Peaceful sleep

I thought I'd weigh in on the PETA trial now that a verdict has been handed down. For those of you that haven't been following this case (or live in the peaceful bubble of reality TV or, thankfully, do not watch Fox News), two PETA employees were on trial in NC last week for animal cruelty, littering, and obtaining property on false pretenses. In short, the two employees were caught behind a Bertie County Piggly Wiggly dumping the bodies of animals they had picked up from vets and shelters and had euthanized in their PETA van. Pretty much, the employees were only found guilty of littering and have to pay a fine, pay restitution, and do community service.
Now, when I first heard the story, my honest first impression was sheer confusion. I was mortified because I always thought that PETA, sometimes too radically for my blood, but always with their unwavering save-the-furries ideology, was the one organization that would always stand up for animal rights. So I assumed that these were rogue employees, right?
Then I caught wind of the somewhat biased website, PETAkillsAnimals.com that was following the trial. When I found out that the PETA employees were following the directions of their employer, I was even more confused. And on the Dogster Blog, folks were chiming in with the "I knew PETA went too far" and "they're a bunch of hypocrites" and so on.
Being the "fair and balanced" journalist that I am, I did a little searching for PETA's statements on the matter. I found it odd that they really buried their statements on their website, since when taken alone, give very reasonable and sane accounts of why they work in NC, which is very close tho their Norfolk VA headquarters. They have a picture of the old Bertie County gas chamber in which the animals used to be gassed(when not just "shot with a .22"). But again, due to the lack of national media attention to the trial, they didn't feel a need to put this in their Media Response center. So a little part of me thinks they're trying to hide the fact that they're in the business of euthanizing puppies because it's not what their celebrity superstars would find glamorous. Not like Cruelty-Free wear at New York's Fashion Week, which is today's banner splash.
While reading about the trial, I found out that one of the puppies the employees put down was also named Toby. A lot of them have names. For me, the most distressing part of the melee is the political volley between PETA and the anti-PETA folks decrying the "terrorist" group. While the meat-packers and virulently anti-PETA folks paint the general picture of "hypocrite," and everyday folks latch on to the supposedly hypocrisy of killing puppies while "forcing" us to go without leather belts, Chik Filet, and animal-tested lipstick, the focus is on whether or not what the kids did is considered "animal cruelty" or not. I personally and unpopularly do not believe that it is. If indeed the shelters are overrun, and Bertie County does not have an adoption program, and the poor animals are being gassed or frozen in their outdoor dogruns, then the humane thing to do is indeed sadly euthanize them. I personally find it upsetting that anyone with a dog from a puppy farm or even a regular breeder would cast a first stone at those trying to control the pet population. That is the real hypocrisy.
My beef (no pun intended) is with the fact that the kids got off on the False Pretenses charge. It is apparent, at least to me, that many of the folks from whom they were picking the animals were assuming that the PETA van was coming to find the animals homes, not automatically euthanizing them and putting them in the Norfolk storage freezer (which is in fact what the stated procedure is). It's on the personal level where things break down (like when folks bring puppies to shelters when they can't handle them after convincing themselves that they will for sure be adopted by a better person before their time is up).
The policies should be clearly stated. People should realize that they are bringing an animal to a shelter to be put down, plain and simple. And PETA should train its employees to know that one can't just take animals from hospitals saying you are finding the animal a home. Perhaps they are so use to "liberating" animals from labs and circuses that they get confused about the propriety of taking animals from veterinarians, telling them that they have found Toby and Happy good homes, and secretly putting them down in a van because they think they know best.