Tuesday, October 16, 2007 , early evening

Ellen is wrong

If you haven’t heard about it already, there’s a huge kerfuffle going on regarding Ellen Degeneres and a dog she adopted from a rescue group.  Ellen signed an adoption contract stating that if she couldn’t keep the dog for any reason, she’d return it to the rescue.  When she decided the dog wasn’t a good fit for her household, Ellen gave the dog to her hairdresser, instead of contacting the adoption agency and returning it to them.  The adoption agency removed the dog from the hairdresser’s home, and today Ellen was on TV and crying and complaining that the adoption agency wasn’t being fair.

The adoption contract Ellen signed wasn’t unusual, and I totally support the adoption group for wanting to keep track of the dogs they’ve rescued and rehabbed.  I’d be very angry if a cat I’d adopted out to someone ended up passed from household to household without my knowledge.  There was nothing to stop Ellen’s hairdresser from legally applying to adopt that particular dog herself, and just because Ellen spent money on the dog, it’s not her job to be ignoring the rules the dog adoption group had set.  The rules exist for a reason, even if not everyone agrees with them.  Our cat, Derek, was adopted from Best Friends (before we realized how easily stray cats would just fall into our laps), and we have a similar agreement with them.  Technically, Derek belongs to Best Friends, but we provide his care.  If we can’t keep him, he must be returned to Best Friends.  His microchip is registered to Best Friends, not to us, and we aren’t allowed to modify it.

The adoption group is being vilified by a lot of people today, and I really feel sorry for them.  They’re receiving death and arson threats, and have had to shut down the retail establishment which supports their rescue efforts.  They can’t adopt out any dogs for fear they’d be adopting to someone who was trying to get revenge.  Ellen has basically put this group out of business; no more dogs going out, means no more dogs coming in.  I would never adopt an animal out to Ellen, anyway; this is the third dog she’s given up in the past couple of years (that I’m aware of… maybe there were more), and she makes a lot of bad decisions.  She wants a dog which is good with her cats, but she keeps adopting puppies of breeds with strong prey drive, as opposed to looking for an older dog who’s been proven to like cats.  I’ve never really cared for her one way or another, but this pretty much seals the deal for me in the “dislike” column.

I’m not big on financial retribution, but Ellen needs to apologize publicly to get her minions off the backs of the rescue, and she needs to put up enough money to put the rescue back in business.  If she really loves animals, like she claims, she’ll want to ensure that people actively working to put dogs in good homes will be able to continue their mission.  As for the dog in this situation, perhaps there was a waiting list of people wanting to adopt it, and the dog can now fairly go to the next person on that list.  It’s a cute little thing, and I’m sure someone will be happy to get in line to adopt a coveted puppy of a popular breed.

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We’re in the minority, but this Texas newspaper columnist agrees with me, as does this HuffPo blogger.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 10/16 at 06:34 PM
The Litterbox • (5) Comments • Permalink
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