simply a fairy tale, perpetuated to
excuse the killing done by
the pounds. There is in fact no correlation between spay/neuter and the
killing in
the pounds, absolutely none. The only effect of
spay/neuter upon the killing in the pounds is that the fewer
animals are born, the fewer the pounds can kill. In fact, pounds are
relatively empty these days compared to
previous years, the
decrease in the number of animals impounded is very noticeable. And there
are pounds
which have never had very many animals in them, and
have nothing but empty cages, yet these pounds kill
off the
animals anyway.
People believe in the myth of "overpopulation" as
the reason that the pounds kill. So people are always
talking
spay/neuter, as "the" solution, that is supposed to magically stop the
killing in the pounds. People
just endlessly repeat the rhetoric
they have been programmed to say, but in fact there is so much
spay/neuter that the population of animals in the pounds has been cut
so drastically, yet the pounds still kill
all the animals. And
they will continue to do so as long as they are permitted to. If the
entire pound were
empty except for one animal, the pound would
kill that one animal. All the pounds keep on killing, because
no
one makes them stop. And rest assured, until and unless we make them stop
the killing, they will
continue to kill every poor animal they
can get their hands on. What we need is not more endless
spay/neuter rhetoric. What we need are campaigns to demand that the
pounds stop killing.
The killing will never stop, when people are
detoured from the truth, into excusing the killing by the
pounds,
turning a blind eye to the killing by the pounds while focusing
exclusively on spay/neuter, and
being content with “reducing” the
killing. “Reducing” the killing is no accomplishment, as the number of
animals available to kill decreases, the killing is thereby “reduced”
automatically, and it is no solution. The
animals will continue
to die until the pounds are held responsible for the killing they do, and
insist on
doing, and for their obstructionism toward rescues and
adoptions. The only thing that will stop the killing, is
stopping
the killing!
Spay/neuter campaigns don’t target the real
breeding
It really just doesn't make much difference to no-kill,
how much spay/neuter is pushed or instituted,
because the people
who have the animals who are reproducing the most, do not get their
animals
spayed/neutered, and are not going to in the future, not
under the current system. They must ultimately be
forced to be
decent animal caretakers ("owners") or to relinquish their animals and not
allowed to have any
more--once pounds are no longer killing
animals. As long as animals are being killed, no animals should be
taken from homes and dumped into the pound, it ends in the animals'
deaths.
Spay/neuter, while important, will level off with regard to
its effect on the reproduction that is still
occurring, because
the animals of the most irresponsible people are not being
spayed/neutered. The
largest amount of the breeding of animals
who end up being killed in the pounds, goes on by people that no
one dares to approach to try to get them to stop breeding. No one
would even dare go into their
neighborhoods for fear of their own
lives, to try to talk to them about spaying/neutering their animals or in
any way lessening the breeding, or animal abuse. These people
fight their animals for huge amounts of
money, and they slash the
throats of meeker animals to be used as bait for their fighting animals.
They
breed animals, especially Pit Bulls, ad infinitum in an
effort to produce animals who will fight, especially to
the
death. Most animals, of course, including Pit Bulls, will not fight, so
the perpetrators just keep breeding
them by the thousands to find
one who will fight, much as the Greyhound industry breeds huge numbers of
animals just to get one who runs fast.
The pounds claim
they are “rescuing” animals from “abuse”. But they never even go near the
people that
are perpetrating actual abuse on animals, the gangs
and big money dogfighting breeders and rings—the
pounds are too
scared to do that, but they obviously are not too scared to brutally kill
thousands of
innocent animals, nor to take animals away from
decent owners who care for and care about their animals,
and slap
impossible to pay ransoms on them to get their animals back. And because
the pounds and other
“law enforcement” do not target the most
abusive dog fighting/dog breeding operations, the dog
fighters/breeders are heroes and role models for thousands more gang
members and others seeking to
emulate them by seeking “tough”
dogs, which they generally discard when they find the dogs are sweet
instead, and these poor dogs end up in the pounds, irrationally
feared and shunned by adopters, killed off
fast by the pounds, no
one knows and no one cares.
The religion of
“overpopulation”
We need to look this word “overpopulation”
squarely in the face, to examine it thoroughly. Instead, people
speak in hushed, reverent tones about “overpopulation” in order to
excuse the mass killing in the pounds.
Most animal welfarists
worship at the feet of the pounds. The pound employees are the high
priests who
sacrifice the victims, the animals, to the god of
greed and bloodthirsty profits and good ol’ boys networks.
