It’s amazing the bits and pieces that can all eventually come together after a day or so of web surfing.
A comment on the Bad Rap Blog tipped me off to the fact that, while HSUS said “no thanks” to helping the suffering Pit Bulls of Oklahoma, they were right there when a recent North Carolina dog fighting bust went down. According to an article in the Wilkes Journal Patriot,
The 127 pit bulls were taken away with help of Charlotte-Mecklenburg Animal Control personnel with four vans. A tractor-trailer belonging to the Humane Society of the U.S. also was used to transport dogs.
On the HSUS website, a press release about the raid says
“The raid of this suspected dogfighting operation is the culmination of an extensive investigation, and dogfighters everywhere should worry that they could be next,” said Chris Schindler, deputy manager of animal fighting law enforcement for The Humane Society of the United States.
“We are grateful to the Wilkes County Sheriff’s Office and Wilkes County Animal Control department for acting quickly and efficiently against this suspected dogfighting operation.”
It is a felony to possess a dog for the purpose of dogfighting in North Carolina. Those involved in illegal dogfighting can receive four to 10 months in prison.
What I find most telling is what this press release (so full of praise for the work of Wilkes County officials) fails to reveal – that a successful prosecution will lead to the immediate death of every Pit Bull confiscated in the raid, puppies included.
He said the pit bulls were being kept as evidence at an undisclosed location until the completion of court proceedings in the case, with a goal of moving through court as rapidly as possible.
“If the state wins the case, the dogs will be euthanized, as called for under the county’s Animal Control Ordinance, based on the dogs being trained and used for fighting,” he said, adding that the dogs were therefore considered dangerous.
– Wilkes Journal Patriot
No condemnation of this policy is found on the HSUS website. On the contrary, this singular fact is conspicuously absent, although calls for more donations to help ‘end dog fighting’ abound. In fact, right next to the press release is a banner touting the HSUS’ $5,000 bounty for information on suspected dog fighting operations. Seeing it there, and knowing HSUS’ “Kill ’em all” policy on Pit Bulls, I couldn’t help but be reminded of the bounties some areas pay for the bodies of dead wolves. I can hardly think that a stance of ‘death to all fighting Pit Bulls’ is also conducive to convincing people to turn the dogs in – unless, of course, you plan to do your level best to prevent the general public from ever learning that the only Pit Bull HSUS cares for is a dead Pit Bull.
Of course, there’s also the distinct possibility that HSUS’ $5,000 bounty kill fee reward is actually a scam, as the author of this blog asserts.
I find it quite striking that when live Pit Bulls (by which I mean, Pit Bulls that were alive, and were going to remain alive) were involved, HSUS wanted no part of the situation – but when dead Pit Bulls (by which I mean, Pit Bulls that will be murdered killed euthanized as soon as the case is completed) were involved, HSUS could send transport trucks across the country. Apparently, while Pit Bulls can be quite useful tools for raising money, HSUS isn’t quite so keen on spending any of those funds to actually keep them alive.
Of course, as the recent cases taught us, the insistence of Wilkes County that the operators of Wildside Kennels should be actually found guilty in a court of law before the Pit Bulls are murdered slaughtered euthanised must be quite frustrating to HSUS. After all, why wait for a court decision? It certainly wasn’t necessary in the Pat Patrick case, where all of his dogs were put down before he’d even had his day in court – an action taken with the full support of HSUS, and their ‘dog fighting Czar’ John Goodwin. Blue Dog State does a phenomenal job of re capping the horrors of the Floyd Boudreaux and Pat Patrick cases – horrors not related to ‘dog fighting’, but to the needless extermination of dogs only suspected of being used or bred for fighting. As Blue Dog State points out, Boudreaux and Patrick both had their charges tossed out – but that didn’t save their dogs. To HSUS, the only tragedy in these cases is the fact that the court cases were lost, and not the needless deaths of literally hundreds of dogs, or the suspension of the rights for the accused to be innocent until found guilty (a grace we should be applying to their dogs, as well).
A recent comment by Jennifer of Adamant Bulldogs tipped me off to HSUS’ recent activities in San Luis Obispo County. Seems that the San Luis Obispo County shelter asked HSUS to come in and help them to overhaul their antiquated shelter system. Aside from the colossal waste of money that this whole fiasco involved (topping $22,ooo!), the recommendations included this sentence (emphasis mine):
The HSUS recommends that no dogs seized from dogfighting operations, even puppies, be placed for adoption or transferred to placement partners.
The full report can be downloaded here, and the specific section mentioned is section 9.9 . In the event that the report disappears, I’ve done a screen cap of the actual section. It just gets progressively stupider, the more you read.
This all cohered into a post for me when I was watching the Dogtown episode on the progress of the Vick Pit Bulls who are being offered sactuary at Best Friends. Aside from the fact that the HSUS was one of the “Animals Rights groups” who called for the murder extermination euthanization, there was the tidbit thrown out at the end of the show that “The Humane Society estimates one million Pit Bulls are euthanized every year”. Well, yes – at their recommendation, and if the HSUS had their way, that number would be even higher.
So, here we have HSUS, busily fund raising on the backs of fighting Pit Bulls with one hand, while calling out for their death with the other. Isn’t there a name for that kind of behaviour, over above the obvious one of ‘hypocrisy’?
As Gina always says, “Why is anyone still listening to PETA?“.
Can I now add my own?
“Why is anyone still giving money to HSUS?“.
decided that starting a column which basically begs people to send me stupid questions might not be such a good idea — the questions might need to be answered, but by a calmer person than me.