Asshat Rant - Dog Fighting or "Activism"?

Found this little gem on Detnews.com (Detroit News). The article is called:

Police Bust Dog Fighting Ring on Detroit's East Side

The report was written first thing this morning. It is unfortunate that we see this so often in the news. You'd think that as a race, humans could grow above such things ... I started this posting as a News Reel, but it is making me think of a Rant ... please bear with me as I don't think I can contain myself on this one ... I see too many people blog about this and post the same thing ... over and over (how boring!?). Here's my take on the dog fighting situation:

We all saw the stories about Mike Vick, the NFL player who was caught running a dog fighting ring. Although ... perhaps I shouldn't assume that everyone knows about this guy ... for those of you who don't know, here's an article that explains what happened:

NFL Star Indicted Over Dog Fighting

We all know Mike Vick is an asshat - I'm not going to go into details on that. I would like to see them should shut down all the rings and send all people participating to jail to share a cell with an animal activist ... how do you think that would end up?

No matter how much I dislike Mike Vick for participating in the dog fighting ring, I don't agree with using him the way the media as well as charity organizations used him. He became a scapegoat ... these are some of the videos that were created after Mike Vick was Indicted ... "Dogs In the Kennel" ... "Michael Vick is Guilty" ... Neither of these videos has terrible footage so don't worry - some sad pictures and some snarly pics, but otherwise, no graphic stuff (I am trying to keep this clean!)

So, what's the point? My point is ... How many advertising dollars were spent by animal activism organizations for this ... "propaganda"? How much of that money could have been spent directly helping and assisting animals? How much time and energy was spent working on making youtube videos that could be spent doing better things - like charity work?? Charities are ALWAYS looking for people to help them out by donating time, resources and money.

I don't mean to ramble, but I want to ensure that my position is well explained, so bear with me.

Advertising about how terrible dog fighting is will not deterr the men and women who want to participate in it. It WILL, however, create fanatics and infuse hatred in the people who may otherwise have really wanted to help prevent this sort of thing.

Hate and fanaticism will not help those dogs - or any other dog affected by dog fighting. The only thing that will help them is support from the community and people like you and me to the charity organizations that shut these fighting rings down.

Thing is ... I don't know who is the bigger asshat. The guy who participates in the dog fighting ring ... or the guy who sits on his couch and complains about how terrible dog fighting is - but can't be bothered to get up off his duff and do something about it?? Is it the dog fighting guy or the one who calls himself an "activist" because he tells his friends how bad dog fighting is??

Stop dwelling over how terrible these people are because if you're not helping fix the problem than you are a part of the problem.

If you really want to help stop dog fighting rings, why not go to your local shelter and spend an hour volunteering after work today? If communities could get one hour per week of volunteer time from multiple people, than that is a big help.