"who Killed These Dogs?"

[Red Fox]

http://www.dogstarda...lled-these-dogs

A picture and the subsequent conversation on Facebook has compelled me to write this blog post. The conversation is about a picture making the internet rounds. It is a picture of four dead dogs lying on the floor of a shelter truck. At the top right of the picture are the words, "If you breed or buy, you are responsible for this."

I cannot express how offended I feel about this message. I also feel embarrassed because not long ago I was on the "Don't breed or buy while shelter animals die," bandwagon. Why? Because it's easy to blame breeders and non-shelter-adopting dog owners for the problem of pet homelessness and euthanasia. It's easy to imagine that pet homelessness would be solved if there were simply more homes for pets. It isn't true, but it's easy. Just as easy as it to pretend that human homelessness is about not having a home.

The victim in this kind of campaign is the innocent, perhaps ignorant, average person who loves dogs. The person who has done nothing wrong but is suddenly saddled with the challenge of solving a problem that they didn't cause, don't understand and really cannot fix.

The relinquishment of pets has several causes, but none of them are a mystery. First and foremost is the failure of dog owners to educate themselves BEFORE they get a puppy (ring any bells?). If potential dog owners would do this one thing it would literally wipe out all of the other causes of pet homelessness as we know it and save thousands of lives. It is seriously, truly, honestly that simple.

If this happened the puppy mills would go out of business quickly because the now savvy, educated market would no longer be interested in their product. If this happened veterinarians who suggested keeping puppies at home until they are 16 weeks of age would go out of business for giving out-dated advice. If this happened even those dogs who might become homeless would be quickly snatched up because they would be house trained, well-mannered, friendly and have good bite inhibition. If this happened dog trainers would be busier than they've ever been conducting puppy classes and teaching students how to participate in all the sports and activities they wanted to do with their friendly, well-behaved dogs.

But this isn't happening. So those of us working in rescue are faced with a constant barrage of untrained, ill-mannered and sometimes downright dangerous dogs who are unwanted and unadoptable. We know they didn't start out this way and we know they didn't have to end this way. On a daily basis we are faced with punishing the innocent dog with death while the guilty parties who created this mess walk away. We can't help but think that someone, besides this dog, must pay.

We think, and rightly so, that it is unfair that this dog was created only to be destroyed by no fault of his own. We blame the breeder. It's not a wrongful placing of blame. That is until we stretch it out to include all breeders. We lump them all together. The professional breeder, the backyard breeder, the accidental breeder, the puppy mills and the pet stores that sell their wares. Once that group is rounded up we can put all the people who buy from them in one category, too. All the same, all to blame.

With each newly relinquished, returned or euthanized dog our anger and resentment grows. We start to resent dog owners in general and tell ourselves that this whole problem exists because people are just stupid. They don't know what they're doing. They don't care. They cannot be trusted. They are not like us. It is us against them, except that they are the only ones who can save us. Now there's a recipe for resentment.

And this is when our rescue minds really bend the wrong way. Faced with yet another dog who will probably die due to circumstances beyond his control we decide to twist, mangle and distort reality. We decide that since we can't see a way to educate the public, we will find a way to throw their mistakes back at them. The dog is the victim here, so we advocate for him. The more damaged he is, the harder we fight for him. We sugar-coat his behavioral problems and minimize the danger. We prey on the emotions of the public, sell them a bill of goods and convince ourselves that if anything bad happens it is because people are so stupid. After all, there are no bad dogs, just bad owners, right?

So here we are. We're angry, hurt, helpless and have resorted to less than honest tactics in order to save every dog we can. We hate the public for causing this mess and we're posting pictures of dead dogs on Facebook to let them know just how angry we are.

Meanwhile, a dog-loving person who knows nothing about any of this walks into the shelter…what now?

How about some honesty? Here's what I want the dog owning public to know.

If you are at the shelter to drop off your untrained, ill-mannered, people biting, dog aggressive dog because you can't or don't want to deal with him anymore, I want you to know that you are responsible for what your dog is now and everything that happens to him from here on out. I am saying that as a matter of fact, not as an accusation.

Ignorance does not relieve you of responsibility. We do not hold people unaccountable if they shake a baby simply because they claim they didn't know it would cause damage or death. It is your responsibility to know these things.

At some point we have to stop allowing people off the hook for not knowing that keeping their puppy inside for four months could cause serious behavioral problems. Dog owners who are surprised that their dog grew bigger and failed to train himself must be held accountable for not preparing themselves.

