How to do, "It's not about you?"

A friend of mine -- thanks, Marti! -- posted this. It's an interesting approach to the "it's not about you" neutering program I talked about a few notes ago. Will it work on the hardcore? No. Will it raise awareness amongst those who aren't even thinking about it? Yep, I think so. Good job.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG6dAnIMDys

See Foot. Shoot Foot. Foot hurt. No surprises.

Ran across another seemingly-intractable community-at-odds situation within the Greyhound world: the Grey2K anti-racing organization and the Rescue community.

Grey2K is the relative newcomer in this world. Had they sought out a focal point to relate to the existing legal industry, they might have garnered some agree-to-disagree street creds. But it appears to me that they've blown it by demonizing the scads of GOOD folks and trainers and fans and owners in the larger Greyhound world. Not sure how they can come back from where they are now.

Well, actually, I do know how they could make a comeback from it. And how they could move toward building consensus. But based on what I've seen, the odds of the organization listening to good advice aren't high. Factual misstatements and deliberately misleading characterizations aren't a good way to persuade the undecided.

Now, in case you don't know this about me, let me just tell you up front that I've got six Greyhounds myself. A few retired racers and other assorted orthopedic cases, oops pups, and various bounce backs. I've had Greyhounds since 1998 and I love everything about 'em. Have even written a bunch of novels featuring them. Go check out dogbooks.org.

But as crazy about them as I am, I understand they're dogs, not furry little substitute children. I also understand that they love to run and that they're competitive about it by their very natures.

Grey2k proclaims: "Greyhounds are treated as simply property!"

Ah. Yes. Actually, that is the state of the law. Property laws apply.

But then again, we know how well this shrill PETA-style approach works. After all, that's why none of us eat meat anymore.

Oh. Wait.

Need some answers, folks. Not sure that Grey2K has 'em.

Spay/Neuter: it's not about you. Or is it?

I was working on my spay/neuter and community-building program the other day and ran smack-dab into an assumption I'd made -- or perhaps just an issue I hadn't thought out thoroughly.

We talk about spay/neuter as a single issue. But is it, really? Are you certain? More importantly, is it one issue as it relates to building community? That's important, because from community comes consensus.

For most of us in shelter, rescue or adoption guarantee programs (let's just call this Rescue), spay and neuter are the same issue. The differences are in the medical issues.

But outside Rescue, there's difference in initial reactions to spay and neuter and there's also a difference in the way that men and women react to them. Note -- this is anecdotal data and needs further validation.

Women tend to think about spay and neuter in the same way. If they're strongly opposed to one, they're strongly opposed to the other. If they're neutral on one, they're neutral on the other.

Not so with men. They tend to be more opposed to neuter than to spaying. How many time have you seen a guy wince when you talk about neutering his male dog?

So -- IF this is true, as politically incorrect as it might be, what does that say about our approach to building community? Seems to me that we've got some serious reframing work to do in terms of humans personalizing the issue of removing testicles. Too much identification.

Neutering -- it's not about you.

But at the same time, isn't it a failure of empathy -- or sympathy? -- that allows humans to abuse and neglect animals in other ways? And the cure for that is developing the empathy or sympathy, just the opposite in a way of what we much accomplish in regards spay/neuter.

How do we reconcile those two faces of personalization?

As my friend Jer DuFresne says: the conversation continues with you.