the no-kill controversy: manifest and latent sources of tension by arnold arluke

67

raditionally, most animal shel-ter workers have denied that thekilling, or euthanasia, of animals

in their facilities was cruel, even wheneuthanized animals were adoptable,young, attractive, and healthy.1 Work-ers have sustained a core professionalidentity of being humane, good-heart-ed “animal people” who want the verybest for their charges, despite—oreven because of—their euthanasia ofanimals. Killing has been taken forgranted, regarded as a “necessaryevil” having no alternative in theireyes.

One reason shelter workers havebeen able to maintain this self imageis that, until the last decade, little ifany organized criticism has been lev-eled at them. When criticismoccurred, it tended to be case-specif-ic, focusing on which animals wereeuthanized, how it was done, andwhether the shelter shared this infor-mation with the public. Although afew shelters offered an alternative tothe standard paradigm by restrictingadmission of unadoptable animalsand billing themselves as “no-kill”shelters, they did not represent a seri-ous threat to the continuation of“open-admission” policies towardeuthanasia.2

However, criticism of euthanasiahas mounted steadily in frequencyand fervor from within certain seg-

ments of the sheltering community.In 1994 the Duffield Family Founda-tion created the Maddie’s Fund,which sought to revolutionize the sta-tus and well-being of companion ani-mals by championing the no-killmovement. No longer possible toignore or discount as an outrageousidea, this movement has spurreddebate at the national level about theproper role of euthanasia in shelterpractice. The resulting challengeshave strained the ability of conven-tional shelters and humane organiza-tions to protect workers psychologi-cally from the charge that euthanasiais a form of cruelty. Instead of pre-venting cruelty, which their missionmaintains, these organizations noware seen as causing it. In response, theno-kill movement has been attackedby those who defend the practice ofeuthanasia and open admission.

Although some argue that everyonein the debate shares a passionate con-cern for the welfare of animals, a riftover this issue divides the sheltercommunity. Ultimately, the bestinterests of animals may not be bestaddressed in a climate of controversyand criticism. To understand and per-haps reduce this controversy, the ten-sions fueling the no-kill conflict needto be identified and the breadth ofthe gulf separating its two campsassessed.

MethodI investigated the shelter communi-ty’s response to the no-kill movementin two communities that have takendifferent approaches to the issue.Though located on opposite coasts ofthe country, these metropolitan areasare similar in size and wealth. Themakeup and nature of their humaneorganizations, however, are quite dis-similar. One community is home tomany independent organizations thatindividually have received praise orcriticism over the years; until recent-ly they have been a widespread groupof equals sharing a common mediamarket. Even animal control pro-grams have been large, countywide,and sometimes-progressive players intheir own right. In the other commu-nity, two key players are so large thatthey have dwarfed the role and signif-icance of others; the two players havebeen conservative, lagging somewhatbehind the nationwide trends in shel-tering. These two communities havedealt very differently with the petoverpopulation issue. In one case theSPCA (society for the prevention ofcruelty to animals) has embraced theno-kill concept, while in the other ithas not. There are differences in therelationships between the SPCAs andneighboring humane organizations,as well; in the former community

The No-KillControversy:Manifest and LatentSources of Tension

Arnold Arluke

5CHAPTER

Introduction

T

68 The State of the Animals II: 2003

these relationships are uneasy, whilein the latter they are cordial.

In each community I conductedparticipant observation at the SPCAshelter, the city animal control office,and nearby (i.e., within sixty miles)smaller shelters that either competedwith or complemented the work ofthe SPCAs. “Sanctuaries” and rescuegroups also were studied. Gatekeep-ers in these settings introduced me torespondents as a sociologist interest-ed in understanding how peoplethought and felt about the no-killissue. I was allowed to observe almostevery facet of shelter and sanctuaryoperation, including, but not limitedto, kennel cleaning, intake, adoptionwork, behavior training, and euthana-sia. Ultimately I carried out morethan 200 hours of observation and 75interviews that elicited the intervie-wees’ perspective on the no-kill issueand the animal overpopulation prob-lem. In addition I attended the na-tional meetings of the major no-killand open-admission organizations,examined press accounts and shelterpublications relating to no-kill, andcombed several Internet news groupsthat discussed shelter issues.

Details about each camp’s perspec-tive were subject to respondents’ bias-es, distortions, and memory limita-tions. Information obtained wastreated as an accurate reflection ofwhat people thought and felt,whether or not it was objectively true,since the perception of truth motivat-ed and justified people’s behavior.From these data I constructed, ratherthan assessed, the perspectives ofboth camps toward the no-kill issue.Although this approach follows thatof sociologists and social historians,who argue that collective behavior isbest understood by examining partic-ipants’ own understandings in rela-tion to their social context, it mayfrustrate those who think I should bemore critical. However a criticalapproach would be neither faithful tomy ethnographic method nor helpfulin creating dialogue and commonground.

I also tried to sample a wide varietyof shelter organizations by size, orien-

tation, location, and financial health,but it was impossible, and perhapsunnecessary, to study every nuanceand variation. The wide diversitymakes it very difficult to characterizethe perspectives of these camps.Indeed, at one level, the only thingthat makes each camp identifiable asa group is the fact that one supportsthe role of and need for euthanasia,while the other does not. Even here,though, the why, the how, and the cir-cumstances of euthanasia vary con-siderably. For example, the players,policies, and realities of animal shel-tering in any one community vary interms of numbers, composition,strength, and orientation of shelterorganizations. Arguments and per-ceptions of individuals on both sidesare informed by and respond to therealities of their own communities. Insome cases, these local realities leadmembers of the same camp, whowork in different contexts, to makevery different comments about theopposition. Knowing this may helpreaders understand contradictorystatements made by respondents onthe same side of this controversy.

Manifest andLatent TensionsGroups experience tension in twoways. At a manifest or surface level,group members are aware of andspeak about superficial differences inattitudes or behaviors thought tocause various problems. These sur-face tensions are acknowledged pub-licly at group meetings, written aboutin professional and popular publica-tions, and debated and mulled over bythose who experience them. Sincethese manifest tensions are thoughtto be the root cause of problems,solutions are aimed at altering, neu-tralizing, or eliminating them.

While important to understand andmanage, these manifest tensions aresymptomatic of deeper, rarely verbal-ized tensions. These latent tensionsare sensed by group members butrarely articulated in a conscious ordeliberate manner. The tensions lurk

beneath the surface of everyday com-munication, perhaps appearing ininnuendos that stop short of sayingwhat actually is on the minds and inthe hearts of speakers. For those hop-ing to reconcile tense intergroup rela-tions, it is crucial to identify and cor-rect sources of latent tension.Attempts to reduce conflict oftenstop short, staying at the manifestlevel of perceived differences or prob-lems and offering solutions that can-not significantly reduce group ten-sion because issues, images, andimplications below the surface re-main untouched.

Certainly, the American humanecommunity is no exception to thispattern. Discussions about no-killhave been more cathartic than ana-lytic, allowing people to vent theirconfusion or anger and identify alliesand enemies. These discussions havestayed at the manifest level of inter-group tension, involving issues ofdirty work and dishonesty.

