Fundraising for Animals by Endangering and Killing Animals: Take Action

The Humane Society of Missouri (HSMO) is an animal welfare organization. That's not a criticism--just a point I'm conceding. But unlike many local or regional humane societies, HSMO is not solely a dog and cat (and other small companion animal) organization, nor are farmed animal issues something they have to deal with only rarely and temporarily. Rather, HSMO runs a full-time operation, about an hour's drive from St. Louis, caring for rescued farmed animals: horses, pigs, cows, chickens, ducks, sheep, goats, and more live at Longmeadow Rescue Ranch (including the sweet steer whose photo, as a young calf, readers used to see as my profile photo here and which now appears above). And once again, in an act of frustrating disconnect, HSMO is selling out these very animals for money.

HSMO is not a terrible organization. Indeed, the last time I mentioned them here, it was positive--in reference to their role taking care of 400 of the 450-500 pit bulls seized in the recent news-making dogfighting bust (a task with which they still need help, by the way)--but the organization has repeatedly made other decisions that are inexcusable for an entity whose mission is supposed to be the protection of animals. And it is the event about which I (as well as everyone else on their mailing list) received an e-mail last night that has finally prompted this post and campaign:

In August, as a fundraiser for the rescue ranch and its animal residents, the Humane Society of Missouri is hosting a polo match and barbecue dinner. The HSMO is teaming up with, I presume, some wealthy donors and polo groups to raise money specifically for horses, pigs, cows, chickens, and other farmed animals--by exploiting and endangering other horses and by selling the sauced and cooked bodies of other cows at least, if not also pigs and chickens. I wish I were kidding.

First, let's talk BBQ (which will be included via buffet in the $75 upper-level "VIP" ticket): Although it aggravates and dismays non-cherry-picking animal advocates when dog-and-cat organizations host events and fundraisers that are centered around serving the dead bodies of other animals who are no different from dogs and cats, that's a common experience and one that doesn't often surprise. It's not acceptable, but it's not surprising. Similarly, HSMO's practice of teaming up with Sea World for its annual Bark in the Park to benefit dogs is disturbing and needs to stop, given how the exploited Sea World animals suffer, but again, not terribly surprising. But selling the barbecued bodies of cows or pigs or chickens who were confined, mutilated, traumatized, quite possibly beaten, and ultimately slaughtered horrifically--and thereby funding that treatment and slaughter--to raise money for the care of rescued cows, pigs, and chickens? It doesn't matter that HSMO and Longmeadow Rescue Ranch are welfare, not rights, organizations. This is fundamentally wrong.

And then there are the horses. And I find this display of cognitive dissonance even more surprising, given that horses--in society, in Missouri, and arguably within HSMO--are generally accorded more consideration than the farmed animals most people wrongly view as walking food. Longmeadow is and has been home to many neglected and abused horses, no shortage of whom have been discarded, neglected, and even sent to slaughter after those who use them for entertainment lose interest in them or don't find them profitable anymore, or after the animal is injured. But HSMO and Longmeadow continue to celebrate--and raise money via--the very industries, practices, and view of horses that ensure Longmeadow and other organizations will never have a shortage of horses to rescue.

Indeed, just over a year ago, my jaw dropped upon receiving an invitation from HSMO to a Grand Prix fundraising event for Longmeadow, where guests were encouraged to donate $60-70 in order to feast on a buffet (presumably of animals), or $200 for a tailgate spot, while watching riders endanger the horses via jumping and other events. Only two years prior, HSMO had been involved in a dramatic, grisly rescue of 25 horses and 1 hinny (and the recovery or euthanasia of 16 additional horses) when a trailer full of them, on its way to a Chicago slaughterhouse, crashed near St. Louis--including horses who'd been sold for slaughter after being bred and used by the racing and show industries. The story made news all over the nation and brought attention to what happens to horses after they disappear from the racing spotlight or fail to bring in the money, in various entertainment venues (including racing, riding shows, and so on), that their breeders and "owners" hoped for. Some of those horses still reside at Longmeadow.

Horses bred and used for racing, for show, and for other entertainment and "sport," including polo, are regularly injured in the events in which they are forced to perform. They are also neglected and killed, and because of the way they are bred, used, and discarded by these industries, there is an ever-growing need for safe sanctuaries for them, and there aren't nearly enough places able to take them as it is, as HSMO knows. Yet HSMO is celebrating and perpetuating the very practices that treat horses like profit machines that can be endangered and repeatedly injured while in use and then neglected, shot, or otherwise disregarded as soon as they stop being useful.

The Humane Society of Missouri needs to make a change. It cannot continue seriously presenting itself as a broad animal protection organization while raising money by exploiting and killing animals. It cannot save one horse, one cow, one pig, one chicken and then endanger and kill countless more of those same animals to raise money for the care of the few rescued. It is nonsensical. It is wrong.

Please join me in respectfully asking the Humane Society of Missouri to make a change, to revise its plans for this August fundraiser to not include the polo match and to commit to making the meals and the entertainment at this and all future events truly animal-friendly--in other words, serving healthy, tasty vegan meals, for which animals were not tortured and killed, at any events where food is offered (and this can be done quietly, with little fanfare); ending its support for, and fundraising via, the exploitation and endangerment of horses; and ending the partnership with Sea World (and parading of Sea World animals) at Bark in the Park.

I want to reiterate that I really believe there are many at HSMO and Longmeadow with big hearts and the best of intentions; that isn't in doubt. Most animal rights advocates themselves spend years doing and believing things that they later look back at and see as absurd and hypocritical, and no one should be vilified for practices they undertook before seeing those practices for what they are. HSMO has already taken the first step by creating and supporting Longmeadow Rescue Ranch in the first place, by acknowledging that these animals matter. It doesn't have to become an animal rights organization. It doesn't have to start actively advocating veganism itself. It doesn't have to make any bold public statements. But to be consistent with its own mission and values, it does need to take the next step and stop actively exploiting, endangering, and killing the very animals it is aiming to help. The Humane Society of Missouri already does good work. Now it is time to do better.

If you agree, please take action here.

Pictured above: Kelso, a Limousin calf (a "beef" breed) who was neglected and subsequently rescued, along with a stunning number of neglected, starving egg-farm hens, by Longmeadow Rescue Ranch in 2006.