Friday Hound Blogging

One of the things we like to do on Fridays here in the marbled halls of IM Central, as the Stoli cools, is to check out the intertubial hangouts of the overlords just to get a sense of where the conversation is going. Lately we've witnessed much wailing and gnashing of teeth over the gathering tsunami of decoupling, and by that we mean they're blaming everybody and everything for pointing out that they base their "sport" on the heartless exploitation of innocent creatures who are summarily disposed of in often the most horrendous of ways when they can no longer generate a profit. Also, to be more accurate in the overlords' case it's wailing and gnashing of tooth. The point is, it appears the the impending demise of their greyhound powered ride on the gravy train has penetrated all but the deepest realms of their delusion. We mean, even John Parker has not only lately become aware that there is a wall, he has even begun to ascertain that there may be some sort of writing on it.

But that's not what we want to tell you.This week as we were chuckling over the overlords' penchant for invented spelling we ran across what appears to be an attempt at an actual essay by an overlord who appears to believe he is an intellectual. Well, at least as much of an intellectual as you can expect in Overlordistan. You know the old saying, in a country of idiots the man who can tie his own shoes is king. Anyway, this particular scribe has unleashed almost 800 words starting with the history of greyhounds and ending up with it's all Grey2K's fault. Somewhere Mr. Spock is crying.

Our first thought was Man! We weren't aware there were overlords who knew 800 words. Then we noticed several words were repeated the the real total drops down substantially. We would link to it, but you might go read it then hate us forever for costing you fifteen minutes of your life and 40 IQ points.

But that's not to say we can't bring you the highlights huh? Well, high light might not be exactly accurate, but what the heck, the Stoli's already taken care of at least 40 of our IQ points so let's have at it!

Scientists and researchers feel that the halotypes of our contemporary Racing Greyhounds probably first emerged as part of a branching-off process from the Grey Wolf, which began perhaps as many as 140,000 years ago. This is a staggering proposition. What it essentially means is that Greyhound-like dogs evolved naturally, until they eventually became companions of men. Since the Greyhound has always had a utilitarian purpose, either as a pre-historic, wild and deadly hunter of game, as a swift and efficient courser of vermin, or as a racer of astonishing speed and athleticism, he is unique among canines.

Oh boy, oh boy, let's play One Of These Things Is Not Like The Others! "Wild and deadly hunter of game, as a swift and efficient courser of vermin". Let's see, helping subsistence hunters feed their families and keeping pests and their diseases away, that it? "A racer of astonishing speed and athleticism." Right, becoming a commodity and having their worth measured by how much money they can generate. Ha! That's the different one! This game is fun.

As respected Greyhound pedigree researcher and writer Martin Roper has suggested (in his essay, Everything You Know Is Wrong), it is highly unlikely that the Greyhound was ever domesticated by Egyptian Pharaohs, as had been long thought to be the case.

Umm...The appeal to authority, which is called Ethos for all you keeping score at home, is a common and well respected technique in essay writing, but Martin Roper? Don't know much about him. Well, to be an expert you need a long list of credentials and accomplishments, so let's go see what Mr. Roper has done to deserve his exalted position in the aforementioned essay, shall we? Hmmm, it appears an appeal to Mr. Roper is like asking for investment advice from Sponge Bob Square Pants.

So while on one hand we have gained a much deeper and more accurate understanding of how our Greyhounds have come to be who they are today, on the other hand, we see a new litany of outrageous dis-information being disseminated throughout all forms of media. This popular, contemporary Greyhound mythology has arisen from a cartel comprised of “four-legs-good, two-legs-bad” academia, animal rights activist extremists, donation-seeking lobbyists and propagandists, and a daisy chain of activist-“journalists”.

 OK somewhere in that paragraph we fell into a wormhole or some other time portal device because one second we're reading about the history of greyhounds and the next instant the topic has changed to animal rights activism. Someone alert the staff at the Large Hadron Collider! We've discovered the non sequiter particle!

This new mythology is rooted in an elitist, “New Age” dogma, which preaches that the use of any animal for any human purpose whatsoever is “speciesism”, and is, by definition, oppressive, imperialist and “colonial” in its nature and practice, and therefore must be prohibited.

Huh. Guess we'll have to get ourselves one of those New Age dictionaries because in our dictionary speciesism is defined as "a belief of humans that all other species of animals are inferior and may therefore be used for human benefit without regard to the suffering inflicted." That sort of defines greyhound racing, doesn't it there Mr Essay Writer Sir?

A culture comprised of the mostly non-university educated, rural, agrarian, working-class, which views the keeping of animals not simply as an end unto itself, but as the means to an end, is therefore deemed intrinsically and systemically cruel, inhumane, barbaric, inferior and outmoded. That would be “outmoded”, as in “doesn’t deserve to exist”… as in “greyhound racing professionals”.

Oh, nice move there Mr. author sir. Did you see how he injected that little bit of class elitism in there?  "A culture comprised of the mostly non-university educated, rural, agrarian, working-class?" See, it's not really about the needless suffering and painful deaths of the greyhounds at all. It's just those college educated liberal egg heads a coming 'round here sticking their noses where they don't belong. We'll call this the Rick Santorum gambit. So, our question is, how did a group of people who started the paragraph out as "mostly non-university educated, rural, agrarian, working-class" become "greyhound racing professionals" by the end of it? Correspondence school?

We won’t belabor the preposterous concept of “speciesism”, since the essence of Darwinism and the nature of all species is to compete ruthlessly and without remorse for domain, habitat, food–and in the Darwinian model, often to the complete annihilation or extinction of less well-adapted species.

Yeah, that's probably just as well there Mr. Essay Writer sir since you obviously didn't understand speciesism and apparently don't get Darwin either.  See, adaptation is about the organism's relationship with its environment, not how it competes with other organisms. Hope we cleared that up for you.

Nor should we give any credence to the oxymoron of “animal rights”.

Whoa! Did you see what he did there? In one sentence he negated an element of moral philosophy going back over 200 years! Somebody better tell Tom Regan to start looking for another job.

Proponents of animal rights wish to co-mingle amoral creatures within the realm of uniquely human, intricately-reasoned, moral constructs like rights. The first person who can successfully plead the case of Salmon’s Rights to a hungry Grizzly Bear will be the first person who can speak credibly to such a ludicrous concept.

 Hey! There's the non sequiter particle again. OK, this is where we came in so hey Drop Kick how about we take you out for some "utilitarian purpose" like say peeing on that tree over there? Afterwards you can engage in some "swift and efficient" chasing of your ball.

AHK Drop Kick is a very quiet and calm girl. She is learning to play with toys. She asks for attention by poking you with her nose. She does well in her crate. AHK Drop Kick would do well in a home by herself or with other dogs. She would do well in a home with older, well-behaved children or teens. For more information about this dog, and other rescued racing greyhounds looking for homes, go here. If you don't know about the plight of racing greyhounds go here.