Manifest Tensions

Dirty Work Some jobs important to the everydayoperation of society are avoided bypeople who choose not to engage indisrespected occupations. This dirtywork is seen as distasteful or discred-iting because it casts a moral pallover those who do it (Hughes 1964).Most people turn a blind eye to thiswork, preferring that others do it butviewing those who do so as modernuntouchables—members of a castethought to be symbolically contami-nated and best avoided or pitiedbecause they are associated withunpopular, unpleasant, or uncleantasks.

Many of the open-admissionists Iinterviewed felt that no-kill sheltersdelegated euthanasia to them. Theybelieved that they were judged to bemorally tainted because they killedanimals. They sensed they wereuncomfortably tolerated, at best, forcarrying out such an unpleasant task,and challenged, at worst, for continu-ing to do it. As one respondent said,

“Why am I now an enemy? It used to be the humane societies versus the pounds, who were the baddies.Now we are the baddies.” Anotherrespondent concurred, saying, “It’sno fun being the villains with theblack hats.” As the “baddies,” open-admission workers thought that no-kill advocates cast them as wrong-doers who were “looked down upon”(Milani 1997), “discredited” (Bogue1998b) or “guilty . . . because they are murderers” (Caras 1997a)“. . . sadists, or monsters” (Caras1997b). Moreover some respondentsfelt that, with the growing popularityof the no-kill concept, the public hadjoined this critical bandwagon to cas-tigate them as bad people for eutha-nizing animals. The result was thatopen admissionists, rather than thepublic, were blamed.

The casting of open admissionistsas “baddies” stemmed from the lan-guage used by no-kill advocates. Manyopen-admissionists argued that theterm no-kill was itself an “attack” onthem, implying a “put-down” of openadmissionists as killers (Bogue1998a). “When they say, ‘no-kill,’what they really mean is, ‘you-kill,’”claimed one critic (Miller n.d.).Indeed, there was concern that theterminology itself positioned openadmissionsts as “pro-kill” (Paris1997), since the term no-kill impliesits opposite. “Open admission shel-ters are not ‘kill’ shelters any morethan ‘pro-choicers’ are ‘pro-abor-tion,’” explained one open-admissionadvocate. Not surprisingly, someopen-admissionists have called forabolishing the “no-kill” label and sub-stituting the term limited admission.

Even more provocative was lan-guage that accused open-admissionshelters of killing animals in waysreminiscent of Nazi cruelties tohumans. One charge labeled theopen-admission approach the “finalsolution,” a term referring to theHolocaust. Another charge was evenmore specific: referring to euthana-sia by open-admissionists, a no-killconference panelist described it asthe “holocaust of family members[i.e., shelter animals] being put to

death.” And a number of shelterdirectors have been called “butcher,”“Hitler,” and “concentration-camprunner” (Foster 2000; Gilyard 2001,6–7). Short of specific references tothe Nazi Holocaust, some no-killadvocates suggested genocide-likeactions by open-admissionistsbecause they were conducting “massslaughter of animals” or “legitimizedmass slaughter.”

Slightly less provocative werecharges of criminal-like action towardanimals. “To me it’s criminal if a dogwith poor manners or who is a littlebit standoff-ish should be euthanizedfor behavior reasons,” noted one no-kill advocate. Sometimes the “crimi-nal” metaphor was created throughthe use of such penal language as“execute.” For example, one no-killtrainer was trying to modify thebehavior of a very aggressive dog whobit two staff members, required muz-zling for walks, and was kept in theshelter for sixteen months. She saidthat the dog would have been “exe-cuted” had the dog been in an open-admission facility. This terminologysuggests that, if open-admissionworkers euthanized this difficult-to-adopt, potentially dangerous dog,their act would be morally equivalentto putting a criminal to death. Whileopen-admission shelters spoke of“euthanasia rooms” and “euthanasiatechnicians,” no-kill staff claimedthat their shelters did not have “exe-cution chambers” and maintainedthat they did not “kill” as did theiropen-admission peers.

At the core of this provocativeimagery was the idea that openadmissionists were killers, an ideathat reinforced the no-kill distinctionbetween killing and euthanizing.Open admissionists patently rejectedthis distinction, claiming that theyonly euthanized. Of course, whenworking with peers, open-admissionworkers did speak of killing. Shelterworkers sometimes used the term killwhen speaking with colleagues butwere careful to say “euthanize” whenspeaking to the public. Use of thislanguage was not an implicit accep-tance of the no-kill distinction, but

rather a combination of black humorand informal understanding that theywere using kill as a linguistic short-hand to describe their acts. Othershelter workers deliberately used theterm kill, at least before the rise of theno-kill movement, as an interestingway to demonstrate their continuinglack of acceptance of euthanasia as asolution. For them it served as areminder that this was somethingthey did not like to do and wanted toeliminate the need for. Thus, whilesome objected to the use of this termbecause they were concerned about itmaking them look or feel callous, oth-ers supported its use, saying that ithelped remind them that they weretaking lives—a symbolic way of keep-ing fresh the commitment to attackthe source of the problem.

Open admissionists resented theperception of them as killers becausethey felt it was unfair or hypocritical.In their opinion, by being forced toeuthanize many animals, they weremade to shoulder all the moral, emo-tional, and aesthetic heartaches thatwent with the job. One editorialargued that the harm of no-kill is that

It punishes shelters that aredoing their very best but arestuck with the dirty work. It isdemoralizing and dishearteningfor humane workers who would doalmost anything to stop thatheartbreaking selection process.Humane workers who are braveenough to accept that dirty workdeserve better than that. (Caras1997c, 17)

Instead open admissionists calledfor what one interviewee described as“. . . s haring the burden. As long asthere is euthanasia to be done, theresentment on the part of us is thatwe shouldn’t be doing it all. Any shel-ter in the same town should be shar-ing the burden. That’s like saying weare all working on the same issue. Weare all going to take the good stuffand the bad stuff.”

However, no-kill proponents arguedthat if anyone was to blame it shouldbe open admissionists. In their opin-ion blaming no-killers for delegatingdirty work sidetracked shelter work-

The No-Kill Controversy: Manifest And Latent Sources of Tension 69

ers from a more important matter.Open admissionists, they said, neededto see that they were guilty of com-plicity in killing because they made it“easy” for the public to handle theiranimals like unwanted consumergoods disposed of without fore-thought. “They [open-admission shel-ters] are teaching the public they canthrow away their animals at the shel-ter, and the shelter will euthanizetheir problem for them, and theyaren’t to blame because they took thepet to the shelter.”

No-killers saw charges of dirty workdelegation as “garbage talk,” contend-ing that open-admission shelters need-ed to rethink their mission and identi-ty so they could become no-killthemselves. Open-admission sheltersshould “get out of the killing busi-ness,” as one no-kill worker said, forthe sake of those working in such set-tings. Carrying out euthanasia wasthought to be an “endlessly demoraliz-ing activity” that stopped workersfrom focusing on their “core purpose:bringing an end to the killing of theseanimals.”3 Having sympathy for theireuthanizing peers, many no-kill em-ployees wanted them to have theopportunity to work in an environmentwhere the killing of animals was rareand, when done, was for apparentlyextreme veterinary or behavioral prob-lems. “People are drawn to work herebecause it is less scary,” observed oneno-kill worker. The scariness refers tothe loss, guilt, and grief experienced ifworkers kill animals with whom theyhave established some relationship,especially if these animals were poten-tially adoptable. Another workerexplained, “I don’t have to worry that Iam going to bond with an animal andthen have to put him down, which ismy perception of what happens in killshelters. So I feel lucky that those arethe kinds of emotions I don’t have todeal with.” This thinking suggestedthat no-kill workers were not duckingresponsibility for delegating dirty workor refusing to share the burden.Instead, they wondered why openadmissionists continued their tradi-tional approach to euthanasia, givenits adverse emotional impact on them.

