Annalise Hansson ’18, Photo Editor

If you and your family have been considering getting a pet, please take into consideration where the pet comes from.

When you buy a dog from pet stores, you are supporting cruel puppy mills. Puppy mills are large-scale commercial dog breeding facilities where profit is given priority over the well-being of the dogs. These mills are overcrowded and unsanitary, with insufficient conditions in which to raise pets. Cat and dog breeders are not much better than the mills either; animals are locked into cages with others, often with little room to move.

The people running these only care about the profit, not the care of the animals; the animals kept here are sentient, living beings that do not deserve to spend their lives in a cage. By buying from these puppy mills, you are supporting and encouraging this inhumane treatment.

Additionally, there are plenty of animals being kept in shelters that need loving homes. Once these shelters fill up, dogs and cats are put to sleep. Adopting from shelters is also much cheaper than the alternatives (dog breeders charge around $1000 per dog), and less of a hassle as far as time and paperwork go. So, go ahead and visit an animal shelter- you might just save an animal’s life.

Photo courtesy of santabanta.com