The
worshippers, the pound apologists, write reverential poems of gratitude to
the high priests of killing,
that they are “cleaning up society’s
mess”, that they are brave and heroic for doing the “necessary” job of
perpetrating holocausts upon the animals, and the apologists insist
that we should all be gratefully
worshipping at the feet of the
killers too. They insist that we must never question the religion of
“overpopulation”, always instead being happy and grateful for the
ritual mass-sacrifice of all animals the
pounds can find, aided
and abetted by pound apologists themselves dutifully bringing in animals
to be
killed, and encouraging others to do the same. And of
course the pound apologists claim that killing the
animals is
doing the animals a favor, and that the animals too should be grateful for
being killed. This is all
part of the pathological religion of
killing that has developed and is flourishing throughout most of the
subculture that refers to itself as the “humane community”, and even
much of the public at large, and is the
means that pound
apologists, as well as pound employees, can justify to themselves the
horrendous crimes
of mass killing of our non-human brothers and
sisters, which is de facto done for no other reason than that
they are of another species.
We need to recognize that the
very word “overpopulation” is a lie, and using it simply perpetuates the
whole pathological system of killing animals instead of dealing
responsibly and compassionately with them.
We need to eradicate
the word “overpopulation” from our lexicon, and must stop supporting and
excusing
killing by saying the pounds have no choice, that they
“need” to kill, that killing is okay, and holding the
pounds
blameless. Every time someone uses the nonsense term of “overpopulation”,
it is enabling the
pounds to continue the killing. To buy into
the “overpopulation” religion is to agree with the pounds that
there are “too many” animals—no matter how few animals there are, it
is ALWAYS “too many”—so the pound
forever has the human
population’s blessings to go ahead and kill them.
Other, newer
excuses for killing
The number of animals killed in the pounds has
nothing to do with the amount of space in the pounds! Even
the
kennel managers, when they are being honest, admit to that. They were able
to hide behind the
“overpopulation” or “overcrowding” excuses
years ago, but some volunteers, rescuers, adopters, “shelter
scouts”, all those who frequent the pounds, point out how empty the
pounds are these days, as the
population of animals available for
the pounds to impound and kill dwindles. Now that the pounds are not
crowded, they don't use the "overcrowding" excuse as often. It
becomes more and more difficult for the
pounds to use the excuse
of “overpopulation” or “overcrowding” to hide behind, so they resort to
the
protocol of labeling animals “sick” or “vicious” as excuses
to kill.
The vast majority of animals in the pound get kennel cough
sooner or later, or even if they are not “sick”,
they are labeled
as deathly ill if they so much as sneeze in the drafty pounds, or if they
have a flea, or a
dislocated paw, or a slight sore, and then of
course it’s off with their heads. Sooner or later virtually all the
animals either get sick or slightly injured in the pound, or as
happens in so many cases, the animal is not
sick or injured at
all but the kennel management or the vet staff or management claim the
animal sick or
injured, and so kills the animal, claiming they
“had to”, that the animal was “suffering”, and that killing is the
only solution. The pounds often exaggerate any slight illness or
other medical condition, calling it “possible
distemper”, and/or
painting scenarios for people that it will cost them thousands of dollars
to treat simple
conditions, all in an effort to dissuade them
from adopting.
And the pounds kill so many animals with the claim
that they are aggressive, when they are not at all. Almost
any
animal can be intimidated into exhibiting defensive or simply cowering
behavior in the slaughterhouses
and can then be labeled
“vicious”—or even simply labeled “vicious” even when never having
exhibited
anything but total docility and friendliness. And
again, the pounds exaggerate any slight possible exhibition
of
defensiveness at any time by any animal, or they just invent it. And even
if the animal is somewhat
aggressive, killing is not the
solution.
The pounds always find or make up some excuse, a way, a
ploy, to get the public to allow them to keep
killing all the
animals, and to approve of it, whether it’s the “overpopulation” idea, the
psychopathic
“temperament testing” ruse, or the sickness or
injury excuse, or purported “aggression” excuse.
And there are even
more creative excuses used these days to justify the killing. One of them
is to “remind”
the public that they are not a boarding kennel,
and so they are not going to use the public funds to feed and
care for the animals. Nor are they going to spend any money to attend
to any medical needs the animals may
have. The solution? Kill
‘em, of course! One pound suddenly killed off all of the handful of
animals which
constituted the entire population of the pound,
with the excuse that it didn't want people to get the
impression
that the animals could stay there indefinitely--how's that for a good
reason to kill all the animals?
Here are another couple of great
reasons the pounds used recently to kill animals--because the pound
claims the animals are "miserable", or because they are “depressed”,
in the "shelter". How else would they
be in the place that wants
to kill them than miserable or depressed??? The management decides
therefore
that "it isn't fair" to the animal to let him
live--apparently being killed is what's considered "fair", by those
with the killing mentality. There is no end to the variety of excuses
the pounds can come up with these days
to try to justify the
killing. Apparently the excuses, no matter how absurd, are readily
accepted as plausible
by most people, conditioned as they are to
excusing the killing.
And often the pounds can’t even come up with
any excuse, nor do they even feel compelled to—they have
a
license to kill, after all, and they are “the authorities”, and no one
questions their “right” and “duty” to kill
every animal they can
get their hands on, least of all the “humane community”. And often the
pounds kill
animals even before the legally mandated holding
period of 4 business days is up, which is in violation of
the
(California) Hayden law and the Agricultural Code. But the pounds get away
with it, because nobody
knows and nobody cares.
