ALERT: Group thinks Iditarod cruelties are inspirational for women

[Guest guest]

PLEASE CROSSPOST

 

From the Sled Dog Action Coalition, http://www.helpsleddogs.org

 

Wild Women Unite, a group that seeks to empower women, invited

Iditarod musher DeeDee Jonrowe to be a guest speaker at its

Wilderness Weekend, Sept. 16 to 19 in Pulaski, New York. In the 2002

Iditarod, Jonrowe's dog Mark died from a bleeding stomach ulcer.  On

the All About Animals Radio Show, Dr. Paula Kislak, President of the

Association of Veterinarians for Animal Rights, said that before

Mark's ulcer ruptured there would have been signs that an ulcer was

present. He would have showed " a lack of interest in food, more

vomiting than normal, discomfort in the abdominal area. "

 

Jonrowe has admitted having over 100 dogs chained on five foot

tethers in her kennel, sleeping on the sled while the dogs race and

breezing through checkpoints. When mushers blast through checkpoints,

the dogs do not get veterinary physical examinations.

 

Ask Yvonne Kopy and Annette Snedaker, the directors of Wild Women

Unite, to cancel Jonrowe's speech.

 

EMAILS: Yvonne, Annette

 

SAMPLE LETTER TO PERSONALIZE:

 

Dear Ms. Kopy and Ms. Snedaker:

 

I understand that Wild Women Unite invited Iditarod musher DeeDee

Jonrowe to speak at its Wild Women of the Wilderness Weekend. I hope

you will cancel her talk after reading the information I provide.

 

In the 2002 Iditarod, Jonrowe's dog Mark died from a bleeding ulcer.

In an interview on the All About Animals Radio Show, Dr. Paula

Kislak, President of the Association of Veterinarians for Animal

Rights, said that prior to Mark's ulcer rupturing there would have

been signs that an ulcer was present. He would have showed " a lack of

interest in food, more vomiting than normal, discomfort in the

abdominal area. "

 

Jonrowe has admitted to having over 100 dogs tethered on 5 foot

chains in her kennel, sleeping on her sled while the dogs race and

breezing through check points. When mushers blast through check

points, the dogs do not get veterinary physical examinations.

 

In the Iditarod, dogs are forced to run 1,150 miles, which is the

approximate distance between Binghamton and Tampa, Florida, over a

grueling terrain in 8 to15 days. Dog deaths and injuries are common

in the race. USA Today sports columnist Jon Saraceno called the

Iditarod " a travesty of grueling proportions " and " Ihurtadog. " Fox

sportscaster Jim Rome called it " I-killed-a-dog. " Orlando Sentinel

sports columnist George Diaz said the race is " a barbaric ritual "

and " an illegal sweatshop for dogs. " USA Today business columnist

Bruce Horovitz said the race is a " public-relations minefield. "

 

Please visit the Sled Dog Action Coalition (SDAC) website

http://www.helpsleddogs.org to see pictures, and for more

information. Be sure to read the quotes on

http://www.helpsleddogs.org/remarks.htm. All of the material on the

site is true and verifiable.

 

At least 122 dogs have died in the Iditarod. There is no official

count of dog deaths available for the race's early years. Causes of

death have also included strangulation in towlines, internal

hemorrhaging after being gouged by a sled, liver injury, heart

failure, and pneumonia. " Sudden death " and " external myopathy, " a

fatal condition in which a dog's muscles and organs deteriorate

during extreme or prolonged exercise, have also occurred.

 

In the 2001 Iditarod, a sick dog was sent to a prison to be cared for

by inmates and received no veterinary care. He was chained up in the

cold and died. Another dog died by suffocating on his own vomit. No

one knows how many dogs die in training or after the race each year.

 

On average, 54% of the dogs who start the race do not make it across

the finish line. According to a report published in the American

Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, of those who do

finish, 81% have lung damage.

 

Tom Classen, retired Air Force colonel and Alaskan resident for over

40 years, tells us that the dogs are beaten into submission:

 

" They've had the hell beaten out of them. " " You don't just whisper

into their ears, `OK, stand there until I tell you to run like the

devil.' They understand one thing: a beating. These dogs are beaten

into submission the same way elephants are trained for a circus. The

mushers will deny it. And you know what? They are all lying. " -USA

Today, March 3, 2000 in Jon Saraceno's column

 

Beatings and whippings are common. Jim Welch says in his book Speed

Mushing Manual, " I heard one highly respected [sled dog] driver once

state that " `Alaskans like the kind of dog they can beat

on.' " " Nagging a dog team is cruel and ineffective...A training

device such as a whip is not cruel at all but is effective. " " It is a

common training device in use among dog mushers...A whip is a very

humane training tool. "

 

Mushers believe in " culling " or killing unwanted dogs, including

puppies. Many dogs who are permanently disabled in the Iditarod, or

who are unwanted for any reason, are killed with a shot to the head,

dragged or clubbed to death. " On-going cruelty is the law of many dog

lots. Dogs are clubbed with baseball bats and if they don't pull are

dragged to death in harnesses..... " wrote Alaskan Mike Cranford in an

article for Alaska's Bush Blade Newspaper (March, 2000).

 

Jon Saraceno wrote in his March 3, 2000 column in USA Today, " He

[Colonel Tom Classen] confirmed dog beatings and far worse. Like

starving dogs to maintain their most advantageous racing weight.

Skinning them to make mittens. Or dragging them to their death. "

 

The Iditarod could not be legally held in most states because doing

so would violate animal cruelty laws. The California law's (§ 597)

description of a person who commits animal cruelty is typical: " Every

person who overdrives, overloads, drives when overloaded, overworks,

tortures, torments, deprives of necessary sustenance, drink, or

shelter, cruelly beats, mutilates, or cruelly kills any animal, or

causes or procures any animal to be so overdriven, overloaded, driven

when overloaded, overworked, tortured, tormented, deprived of

necessary sustenance, drink, shelter, or to be cruelly beaten,

mutilated, or cruelly killed...or otherwise uses the animal when

unfit for labor, is, for every such offense, guilty of a crime

punishable as a misdemeanor or as a felony or alternatively

punishable as a misdemeanor or a felony and by a fine of not more

than twenty thousand dollars ($20,000). "

 

The race has led to the proliferation of concentration-camp-like dog

kennels in which the dogs are treated very cruelly. Many kennels have

over 100 dogs and some have as many as 200. It is standard for the

dogs to spend their entire lives outside tethered to metal chains

that can be as short as four feet long. In 1997 the United States

Department of Agriculture determined that the tethering of dogs was

inhumane and not in the animals' best interests. The chaining of dogs

as a primary means of enclosure is prohibited in all cases where

federal law applies. A dog who is permanently tethered is forced to

urinate and defecate where he sleeps, which conflicts with his

natural instinct to eliminate away from his living area.

 

Iditarod dogs are unhappy prisoners with no chance of parole. Please

do not promote this barbaric race by having Jonrowe speak.

 

Sincerely,