According to this Sports Illustrated article, Vick now plans to plead guilty only to interstate trafficing for dogfighting - not to gambling or killing dogs. The article has this from Vick’s father, Michael Boddie:
Yeah - after all, that thing with Pete Rose never attracted much attention, and MLB was pretty quick to let bygones be bygones, once things had quieted down.
What a coincidence- they got rid of the change that would most affect his football career, since he said he didn’t receive proceeds from the fights. And he also didn’t admit to killing any of the dogs who were electrocuted, hanged and so on in April. He said they died as a result of the group’s efforts and that he was aware of those efforts, but didn’t admit to doing the dirty work.
I don’t mean to hijack the thread and I can certainly start another, but can someone explain why dogfighting is a “bad” thing? I also read that the reason the dogs are killed as opposed to getting treatment is because veterinary clinics will alert authorities. Is this true?
- Honesty
You don’t see them arresting veterinarians who kill dogs on a weekly, if not daily, basis. It’s not the killing, it’s the cruelty. It’s quite legal for me to kill my dog, if I do it without causing unnecessary cruelty. The charges on which Vick has plead out are all based on acts deemed to be cruel - he’s not charged with “murdering dogs.”
Forcing dogs to fight for the amusement of spectators is generally considered cruel to the dogs, and this culture generally frowns on deliberate cruelty to animals, especially animals like dogs, who we tend to consider pets or companion animals, and have anthromorphized to an extent that we haven’t many other animals.
Marley23 I think that most people do, in fact, “care that much about cruelty.” Kids who torture animals are always acknowledged by our society to be fucked up, for instance. We have laws against animal cruelty, whereas we don’t have laws against hunting. (I guess the above already addressed this.) It’s kinda about the issue of dogs being beloved animals, and kinda not - I mean we have laws against cockfighting (I think - it’s looked down on, I at least know that) and cocks aren’t exactly beloved animals like dogs are. Animal cruelty is animal cruelty.
That’s part of it. Another part of it is that Vick is a multimillionaire athlete and he has no justification for being part of a fucked up, shady business like dogfighting when he’s already getting paid millions to throw around a ball. This whole story has just gotten me more and more pissed off.
But we have no trouble with setting cats on fire or ripping the wings off parrots?
It’s not just dogs.
No, it’s not, but dogs was what he was asking about. And I do think that there’s more of an uproar about this case than there would be if Vick was running a cockfighting ring, for instance. People do tend to have an emotional reaction to dogs that we don’t to a lot of other animals.
he’s involved with dog fighting where dogs tear each other apart. His intent is to watch this.
Everyone seems very concerned about the manner in which the dogs were killed (which was absolutely inexcusable) but for me the awful thing about dogfighting is not that they are tortured at the end of their lives, but that they are tortured and starved their entire lives up to and including the times of their deaths. Dogs aren’t normally naturally mean creatures. It takes a lot of being abused to bring out that behavior.
As to the hunting vs. dogfighting thing, of course there would be outrage if we bred deer and kept them locked in cages their whole lives, beating them regularly and starving them, only to actually torture them to death in the end.
Inbreeding is also a major technique: dogs with a certain psychosis are bred with siblings and parents in order to highlight that psychosis in their offspring.
I spoke with a dogfighter once (the term “dog man” is something that, IME, is used by dogfighters as a euphemism for their crimes) who described locking a puppy in a closet and then taking turns with his friends beating on the door of the closet and shouting. They took turns so they could do it for hours: the idea was to terrify the dog into insanity.
Dogs are drugged, fed gunpowder, left on treadmills for absurd lengths of time, beaten, chained ot tires to drag around the yard, and more. Neighborhood pets are kidnapped and thrown to the fighting dogs to train them to be “game”–that is, to attack and kill other small animals. When fighting dogs get loose, they look for other small animals to kill, which may be cats, dogs, or children.
Dogs owned by dogfighters live lives of utter misery. It is, in my opinion, an indefensible industry.
Daniel
All that behavior that you’ve described is abnormal for professional dogmen. It bespeaks more of idiot ghetto gangbangers really. Newsweek did a decent article on dogfighting recently, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19028969/site/newsweek/, from a law enforcement perspective, not a lying, ignorant animal rights extremist perspective. Vicks operation wasn’t professional, nor were his methods.
“Professional” merely means that someone is doing it for a living: it does not bespeak any level of ethics or decency. Professional dogfighters are every bit as gruesome as your “gangbangers.”
I think I’m becoming clearer on why you’re so hostile to HSUS.
Daniel
That article does not contradict what **Lefty **said. It gave little mention to training. Here’s one with a bit more detail.
Distinguishing between “professionals” and other dogfighters is inane
People with dogs as pets tend to understand how dogs behave when treated well as part of the family. They’re amazing really. That’s why when you hear about dogs being treated horribly and tortured and trained to kill (like the pair of pit bulls that killed that San Francisco attorney a few years back), and when dogs are tortured and suffer just so a particular “culture” can have “street cred and respect” and for the gore, it seems sick and psycopathic. Can you imagine hearing the screams of pain, pathetic wimpering and other horrors that take place that are not only ignored but encouraged and glorified? It’s more than bad judgement…it’s sick.
Correct, if this was Peyton Manning, no one would even care, he would still be playing and have all his endorsements and commercials, still host SNL, etc.
Vicks problem is the utter cruelty involved. If he were caught shooting one dog with a BB gun, he would still be playing and would get a slap on the wrist. To inflect unspeakable cruelty on dozens of creatures is the main problem. Hell, if he were into dogfighting but at least killed the dogs humanely, he’d be a lot better off in the eyes of the public- many greyhounds are killed once they can’t run anymore, but they probably aren’t drowned, electrocuted, hung, etc.
I don’t get the whole “Vick is in more trouble because he’s black” meme. When I first heard the story I had no idea who he was or that he is black. Hell, my football knowledge is so dated that I assumed that, as a quarterback, he’s probably white. I was appalled by the crime, not the criminal, and his intent has everything to do with my reaction.
No one would even care? The NFL would just give him a pass on gambling? Federal conspiracy charges? Electrocuting dogs? Why would you think that?