Please
understand, THE POUNDS ARE SET UP TO KILL. That is what they do, and what
they have always done.
They will give the public and the “humane
community” any excuse to make them go away and just keep
letting
the pounds kill as always. The pounds are nothing but killing machines, as
they have always been,
and they will always kill unless their
license to kill is taken away. But killing is NOT a solution to anything.
THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR KILLING ANIMALS, IT NEEDS TO
STOP!
Why the pounds kill
People like to think the best of
other people, so they look through rose-colored glasses at the pounds.
People refuse to believe the truth, which is that the pounds
PURPOSELY are intent upon and determined to
kill every animal
they can get their hands on. Why do the pounds cling so tenaciously to
killing? One reason
is that it’s a good old boys network, and
they are determined to do what they have always done, which is to
exterminate all non-human life they can. The other compelling reason
is that there is likely FINANCIAL
PROFIT in killing: the animals
are worth more to them dead than alive, selling the corpses to rendering
companies, which profit by billions of dollars per annum. There
are likely other reasons, such as laziness,
habit, bizarre
beliefs and just plain sadism. In order to work in the pounds, all the
employees must agree
that the killing is fine, all employees are
after all part of the killing machine, and so it just continues as it
always has.
The slaughterhouse pounds have ALWAYS killed every
single animal, with the excuse that the pounds were
protecting
society from animals; it was a one-way ticket to hell for any animal who
was unfortunate enough
to be caught by the dogcatcher. And guess
what? Nothing has changed! Except that now the excuses given
by
the pounds have become more creative.
Because of a bit of public
scrutiny, the pounds grudgingly permit a small token percentage of animals
to be
adopted/rescued—though virtually all CA pounds now have
taken steps to ensure, via the “temperament
testing” ruse, that
nearly all of the animals in their facilities are locked up and killed
quickly without any
opportunity for the public or even rescues to
see the animals, let alone get them out alive. Most pounds
kill the vast majority of all the animals they impound, not even
giving any chance for them to be adopted.
They use the ruse of
"temperament testing" in order to get away with their continuous
perpetration of the
holocaust on animals and as always, they
insist on firmly obstructing all but a few token animals getting out
alive, and even the pounds which do not admit to using the heinous
and false "temperament testing"
nonsense, nevertheless
surreptitiously emulate the draconian tactics of "temperament testing". It
is truly a
fatal mistake on the part of people to believe that
the pounds are "doing the best they can" and only kill
because
they “have to”, that the killing is “necessary”, that there are “simply
too many animals”, that there
is “overpopulation”, or even
because the animals are “sick” or “vicious” or “old”.
The pounds
kill because they CAN, because the public, including the “humane”
community, gives their
blessing for the pounds to kill, and funds
these slaughterhouses. As long as the public, and the “humane
community” continue to give their permission for the pounds to mass
kill animals, the pounds will continue
to kill every animal they
can, as they have always done. Why would they change? The public and the
“humane community” enable the killing, by believing in,
accepting, and approving of the lies and excuses
given by the
pounds. But the pounds don’t even need to give any excuses—the “humane
community” itself
continually defends the killing in the pounds
with the excuse of “overpopulation”. It wouldn’t be right to kill
animals even if there were “too many” animals. But in fact there are
not too many at all, rather there are too
few. The truth of the
matter is that there is UNDERpopulation of animals, though of course the
religion of
“overpopulation” in which everyone slavishly
believes, will not permit people to unbend and look at the
actual
truth.
An analysis of the problem
Here are excerpts from a
very astute article by Patty Adjamine, Director of New Yorkers for
Companion
Animals, entitled “Companion Cats and Dogs: A Consumer
Issue”:
“Each year, a certain percentage of …animals will
inevitably become homeless due to variable human
circumstances…This is…a complex problem of cultural irresponsibility
(as marked by transient lifestyles or
casual ‘throw-away’
attitudes toward companion animals) as well as trends in consumer
attitudes of
rejection and demand (i.e., ‘rejection’ of adult,
previously owned, mixed-breed or stray animals; ‘demand’
for
newly created puppies, kittens, small dogs and purebreds.
“To
understand this concept, we need only imagine (or research) a typical day
in a typical shelter in Anytown
U.S.A. On a particular Saturday
in Anytown, there were 100 people interested in acquiring a cat or dog. At
the same time, there were 100 available and adoptable cats and
dogs at the Anytown shelter. As it appears
there was no real
problem in ‘overpopulation’ there; every animal should have been assured a
home, right?
“Wrong. Because of the 50 people looking to adopt a
cat, 30 wanted ‘little kittens’ no more than four months
old and
16 people sought long-hairs or exotic breeds. Of the 50 cats up for
adoption at the Anytown shelter,
only six were kittens and four
were pedigrees. Of the 50 people seeking dogs, 20 were demanding of ‘small
puppies’ and 25 were specific of ‘breed’. Of the 50 dogs at the
shelter, there were 10 purebreds and no
puppies.
