Black animals and witchcraft

Meera:

The following item heading today's Houston SPCA Newsletter is disturbing:

Fall Friendzy
To warm your heart during the month of October, the Houston SPCA is lowering the normal adoption fee for all beautiful black dogs and all orange and black cats, 6 months and older, to half-off the normal adoption price.

I'm livid that HSPCA is making black animals more "affordable" close to Halloween, when other shelters take precautions to protect black (and also solid white) animals from freaks who would torture and sacrifice them in "satanic" rituals. In fact, some shelters discontinue black-animal adoptions before Halloween. Not even the myth-busting Snopes.com denies that instances of animal sacrifice increase in October. There are instances of Doberman, Rottweiler, and other "dark" dogs killed every year on Halloween.

How many will pay even a nominal fee for a sacrificial cat or dog when they can steal the neighbor's pet? Who knows, but a shelter should err on the side of caution. Efforts to align the number of adoptions to the growing volume of animals surrendered should not be at the expense of what litte a shelter can do to prevent more suffering for those who have suffered enough. The free-for-all Telethon is a foolhardy way to clean house. Increasingly, there are two-for-one days, deep-discounts, and most shocking of all black-animal specials (for Halloween!!) ... with no background checks! Do we offer animals any protection at all?

Regardless of whose idea it was to make black animals more affordable to creeps and sadists at this particular time, what amazes me is that the HSPCA staff en masse would not question authority and "negotiate" a postponement of a decision sure to cost some unfortunate animal a gruesome death.

Perhaps it is not too late to spare him or her if this order is reversed in view of ample documentation that it is contrary to all common sense.

Respectfully. -- Dolores