PETA

[AnimalAvenger]

VDACS Shelter Murder Totals:

2008
2007
2006
2005
2004


2009 stats (non-VDACS source)

Their defense:
blog.peta.org/archives/2009/03/why_we_euthaniz.php


MORE:

Vivisectors love PETA. While PETA claims to be against animal research, they championed a Pit Bull ban in Ontario, even though Ontario allows pound seizure. After 72 hours in a municipal pound, dogs are sold to any researcher from a registered research facility for $6. Its bad enough that PETA endorsed a Pit Bull ban in Ontario that causes people to surrender their animal companions under the threat of arrest. But now these family pets are being sold to laboratories for animal experimentation.

www.nathanwinograd.com/?p=1199

[Black Dove]

Thanks for posting this. It really makes you see what horrible people live in this world, and definitely makes PETA okay with me.

[AnimalAvenger]

They are also not against any sort of breed-specific legislation and actually seem as if they are for it.

blog.peta.org/archives/2009/07/petas_position.php

To clarify PETA's position on pit bulls: We're for 'em.

By "for 'em," I mean that we are for pit bull protection, for their happiness, and for treating them like dogs instead of like cheap burglar alarms, punching bags, or gladiators in perverted death matches.

Some pit bull fanciers out there seem to think that PETA is "against" pit bulls because we don't oppose breed-specific measures to address what is obviously a breed-specific crisis. Au contraire. If someone proposed a ban on breeding Labrador retrievers or Chihuahuas or poodles (you get the picture―any dog), we'd be for those too. That's because we don't think any dogs should be brought into the world as long as millions are dying for lack of homes in animal shelters and on the streets every year.

Millions, people. Millions of dogs just like the ones you share your homes with have to be euthanized because too many people fail to spay and neuter their animals and choose to buy from breeders and pet stores instead of saving lives by adopting from animal shelters. Wouldn't we be derelict in our duty if we didn't support laws that would alleviate suffering and reduce those numbers? If those laws saved just one animal from suffering a miserable life or a painful death, wouldn't they be worth it?

Pit bulls are often singled out by legislators because they are involved in so many attacks on humans and other dogs—as well as horrific cruelty cases. Our fieldworkers know firsthand just how frequently and mercilessly pit bulls are abused. These dogs are hands-down the most common victims of heartbreaking abuse and severe neglect that our caseworkers encounter.

I'm going to warn you—the following pictures, which were taken by our caseworkers of pit bulls they have helped, are graphic and disturbing. But I hope you'll steel yourself to look at them and decide for yourself whether or not these suffering dogs would have been better off if they had never been born:

Rest: blog.peta.org/archives/2009/07/petas_position.php

[AnimalAvenger]

Here is something they posted on SocialVibe on their euthanasia problem:

PETA is on the front lines in the battle to help unwanted dogs and cats. Our caseworkers work tirelessly to rescue homeless animals from environmental dangers and situations of cruelty and neglect (http://www.HelpingAnimals.com/about_cap.asp). Our staff members crawl through sewers, poke around junkyards, climb trees, and dodge traffic in order to reach animals in danger. During floods and storms, we are out saving animals’ lives at all hours.

Some of the animals who are rescued by PETA are lost companions; we are always happy to return such animals to their homes. PETA does not operate an animal shelter, but we do foster many healthy homeless animals (often in our own homes) or take them to animal shelters to await adoption. The reality is that thousands of adoptable animals are euthanized every day in animal shelters and veterinary offices across America because of a lack of good homes.

Because most people take healthy, adoptable animals directly to local animal shelters, the majority of animals who come to PETA are extremely sick or seriously injured. For these animals, euthanasia is, without a doubt, the most humane option. To learn about one such case—involving Asia, a local dog who suffered terribly at the hands of her owners—please see www.HelpingAnimals.com/f-asiasstory.asp. On another occasion, when an explosion from a power-line transformer burned a flock of starlings, PETA was the only agency to come to the birds’ aid. If our trained technicians had not been ready to end these starlings’ misery, the injured birds would have suffered for days before finally succumbing to a painful death.