“Result?
Only 10 cats were adopted from the Anytown shelter that day -all the
kittens, two pedigrees and
two young adults. Of the 50 adoptable
dogs, nine were adopted - six purebreds and three young mixed-
breeds (at 3, 4, 6 and 8 years of age, the remaining purebreds were
considered ‘too old’).
“Of the 80 people who did not adopt from
Anytown that busy Saturday, 50 eventually bought from breeders
and pet stores, while 30 decided to ‘wait it out’ until the ‘perfect
pet’ came along. On Monday morning the
remaining 80 animals at
the Anytown shelter were ‘euthanized’ to make room for the 80 new cats and
dogs
arriving over the weekend - animals who, for the most part,
were not the direct result of ‘overpopulation’
(as represented by
new litters of kittens and puppies), but rather, victims of throw-away
attitudes or human
circumstance (i.e., caretaker died, moved, was
arrested, became pregnant, allergic or simply lost the animal
who
was then deemed a ‘stray’).
“The point of all this is simply to
illustrate common scenarios in shelters across the country, where the
majority of animals die, not because of overpopulation, but because
of myopic consumer tendencies in
preference and rejection. Actual
proof of these assertions may be witnessed in some of the
following:
“For a number of years, a popular no-kill shelter in New
York claimed a ‘puppy shortage’ in New York based
on New York's
strong spay/neuter programs. To meet ‘public demand’ for puppies, this
well known shelter
imported thousands of animals from other
states. Meanwhile, New York State shelters killed tens of
thousands of young adoptable dogs annually! Can those deaths truly be
attributed to ‘pet overpopulation’?
Or are they a result of
consumer demand, spurred by dubious shelter practices which placate such
‘demands’ rather than challenging them through aggressive
educational programs?
“According to figures from the American Humane
Association, dog euthanasia in shelters has steadily risen
since
1990 and cat euthanasia has been on the rise since 1988 by 35% despite
numerous national
campaigns promoting spay/neuter and increased
attention to the tragedy in our shelters. Ratios of shelter
killings to shelter adoptions have remained a fairly consistent 80%
to 20% (like the imaginary ‘Anytown’
scenario) even in areas
where spay/neuter efforts have been successful in lowering actual numbers
of
animals received and handled by shelters.
“On the last
two points, it perhaps could be said that the approximate 8 to 10 million
[at the time the article
was written] cat and dog shelter deaths
that occur annually are a sad testament to a spay/neuter battle
largely won, but a war lost. One is forced to wonder, what is really
wrong?
“…As the law of ‘supply and demand’ dictates, it is
virtually impossible to outlaw something that supplies a
product
that people want; when it comes to legislation, the bottom line is,
‘cruelty ends where profit begins.’
… Campaigns on spay/neuter and
attempts to legislate against ‘puppy mills’… while productive of some
good and heightened public awareness toward certain aspects of the
problem, they nevertheless fail to
address the problem at its
core. That is, consumer demand for kittens, puppies, small dogs and
purebreds,
as well as public stigmas against adult animal
adoptions, mixed-breeds, strays and previously owned pets.
“…The
battle to save companion cats and dogs must be taken to the streets in
forms of:
* Organized protests against breeders, dog and cat shows, pet
shops, etc.
* Stigmatization of public demand for kittens, puppies and
breeds (i.e., the connection must be made
between what people
‘want’ and cruelty to animals as represented by over-breeding to meet
"demands”
and massive killings).
* Greater emphasis on
educational issues such as humane training and upbringing of puppies/dogs.
Greater promotion of medium-sized dogs and mixed breeds. Greater
emphasis on the advantages of
adopting adult cats and
dogs.
“The public image of strays, mixed-breeds, adult and shelter
animals must be upgraded, as the public's
image of non-fur coats
has been upgraded.
“Presently, shelters (and even some purebred
‘rescue’ groups) argue that unless they promote and
advertise
‘kittens, puppies and purebreds’, people will simply buy these animals
from pet stores and
breeders. Unfortunately, while this may
largely be true now, it is merely testament to our movement's failure
to properly address the issues, not vindication for such dubious
actions on the part of shelters, rescuers,
etc.
“In truth,
arguing for shelters to promote or advertise ‘kittens, puppies and breeds’
is like arguing for a
‘more humane trap’ for fur, rather than
challenging the issue itself! Those of us who appease the breeding
industry and allow a mostly naive and uneducated public to dictate to
us become part of the problem rather
than its
solution.
“It is time for the animal protection movement to take
the same activism and dedication it has demonstrated
for the fur
issue and direct it toward a battle to save these millions of defenseless
cats and dogs
needlessly dying in shelters and on streets for
want of simple promotion.
