Friends of Rodeo - Helpful Info

Many people think there is no difference between animal welfare and animal rights. However, true animal rights advocates equate use with abuse. They believe it is immoral for people to use animals for any purpose.

Animal rights advocates want you to believe that any form of animal use is cruelty. They want you to believe that animals are on the same level - spiritually, mentally, and physically - that humans are. The goal of animal rights advocates is to completely eliminate all animal use. Animal welfarists, believe it is permissible to use animals for human benefit and want to see suffering minimized. Animal welfarists believe they have every right to use animals as long as they love and care for these animals. Animal welfarists do not believe in, nor do they condone, cruelty or abuse to animals.

How is Rodeo affected by animal rights? Animal rights advocates oppose Rodeo for the same reason they oppose all animal use. Up until recently, Rodeo has been targeted in a rather random manner, but there are several indicators that animals in entertainment (this includes Rodeo) will be the next serious thrust of the animal rights movement. For example, a disturbing Bill (H.R. 3252) was introduced in Congress in August 1991 which if passed would have had serious consequences not only to Rodeo but to all exhibitors of animals. The Bill H.R.3252 was in the Subcommittee on Department Operations, Research, and Foreign Agriculture of the Committee on Agriculture, where it remained as a major threat to the sport of Rodeo. Rodeo's vulnerability rests mostly on the fact that as a sport and entertainment event it is easier to criticize than animal enterprises that may be looked upon as a necessity, such as meat production.

Animal welfarists are at a disadvantage because we are being judged from a society that is 3 to 4 generations removed from the farm. In today's ever-growing urban population, fewer and fewer people have had any experience working and living with horses and cattle. People who do not understand large animals and their needs are vulnerable to the manipulation of the facts.

Some of the people who oppose Rodeo and other animal uses are well-meaning individuals wanting to do something to prevent animal cruelty. Unfortunately, their views are often based on contrived, sensationalized materials designed by people who cannot be credited with the same worthy intentions.

According to a 1992 report in the Animals' Agenda (an animal rights advocate network publication) there are 3,500 humane societies and 900 advocacy groups (advocacy groups being the animal rights advocates.) These 900 advocacy groups are what Friends of Rodeo is so deeply concerned with.

Rodeo is a part of our heritage that Friends of Rodeo is not willing to give up! It's time for those of us who believe in animal use but not abuse to gather together and stop the animal rights advocates before they stop us!

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