Why Do Shelters Kill?
The connundrum of doing society's dirt work while trying to remain mentally and spiritually intact. Nobody who works at an animal shelter wants to kill the animals that are brought in for shelter. They do it because they see no alternative. They indeed see it as a necessary evil preventing the suffering of millions of animals that would otherwise be abused, neglected or abandoned to starve on the streets. Shelters across the country accept 6-8 million dogs each year. The inflow of animals is far greater than shelter space, and the shelter resources to find new homes. Shelters that euthanize dogs do so because they believe that warehousing the dogs is not in the best interest of the animals. Every animal deserves a decent quality of life, and living in prison cages over the long term does not support this principle. People who work in shelters want to help animals - they should not be required to take on the job of killing the creatures they love most. This terrible burden is unfair to shelter workers everywhere who care deeply for the animals and desire to nurture life not destroy it.