What Wayne Pacelle and Michael Vick Have in Common

You wouldn’t think that Wayne Pacelle and Michael Vick have much in common, but as I reflect on it, they have three things in common: 1) they both tried to make money off of the tortured and enslaved dogs at Bad Newz Kennels (Vick’s dog fighting operation), 2) they both tried to have those dogs killed (Vick did it with his own hands, Pacelle publicly called for their destruction), and 3) as of this week they both “work” for HSUS.

Is this troubling to anyone except me? The announcement that Michael Vick will be helping HSUS with an anti-dog fighting campaign could not have come at a better time for Vick who will be meeting with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell in the next few days (according to the Washington Post) to discuss his reinstatement into the NFL. Goodell has been very sensitive to the recent scandals, including Vick, to hit the NFL, and wants to be able to show, if reinstated that Vick is changed. HSUS will certainly help sell Vick’s case here.

I oppose Vick’s reinstatement into the NFL purely because I don’t think he’s sorry for anything except getting caught and I don’t think he should ever be a role model to anyone again. But in case you’re new to this story let me fill you in a little.

Michael Vick didn't just run a dog-fighting ring--he killed dogs with his own hands, devised horrible, slow deaths for dogs who lost in the ring, and by his own admission enjoyed throwing people's pets into the ring with fighting dogs and laughing while they were torn apart. Consider this and tell me if this man is capable of regretting any of his actions (except getting caught) or ever empathizing with anyone.

If you let that one sink in, consider this--if you don't believe he's sorry, or even capable of being sorry, what do you think that the inner-city youths he's supposedly going to reach out to are going to think? And if they don't believe that he's sincere or believes that they shouldn't fight dogs, what message are they going to take home from that? Do you think kids are too stupid to sense insincerity? I for one can distinctly remember in my own childhood completely dismissing messages that I later learned were true and actually valuable, simply because I could smell insincerity and condescension on the speakers. Kids can tell the difference between someone who is lying to benefit themselves and someone who sincerely wants to help them avoid the mistakes they made themselves.

I have to also wonder if there weren’t NFL players who love dogs and don't enjoy killing them in gruesome manners who could contribute to a PSA campaign or educational materials? Because there are a lot of people out there who love dogs and many of them do play professional sports.

But let me return to my original comparison—Pacelle tried to profit from the dogs, the victims in this story, and then he tried to kill them.

Mr. Pacelle has refused for two years now to respond to the allegations that he raised donations off of the Vick dogs, claiming that HSUS was physically caring for the dogs, even though none of that money went to care for the dogs. Pacelle has not apologized for stealing those donations and then advocating that the dogs all be killed. This did happen. It is a fact. It's very serious. And Wayne thinks he's above any accountability and will never respond. Many serious allegations about his conduct and the conduct of senior staff and managers at HSUS have been raised over the past few years and they will never answer any of those questions. They might respond by accusing those asking the questions of wrongdoing or by bragging about some other program they have, but they are incapable of giving a straightforward yes or no answer. And the refusal to give a straight answer should really tell us as much or more than the straight answer would have. Because if these things were false, I'd have to think, after they've been brought up over and over then someone with some authority from HSUS would have tried to put it to rest.

In deciding to work with Vick HSUS is being purposefully divisive. They cannot be unaware at how offensive this will be to all the people working in the trenches desperately trying to save abused, neglected, broken animals. But this is not the only time they’ve been divisive. HSUS took a public stand against the SHAC activists who (whether you agree with their methods or not) are doing hard prison time for website activities which anti-abortion activists use with complete impunity all of the time. Why does that matter? Because even though I was troubled by some aspects of the SHAC campaign I don’t think people should go to prison for doing things to help animals that are accepted in other causes. If nothing else how is an activist to navigate what is legal and what isn’t, when it is their desire to help animals which is outlawed, not necessarily how they do it.

HSUS won't oppose the AETA, even though it’s essentially a thought-police law (it outlaws the motives behind protests, not the methods used). In fact Mike Markarian has made statements in support of it and for the draconian sentences imposed through the AETA against SHAC activists. If you're having trouble following this it boils down to this, Pacelle and Markarian believe that the large sentences that SHAC activists (Lauren is serving 8 years right now) received are fair and just--for running a website, admittedly an extreme website, from which nobody was ever hurt. Maybe some fax machines got gummed up from all black faxes, but other than that I don’t think anything really bad happened. And HSUS is fine with the incredibly light sentence that Michael Vick got. And they want to work with Vick, but cannot work with anyone who advocates abolition or no-kill. For fuck's sake, that's just too extreme, but killing and fighting dogs is totally forgivable.

HSUS was also divisive in establishing their own conference TAFA as a rival to the long-established AR conferences. This might be fine if they were willing to welcome all views to the table, but instead they insure nobody (and I mean nobody, regardless of other views) can advocate an abolition platform there. So-called humane farmers who promote breeding, enslaving and slaughtering animals can speak there, but nobody for No-Kill, and nobody taking a hard vegan line. Then they turn around and call other activists divisive when we suddenly question what’s going on. It seems their definition of unity is to agree with whatever comes out of Wayne's mouth, and if we don’t we are suddenly the problem.

It seems we have some difficulty in this movement calling a spade a spade, and some of that stems from disagreement over what exactly a spade is, and the definition of the word is... Yes, I’m being sarcastic. We know what’s up, don’t we? We just don’t want to know.

This means some people are able to witness Pacelle lying and HSUS sending out fraudulent fundraising materials and are able to see HSUS embrace "humane farmers" (who still slaughter animals) at the TAFA conference but turn away fellow animal activists... Anyway, people are able to witness all of this and still insist that HSUS means well and they really want abolition (secretly, they're just saying the opposite to be all tricky) and they really want us all to be unified and hug and sing kumbaya together. So you see all the actions that add up to one conclusion and toss it out the window because "nah, it can't be that..."

Sometimes actions do tell a story. Sometimes the actions of a person or group reveal their motives and goals more than words do. Sometimes the actions and the words are all pointing in one direction and so to avoid admitting there's a problem we stop believing our own ears and eyes.

So we want to believe in Wayne Pacelle so badly as our perfect untarnished hero that we will ourselves to un-know what we already know. Do we need our white knight so badly that we'll turn aside reality to keep believing? And what does that say about the influence another hero, Michael Vick might have should he return to the NFL?

For further reading, please see Nathan Winograd's post on the topic, it's incredibly informative.