In response to my criticism of PETA for:
- Killing 9 out of 10 animals;
- Supporting the killing of all pit bulls in every shelter in America;
- Thanking a Mayor/City Council for killing healthy and friendly dogs because of the way they look;
- Rounding up and killing animals in the back of a van after promising to find them homes;
- Stealing Maya, a happy and healthy dog and killing her;
- Calling for the round up and killing of community cats;
- Rounding up and killing healthy kittens (here and here and here);
- Defending abusive pounds;
- Demonizing cats;
- Lying to acquire and kill animals;
- And more…
Ingrid Newkirk, the founder of PETA and the architect of the killing, responded. Sort, of as she was too cowardly to mention me by name. (She is also too cowardly to debate me openly having refused The Huffington Post‘s offer to host it live). She did not deny any of my allegations. She simply attacked the messenger. One of her criticisms was that I don’t rescue animals myself. Although I could say the same about her and PETA as rounding up animals to kill is not “rescue” (it’s abuse and violence); the truth is, my family and I have rescued plenty of animals. In fact, it is hard to come up with a type of animal we haven’t rescued. One summer, my wife and I even bottle fed 49 neonatal kittens as foster parents for the shelter I ran.
For those who do not know my history, I am not only a former criminal prosecutor known by my colleagues as the “Dog DA” for my forceful prosecution of animal cruelty cases, but I am also a former humane officer, Director of Operations for the most successful private shelter in the country, the director of what was then the most successful open admission No Kill shelter in the country and the first true No Kill community, and chief of animal control. Today, I am the Director of the No Kill Advocacy Center, focusing on shelter reform through direct assistance to shelters and rescuers, as well as political advocacy, litigation, and legislation. I have also written four books on animal sheltering, a vegan cookbook, a book of animal rights philosophy, and have produced a No Kill documentary. And as an attorney, I file lawsuits to protect animals and defend rescuers.
And while the No Kill Advocacy Center saves animals by advocating nationwide for shelter reform, my family is still very much engaged in hands-on animal rescue. At the Winograd house, it has been a constant stream of every kind of animal imaginable, including the standard (abandoned dogs, neonatal kittens, birds hit by cars, homeless rabbits, abused fish, and needy hamsters):
And the not so standard (snails with broken shells, stepped-on banana slugs, injured ducks, neonatal opossums, sick moles, thirsty and tired bees, and even lonely ants):
Our motto is that we never pass up an animal in need. And we never have. And unlike at PETA, the animals we rescue are guaranteed a new lease on life, not a fatal injection of poison.
As to the rest of Newkirk’s absurd allegations and evidence of PETA’s violence against animals, my response will be published later this month:
Stay tuned…
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