Hi,
I apologise for the length of this post and hope you will bear with me and read through. Following the lack of response to a post made by Dyan in the advocacy section I thought I would try posting it in one of the busier forums. The recent death of puppies from Hunte Corp in a truck fire has once again raised, albeit briefly, the issues of puppy mills.
This is a hugely profitable industry, one that cannot be shut down overnight. However those of who frequent such forums and profess to love dogs as much as we do, should really be the ones getting involved. Considering the response a poster got for mentioning that her dog was bought from a pet store recently feelings are obviously strong about this. But it is time to do more than just criticize, rightly perhaps, individuals. I know people are busy, have lives and none of us can commit to a fulltime involvement in something like this. However consider this – how many of us are in dog clubs, regularly go to the vets, frequent dog parks, and so on. The potential for informing people about this is huge. Similarly how many are involved in their school PTA for example – why cant flyers be posted on a school community noticeboard ?
What I am suggesting is that we try and get organized and involved as a forum, there are dozens of dog and cat forums on the web with tens of thousands of members. If even a small proportion of those were to get involved that means thousands of people. Simple ideas like getting people to write regularly to the media, to talk shows about this, writing to political representatives (an email a week does nt take up too much time does it?). Pfizzer for example is a major backer of Hunte – why cant a list of their competitors products be drawn up and circulated, write and tell them we wont be using their services anymore, Hunte also makes additional dog products – write to stores that carry them and say am sorry but we will not use your shop again. Flood Pfizzer with calls, emails and letters. A couple of politicians said they were going to tackle the puppy mills, write to them expressing support and say it is an issue you would base your vote on, put up flyers in your kids schools. Write to those politicians in states who have not taken action, write to travel agents and holiday companies who advertise trips to the Amish country – which is involved hugely in the puppy mill industry. Boycott Pfizzer. Hand out flyers and letters at your dog park, or dog club, get in touch with animal rights groups.
There are things that can be done. We could get involved with groups who have already made a start on puppy mills and ask what we can do, what they advise. An hour a week is not impossible to spare – writing emails, asking a few friends to sign a petition, and so on. And much of what could be done can be done in our daily routines – be it the dog clubs we go to, the trainers we use, work and so on. Can you imagine how many people could be informed if your dog trainer was willing to hand out a flyer with all the info on this issue to their students. It could n#%92t hurt to ask them.
What we need are a few people who are willing to get involved and make a start. I have some extra time at the moment, and am more than willing to make a start on this. Is anybody else? All we have to do for example is say person A is responsible for contacting certain forums with the ideas we have, person B can draw up a list of groups already involved in this, person C can email pharma companies saying we want to boycott Pfizzer and need a list of alternative products (and yes that would get back to Pfizzer which is also the point) and so on. Get the ball rolling as it were. This needs to be sustained though, otherwise we will be saying oh how terrible these puppy mills are in 10 years – the media covered all of this in 2000 and people were angry and outraged, but interest fades.
This is nt easy – Hunte for example gets loans from the US Department of Agriculture, that#%92s right your tax dollars for our American members are helping keep these puppy mills in business. Why are nt pet owners sending a thousand angry emails a week to them? But by the way public pressure forced Woof & Co to close, this is not an impossible task but it takes time and serious effort.
Again I apologise for how long this was but I really hope people will respond to this. As I searched the web for info on puppy mills and Hunte Corp I was stunned by just how big this industry is and how many people are involved, many of them public figures and companies. I was outraged too, but then had to ask myself what use was my outrage if I did absolutely nothing with it. If those of us who are so involved with dogs don't get involved who else will?
Sergio