This sign on the front door of a pet shop is self-explanatory. I don’t know where the shop is but it probably does not matter as the problem will be similar anywhere, I suspect. It is a reminder as to the disposability of pet animals for a minority of people. Or is it a minority? What percentage of people do treat companion animals as disposable. More than you think I’d aver. There is a problem in the relationship between humankind and animals. It is still wrong notwithstanding that there is a huge number of great people who care deeply about animal welfare.
The Covid-19 pandemic supports the concept of disposability. There’s been a surge in dog adoptions, particularly of inherently unhealth dogs such as the French bulldog. The adopters are first timers. They are unexperienced.
They don’t care much or at all that their chosen dog has built-in health problems because of the way they have been bred. They just want an attractive dog because they are lonely or bored during a lockdown. It is poor attitude to have before adopting. It increases the chances of giving up the dog months later. And they give them up online, for sale, as they have spent a fortune buying the animal at inflated prices due to market forces.
The bunny poster mirrors the policies of some rescue centres in the USA, which don’t allow adoptions of black cats at Halloween. You can immediately tell why: the cats are liable to be abused by people celebrating Halloween. They want the real thing, the witches’ familiar. There are enough people who have to compunction about abusing cats for their amusement in the world to force adoption centres to take action.