No-kill proponents pointed out thatthey too have been discredited ordemonized for not killing enough ani-mals as opposed to killing too many.This stigma was felt, according tomany no-kill spokespersons, whenthey were ignored by open-admissionleaders. Several speakers at a no-killconference lamented the lack of sup-port for no-kill at national animal wel-fare and animal rights conferences,where companion animal issues were“not well represented.” They felt thatopen-admission authorities spurnedtheir well-intentioned advances forsupport of no-kill conferences andother activities. One national spokes-woman for the no-kill movementclaimed that prominent open-admis-sion leaders and academics evenrefused to return her telephone calls.This lack of recognition by main-stream humane authorities was seenas hypocritical, given their presumedconcern for promoting the welfare ofanimals. As one speaker at a no-killconference pointed out, “The mostfundamental right of animals is to beallowed to lead their own lives andnot be killed, yet this right has notbeen strongly embraced by open-admission animal welfare and rightsgroups.” This was seen as a deliberaterepudiation of the no-kill perspective.

No-kill advocates also felt ignored,misunderstood, and criticized at thenational conferences of open-admis-sion organizations, because euthana-sia proponents seemed unwilling toenter into a “dialogue.” As one no-killadvocate put it,

I don’t like being demonized. Somany people there were veryresentful of us. They know thewonderful things we do here andhow wonderful we are. We wereexpecting people to be, like,“Wow, you are affiliated with thatwonderful group,” and instead wewere, like, getting slammed,shielding ourselves from the rot-ten vegetables being thrown at us.That feeling was very pervasivethere [at national meeting].

Another no-kill worker felt “dissed”at a national humane meeting, recall-ing,

I didn’t appreciate sitting in aworkshop and having an HSUSemployee speaking, saying to me,“It is the responsibility of all of usin the shelter profession to eutha-nize animals.” That’s a value judg-ment. They are communicatingthat no-kill is bad and that weshould all be euthanizing animals.She was basically dissing no-kill. Iimmediately raised my hand todefend [no-kill shelters] but I wasnot called on.

Dishonesty A palpable distrust existed betweenopen-admission and no-kill followers.Members of each camp insisted thatthey were woefully misunderstoodand misrepresented by the opposi-tion, which, in turn, was seen as por-traying itself dishonestly to profes-sional colleagues and the generalpublic.

Open admissionists attacked thehonesty of no-kill shelters andspokespersons on a number ofcounts. First, they said, no-kill advo-cates lied about not killing shelteranimals when the term was taken lit-erally. “I believe they are trained to lieand there is deception to the pub-lic. . . that animals are not eutha-nized,” said one worker. One criticmaintained that some no-killers euth-anized animals “surreptitiously,behind closed doors,” so supporterswould not find out. To many respon-dents this “deception” was termino-logical: “What is a shelter’s definitionof no-kill? At our shelter it is that wedo not kill for overcrowding or when adog’s ‘time runs out,’ but we do euth-anize for behavioral and health rea-sons. Now to me that’s not no-kill. Itmakes that terminology close to a lie.What do the press and the public anddonors think it means? Probably theytake the words literally—‘We don’tkill dogs, ever’—well, they do!” Onthe grounds that the term was false iftaken literally, some critics proposednew terminology, calling no-kill shel-ters rarely-kills or low kills. Anotherproblem that has less to do with ter-



minology, but still was regarded as amatter of dishonesty, has to do withmisrepresentation. Open-admission-ists claimed that no-kill shelters mis-represented themselves by shiftingresponsibility for killing to other shel-ters; this made the no-kill sheltersaccomplices to death, argued theopen-admissionists, although theshelters distanced themselves from it.One such critic maintained, “. . . Thereality of a ‘no-kill’ approach to shel-tering simply means ‘let someoneelse kill’” (Savesky 1995a, 4).

Second, open-admissionists saidno-killers were deceptive in claimingto adopt out all their animals, a tacticsome critics called a “smart market-ing strategy.” This point was under-scored by one critic who claimed that“their almost no-kill policy” resultedfrom only accepting “very adoptableanimals,” leaving the “burden” ofeuthanizing turned-away animals toopen-admission shelters. It wasalleged that no-kill shelters “take inthe ‘movie star’ dogs and cats, thepretty ones they know they can placein new homes, and turn away therest” (Caras 1997c, 17). The result ofsuch policies, open-admissionistssaid, was that most animals wound upat open-admission shelters. “They arestrays, ‘too old,’ unsocialized, injured,or diseased. They are consideredunadoptable by no-kill shelters sothey are brought to us” (Bogue1998b). One person compared thisself-serving policy to a school thatalways has impressive SAT scoresbecause it accepts only bright stu-dents in the first place. No-kill shel-ters were seen as excessively “picky,”rejecting some animals with extreme-ly minor problems that could be usedas excuses for turning them away.Expanding on this point, one respon-dent said, “If an animal has the tiniestpatch of flea allergy, dermatitis, whichis curable, they say no if they want to.Bad teeth, they say no if they want to.Any animal they can say no to, theyare going to say no. They don’t takemany that need treatment.” Onerespondent said that even “color”could be used as a reason to classifyan animal as “unadoptable,” if there

were too many similar looking ani-mals together in a shelter, such astiger-striped kittens. Some criticsalso charged that no-kill shelters useda “changeable” classification, where-by a placeable animal could be reclas-sified as unplaceable if the animal wasnot adopted, enabling the shelter toclaim a “huge” percentage of their“placeable” animals were adopted.Some felt that this classification“game” was so capricious it made no-kill “a joke.” All of these manipula-tions, some charged, enabled the “no-kill propagandists” through“deception” to produce statisticsapparently documenting low rates foreuthanasia and high “save rates.”

Third, critics charged that no-killshelters misrepresented the cause ofbehavior problems in dogs, not admit-ting that these difficulties were dueto long-term confinement and/or thekind of training they received. Forinstance, “excuses” were made forthe bad behavior of animals, as in thecase of a dog showing “guardingbehavior” around food whose actionswere “explained away” by pointing tothe lack of food the dog had experi-enced. One worker spoke about “thebetrayal the public would feel if theywere aware that the shelter theytrusted has made them the subject ofan experiment in placing rehabilitat-ed biting dogs, an experiment with somany failures.” Critics maintainedthat the aggressiveness of shelterdogs was not fully disclosed toadopters. Upset by this problem, aworker described a shelter that wasbeing sued for adopting out a Rot-tweiler who was known to have killedone dog, only to have him knockdown his new owner and kill her petdog. The same worker also claimedthat this shelter concealed frompotential adopters that another doghad bitten seven volunteers. Inresponse, she resigned from her orga-nization, noting: “They adopted outany and all dogs, no matter their his-tory and, worst of all, did not telladopting families if the dog had bit-ten previously.” Another no-kill work-er, uncomfortable with her own shel-ter’s policy, gave credence to this

open-admission critique when shereported “incredible feelings ofguilt,” making it “hard to sleep atnight,” because she felt “complicity”in adopting out dangerous animals toclients from whom information washidden about these problems and whowere blamed by staff when animalswere returned.