If you're going to get a dog it is your responsibility to know how to care for it and to call on professionals when you need help. If you find that you didn't prepare properly and therefore things are turning out badly, you shouldn't be allowed to dump your mistakes on the community, shrug your shoulders and say, "Well, I didn't know."

If you are at the shelter looking to adopt a dog, I want you to know that you are not responsible for the fearful, reactive, hard to deal with but heartbreaking dog who is up for adoption. If that dog ends up being euthanized it is not on your hands. Nor is it on the hands of the shelter that euthanized it. It is the original owner, whoever they acquired the dog from that is responsible for where that dog is now.

If you adopt an aggressive, fearful or otherwise damaged dog without understanding what that means for your future as a dog owner, you have been duped by the rescue/shelter because you walked in there uneducated and not knowing what you wanted. No different than what happens every day on used car lots. Buyer beware and be educated! Many people have a mechanic look over a car before they buy it. More people should have a trainer look over dog before they adopt it.

Speaking of which, let's not leave the training profession out of all of this. We are also guilty of placing blame on the average pet dog owners. We complain about their lack of education without remembering that it is our job to educate them. We concern ourselves more with dog friendliness than with people friendliness while lamenting the fact that owners don't seek us out.

If you are a trainer who is so focused on animals that you haven't bothered to develop fantastic communication skills with people, because after all you don't really like people that much anyway and you believe that dogs are suffering because people are just stupid and don't want to learn, then you have a hand in all this.

EVERY person who comes to a trainer is an opportunity to save dogs' lives. The macho jerk who thinks it's stupid to give the dog a treat for peeing outside is your opportunity to make a difference. He is going to tell all of his macho jerk friends about it. The woman who is taking advice from both you and the neighborhood pseudo-trainer is an opportunity to make a difference. Show them both why your information is better.

And every person you see or talk to who either has a puppy or knows someone who has a puppy is literally a dying body in front of you waiting for CPR. If you don't know how to use your charm, wit and expertise to chat up those people and make them want to listen to you then you have more dog trainer training to do! The dog training profession is absolutely, positively a people business.

And when we see propaganda like the picture that started this thread, we have an obligation to every one of those dogs who have died to speak up and tell the truth. It was hard for me. Not here, but elsewhere. I felt like a bitch stirring up trouble. But you know what? Tomorrow I go back to work at the shelter and dogs will be dropped off by uneducated owners, dogs will die, dogs will be adopted, dogs will be assessed, and dogs will be trained. The people who landed those dogs in a shelter will not feel responsible, while the people who didn't will cry.

Am I angry? You bet. Do I think the anger is justified? Absolutely. But if we want solutions we have to channel that anger and attack the problem where it will make a difference. I love it when a great dog finds a great home, but I'm not naïve enough to believe that an adoption, or even a thousand adoptions, is going to stop dogs from dying. Puppy classes will. Educating kids will. Educating the puppy buying market will. Pictures of dead dogs won't.

[Cheyd]

Very interesting, it is all about education, the earlier we educate the better choices are made

Thank yu for posting

[Leema]

And, an interesting read: The Rebuttal

http://btoellner.typepad.com/kcdogblog/2012/04/on-assessing-blame-vs-focusing-on-solutions.html

On assessing blame vs focusing on solutions

Earlier this week, there was an interesting post on Dog Star Daily entitled "Who Killed these Dogs?" The premise of the post was debunking the old mantra of "If you breed or buy, you are responsible for this" -- along with a picture of dead animals that were killed at a local animal shelter due to 'pet overpopulation'.

First of all, I will admit that I agree with the author, that the old mantra is tired and not accurate. However, I disagree with many of her other assertions -- and worse, think in an effort to assess blame created such a bad image of shelter pets that she is making the problem worse, rather than better.

The author goes on to blame several causes:

1) Failure of dog owners to educate themselves before they get a puppy

2) Veterinarians who tell owners to keep puppies at home until they're 16 weeks of age that cause pups to be poorly socialized

3) Dog trainers for not emphasizing the importance of puppy training and actively educate dog owers they see.

She then notes:

So those of us working in rescue are faced with a constant barrage of untrained, ill-mannered and sometimes downright dangerous dogs who are unwanted and unadoptable. We know they didn’t start out this way and we know they didn’t have to end this way. On a daily basis we are faced with punishing the innocent dog with death while the guilty parties who created this mess walk away. We can’t help but think that someone, besides this dog, must pay.