“Spay/neuter campaigns are, of course
important, but (like anti-trapping campaigns) they simply aren't
enough. As long as there's demand for a product (kittens, puppies,
small breed dogs), somebody's going to
supply it, thereby
diluting ultimate success for spay/neuter campaigns, essentially fought in
a vacuum.
“…Talking ‘spay/neuter’ out of one side of the mouth,
while feeling compelled to ‘give the public what it
wants’ - more
kittens, puppies and purebreds out of the other, is simply incompatible.
One doesn't solve a
problem by placating its source.”
Here
are quotes from Taimie Bryant, UCLA law professor and primary author of
the Hayden law:
“Too Many Shelter Deaths. Chapter 752 [of the
Hayden law] was premised on facts that indicated a
needlessly
high (and expensive) kill rate in our animal shelters…Senator Hayden
sought to address the
problem of excessive, routinized killing of
companion animals already born but caught in a system that
results too easily in their deaths…Emphasis on saving lives. In
policy sections within the Civil Code, the
Food and Agricultural
Code, and the Penal Code, Chapter 752 promotes adoption of healthy and
reasonably
treatable animals whenever possible. In the absence of
policy statements to the contrary, the de facto state
policy has
been to kill lost and homeless companion animals.
“In the absence
of policy statements to the contrary, the de facto state policy has been
to kill lost and
homeless companion animals…Our shelters have a
very bad track record when it comes to adoption. In
California in
1997 with a statewide human population of close to 33 million, only
142,385 cats and dogs were
adopted from our shelters. 576,097
were killed. These statistics belie the breast-beating of shelters and
sheltering organizations that have claimed that the longer holding
period will mean the killing of placeable
pets to make room for
unplaceable strays. The sad fact is that most animals are killed in our
shelters, no
matter what their condition…The horrible fact is
that the vast majority of companion animals die in our
shelters
regardless of their status. Some of our worst shelters protest that they
want to kill unadoptable
pets so that they can keep the adoptable
ones, when, in fact, they kill almost everyone…
“Killing, the
strategy of choice for so long, has never been a solution; there have
always been more animals
to fill shelters at taxpayer expense and
to kill at taxpayer expense. More spaying and neutering in the past
decade has brought impound rates down, but most entering animals die.
…a non-violent, life-preserving
approach is ultimately more
comfortable and productive of the search for solutions than the discomfort
of
wedging the violent (even if painless) act of killing into a
rationalization that enables one to continue
routine
extermination of cats and dogs. Indeed, the ease of killing obviates the
search for solutions…many
shelters are throw-backs to the days of
killing as the only method of population control and punishing
animals for the apparent irresponsibility of their human companions.
Those of us working on these bills as
they moved through the
Legislature searched for answers to the question as to why there is such
disparity
in animal sheltering and resistance to change even in
the face of demonstrated progress at shelters trying
new
techniques.
“Why Doesn’t The Killing Stop? Many explanations
surfaced. Most had to do with management incentives to
try new
approaches. One view, from a person within the sheltering industry, is
that many shelter directors
have moved up through the ranks from
kennel worker to management, carrying with them the belief that
killing is appropriate, cost-effective, and supported by the public.
When a person who cares about animals
takes a job that requires
them to kill healthy animals, there is strong internal pressure to justify
what she or
he is doing without sacrificing the belief that he or
she cares about animals. Killing is legitimized as kinder
than an
uncertain fate. It is deemed ‘necessary’ because of owners'
irresponsibility. A shelter culture
emerges that reinforces the
‘need’ to kill because of others' irresponsibility, the greater good of
painless
death as compared to life in a problematic, or cruel,
home, the value of providing the service of disposing
of animals
no one wants to see on the streets, and solidarity among those who kill
without receiving thanks
from the people who appear to benefit
from their ‘street cleaning.’ Certainly it would be easier to believe in
the justice and wisdom of killing than to continue to kill while
burdened with a nagging suspicion that
animals could have and
deserve a chance at life, whatever life brings to them. There is just too
much
cognitive dissonance involved in caring about animals while
routinely killing healthy, loving and lovable
individuals. A
person whose career is maturing in such a setting may well develop belief
systems to support
the methods she or he has used for so
long.
“Second, there would be few occasions to question whether
this approach is supported by the public
because the general
public does not use shelters on a regular basis. If a person rarely visits
the shelter, he
or she may see nothing amiss or may well believe
that a bad experience is atypical. Not finding a lost
companion
may mean that the animal never came in to the shelter and not necessarily
that it was killed
immediately or sitting in some shelter in
another part of the city. Moreover, if there is proof that the shelter
has violated the law even to the extent of killing someone's
companion animal, that person is entitled to
very limited
monetary damages. It is not cost effective for lawyers to handle those
cases, and, even if the
shelter pays damages, the amount of money
is so small that it fails to serve as a deterrent sufficient to
generate change in the shelter. Lawsuits against the government, even
suits in which the court simply
directs the shelter to follow the
law, are notoriously time-consuming, expensive, and difficult to win.