Some critics claimed that, if notdeliberately dishonest, no-kill shel-ters misrepresented themselvesbecause they were unrealistic. Oneopen-admissionist wrote, “The con-cept of the shelter where no animalsmust die is a fantasy that seems toogood to be true” (Caras 1997c, 16).These “fantasies,” argued openadmissionists, made donors and thegeneral public “feel good.” As oneworker said: “The truth is that it isimpossible. They are encouraging anexpectation that is unrealistic.”These expectations

. . . raise false hopes and wishes forpet owners and our communitiesthat animal abandonment isgoing to be prevented simplybecause the killing of adoptableanimals is going to be prohibited.The complexities of the problemof killing so many animals in ourshelters is not simply due to theperception that an unwanted petis “better off alive on the streetsthan being killed at the pound.”(Cubrda 1993)

Critics argued that, in addition toraising false hopes, these fantasies ledpeople mistakenly to believe thateuthanasia was unnecessary at theirlocal humane society, a strategy thatsiphoned funds away from open-admission shelters.

No-kill advocates maintained thattheir aims were distorted, bemoaningthe “warfare” and frequent “bashing”by open-admission spokespersonsthat resulted in “credibility hits”against them. One no-kill staff mem-ber spoke of her frustration with peo-ple who misconstrued the meaning ofno-kill as a preference for animals tobe kept alive in unpleasant orunhealthy circumstances. She noted,“I don’t know if there is any sane per-son who would agree that a ware-

house kind of life. . .is better thandeath. I don’t think anybody is argu-ing that, except for an extremelysmall subset of people who are not inthe mainstream of the no-kill move-ment.” No-kill advocates also dis-agreed with those who criticized theconcept of no-kill because it failed tobe literally true, admitting that a fewanimals, albeit a tiny number whencompared to open-admission shel-ters, were euthanized. Some evenrefused to label their shelters as no-kill or minimized use of this termbecause their euthanasia rates werenot zero.

For their part no-kill sheltersargued that open-admission organiza-tions “kill healthy animals” (Foro1997, 16) and misrepresent the realmeaning of euthanasia. Seeking toundermine the semantic justificationfor killing so many animals, one no-kill spokesperson wrote: “The termeuthanasia, as used by these practi-tioners [open admission and animalcontrol staff] in the destruction ofhealthy animals, softens the realityand lessens its impact on the public.Sadly, to mislabel killing as euthana-sia for controlling animal overpopula-tion does not allow society to dealwith the tragedy or to accept respon-sibility for making this happen” (17).“True,” “authentic,” or “dictionary-defined” (17) euthanasia was spokenabout to separate “killing” fromother instances where extreme,untreatable, chronic suffering man-dated euthanizing animals. No-killadvocates also reclaimed the conceptof euthanasia by asserting thathumane death be done only for thesake of suffering animals rather thanfor owners who had their own agendafor requesting euthanasia, suggestingthat open admissionists wronglyblurred this distinction. Not surpris-ingly open-admission advocatesrejected this distinction, claimingthat it was mere “semantics.”

No-kill proponents also refuted thecharge that they were “picky” toensure high adoption rates. Theyclaimed to take many animals thatwere far from the “cream of thecrop,” as one worker pointed out. “We

get only the worst here; everybodythinks we take only the best dogshere. It’s hard for me to find a familydog in our shelter because we are tak-ing the ones no one else takes.” Infact, in one no-kill shelter, there wasstrong internal pressure on intakeworkers to accept as many dogs aspossible from the nearby animal con-trol office, regardless of their bad or“spooky” behavior or poor condition;otherwise the dogs were likely to beeuthanized. In one instance, after anintake worker refused an aggressive,six-month-old dog offered to her shel-ter, several coworkers chided her andcalled her a murderer. Challengingback, some no-kill shelters felt thattheir save rates might be even betterwere it not for having difficult andunadoptable animals dumped onthem by animal control organiza-tions. A respondent explained,

We could inflate our save rateeven more if we had a bar thatresembled anything like anothershelter[’s], where they see thehint of a curl of a lip and that ani-mal is euthanized and it nevergoes to their staff as an adoptableanimal, where we would not evenflinch at that. So I would say ournumbers are possibly even betterin so far as we are taking someserious-behavior animals—dogsthat bite you, dogs that areaggressive.

Latent Tensions Identifying manifest tensions helps todetail the no-kill controversy but doeslittle to diffuse it. Most proposals toallay the conflict come from the open-admission camp, which has called forno-kill advocates to modify theirprovocative language. However, thoseconcerned about inflammatoryspeech in the no-kill controversy havetuned into only a small part of thebigger picture that informs this con-troversy. Provocative language is asymptom and not a cause of the prob-lem; its social and psychological rootsare concealed and complex. Toexplain the persistence and fervor ofthe strife, it is necessary to analyze

the unexpressed, complicated, andrecalcitrant issues that underlie man-ifest tensions.

Vested Interests Much like the abortion debate, thepersistence of which stems from thevested interests of pro-life and pro-choice proponents, the no-kill contro-versy is stubborn and resistant to easycompromise. No-kill and open-admis-sion followers cling to and defendtheir vested interests, including theircollective identities, occupationallifestyles, and world views. These vest-ed interests underlie any debateabout the merits of different policiesfor controlling and managing petoverpopulation or dealing “humane-ly” with its victims.

Members of each camp in myresearch had a vested interest in pro-tecting their humane identities. Forno-kill followers this identity providedsome cachet because it empoweredthem. They saw themselves as “redis-covering” who they were, as opposedto open-admission workers whomthey felt “have forgotten our missionand are lost in the overwhelming jobof euthanasia,” according to one shel-ter worker whose organization wasswitching from open admission to no-kill. In the opinion of no-killer follow-ers, open-admission work was simplynot the work of a “’humane’ society.”Their new identity also was empower-ing because it had an outlaw quality;this made it an attractive and power-ful label for no-kill workers who feltalienated, misunderstood, andexcluded from the humane powersthat be. Believing that they were dis-empowered framed their camp’sstance as “anti-establishment” rela-tive to open admissionists (Foro,n.d.a). Poorly endowed, small sheltersespecially were drawn to the identitytag of no-kill because it symbolicallyrepresented their perceived power-lessness in an animal communitydominated by a few large and power-ful national organizations. The chargemade by some that the San FranciscoSPCA (SF SPCA) had “sold out” toThe HSUS (which is viewed as pro



open admission in its orientation) byincreasing the number of animals iteuthanized from almost none to afew, speaks to the current importanceof boundaries in conferring identityin the humane community.

Other features of the no-kill identi-ty that offered some cachet camefrom its evangelical quality, callingfor people to see the “right” way toapproach this problem and convert tothis “movement,” leaving behindtheir former, ill-conceived approach.Several respondents commented onthe “religious fervor” of no-kill fol-lowers; one said that there was a“kind of saintliness” about the move-ment. There even were rare attemptsto include elements of Buddhism andvegetarianism as part of the “no-killphilosophy” (Foro, n.d.b).