In addition, PETA provides free euthanasia services for people who have very sick, critically injured, or geriatric companions but can’t afford to take them to a veterinarian. One family—lacking money for vet care and transportation—turned to us for help for their cat, who had barely crawled back home after being mauled by a pack of dogs. We were able to give the cat a peaceful end to her intense pain.

PETA also began offering our services to pounds in North Carolina in 2000 after we were contacted by a police officer who was distressed by conditions at a county pound. When PETA steps in to properly euthanize animals—at no cost to participating animal shelters—our involvement prevents animals from being shot to death with a .22 caliber firearm, gassed to death in a rusty metal box, or injected with a paralyzing agent that causes slow suffocation without loss of consciousness. Compassionate euthanasia prevents animals from suffering for weeks on end because of disease, illness, or worse. We know from bitter experience that for homeless animals—even those in some animal shelters—there is such a thing as a fate worse than death. To learn more about the conditions that led to our involvement in these North Carolina counties and about some of the many improvements that we’ve been able to make, please visit www.HelpingAnimals.com/f-nc.asp.

Some well-intentioned people might argue that the solution to the overflow of unwanted animals is to open sanctuaries. But the sad reality is that the math just doesn’t add up. There is not enough money available to us or to anyone to build enough sanctuaries or organize enough animal-adoption programs to keep up with the number of unwanted animals—particularly those animals deemed “undesirable” because of their infirmities, age, or behavior. Abandoning domesticated animals to fend for themselves would be irresponsible, of course, but keeping them in cages or pens for a lifetime is no more humane for homeless dogs and cats than it is for animals in laboratories or circuses. To learn more about “no-kill” sanctuaries, please see www.PETA.org/campaigns/ar-nokillshelters.asp and www.PETA.org/feat/acgas/index1.asp.

Putting all our resources into kenneling unwanted animals would also do nothing to stop the flow of more and more homeless dogs and cats. Preventing the source of the problem—the birth of unwanted animals—is where money and efforts need to go. PETA runs two mobile spay-and-neuter clinics in Virginia and North Carolina at least six days a week. The clinics conduct much of their work in disadvantaged neighborhoods, where we offer no-cost to low-cost sterilization surgeries and other services such as flea and tick treatments, vaccinations, and deworming. We sterilize thousands of dogs and cats each year, including feral animals. Since starting our first mobile clinic in 2001, we have sterilized more than 57,000 animals, including almost 8,700 in 2009 alone.

We hope you understand that it is heart-wrenching for those of us at PETA and at animal shelters across the country who care deeply for animals to have to hold these animals in our arms and take their lives because there is nowhere for them to go. Those who truly seek to make a difference for animals understand that it is necessary to do the right thing—even when it’s unpleasant—rather than supporting false “solutions” simply because they make us feel less uncomfortable. PETA has always spoken openly about euthanasia on our Web site and in our publications, and—although we understand that it is upsetting to think about—euthanasia will continue to be necessary in this imperfect world until people take action though spaying and neutering to prevent dogs and cats from bringing new litters into the world. For more thoughts on PETA and euthanasia, please go to blog.peta2.com/2009/03/why_we_euthanize.html and blog.peta2.com/2009/05/peta_and_euthanasia_part_ii_wa.html .

We hope that this message has shed some light on our work. To read more about what PETA is doing for companion animals and how you can help, please visit www.HelpingAnimals.com .

Thanks again for writing and for sharing your compassion for animals.

-Jason with peta2

www.socialvibe.com/#/discuss/3/93/128452

www.socialvibe.com/#/discuss/3/93/128452

[AnimalAvenger]

Also just found this:

blog.peta.org/archives/2009/03/why_we_euthaniz.php
blog.peta.org/archives/2009/05/peta_and_euthan.php
blog.peta.org/archives/2010/02/will_you_nip.php
blog.peta.org/archives/2010/02/placing_the_blame.php