Animals can’t talk, volunteers won’t talk, and shelters control all
records. Only volunteers and rescuers who
want to find homes for
shelter animals have regular dealings with shelters. Yet volunteers’ and
rescuers’
ability to provide relief to ‘sheltered’ animals is
dependent on maintaining a good relationship with shelter
personnel.”
The big picture
Clearly, the problem in
finding homes for animals is not one of “overpopulation”, but one of
distribution and
education. There are more than enough homes for
all the animals, and there is a right home for every
animal, and
a right animal for every home, with a very few perhaps that cannot ever be
placed, and those
can be cared for in sanctuaries. The challenge
is to get the animals to the homes or sanctuaries. In order to
succeed in that endeavor, three factors must be addressed:
•
Obstructionism must be removed.
That consists of the killing in the pounds, primarily. A complete shift
must first occur to zero killing, and the entire pound system
must be overhauled.
•
Education must be thoroughly
implemented, to elicit widespread social change in attitudes regarding
the animals that people want, and the animals in the pounds.
•
All-out marketing, promotion,
and other creative strategies must be utilized in order to get the animals
into good homes.
If you stop the killing, they will
come
No matter how the kill pounds try to increase adoptions, no
matter how they promote or invite the public,
the adoption
numbers continue to remain low. Yet when the pounds send animals to
well-advertised
adoption events, the animals are adopted. And the
public adopts from rescue groups, the same animals that
it would
not adopt in the pounds. Why? There is a vital factor that must be
addressed: The compassionate
public avoids the pounds as it
always has. Most of the people that SHOULD go to the pounds, DON'T go to
the pounds, precisely BECAUSE THE POUNDS KILL. People who are
sensitive, compassionate, and caring
toward animals don’t want to
go to a slaughterhouse! Yet these are the people who provide the best
homes
for animals, and they are the ones who would and should
adopt the animals in the pounds!
As long as the pounds continue to
kill, virtually the only people who go to the pounds are the people who
CAN go to the pounds, the ones who only want the baby puppies and
small dogs, the infant kittens and
purebreds, and they only go to
the pounds in order to try to get these animals cheaper than from a
breeder
or pet store. Most of the people who continually traipse
through the pounds to “shop” for a specific type of
animal, and
leave empty handed when they don’t find the animal who will gratify their
desires, are callous
and oblivious to the animals in the pound.
These people objectify animals, and cannot connect with the
living beings and their plight in the pounds, they simply do not care
about the animals in the pounds, they
are unconcerned that the
animals are killed—those are the types of people who mostly frequent the
pounds, and they almost always simply snatch up the youngest
infant animals or the smallest animals, as
toys for themselves or
their children, discarding the animal sooner or later. These types of
people
perpetuate the cycle of demand for breeding of puppies and
kittens and other infant animals, and
abandoning them later, only
to procure new infant animals and continuing the cycle. These are the
types of
people who should never have an animal in the first
place, yet the pounds sell them all the infant animals,
while
killing these same animals when these people are finished abusing and
abandoning them, and of
course the pounds kill all the rest of
the animals in the pounds.
The people who adopt the large, adult
animals, older animals, imperfect animals, are out there—they take
them in as strays, they adopt from rescues, they adopt from mobile
pet adoptions, anything that doesn’t
involve them having to go to
a place that kills animals. While a small percentage of compassionate
people
will go to the pounds, it takes a real effort even for
these people to face going to a place of killing. Most of
the
types of people who would provide good homes for the animals, while they
won’t go to a kill pound, will
adopt the pound animals
second-hand--they adopt from the rescues, who have pulled the animals out
of the
pound, and present the animals in pleasant settings. But
there is a very limited number of animals who can
be rescued by
local grass-roots organizations—the adoption fees must be paid, boarding
must be paid or
fosters provided, medical costs can be
prohibitive, the animals must be taken to adoption events which are
a lot of time and effort. The vast majority of animals in the pounds
cannot be rescued first and then
presented for adoption, due to
limited rescuers and resources. The only viable solution is for the
responsible, compassionate adopters to adopt directly from the
pound.
But these same adopters who now will not set foot in a
pound, and there are many of them, will adopt
directly from the
pound, if and when it becomes a real shelter, a place where they can go
and not have to
be faced with the prospect that no matter which
animal they adopt, all the rest will be killed. Expecting
people
with any sensitivity and compassion to go to a kill pound is unrealistic.
It is very traumatic to see the
animals, and know that they will
be killed, and knowing that all those animals will be killed. When
compassionate people go to the pound to adopt, knowing they can only
take one or two animals, how can
they choose? How can they face
letting down all the rest of the animals? How can they bear to look at
those
doomed faces? In a very real way, the killing in the pounds
is the most effective deterrent to increasing
adoptions, and the
most effective way for the pounds to get to perpetuate the
killing.
If the pounds stop killing, then people will not be
confronted by the imminence of death all around them.