Perhaps the most cachet came fromunintentional piggybacking on thepro-life movement. Large and suc-cessful social movements provide anassembly of symbols and ideologicaltrappings—a cultural resource—thatother groups can use to fashion theirown thinking and model their ownactions, or from which they can drawemotional power and symboliccoherency. While there was little evi-dence that no-killers subscribed topro-life beliefs, there were many par-allels between the ideologies of thesetwo groups that empowered the no-kill movement and emotionallycharged the identity of its followers.Just as the pro-life movement cam-paigns to save the “helpless unborn”who should not be “killed,” the no-killmovement questions the moral, aswell as the practical, basis for killingunwanted or undesirable shelter ani-mals. The “killing” of shelter animalssignaled a moral assault on the fabricof human-animal relationships thatwas unimaginable to no-killers, muchas abortion was to pro-lifers (Gins-burg 1986; Kaufmann 1999). Manyno-kill proponents saw the openadmissionists’ version of euthanasiaas murder committed by selfish own-ers and unimaginative shelter work-ers willing to accept the status quo, inthe same way that pro-life advocatesdefined abortion as a crime approved

by a legal system which protectedmurderers and left victims unprotect-ed (Doyle 1982).4 In the end thiscachet was strong enough to make itvirtually impossible to stop usingsome language, including the veryterm no-kill. Its advocates were un-likely to curtail use of this self-moniker because it so powerfullyorganized their identity.

Open admissionists have discov-ered little if any cachet in theirhumane identity, at least comparedwith no-killers. For the most part,they have refined their former identi-ty in a reactive and defensive mannerby digging in their psychologicalheels and reaffirming their long-standing image as the standard bear-ers for humane treatment of animals.Ironically their “new” identity hasmade them appear to be victims fac-ing a more powerful enemy. For exam-ple some open admissionists spoke asthough they were on the “wrong sideof the street” because the “dirtywork” of killing was delegated tothem. They felt powerless to stop thisflow of animals and the undesirabletask of euthanizing so many. Somestaff in open-admission shelters andanimal control offices, especially incities that had strong and financiallystable no-kill programs, lamentedhaving poorer facilities and less pub-lic attention. This difference wasnoted in a major magazine articleabout animal shelters, which referredto one city’s animal control office as a“tenement” and its no-kill operationas a “palace” (Hess 1998).

Open-admissionists also failed topiggyback their identity on a culturalresource that could give it momen-tum, coherency, and cachet. In con-trast, pro-choice advocates linkedtheir cause to the feminist move-ment’s protection of the rights ofwomen. Support from animal rightsgroups, such as People for the EthicalTreatment of Animals (PETA), did notprovide this cachet. One reason isthat no-kill groups also claimed to beprotecting the rights of animals byopposing traditional euthanasia poli-cy, making the rights issue somewhatof a wash. It was true that open

admissionists focused on the issue ofeasing the suffering of animals andproviding options to owners who nolonger could or wanted to care fortheir pets. However this symbolismpaled in comparison with the no-killmovement’s moral concern for whatwere seen as innocent, helpless, anddesirable animals, a stance similar tothe pro-life movement’s symbolic con-struction of the fetus (Doyle 1982;Sheeran 1987). In American societyanti-death icons trump almost anyother image except that of freedom,and this appears true in the presentcase. Moreover, although some openadmissionists wish to develop theirown label conveying a new identityrivaling “no kill,” this would perpetu-ate the tension rather than remedy it.

Workers also had vested interests inprotecting lifestyles, whether person-al or occupational, associated witheither the open-admission or no-killapproach. They sought to defendwhat was familiar to them at work,while questioning others who threat-ened this routine. For instance, at onelevel, the open-admission approach toeuthanasia was easier for establishedbureaucracies that had worked thisway for years and had developed suit-able defenses to cope with it. Main-stream open-admission shelters havehad the resources to garner large-scale support for euthanasia as thebest way to deal with pet overpopula-tion, and they have grown comfort-able with their established methodsof doing so. One respondent claimed,

We are all vulnerable to the possi-bility that euthanasia just makesmy day go a little bit easier. If yousuddenly ended euthanasia forreasons of space, you’ve got a bigproblem, don’t you? You are goingto have 20 or 80 percent morepopulation than before. Solvethat problem. If there is euthana-sia, it does make things a little biteasy, doesn’t it, to have your shel-ter running very smoothly andefficiently?

No-kill workers also developed orga-nizational routines that made theirwork easier for them. Those most out-spoken in their criticism of euthanasia

took the moral high ground by dis-tancing themselves from it while onthe job. In their shelters they regard-ed euthanasia as a clinical, veterinaryact performed elsewhere by techni-cians in animal control agencies, or aninfrequent, highly ritualized and emo-tionally upsetting treatment of a“good friend” done by in-house veteri-narians. They provided a language andset of rationalizations to ensure thatsuch rare, in-house killings would beseen as impossible to avoid, withoutany ambiguity about the wisdom ofdoing them. These steps made themcomfortable and secure while on thejob. Like their open-admission coun-terparts, they came to see their par-ticular organizational way of life as thebest one for animals and themselves.

Finally, these accustomed ways ofworking endured because workersaccepted the presumptions thatpropped up, defended, and explainedthem. Usually the presumptions wereexpressed by people as “truths” thatwere rarely questioned and oftenthought to be self-evident. It was pre-dictable that the workers could notsee the tenuousness of such “truths,”since ideologies make those who pro-fess them shortsighted as to theimplications of their beliefs. Thebeliefs function as “reality” anchorsfor people and, as such, are clutchedtenaciously. Respondents in myresearch supported these anchors byuse of key terms, such as shelter,euthanasia, adoptable animal, andhumane, whose meanings were am-biguous and therefore modifiable tobe consistent with each camp’struths. The terms became a linguisticcode to define a camp’s position rela-tive to other groups.

For example, while both open-admission and no-kill advocatesabhorred euthanasia, they had differ-ent takes on killing because they haddifferent conceptions of the funda-mental problem. Each group definedthe problem somewhat differently,making for different solutions. Open-admission shelter workers saw theproblem as an animal problem—oneof managing pet overpopulation. Theyargued that no-kill approaches did

not solve this problem but merelyshifted the responsibility for euthana-sia to another shelter or agency. No-kill advocates, however, saw the fun-damental problem as a personproblem—one of changing the natureof shelter work so that workers couldhave a professional identity unconta-minated by the contradictions posedby conducting frequent euthanasia,especially if it involved animalsthought to be adoptable. Evidence ofthis changing emphasis from animalsto people came from the public justi-fications of shelters that have aban-doned their prior open-admission/euthanasia policies for no-kill ap-proaches. When a major SPCA did so,the New York Times headline pro-claimed: “ASPCA Plans to Give UpJob Killing New York Strays.” The textexplained that

Killing stray dogs and cats hasobscured its mission—and itsimage . . . . The society has backedaway from killing, which it callsanimal control. “Philosophically,it’s a nightmare to kill 30,000 to40,000 animals a year. . . . That’snot our mission.”. . . Being per-ceived as an animal killerhas. . . saddled it with an image fardifferent from the one it wants—that of an animal care and adop-tion agency. (Hicks 1993, B14)

These divergent views were bol-stered by the isolation of workersfrom the realities of shelters unliketheir own. Most workers in each camphad little if any firsthand experiencewith the opposing group. As in theabortion controversy, where pro-lifeparticipants had little or no directexposure to abortion (Luker 1984),most workers in no-kill facilities hadscant exposure to euthanasia. Nothaving direct contact can exaggeratethe emotional difficulty of doingsomething, making it seem evenmore wrenching than it might be inreality, and making it seem even morehorrific or ghastly than it seems tothose workers who have learned howto rationalize or cope with it. Similar-ly, many open-admissionists neverworked in no-kill settings; this lack ofexperience certainly made any other

approach seem impractical or evenoutlandish.

