What’s this about the PETA people wanting to ban slip collars for dogs?
Here’s PETA’s line on choke collars and buckle collars.
http://www.peta-online.org/g4/pubs/at/298/leash.html
They recommend a harness instead, but I would take anything PETA says with a grain of salt.
Amen to that, TNT. Remember, this is the same group that wants the Green Bay Packers to rename themselves. They are offended that one of America’s favorite football teams is named after the meat packing industry. What name would PETA prefer? The Green Bay Six-Packers. Unfortunately, I am not joking. Fortunately, the Packers told PETA where they can shove their six-packs.
HEre is a quote from Ingrid Newkirk, a co-founder of PETA. “The dog and the cat must disappear from the concrete jungles…If people want toys, they should buy inanimate objects…If they need companionship, they should seek it with their own kind. One day we will put an end to the breeding of dogs and cats”.
Most people following the AR movement have no clue that their hidden agenda is to do away with companion animals. They swallow the lines that the AR leaders feed them. Such as a choke collar causing distress and pain.
Folks, I am a dog trainer and have been training dogs for more than 40 years. Any training tool, improperly used, has the potential to cause harm. That includes buckle collars, head halters (talk about whiplash!!!) and harnesses, which an awful lot of dogs walk out of. In my 40 years experience there has never been any damage to any dog that I have trained. That’s thousands of dogs. My students are taught that the collar is not a restraining device, but a signalling device. The collar is only tightened momentarilly and within a very short period of time the dog is walking on a loose leash. Once the dog is trained, it doesn’t matter what kind of collar it wears or doesn’t wear. It will stay at the owner’s side without pulling.
The scary thing is that governments are buying this nonsense. The Federal government is, even now, entertaining comments on distress in dogs and whether the choke collar should be banned. In the city of Little Rock, language making the use of choke collars illegal, except during actual training, is now before the City Board as a part of a proposed new ordinance.
The AR groups are uninterested in Animal Welfare. In fact, they say that Animal Welfare gets in the way of Animal Rights. Those of you who are enjoying the companionship of pets need to be aware that the AR groups are very wealthy, they are very patient, and they are slowly closing the noose that will take our pets from us. Mandatory spay/neuter, the Boulder “guardianship” instead of the word “owner” – look beyond the surface to what is really there. It’s damned scary.
They can have my cat when they pry him from my cold, dead, hands. 
Actually, though, I think you’re taking it just a little too far. Every movement has its fanatics and its moderates; you shouldn’t judge the group just from the writings of their fringe wing. I’m sure there are plenty of PETA members who think having a pet is tantamount to slavery, but I highly doubt the rank-and-file members want to take away your border collie.
Oh, and I have yet to see a “mandatory” spay/neuter law that doesn’t allow people to pay a licensing fee for any pets they don’t wish to fix. Every day, thousands of animal shelters kill cats and dogs because they simply don’t have the money to take care of every animal that gets dumped on them.
Is it just me, or is there a General Question asked and answered here? I mean, it’s not like there is a shortage of anti-PETA threads elsewhere on this message board or a terrible software error that prevents members from opening a new thread in, say, Great Debates or the Pit. Is there?
Count me in that crowd. I imagine the only thing people in this country would fight harder for than keeping their guns is keeping their pets. What good is hunting without a good hunting dog at your side?
PETA is an organization that at one time had a decent message and then made the mistake of buying into their own propaganda too much. Now their mostly a bunch of loonies.
I’m all for protecting animals from people who want to set them on fire and telling cosmetic companies that spraying perfume in the eyes of bunnies is a no-no but I’m still going home at night and eating my steak and throwing my dog the bone (that is, of course, if I had a dog…I’m not sure what my cats would do with a steak bone…probably ignore it).
Did PETA ever ask the animals what THEY want? I have no doubt my pets consider me as THEIR pet and are quite content with a guaranteed food supply and a roof over their head. Did dogs and cats lose something on the way to domestication? Almost certainly. Did they gain something as well? You betcha! Why starve for three days and then run your ass off to catch a measly mouse for dinner when there’s cans of the stuff in the cupboard (maybe not canned mouse but you know what I mean). I’d lay money down…ALL of my money…that if you could ask my pets if they wished to be ‘free’ or stay with me they’d choose to stay assuming they fully understood just what being ‘free’ entailed.
Some American Indian tribe (I forget which) had a great myth about the dog. I’m paraphrasing but it basically goes like this (sorry about the male centric language but that’s how this stuff was written back then):
Even ancient people respected and revered the dog. They’ve been our comanions for eons and the dog seems content with the arrangement. In short, the dog CHOSE to be with humans. You don’t see Tigers or Wombats in people’s living rooms and believe me, if Tigers wanted to be cool and hang with people they WOULD have ended up as pets as well (tell me you wouldn’t LOVE to have a TRULY tame Siberian Tiger as a house pet…never mind the size of the litter box you’d have to keep!).
Nature has many symbiotic relationships and while this may not fit the strict definition of ‘symbiotic’ I think the spirit of the term can be implied here.
As for cats I don’t know. I think they were inflicted on us by the Clams from Scientology. But that’s just a WAG on my part…
:: Sigh :: Apparently there is. Off to GD.
I am a PETA supporter (financially), and a former card-carrying member. I am an animal-rights supporter.
I have pets. Most animal-rights people I know have pets. I love my cats.
I will always have pets. I feel that, having performed centuries of domestication on dogs and cats, we are responsible for them and have an ethical obligation to treat them well.
Do not assume that a few outspoken schmucks speak for all animal-rights supporters any more than you would assume that Jerry Falwell speaks for all Christians, damnit.
End transmission.
Yeah, I mean, I’m sure my cats would be better off outside, instead of having the full run of the house, eating leftovers, sleeping in our beds, having special places made for them when it’s cold.