We think, and rightly so, that it is unfair that this dog was created only to be destroyed by no fault of his own. We blame the breeder......With each newly relinquished, returned or euthanized dog our anger and resentment grows. We start to resent dog owners in general and tell ourselves that this whole problem exists because people are just stupid. They don’t know what they’re doing. They don’t care. They cannot be trusted. They are not like us.

Now, there is a lot in these couple of paragraphs that I think give you an idea of the 'flavor" for the article and I think encompasses a whole lot of what I find to be wrong with it.

First off, let's make no mistake, for a dog to end up euthanized in a shelter, a whole host of things have to fail: whoever sells (or adopts) a dog has failed to educate the dog owner, the dog owner has failed to educate themselves, the dog owner has failed to put an identifyer on the dog so it can be brough back home, and probably most importantly, the shelter where the dog ended up failed to find it a new home.

Regardless of everything we do; education, training classes, etc, dogs will find their way to a shelter -- and shelters have a responsibility to find homes for those animals if they are able to be rehomed (Most are). Often, I feel like because of the resentment toward the dog owners the author describes, I think many shelters/rescuers fail to find as many homes for dogs as they could because they lose the trust in the public, they shun the public, and it is the public who is mostly likely to help them through the adoption process.

Here's the truth: there are 78 million owned dogs in this country. Each year, only about 4 million find their way into a shelter at all. That means about 95% of dog owners are actually doing right by their dog every year. There is little reason for such massive distrust in the public.

But here's another issue I have with the article: since when did every dog that ends up in a shelter become untrained, ill-mannered and/or downright dangerous?

While it's true that shelters see dangerous, ill mannered and untrained dogs -- the majority are just simply lost and unable to be reunited with their owners. And many of the ill-mannered and untrained are completely able to be rehabbed with a fairly small amount of training work on the part of the shelter or rescue. And isn't this our job as rescuers to provide the dog the resources it needs to be rehomed?

I'm deeply disturbed by someone who claims to be involved in rescue to paint such a bleak picture of shelter dogs. Here's her quip:

If you adopt an aggressive, fearful or otherwise damaged dog without understanding what that means for your future as a dog owner, you have been duped by the rescue/shelter because you walked in there uneducated and not knowing what you wanted. No different than what happens every day on used car lots. Buyer beware and be educated!

From my experience, the majority of the dogs we see in rescue and at the shelter are gentle, loving pets. Or sure, some are high-energy and need to burn off a little steam due to the stress (and lack of exercise) that comes from shelter life -- but nothing like the image painted by the author. Meanwhile, I'm also disturbed that such a focus would be on the proper training of puppies when most homes would actually benefit from starting out with an older dog so they can avoid the struggles of handling puppies or adolescent dogs (which are far more work than most adult dogs). Or, that more shelters/rescues can't sell the value of pet dogs -- and that the vast majority of people don't need purebred dogs -- of course that might be difficult if the rescuer shares the same image of shelter dogs as damaged goods.

So, if we want to solve the problem of dogs dying in our shelters, we must put the focus on solutions that will work.

-- Yes, educating dog owners on proper channels for getting a dog would help (and this does include when and why buying a specific breed puppy makes sense -- and it does for some people)

-- Yes, providing training classes and proper dog training will help

-- And yes, blaming people who indiscriminately breed will also help

-- But more importantly, it means understanding that there are many catch points in the process -- and the final catch point is at the shelter. And it is the shelter and rescue community's responsibility to help find homes for the dogs that make their way to the shelter. It means not treating these dogs as "damaged goods", but giving them the proper training they need to be rehomed, or doing a better job of marketing these dogs so people realize what great pets most shelter animals can (and will) become. It also means not deamonizing "the public" -- most of who are responsible -- because of the actions of a small percentage of them. And it means not becoming resentful of this public that is also the same group that you will hope will come to adopt a dog from your shelter.

Unfortunately, I believe this author does more harm than good in her quest to lay blame, and casts a very innaccurately bleak picture of shelter dogs in the process.

[Dame Aussie]

People are more educated than ever and yet our behaviour is worse than ever IMO.

After 4 years of working in a shelter and watching idiots dump their dogs on a daily basis and then seeing those dogs die, I honestly believe its a lost cause.