Attacking the ProblemDiffering approaches to dealing withanimal overpopulation resulted in asecond latent tension. No-kill workers“fought the good fight” for each ani-mal who came their way, expending asmuch time, labor, and money as nec-essary to ensure that he or she wascared for, loved, and, they hoped,adopted. Workers could feel asthough they championed individualanimals. As one respondent said, “Wedare to think that every individual lifedoes matter. . . that that individual’slife actually matters.” This focus onthe welfare and fate of individual ani-mals, combined with the knowledgethat euthanasia was very unlikely,allowed these workers to indulgetheir “rescue instinct” and their needto have emotionally deep and com-plex relationships with shelter ani-mals, even though they knew thatmany animals would be adopted.

The major force behind fighting thegood fight was the unabashed desireof no-killers to rescue or save animals,believing that it almost always wasworth trying to find homes for all ani-mals, even if others classified them asunadoptable. As one respondent said,

There are a lot of self-proclaimedexperts who will tell you that thisor that dog is unadoptable, don’teven bother trying. And we don’taccept that. You can get terrifical-ly good outcomes. . . . It’s a ques-tion of when can you and whencan’t you. The jury is out on ouranimals until we have exhaustedall reasonable attempts.

No-kill trainers believed they couldrehabilitate most problem animals,including those exhibiting aggressive-ness. One trainer compared this chal-lenge with working with criminals,concluding that both animals andcriminals can be rehabilitated if peo-ple try hard enough. “If you’ve gottenpeople who’ve committed certain lev-els of crime, can they be rehabilitat-ed? If you give them the right coun-seling, can you turn them around, or


is it always in them? I would submitthat the right kind of effort hasn’tbeen tried.”

No-kill workers felt that open-admission shelters turned their backson animals that were less than “per-fect,” euthanizing those that could beplaced in homes if given behavioral ormedical attention, along with timeand careful placement. One no-killworker elaborated on this view, say-ing,

Where do you draw the line? Doeseverything have to be pristine andperfect, and you kill everythingelse? We want to give animals achance that we think ought to begiven a chance. It’s kind of like a“quantity versus quality” type ofthing. I mean, the Blackies andthe Willies out there, they wouldbe killed because they are not per-fect, and I see this wonderful petthat would make a great compan-ion for someone and I think theyare worth investing the resourcesinto.

This logic meant that no-kill facili-ties could “save” or “rescue” animalsfrom open-admission shelters, andthat those shelters denied the valueof rehabilitating animals who couldbe improved and perhaps adopted.

Saved animals often faced a severe-ly reduced pool of potential adopters,since it took a very special adopter tobe the right match for an animal withbehavioral or veterinary problems, letalone one that was old or unattrac-tive. Despite this, no-kill workers con-vinced themselves that perfectadopters existed for virtually all oftheir charges. Having this view, how-ever, justified keeping animals for along time as staff searched for suit-able adopters. This search could beparticularly trying when dogs werehighly aggressive and needed muz-zling and constant monitoring. Whena no-kill worker was asked who wouldbe an appropriate adopter for such achallenging animal, she said a dogtrainer would come to the shelter oneday and adopt one. However, sheacknowledged—without apparentirony—that no such adopter hadcome to her shelter since she had

arrived there three years earlier. Fighting the good fight for all ani-

mals made euthanizing any of them adifficult and labored decision. Onefacility had formal guidelines fordeciding on all acts of euthanasia(except for extreme emergencies).The guidelines included obtainingsignatures of approval from the presi-dent, vice president, and initiatingdepartment head, and requiring thatthe animals’ names be posted so nostaff would be shocked by inadver-tently discovering that a “friend” hadbeen euthanized. After completingthis paperwork, cats slated to beeuthanized were given special foodsand treats; soft, comfortable, securebedding; adequate scratching posts;and visits from the staff. Dogs weregiven similar bedding; a rawhide boneduring the day; a beef bone at night;special food and “extra special good-ies”; a cloth toy; and visits from staffmembers who would give them “qual-ity time” through long walks, outdoorplay “with their special buddies,” orquiet time. This “spoiling period,” aninformal practice at many no-killfacilities, involved special considera-tion for animals after the decision wasmade to euthanize them. Spoilingperiods “were awkward” for the staffbecause they knew that animals wereto be “put down,” but the specialtreatment also made the staff feelbetter about the euthanasia decision.One worker said,

The last days are so difficult. I findit very hard to look at a dog car-rying on its normal life, when Iknow that soon it will all be over.But I think it helps us to knowthat our dog’s last day or so wasreally special. It seems to bringpeace to the people around thedog who are suffering, knowingthat the dog is going to get euth-anized.

The individualization of shelter ani-mals meant that no-kill workers werevery disturbed when euthanasia tookplace, even though, or perhaps because,this was a rare event. “It is alwayssuch a big deal. I just cannot get usedto it,” observed one worker. Enor-mous internal resistance occurred at

one no-kill shelter when a small num-ber of overly aggressive dogs wereslated for euthanasia. “We could notfix them. We were at the end of ourability,” lamented one worker. Somedogs had become a danger to the staffand were a liability risk. Managementheld special meetings with differentgroups of workers and volunteers todeliver this news, calm those upset orin “shock,” and reset the organiza-tion’s “bar” for rehabilitating difficultdogs. During the meetings seniorstaff placed most of the blame onexternal forces, saying, “Our hand hasbeen forced by elements in society.”Those external forces included whatthe staff described as unreasonableexpectations for the behavior of ani-mals, and society’s excessive litigious-ness. Trying to ease distraught andconfused listeners, senior staffclaimed they “did not have choices”and “couldn’t” do anything else withthese dogs.

Nevertheless senior managers with-drew their initial list as pressuremounted to spare these animals; afew workers and volunteers demand-ed meetings with shelter officials toprotest this list, and rumors circulat-ed about a volunteer protest strikeand leaks to the press. Workersfeared that conducting euthanasiaon this scale would subvert theiridentities as no-kill advocates. Oneuneasy worker spoke about the slip-pery slope created by doing even asmall number of euthanasias: “Weare in a position now of eitherbecoming like every other shelterand we save only perfect dogs whoneed nothing or what. . . ?” Consider-able, continued pressure by workersresulted in several dogs being takenoff the list and sent to sanctuaries.

