Thursday, May 7, 2009

Treats on the Internets, Round Deux

More links to writings on the 2009 No Kill Conference:

It's a Wonderful World - Nathan Winograd

An Amazing Success - The No Kill Nation

Regarding the Keynote Address - No Kill Revolution

No Kill Sheltering Workshop - No Kill Revolution

What Cats Need and Want - Pet Connection

Other bits for your reading pleasure:

Two great pieces on how the "breed ambassador" Pitbull program has turned into another excuse for killing Pitbulls in shelters: One by The No Kill Nation and the other by Nathan Winograd.

Major increase in mailmen being bitten by dogs in SC

TN shelter has another Pitbull stolen

It costs $16,000 a year to keep this police dog on the force, and budget cuts loom

Opinion piece responding to rationales used by dogfighters

7 comments:

EmilyS said...

wow, those comments on Pit Bull Ambassador programs are.... harsh. Not saying they're inaccurate, but it's certainly a different perspective from the "aren't we wonderful for having a pit bull ambassador program" stuff you usually read.

YesBiscuit! said...

I'm glad to see this push for change. Whenever I read the HSUS quote about how there are so many Pitbulls being killed in shelters already, we should only adopt out the very best ones and not worry about saving bust dogs (me paraphrasing), it blows my mind. To me, it's absolutely the same as "We kill so many Pitbulls, we must kill more" which, when you word it like that, sounds idiotic.

EmilyS said...

well, HSUS is teh suck of course.

But I have the impression that MOST pit bull rescuers believe that since they can't save them all, they should only save (or at least only adopt out) the very very best. One bad incident involving a pit bull from rescue tars them all, and so forth.

YesBiscuit! said...

Didn't mean to lump HSUS in with actual Pitbull rescuers (although hope springs eternal?) but I agree, the "ambassador" idea seems common to me too. It's a trap because it sounds like a good piece of common sense on the surface and most rescues are working beyond reasonable limits already so the idea of taking only a few good ones seems doubly appealing in that respect. But it's a justification for killing healthy, adoptable - albeit imperfect - dogs. In that sense, it's something rescuers and HSUS have in common: Don't take a chance, better off dead.

Katie said...

Thanks for those pit bull ambassador program links. Very interesting reading.

EmilyS said...

Shirley: I think you've articulated the dilemma exactly.

And yes, I have indeed read on many pit bull boards that it's better to kill a questionable pit bull than to take a chance.

Tangi Adopt A Rescue said...

Thank you for posting all these great links to more info about no-kill. The more people post about this the more people will start to believe that no-kill sheltering is possible and the closer we will be to it. Thank you!