The pound
will be a pleasant, welcoming place, and people will come to the pound in
droves to adopt. This
has been confirmed and proved. The way to
increase adoptions, and increase them exponentially, is to stop
the killing! And get the word out everywhere that you have stopped
the killing. Adopters, volunteers,
sponsors, fosters, all come
flooding in when the killing is stopped. People WANT to help an
organization
that is an actual shelter, that adopts instead of
kills, a place where the animals are safe from being killed.
The
very first step to increasing adoptions significantly is to STOP THE
KILLING! That is how to get all the
animals adopted. Killing
begets only more killing, decreased killing begets only decreased killing.
But
stopping the killing gets all the animals adopted.
In
actuality, no-kill CAN and DOES work, beyond anyone's expectations. Nathan
Winograd proved that. He
took a high kill pound, and turned it
around, to where even the old, large mutts had several applicants each
to adopt them, and the Pit Bulls apparently were adopted out too. He
committed to no-kill, and announced it.
There needs to be a
hyper-drive effort to completely involve the "humane" community, the
media, the
public at large, and individual communities, in
working with the pound. And that can happen only when the
pound
becomes no-kill. But it MUST happen FIRST. After the killing has stopped,
the word must get out, so
that people will WANT to come to the
pound. To that end, there must be a media blitz--TV, PSA's, radio,
newspapers. Not just ads, but plenty of interviews and pleas for
people to come and adopt, and invitations
to come to the newly
no-kill pound, and the public will be SOLD on the animals!
The
pounds needs to be open more and better hours, the service must be greatly
improved. Why are there
3 or 4 kennel employees on duty at night,
and only 2 on a Sunday during the hours the pound is open? That
doesn't make sense. And it’s always nearly impossible to get through
on the phones by potential adopters,
because the “animal control
officers” looking to impound more animals tie up all the lines. There has
always
been service to the public in impounding animals. Service
to the public, for TAKING OUT animals, needs to
be made the
priority instead, and needs to be honed and perfected. Unfortunately, many
(perhaps most)
employees will be obstructive to those efforts,
accustomed as they are to the killing system—to just
impounding
and killing as many animals as they can. There will no doubt need to be
personnel changes.
Nathan Winograd had to fire 90% of the
employees. All of this change is resisted by the pounds.
And of
course, the pound needs to be taken to the people! The mobile pet
adoptions are very important,
especially establishing GOOD
venues. This is part of how the community becomes involved. And no-kill
succeeds, and succeeds fabulously, by such community involvement.
And marketing the animals. The media
constantly markets ideas
that people should only adopt infant animals, or certain breeds, or sizes
or colors
of animals. And it markets ideas that some breeds or
mixes are undesirable, or dangerous, or have other
bad habits.
This needs to change, the media, including advertising of all kinds, need
to responsibly,
accurately and compassionately portray animals,
and stop fueling the demand of the public for the animals
which
the breeders and puppy mills churn out.
There is a campaign by many
in the “humane community” to stop puppy mills, and while the goal is a
noble
one, the effort to shut down the pet stores and breeding
operations is largely futile—they will simply set up
shop
elsewhere. The effort fails for the same reason prohibition of alcohol
failed, as long as there is the
demand, the supply will follow.
The only solution is to dry up the demand for infant animals. And it is
largely
ineffectual to keep pushing spay/neuter, without
educating the public to re-focus their demands, to want
the
animals in the pounds who are now being killed. There ARE some people who
go into the pounds to
adopt animals whose lives need to be saved,
but there are not enough of these people. It is pointless to
talk
spay/neuter while at the same time not addressing the demand for infant
animals.
There needs to be a re-education of the public, as well as
countering the mis-marketing of animals, and
instead widely
marketing the desirability of the animals in the pounds. Most people have
NO IDEA that the
big, old lovable mutt in the pound is the
perfect dog or cat for them. And they have irrational fears and
misconceptions about sizes, breeds, coat, color, temperament, ages,
etc. and they instead seek animals
based upon misinformation and
other marketing. That is why everyone wants the puppies, kittens, small
animals, rare breeds. Involving the community, marketing the
animals, education, that is how to clear the
pounds, and get good
permanent homes for the animals.
There is so much education that
needs to be done, and when those involved in "rescue" don't have to
worry about animals being seized and killed anymore, they can then
focus on educating people so that the
pounds won't fill up, but
instead help people find the responsible, compassionate solutions. And
they can
screen people so that only responsible people are
permitted to adopt animals. The solutions are there, they
have
now been tried, and they work. The public stays away in droves from the
pounds, precisely because
they kill. People have to force
themselves to go to the killing pounds--it's a very horrible experience.
When
pounds go no kill, then people begin flooding in--public to
adopt, and volunteers to help, and community to
get involved, and
press and all kinds of help. When people can feel they are a part of a
life-enhancing
operation, they become involved with it. The
pounds are killers--who wants to be involved with
organizations
that just kill??? To go there is to be at cross-purposes with the
organization, to be depressed
and saddened all the time, and
horrified. It all turns around when you have a commitment to not
kill!