Despite these efforts a few dogsfrom the list were euthanized. Themost unsettling case involved a doghaving a history of aggression, butwith whom the animal’s “fan club”had bonded intensely. Only this innercircle was permitted to attend Maria’seuthanasia; lights were dimmed inthe dog’s quarters, and the mood wasextremely solemn if not despondent.Many workers were tormented; a few



chose not to attend the euthanasiabecause they were so distressed. Onestaff member was hospitalized becauseshe was so disturbed by the event, andseveral others took “sick days” be-cause of their grief. During the hourspreceding the euthanasia, as well asthe days following it, workers couldbe seen embracing each other, offer-ing words of comfort, and sheddingtears. “People are walking around likezombies,” said one sad worker abouther peers. A wake held the evening ofthe euthanasia again excluded thoseoutside the inner circle of mourners;a poem in honor of Maria was avail-able; stories were swapped about theanimal along with photographs ofher; flowers and wine were there forthe occasion. As one worker said, thesentiment was: “We love you guys, youdid good work but this one just didn’twork.” Contrary to shelter policy, oneof the workers requested Maria’sashes; a few staff members thoughtthis was going “overboard.”

Open-admission workers, in con-trast, related to shelter animals lesswith their hearts and more with theirheads. Unquestionably they too want-ed the best for animals that cametheir way, but their approach was col-ored by what they saw as a moreimportant issue than the need to feelgood about their relationships withindividual animals—namely, the needto attack the overpopulation prob-lem by increasing the number ofadoptions through euthanasia of ani-mals deemed unadoptable. They alsoused their heads because they felt itwas important never to say no to sur-renderers of animals; despite theirfrustration and anger with surrender-ers, open admissionists feared whatmight happen to the animals if theywere not left at the shelter. Thisthinking forestalled deeper emotion-al relationships with their charges,because all the animals stood somechance of being euthanized and usu-ally were in the shelter for relativelyshort periods. One worker aptly sum-marized this type of thinking as fol-lows: “There’s a part of me that Idon’t give to the dogs—not to thatdog—because that would inhibit what

I can do for so many others. I alwayshave to come back to looking atnumbers. I can’t afford to getattached to a new dog. I have tothink with my head. I have to keeppart of me for the good of the whole.I won’t sacrifice a few for the many.”

According to open admissionists,relating to shelter animals with one’sheart caused ethical and emotionalproblems. They claimed that no-killshelters had such a narrow definitionof suffering, they often could not“see” it; certain animals might not beeuthanized even to end their suffer-ing. Without clearly seeing suffering,workers as well as animals suffered,although the workers’ suffering wasemotional.

These problems were evident atMaria’s euthanasia, according to shel-ter staff members who sympathizedwith the open-admission approach.The fact that this euthanasia was forbehavioral rather than medical rea-sons made it especially difficult forworkers to say that Maria’s “suffer-ing” justified her death. One excep-tion was a staff member who hadworked previously at an open-admis-sion shelter. She commented,

Whenever I put an animal down, Ialways found it to be redeemingbecause the dog has been in tor-ment—and any dog I have putdown has either had an aggres-sion issue or just not been happy,has had a bad life. For me it wasthe one thing I was able to do forthat dog—give it some peace. Iwas able to end the suffering.

Indeed, a number of workers at thisshelter felt that the strong emotionalreaction to the death of Maria was“unfair” to some staff members andout of proportion with what shouldhappen after the loss of an un-ownedshelter dog with a history of biting.One such dissenter said that, if any-thing, members of Maria’s fan clubwere “mourning their failure” torehabilitate this highly aggressivedog. Moreover, his opinion was that,although he thought it might sound“cold,” it was a better idea for emo-tional reasons to have a veterinarianand technician be alone when eutha-

nizing animals. Having all the people who were involvedin his [the dog’s] life standingaround him, pushing their emo-tions on the doctor. . . . it could bedifficult for the doctor not to cry.That’s not fair to do to the doctoror the tech holding the dog. Whyshould they be forced to have anemotion for an animal that theyhave no connection to? They areforced to feel sympathy.

These ethical and emotional draw-backs of bonding so closely to shelteranimals were worrisome not just tothe no-kill workers but also to open-admission proponents who ponderedthe fate of their no-kill peers.

By comparison, a nearby municipalanimal-control office routinely andunceremoniously euthanized animals.While bemoaning euthanasia, workersthere felt that it was the right thing todo given the large number of surren-dered animals and the limited spaceand resources available. They, likeother open-admission workers, reject-ed the notion that they were the “bad-dies” because no-kill workers neededto “rescue” their shelter animals. Theimplication of using this language wasthat these animals were salvageable aspotential pets and therefore shouldnot be killed. The problem, accordingto open admissionists, was that if no-kill workers “rescued” with theirhearts, they would neglect the “biggerpicture,” which the former could see.This criticism was expressed even bysome no-kill workers who bemoanedturning away so many animals for lackof sufficient resources to deal withthem all. To open admissionists, thiswas a management problem—a com-bination of poor resource allocationand bad judgment—that allowedworkers to be self-indulgent. Suchshortsighted policies were seen asbeneficial to workers, since theygained emotional gratification at theexpense of animal welfare.

The above-mentioned animal-con-trol office, like many open-admissionshelters, had no formal protocol call-ing for signing off on euthanasia deci-sions or for in-house postings of theevents. Nor was there a spoiling peri-

od for animals being euthanized,although the workers here, like theirpeers in open-admission shelters,maintained that they “spoiled [theanimals] as much as possible” for aslong as they were in their shelter“. . . not [just for] twenty-four hours.”Spoiling periods per se were thoughtto be more for the psychological ben-efit of workers than for the animalsand to place a “huge emotional bur-den” on the staff members doing thespoiling. While workers lamented hav-ing to euthanize animals, they han-dled it quite differently from their no-kill peers. Rather than expressingtheir emotions about preventingeuthanasia or grieving when itoccurred, these workers blocked theiremotions when it came to euthanasia.As one worker recalled, “I was like akilling machine, a certified euthana-sia tech that euthanized 60 to 100plus animals every single day. Somedays that’s all I did—clean and kill.And go home. You put your feelingson the shelf. You just do your job. Youhave to deal with that sometime downthe line.”

Being Humane Short of the most extreme manifesta-tions of physical suffering in animals,no-kill and open-admission workershad very different perceptions of whatconstituted suffering, or at leastenough discomfort to justify killingan animal for his or her own sake.Having conflicting ideas about thenature of suffering led to suggestionsthat members of the opposite campwere being cruel to shelter animalsbecause they caused needless suffer-ing, either for killing them or forkeeping them alive. Alternativenotions of suffering also allowed bothopen-admission and no-kill workers tosee themselves as humane becausethey could say that they were actingin the best interests of animals com-pared to their peers in the othercamp.

Some open-admission representa-tives argued that no-kill workers werecruel to turn their backs on so manyneedy or less desirable animals, andthat open-admission shelters actually

were responsible for “saving” moreanimals. One open-admission defend-er wrote in an editorial, “The DoorRemains Open,” that “no-kill sheltersseldom operate programs to rescuesick and injured animals off thestreets,” suggesting that animals inneed are turned away (Savesky1995b, 2), while open-admission shel-ters “rescue sick and injured animalsevery day. . . dogs hit by cars, cats tan-gled in debris, animals injured byother animals, victims of all sorts ofaccidents.” In addition, no-kill shel-ters, according to Savesky, “oftenturn away older animals, those withminor health or behavioral problems,or those that they otherwise classifyunadoptable.” Moreover, this authoradded that “no-kill shelters seldominvestigate and prosecute complaintsof cruelty and neglect” (2). By con-trast, she argues that many such ani-mals have a greater chance of beingadopted in open-admission shelters.

