I have no problem with what Ellen is doing, if it makes things right. Life ain't fair......power is not with everyone. Big deal ! DD
Damn it! This country is going to the dogs... Uh, we are talking about a "dog". Just a dog that needs a home, and found one. Good grief. I go to Mexico a lot for vacation and I'll tell you that I'm constantly finding life sooooo much easier there especially after I hear crap like this. A dog!!!!!!! Just a dog that needs a home. I swear, everytime some one person b****es, it turns into a fricken law of the land. Okay...done with my rant.
I love how this story has blown up. Entertainment Tonight can't get enough of it. Ellen: Go buy the damn kids another damn dog. You're a millionaire, go buy them something, anything...JUST SHUT UP!! The kids just learned a life lesson: things don't always go your way. Get over it.
I'm a dog lover myself but I think this story is blown way out of proportion. I'm watching stories on this and Ellen makes this seem like some life threatening situation. It's not like the dog is getting killed or anything. I think there might be worst things going on that a little girl not being able to keep a dog. MAN UP ELLEN!
With all the other crap going on in the world, this one doesn't really bother me. Ellen is the one who screwed up. Let her cry all she wants. I don't care. As far as the family who had the dog taken away from them, blame Ellen. Your little girls will be over it in two days and you can find another dog. I think it's hilarious Ellen is crying on her own show about her own screw-up that her celebrity cannot fix. Someone needs to bust out a PhotoShop-ed image of the Feds taking away Elian Gonzalez from the gay dude in the closet to return him to Cuba but put a picture of the dog in place of Elian. That's what I want to get out of this.
This is a standard contract that almost all animal rescues have. Given that any decent resuce operation does extensive checks on prospective adopters, it would be wrong for the adopter to just then give the dog to someone else that the rescue operation has not done a background check on nor know anything about. Had Ellen simply read the contract, she would have known that she would need to contact the shelter first and tell them about the situation, I'm positive they woudl have had no problem with it provided they were able to do a background check on them first. I don't know Ellen, other than that she's a very funny person, and I doubt that this is about her thinking she's above honoring a contract. What she should have done was goto Mutts and Moms, apologize for breaking the contract, realize that the terms are there for the protection of the dog, and I'm sure things would have been squared up. As it is, the emails that I've seen seem to indicate a rather nasty and bullying attitude from Ellen's representatives.
It's just a dog for goodness' sake. So many of them get destroyed every day because they can't find homes. If a dog has a home and nobody knows of any abuse to the dog, that should be fine. Once they place a dog with somebody, they shouldn't keep calling to check up on it. We need to give that kind of attention to human children (who often don't get it), not pets. Once it's your dog, I thought you could give it away or do what you wanted to with it. On the other hand, it's a little too much for her to go (fake) crying on national TV about those little girls that don't get to keep a puppy, like that doesn't happen all the time. They'll get a new one, hopefully from the local shelter this time, and forget about it. It's also kind of excessive to spend thousands of dollars on training your dog to get along with your cats, and makes more sense to just find it a good home sooner and find a different dog (maybe raise it from a puppy, or keep it in a different place from the cats). People seem to forget the difference between dogs and human children sometimes.
I think it's silly to place any blame on the rescue. They know what their doing. They know the patterns that lead to animal abuse and neglect...which is generally how the dog(s) came to be in the rescue in the first place. They should adhere to their own rules for who can adopt a rescue dog. They probably have made exceptions in the past and have been burned by doing so. To just blindly allow a rescue dog to go with a family that doesn't meet their criteria for a solid home for the dog is irresponsible. I don't blame the rescue one bit in this matter. I blame Ellen for not reading the fine print. Granted, there is a chance the dog would turn out fine. But, obviously, the rescue has seen situations like this where the rescue didn't turn out fine. Or, they wouldn't have gone through the trouble. Just because it's Ellen, Ellen found the family, Ellen says its all good, Ellen...etc. ...that's not good enough nor should it ever be.
Yes, I grew up with one who was a member of the family for 15 years. I knew it would be controversial to post that "it's just a dog", but it's a question of priorities in our society: all the humans that don't get the care they need, and even in terms of dogs all the ones that have to be euthanized at shelters. It doesn't seem fair that some prized dogs get all this attention instead of the other dogs, or children (or senior citizens, or disabled people) in the world. My boyfriend and I talk about this often; we like animals, want them treated well, and may have our own later when we're settled with a family, but some people just put way too much into it for what they are. The family pet is a valued companion, but shouldn't replace your relationships with other people, and I don't understand how much time and effort get spent on some of them.
So, how is the shelter legally allowed to take the dog from a third party? The third party wasn't privy to the contract. Does the shelter have a lien on the dog? As far as I can tell, based on my knowledge of contract law, the only remedy the shelter has is to sue Ellen for damages (of which, there are none, as far as I can tell). They no longer own the dog, so how can they take it from a third party? Sounds like self-help repossession to me.
I really can't believe people are making a big fuss over this. Its a friggen dog. That family can go get an identical one just like it. For ellen to get up and make a public outcry over this is plain sad. There was a news report of a news reporter covering all the homicides in Los Angles. I don't recall seeing a thread opened up over that.
it's in the contract that she signed. she must give the dog back to the shelter if she can't keep it.
and the ASPCA says they see their point of view as well as Ellen's. In any case, it was in the contract she signed. If she had bothered to read the contract, she would have known she needed to contact the rescue shelter first. For all anyone knows, her hairdresser might have had animal cruelty charges levied on him before, or maybe his home is unfit for pets. These are the kinds of things that any decent resuce operation checks before allowing someone to adopt a dog.
But Ellen gave the dog, which she owns outright, to a third party, the hairdresser. The hairdresser now owns the dog, and the hairdresser was not a party to the contract between Ellen and the agency. How can the agency take the dog from the hairdresser? Now, the agency could go to Ellen and say "we're going to sue you to enforce the terms of our agreement if you don't give us back the dog." But I don't think they can just take the dog. That's conversion.
So had ellen given the dog to bad newz kennels it would have been ok as well. its just a 3rd party. No. The original owner wants to know where that dog is going and be certain it is a good home.
I understand. But this also causes the dog trauma. It had a home it liked and a family that loved it. It was taken away from that. M&M should consider that over their adoption policy of flat refusals to homes with kids under 14. It's not about Ellen anymore. It's about that family, including the dog.