My oldest cat is sixteen years old, and she’s blind and deaf. You cannot tell me she would be better off on the streets. My cats and my dog are so spoiled it simply isn’t funny. I mean, they’re total spoiled brats. It’s disgusting.
PETA= we can’t eat meat, we can’t test medicines on animals, we can’t own pets, we can’t wear leather. They are basicly anti-human.
I hear you Guinastasia. My cat, Gollum, is nine years old now, but he would be four years gone had he been out in the wild. I have to give him insulin injections twice daily to control his diabetes.
When Gollum became sick, the vet diagnosed the trouble and told me what would have to be done to regulate his blood sugar (basically a 10-day stay with many tests for sugar and ketone levels in his bloodstream as they adjusted his insulin levels) and that it would cost around $500. Then he asked me whether I wanted to go ahead and do this.
My immediate reaction was one of shock, but of course he had to ask because a lot of peoplewould say, “No, it’s time to put him to sleep.” To me, it would be like taking one of my kids to the doctor and saying “That liver transplant is too expensive, I think we’ll just put her down.” There’s just no way I would willingly let him die, especially over something so trivial as money. However, I have come across a lot of people who were surprised that I would shell out $500 or pay for insulin. After all, he is “just” a cat. (I always think, “Yeah, well between you and him, guess which one I’d pull out of a burning building first?”) He may be “just” a cat, but he has been my constant companion for years, and I expect that his passing will be one of the most painful things I will ever deal with, more so than the deaths of 99.9% of the people I have met in this world.
The PETA fringe is convinced that they are acting out of true altruism, yet they seem to me to be as misguided as those who have a callous disdain for animals. Anybody who tries to take Gollum from me is going to end up with their protest signs inserted painfully in their nether regions.
somewhat of a highjack, but responding to the person with the 9 year old diabetic cat— hah! my kitty was 14 years old when 80$ worth of tests confirmed she had a thyroid condition, my options were : glow in the dark kitty (quarenteen chemo treatment) - figured she wouldn’t last through that, pills twice a day forever, or a $500 operation. We did the $500 operation. Then, 6 months later and another $80 worth of tests, choices were : glow in the dark kitty or pills twice a day forever. we did pills for the next 5 years. People wondered why I did this “She’s lived a long life” blah blah. well, she had another 5 years left as it turned out. so there.
re: Peta. Sympathize with animal conditions. Believe that they should be treated “humanely”. Don’t like fur coats, won’t paint some one who wears one. Like chicken/burger etc, and ummmmmm crab, but, some of that might be I’m too lazy to figure out a good vegetarian lifestyle. Don’t really believe the conspiracy/hidden agenda thing, since most folks seem to lack the capacity for much planning ahead - but then, I don’t believe in the Jewish/bank conspiracy, black helicopters, Roswell, Radical right conspiracy either. Santa Claus, on the other hand, I KNOW is real…
I just want to jump in here and say that I am a foster parent for the Brittany and Springer Spaniel Rescue of the Rockies. I save animals and find tehm good homes. I am not a member of PETA because of their fringe elements and because saving the life of an animal does more to relieve suffering than changing every reference to “owners” to “guardian’s” in Boulder’s laws.
Oh, and I agree 100% that the collar is just a communication device (except for on young Brittanies 
) It is tough to teach a dog to heel on a harness. And a well controlled dog is safer for everyone than one that is ill trained.
But I do support harnesses for some PETA members.
The only way I would put an animal to sleep is if he or she were in so much pain and suffering, that it wouldn’t be fair to let him or her live, even with treatment.
Like, if I had a cat that the only option was constant chemo, and the cat would be miserable, I would do the humane thing and have her put to sleep…but ONLY if she was in major pain.
Sometimes, it hurts watching my cat, because she’s so skinny, and she used to be so fat and active, and now she’s going bald in patches, and you can SEE her ribs practically, but we just keep her cozy and warm.
According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, cats were originally domesticated in ancient Egypt and the Fertile Crescent to protect granaries from vermin. Apparently cats would hang around the granaries because there were plenty of yummy rats and mice to eat, and people noticed the obvious benefit and did what they could to encourage cats to stay. But dogs have definitely been hangin’ with us hairless apes much longer than cats.
I agree with you, but something struck me when I read this quote : that was the way alot of Southerners felt about their slaves.
Now I’m done stirring up trouble. ===zoom!
The resemblance is very superficial. The slaves were human. Animals aren’t. Those who can’t tell the difference have something very seriously wrong with them.
Nope, but that’s why I am not a member of Falwell’s church. There are plenty of animal rights organizations that do not support such radical views. If I gave money to Falwell, (despite the fact that we have about 1 thing in common), you could justifyably say I am supporting his reactionary policies. Thus since you support Peta, you support their radical agenda. Try the Humane society, nicer folks, and only a BIT radical. No terrorism, anyway.
I have trained all of my dogs with a training collar (choke chain sounds horrible, and that may be part of the problem).
We have Newfoundlands, and any PETA person who would like to try and walk one on a harness can be my guest. Properly harnessed, one of these dogs can tow a Volkswagen. To train a dog to heel, you must get his attention, and that usually means his head. Correctly used, a training collar sits high on the neck just behind the ears. A short tug STRAIGHT UP on the collar lets the dog know what you want. Also, a correctly worn training collar will release immediately- many people don’t put them on right, and they stay tight around the dog’s neck.
A training collar should not be the dog’s primary collar. It should be worn while training or walking only, to avoid rare injuries like getting one end caught in between the planks of a picnic table (swear to God).
Our dogs have a life that some humans will only dream about, and I don’t mind one bit. Given a choice, just about any dog (including yours) would live at my sister-in-law’s house, where dogs rule and people drool.