Animal lovers should stop sending money to zealots

I took a beating in the letters-to-the-editor pages a few weeks ago for pointing out the threat national-scale animal rights groups pose to the sports of hunting and fishing.

Now I’m turning the other cheek.

Readers shouldn’t assume that the published letters were the only reaction.

Nor should they think the threat these groups pose is limited to hunters and anglers.

The published letters came mostly from one group of Spokane-area animal rights activists and Wayne Pacelle, the national figurehead for the Humane Society of the United States.

But many phone calls and e-mails called for more scrutiny of these groups and the moral fascism they are trying to impose on society’s use and enjoyment of animals.

One veterinarian pointed out that these groups are clawing their way through legal and legislative channels toward giving pets individual rights rather than leaving them designated as the property of their owners.

The vet said that, among other problems, this would have huge repercussions in the costs of veterinary care and liability.

“Can you imagine the costs of routine pet procedures if we have to run unnecessary tests and insure ourselves for protection against possible multimillion-dollar lawsuits?” he said.

One e-mail came from a woman who works with a small-town animal welfare organization that does the dirty work of caring for the epidemic of lost, abused or unwanted pets. She thanked me for pointing out that these local nonprofit animal rescue groups – including the local Humane Societies that have no connection with the Humane Society of the United States – are always scrapping for money to do their work.

“I used to donate (to HSUS), years ago, but all the money seemed to go to mailings with another free key chain and a request for more money,” she wrote. “I was never sure that my donation was helping homeless animals.

“I now only donate locally, like to the Spokane Humane Society, or to our organization, where 100 percent of funds are spent on vet care.”

This woman, the veterinarian and others asked not to be identified because they didn’t want to endure the crap animal rights groups like to dish out to dissenters.

Speaking out publicly can start a smear campaign and financial burden for a pet care professional or local animal charity.

A story in Tuesday’s paper detailed how the HSUS, PETA and other animal rights zealots are trying to prevent the use of animals in veterinary training and biomedical research.

Medical and veterinary students cannot learn the complexities of hemorrhage on a computer model. Period.

Scientists who are trying to find cures for diseases and test surgical procedures and devices are having their lives threatened by the moral fascists.

“I’d rather see (animals) euthanized than go to a research facility,” said Minnesota Animal Rights Coalition president Charlotte Cozzetto.

These are the nuts who are draining millions of dollars from the checking accounts of little old ladies and others in the uninformed masses who think they are saving puppies and kittens.

But in most cases, these national groups donate little or nothing back to the actual care and welfare of those unwanted animals that are euthanized by the hundreds of thousands every year.

Pacelle smugly wrote The Spokesman-Review to charge me with misinforming the public about the ramifications of his recent testimony before the Supreme Court. He said the case had nothing to do with possibly making hunters and anglers criminals for being filmed or photographed with their quarry.

What he failed to say was that it was Justices Scalia, Sotomayor and others in the Supreme Court chambers who were making that association, not this lowly scribe in Spokane.

He also failed to acknowledge the numbers I shared with readers from the HSUS tax forms showing that more than half of the $4.8 million the group raised in one year for its feeble facade of creating wildlife sanctuaries goes back into mailing and propaganda.

This is the huge difference between sportsmen-supported wildlife conservation groups and national animal zealot groups.

When you write a check to Ducks Unlimited, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation or The Nature Conservancy, the money goes into preserving habitat for wildlife survival and human quality of life.

A check written to HSUS largely supports moral fascism.

These zealots must constantly squeal about animal atrocities, because to be reasonable and effective would curtail the heavy flow of cash into their pockets.

Contact Rich Landers at 509 459-5508 or richl@spokesman.com.