WILL THEY NEVER LEARN?? TEMPERAMENT TESTING

I came across this piece and just had to write something about it. This examiner and the person interviewed were both on the animal commission for the City of LA at one time. Does this mean they know what they are doing, not really! To me, both are drinking the koolaid of "No Kill" when it comes to the temperament testing issue. Neither seem to understand that we have a duty, an obligation, to keep people safe. Shelters are not really for the animals in as much as they are there to protect the public from animals. It is also anyone's duty to try to adopt out a safe animal, not set both families and pets up for failure. And failure is what you will get if you deny temperament testing and the role it plays.

The biggest reason given for not doing temperament testing is that animals in the shelter are stressed and this would affect the results of temperament testing. Whoa, when an animal is sent home with strangers, a strange place, is that not stressful? If a pet is walked in new surroundings, is that not stressful? We do need to know the stress levels of a pet, to ignore it is a certain way to fail that pet.  Instead these two and others, blame the shelters for trying to care enough to avoid failure. They both quote the Whino pretty much on this issue.

So what do we do? Just pimp these pets out to an unsuspecting public? Let any dog, no matter what the temperament, be adopted? Can anyone say liability? Can anyone say ripping the face off a kid? We have to have something to judge by, to not place animals in homes where they can cause injuries, and that is temperament testing. Once again, animals are being placed above the health and well being of people and children. Once again, animals are being set up for failure if we don't do temperament testing. Not all animals can be saved but we can try to spare as many children's lives as possible by not adopting out a dog that is food aggressive or reacts badly to loud noise. Temperament testing is not a ploy used by shelters to "kill" animals because they are lazy, it is an effort to avoid failure for the pet and the people who adopt.

http://www.examiner.com/animal-rescue-in-los-angeles/animal-control-s-temperament-testing

I've been dealing with rescuing animals for 5 decades and never, never would I allow an untested pet to be adopted. Walk the shelters sometimes and see that not all dogs and cats are stressed being there. I had a dog once that loved being in a boarding kennel, he loved the noise, the commotion, he was definitely not stressed. I see many more pets unstressed in the shelters than stressed. This is not an excuse in my book.

These two women forget that the rest of the world is not trying to "save them all", all most people want is a decent pet, one that won't bring harm or disrupt their households. We have an obligation to make sure animals are as safe as they can possibly be when they are put up for adoption. Continuing with this line of thought that we can save them all and there are no bad pets is only hurting our cause. Most people who adopt don't want to take home a dog that snaps when you feed it. And adopting out those dogs only means failure and failure means the dog is returned to the shelter, put on a chain, or dumped in the desert. Wake up Ladies, the rest of the world doesn't share our views and for the good of the animals, we need to protect these people and the animals much better than we are currently doing. Temperament testing is only one tool to do better adoptions, adoptions that work. Any less and animals will suffer.