The 180 degree shift to zero-killing
The pounds have
to COMMIT to no-kill, completely. They need to do the 180 degree shift, to
fully commit to
NO MORE KILLING. And then they need to get the
word out IMMEDIATELY and UNIVERSALLY that they have
done so, and
that they need the GOOD ADOPTERS OUT THERE to come in and adopt the
animals, and the
POTENTIAL VOLUNTEERS OUT THERE to come in and
help get the animals out of the pounds and into good
homes. As
Nathan Winograd says, when you do this, “your community will embrace you
like it never has
before”. This is the formula for
success.
Under the current system, it is a continual CONTEST to see
how many animals can be gotten out before the
pounds can kill
them. In this game, various excuses are given by the pound, often several
different
excuses per animal are tried, in order to justify and
drive away anyone who asks questions, asks for more
time, tries
to get reprieves for animals. There is a very purposeful intent and
determination on the part of
the pound management and many
employees, to ensure that the animals are killed. It is a brick wall, and
it
has not changed, though many people in the “humane community”
have been lulled into thinking that there
has been profound
change in the pounds. The pounds are killing machines, they always have
been, and
they continue to be. There have been some changes, some
crumbs thrown to the “humane community”, and
much ballyhoo over
the few recent cosmetic changes.
Why is the “humane community"
saying things are better now? It’s because they want so badly to ally
themselves with the pounds, to be pals with the pounds, that they are
more than content with any crumbs
they are thrown, and insist
that everyone else also should be. Most rescuers and others who posit
themselves as purported leaders of "the animal community" don't want
to rock the boat with the pounds,
they are unwilling to challenge
the pounds, fearing that they will lose whatever relationship they think
they
have with the pounds. Meanwhile, the pounds can easily
manipulate the majority of the “humane
community” into continuing
to accept killing as usual. The “humane community” largely has NO IDEA
what
actually goes on in the pounds. They simply listen to the
propaganda and believe it, as they have always
done, and they
regurgitate it to the public and the press, which simply perpetuates the
misinformation, and
continues the complacency about killing—the
animals continue to be killed, and no one knows, no one
cares.
Things do SEEM to be better in the pounds, and yet they
are NOT, the pounds simply artfully continue to
spruce up their
image. If the pounds are killing fewer animals, it is only because they
have fewer animals to
kill. Until there is the shift to ZERO
killing, the solution where KILLING IS NOT AN OPTION, there will never be
any significant progress within the pound system. As long as they
have a license to kill, the pounds will
keep killing any animals
they can procure. And all efforts on the part of the pounds will continue
to be
focused and concentrated on PROCURING ANIMALS TO KILL, AND
THEN KILLING THEM. Insanity is defined as
doing the same thing
over and over again, and expecting different results. Permitting the
pounds to keep
rounding up, imprisoning, and killing animals, has
ALWAYS resulted in the pounds continuing to round up,
imprison,
and kill the animals, and it will always continue to do so.
It is
only when a total END TO THE KILLING is demanded and put in force in the
pounds, that the pounds are
forced to reverse their vector, to
completely reverse the direction in which they are going. It is only WHEN
KILLING IS NO LONGER AN OPTION, that the pounds will seek and
implement PLACEMENT OF ANIMALS, and
function as a halfway house
for animals into good homes. Until this fundamental change is put into
place,
THE STOPPING OF THE KILLING, the pounds will continue to
be nothing but KILLING MACHINES, that is what
they have always
been, and will continue to be, UNTIL THEY ARE NO LONGER PERMITTED TO
KILL.
It’s really not rocket science, honest! There’s nothing
complex about it—stop the killing, and get the animals
adopted.
Unfortunately, there are endless attempts to complicate the “problem”,
presenting it as
unsolvable, as too big to be addressed, various
and endless excuses and reasons presented why the
pounds “have
to” continue to kill, and that maybe they can “phase out” the killing at
some point years from
now, while keeping everyone focused on
nothing but spay/neuter, and demanding NO CHANGE from the
pounds.
That’s all rubbish! It is all just a resistance to doing the right thing,
to stopping the killing. The
problem is the killing, and the
solution is to stop the killing, it couldn’t be simpler.
It is time
to come out of the barbarianism of allowing institutions to mass murder
cuddly furry loving
companion animals, as well as all other
animals, hiding behind excuses, hiding their actions, hiding the
animals. DO NOT BE FOOLED!!! There are many empty promises by
politicians and management in the
pounds, who are basically just
spin doctors whose real job is nothing more than damage control for the
image of the pound, promoting it as a “rescue” and their
activities as “saving lives”. They use all kinds of
rhetoric that
sounds progressive and promising, the “reducing the killing” jargon, but
it is all simply a mask
to disguise the fact that the killing
continues, with no end in sight, needlessly, cruelly. The animals need the
COMPLETE END TO KILLING by the pounds NOW, nothing less will
benefit them.
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