Nigel, Lost Iditarod Dog, Found Alive; Musher Learns Nothing

by Stephanie Ernst · 2009-03-14 12:42:00 UTC
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Nigel has been found alive. Unfortunately, his "caregiver" has learned nothing from his becoming lost in the wilderness and what very easily could have been his death. I'd hoped this would be some kind of eye-opener for her. No such luck. She is still considering entering the race again. And incredibly, she reports that she feels bad for the dogs that they didn't get to continue to the finish (as if this would have meant anything to them at all).

While heartened by his return, the 58-year-old musher from Thompson, N.D., felt bad for her other 15 dogs.

“All that time and energy and training these dogs have gone through, and they don’t get to go to Nome,” she said, choking up. “Look what they’ve gone through to run that race.”

She could have been talking about herself. She has undergone rigorous training for several years with the Iditarod in mind. She and her dogs moved their training to Alaska in late October.

Wow. Major, major disconnect. Like other mushers, this one recognizes how much the dogs have gone through for and in this damn race, yet she fails to acknowledge that they didn't just "go through" it, but rather that she forced them through it. Continuing with the harrowing race and arriving at the finish line of the Iditarod would have meant nothing to these dogs; it would have meant something to her.

And as for this--"she could have been talking about herself"? She is talking about herself. Again, this isn't about any kind of joy or satisfaction the dogs would have received upon arriving at Nome. It's about the satisfaction she would have received and that other humans receive, at the dogs' expense.

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Photo by Iditarod pilot Phil Morgan

Stephanie Ernst wrote the original Animal Rights blog at Change.org until December 2009. She can now be found at Animal Rights & AntiOppression.
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