[Little Gifts]

I've worked in child protection for many years. The cases of abuse continue to grow and the severity and length of some of the abuse is hard to imagine. I firmly believe people know right from wrong but still there is an element of society that simply doesn't care about anyone but themselves. They justify their behaviour with a myriad of excuses. Everything and anyone around them seems to have no value.

Education and reminders are always important but the percentage of people this will affect and change the behaviours of is small compared to those that simply don't give a toss about the acceptable way to treat animals, children, spouses, the elderly, etc, etc, etc.

I honestly don't know how you change that.

[tdierikx]

Quite frankly the ills of society are myriad - and the dumping of dogs is but the tip of the iceberg. As noted by PS, there is an element of society that simply don't care about anyone (or anything) but themselves... and all of the stupid PC laws we have aren't helping anyone to become accountable for their own actions at any level.

I look back at my own childhood and remember that there were consequences for stupid or antisocial behaviours - we got disciplined when we misbehaved, and it was often that we were told that we were wrong about something or that we failed a test at school. We didn't automatically have "rights" until we earned them... and when we did earn them, we had to understand the responsibilities that came with those rights as well.

Nowadays it's all about having "rights", but not having any responsibility... and it's always too easy to place blame anywhere else but with our own stupidity or ignorance. How often do we hear that someone's antisocial behaviour is due to having a poor upbringing or rough childhood? It's just not good enough IMHO...

T.

[aussielover]

I think the quality of shelters/pounds resources and abilities varies greatly.

I volunteered at a pound where if a dog didn't try to bite you it was basically rehomable. There was no formal behavioural assessment, and skilled though some rangers and pound staff are, they just don't have the time to conduct proper temperament testing, which in itself is only a guide and many dogs can behave differently in a scary/unfamiliar environment like the pound.

The majority of shelter dogs are rehomable, to the right home, sometimes these homes are hard to come by. I don't think people should be made to feel responsible or guilty for the ones that aren't rehomable or if they cannot provide the right type of home. I think that was the point of the first article which the author of the second article doesn't seem to have grasped.

[SpotTheDog]

People are more educated than ever and yet our behaviour is worse than ever IMO.

After 4 years of working in a shelter and watching idiots dump their dogs on a daily basis and then seeing those dogs die, I honestly believe its a lost cause.

I think it's because we fluff the definition of 'education'. Education isn't simply the supply of information. It has to be about making people think. It has to be an education with a message that makes people use their own brain.

If the simple supply of information were sufficient to influence behaviour, we would all recycle, turn off the lights when we leave the room, put the air con at 24 degrees or higher, not let the tap run when we brush our teeth, pick up dog crap when it happens, buy only free range poultry products, so on.

In the modern world we're bombarded with more information in our lives than ever before - I heard a random stat recently that said children today are inundated with more info by age 12 than their grandparents were in their entire lives.

The provision of information is useless unless it's done in a way to trigger a response - make the recipient think, and they'll change their own behaviour. You may have to keep reminding them to think because they'll lose energy and drive in keeping up the change, but they have to think for themselves or everything you say falls on deaf ears.

[Odin-Genie]

Do we have any statistics on how many dogs in the pounds and shelters have been bred by registered breeders? When I go to pound websites I see very few pure bred dogs. If we could get such statistics, it could be very easy to debunk the mindset that those who 'breed or buy' are responsible for the deaths of pound dogs.

[raineth]

Do we have any statistics on how many dogs in the pounds and shelters have been bred by registered breeders? When I go to pound websites I see very few pure bred dogs. If we could get such statistics, it could be very easy to debunk the mindset that those who 'breed or buy' are responsible for the deaths of pound dogs.

Yes but the argument is that because you have chosen to buy your dog, a shelter dog will die because you didn't offer it a home instead.

I think the better argument would be that buying a pedigree dog is one way of responsibly owning a dog because you are able to select a dog who will suit your lifestyle (i.e. because its traits are predictable).

I think it's a good article

[Crisovar]

From the ANKC website

2009 Breeders and Litters

In 2009 it was estimated that the dog population in Australia was 3.41 million (TNS & BIS Shrapnel).

It is estimated that 10% need to be replaced annually which indicates a demand for 341,000 puppies per year.

In 2009 ANKC Ltd Breeders registered 66,588 puppies, so to provide the estimated number required approx.

274,412 were bred by people outside our organisation who have no accountability for health or welfare.

In 2009, 4,869 ANKC Ltd Breeders produced 8,642 litters, 3,393 (70%) only had one litter.

[ANKC Ltd figures sourced from ANKC Ltd Member Body gazettes]