“Octomom” Promotes Sterilization—For Animals

[Confederate Kahanist]

http://www.care2.com/causes/animal-welfare/blog/-octomom-promotes-sterilization-for-animals/



Nadya Suleman, the “Octomom,” who gave birth to eight babies last year, bringing her total number of children to 14, likely isn’t the first person you think of when it comes to responsible birth control, but she has agreed to place an ad reading, “Don’t let your dog or cat become an “octomom”—always spay or neuter: PETA,” on her front lawn.

When PETA staff members heard that Suleman was facing foreclosure on her La Habra, California home, they cam up with a clever idea to promote animal birth control: PETA offered Suleman a single payment of $5,000 and a month's supply of veggie burgers and veggie dogs to help feed her supersized family in exchange for displaying the ad on her property. 

My co-workers knew that the media wouldn’t be able to resist the irony--and they were right. So far, the ad has run (for free) in dozens of media outlets and blogs, including CNN, USA Today, NBC, the New York Post, AOL News, and E! Online, reaching millions of people with a lifesaving spay-and-neuter message.

PETA often attempts to make deals of this nature, urging individuals, communities, schools, or businesses to promote attention-grabbing, animal-friendly messages in exchange for free vegan food or other things that may be of special interest to them. Not surprisingly, the offers are often ignored--by the recipients, not the media! Perhaps Suleman was able to relate to the plight of millions of homeless animals across the country.

Regardless of her motivation for accepting the offer—and everyone’s opinions about her, which I’m betting aren’t favorable—I have to say, it wasn’t a bad deal for PETA—especially now that “kitten season” is starting.

Spaying and neutering is crucial to ending animal overpopulation. As I mentioned in a previous post about euthanasia, between six and eight million animals enter U.S. shelters every year. Half of them must be euthanized. That means that, even with three to four million animals finding loving new homes—or being reunited with their guardians—there are still not enough homes for millions of other animals. (And, of course, rescue workers who take in mostly unsocialized, sick, and/or abused animals have an even lower percentage of adoptions than those attempting to find homes for healthy, friendly puppies and kittens.)

Eight million a year is more than enough. Until “professional” breeders stop breeding and animal guardians stop allowing their dogs or cats to have “just one litter,” there will be way more homeless animals than anyone can care for. In a satiric way, and for her own reasons, the “Octomom” is at least helping to spread the word about spaying and neutering.

[Rubystars]

I don't like PETA but as far as the Octomom saying this, hey anything that gets pet owners to spay and neuter their animals and discourages the high level of unecessary breeding that's going on now has to be good.

[IsraelForever]

When your uterus has a concierge, you know you've had too many kids!

[Dr. Dan]

Actually according to judaism, you're not supposed to do that to animals. All animals are unclean and should live in the outdoors. To keep them from properly mating and multiplying goes against Gd.

Now, for me personally, I'm not sure if I understand this rule because what if certain pet populations rise too high?

[Rubystars]

Dr. Dan, the fact is people keep animals as pets, and unfortunately there are not enough homes for all of them. It's cruelty not to spay and neuter as long as so many animals are suffering and dying in animal shelters and on the streets.

I'll tell you a little bit about what I personally witnessed. Blackie, a feral cat (very wild) came up into my front yard one day with her kitten Smokepaw, which had a deformed head. She probably had 5 kittens to begin with, but that was the only one that had survived. The others in the litter probably either starved or had something else horrible happen to them. Blackie was extremely, extremely thin with ribs sticking out, and I got the impression her baby had been deformed because she hadn't gotten enough nutrition while she was pregnant (although I can't know that for sure).

Since I love animals I set out food for her and her baby, and they started to look healthier and filled out. Then one day her baby Smokepaw got half-crushed by a car in front of my home. Blackie had dragged her half-crushed baby onto the sidewalk and laid down next to her, while Smokepaw was literally screaming, and half of her body looked dead and stiff and the other half had an eye that was bugging out monstrously. Smokepaw was crying pitifully out of half of her mouth. That kitten ended up having to be put out of its misery because it was dying an extremely painful death. It was a scene out of a horrible nightmare all because someone didn't spay Blackie or Blackie's mom. I wish that had been the end of it but there were more deaths later of  4 out of 5 of Blackie's next litter and two of the babies of her friend Whitenose that died.

This year, that stuff isn't going to happen to their babies. It's kitten season, and they're spayed, and now they can be cats, and they won't have babies just for them to die horrible deaths.