People working in open-admissionshelters also thought it was cruel to“warehouse” animals past the pointwhere they should be “humanelyeuthanized.” Some claimed thatwarehousing was cruel because of theharmful psychological effects of keep-ing dogs and cats in long-term hous-ing, especially if caged with multipleanimals and given minimal stimula-tion and human contact. But in dis-cussions less-than-ideal caging or ani-mal care often fell short of beinglabeled as cruel. One animal controlworker, for instance, was uncomfort-able with the local no-kill shelter’spractice of putting animals intoboarding kennels when space ran outin the facility. “Who do they have tolove them? They are going from onecage to another just to keep themalive. I don’t know if it is cruel; it justseems. . . neglectful. The reason whyit is hard to say it is cruel is that it isnot for a bad reason. The intention is‘Hold on, hold on, you’ll get yourchance.’” Another respondent hesi-tated to use the word suffer, butspoke of the unintentional emotional“neglect” of dogs who are confined incages and have to deal with many dif-ferent handlers and visitors—all of

which takes a “toll.” One respondent,however, did use the word suffer,claiming that some no-kill shelterskept animals so long that they devel-oped “that nervous thing, like dogsspinning, or some of the barking[which] sounds like suffering to me.They are just unhappy and crying.”Similarly, another critic of warehous-ing pointed out after visiting a no-killshelter that “it was spotless. . . . Theyhad air conditioning, climbing trees,toys, and good food. But when youwalked in, they were all over you. Ihad cats attached to my legs andarms, on my shoulders and my head. Ihad scratch marks for a week afterthat but not from aggression. Thesecats were starved for human contact.That’s what breaks my heart aboutthese places” (Donald 1991, 4). Somecritics suggested that workers com-pounded the detrimental psychologi-cal effects of long-term housing byusing inappropriate behavior andtraining techniques. As evidence, onerespondent cited a case of severaldogs who were born in a no-kill shel-ter and stayed there for seven years.All displayed serious behavior prob-lems that were attributed to themethods used in their training.

Open-admission spokespersons alsoargued that warehousing in no-killshelters could cause physical harm.This critique was echoed in a popularmagazine, which reported the follow-ing reaction of a 4-H group leaderafter taking the group to visit a no-killshelter: “Dogs limping around withmange and open sores. Others gasp-ing for air or dragging broken legs,struggling to fight off vicious packs inthe large communal pen. ‘I might aswell have taken them to a horrorshow’” (Foster 2000). The reporterwho wrote this article referred to the“atrocious conditions” at some no-kill facilities, and the “lucklessinmates” who are “condemned” to“filth” and who “suffer” from long-term caging. Indeed, one respondentclaimed that the “quality of care ofanimals is horrific. They [no-kill shel-ters] need to do it right and havesome standard of care.” For example,he pointed to a no-kill facility that


called his shelter in hopes of transfer-ring some of its 110 animals toreduce overcrowding. When therespondent visited the no-kill shelter,he found that the facility was verycold, merely a “semblance” of a build-ing, and that some of the animalswere dead. In addition, when the no-kill shelter was told it could transfersome animals, its manager declinedbecause the open-admission directorcould not rule out their euthanasia.

Most no-kill respondents denied“warehousing.” They felt that theyaddressed the “quality of life” issueand provided a better life for animalsin shelters than some had in adoptivehomes. Although one worker admit-ted that, “from the dogs’ perspective,they are always prisoners,” she feltthat their quality of life was “as goodif not better than the [homes where]many open admission shelters placetheir dogs. . . . I know a good manydogs in suburbia who don’t getwalked, have minimal veterinary care,don’t get socialized. They don’t getpatted much by their owners. They’rein the yard.” Others defended extend-ed stays; one respondent said theywere “less than ideal, however it isfortunate that [the animals] get achance to end up in a wonderfulhome where they are completelyloved and adored.”

Well-funded no-kills described “lav-ish” surroundings for shelter animalsto counter charges of inhumane ware-housing—though these surroundingswere sometimes belittled by the pressor open-admission shelters as exces-sive, and better than facilities provid-ed for some homeless people. One no-kill “Q and A” included a questionasking how it could justify such a“beautiful” and expensive shelterwith “luxury suites for animals,replete with toys, TVs, and play-rooms,” when “most humans don’thave quarters like these.” The reply,in short, claimed these “amenities”were not excessive but “important forthe animals” to reduce their stressand make them “healthier and happi-er. So the toys and playrooms are notfrivolous. They’re just what the doc-tor ordered.”

Part of their defense also rested onthe language used by no-kill advo-cates to describe physical and mentalproblems of animals housed for longperiods of time in shelters. The advo-cates fought hard to describe theseproblems in ways that did not leadquickly to perceptions of hopeless-ness for the animals. For example, inone such facility, animals with behav-ior problems who would have beeneuthanized in open-admission shel-ters were described as having“issues.” The word “issues” conjuresup psychological problems in humansthat can be lived with and managed,as opposed to more troubling behav-ior that is difficult to tolerate andcontrol. In one case a shelter dog hada history of snapping at children, andwas spoken about as “having an issuewith children.” The solution was towork on ridding the dog of that“issue,” while seeking childlessadopters who could keep the dogaway from children.

Language modification also helpedlessen the image of dangerous ani-mals so they might appear as “nice,soft.” One group of no-kill trainerswas particularly concerned, for legalreasons, about written records thatcreated an image of dogs as vicious,perhaps indiscriminate biters. Theystarted a “language project team” notto “hide data,” but

[T]o be cautious. If somebodyreports something, even if it’s lit-erally a puppy who puppy-bit, thatwould go down on the record. Weare trying to clean up all thatjunk. . .trying to make a big dis-tinction between when a dog play-bites versus really bites. We aregiving people who do the report-ing a multiple-choice form ratherthan letting them editorializeabout it. [One choice is] “dogplay-bit hard with bruising.”

In any case keeping compromisedanimals alive or warehousing themwas not as bad as killing them,according to no-kill respondents.They countered criticism with thecharge that euthanasia itself wasoften cruel by definition, if not bypractice, because most shelter ani-

mals could be kept alive and evenadopted. Some methods of euthana-sia were easier for critics to decry onthe grounds that they caused animalsuffering. For example critics of ashelter that used carbon monoxidedeemed this gassing to be morally“wrong” and “cruel” because animalscried out in pain or fear and saw otheranimals dying (Gilyard 2001). Themore common method used, injec-tion of lethal drugs, still was attackedas cruel.

Moreover most no-kill workers feltthat if adverse “warehousing” existedit was at a facility other than theirown. Some no-kill proponents werevery clear that shelters whose missionwas to adopt animals should not keepunadoptable animals in too-smallquarters for extended periods of time;to do so was considered inhumane.Other advocates acknowledged thatthese abuses probably occurred in atleast some no-kill facilities, but theywere marginalized and viewed asexceptions rather than as represent-ing the vast majority of no-kill shel-ters. Indeed one common way to cre-ate this “bad egg” hierarchy was torefer to the abusing facility as a“sanctuary” (used here pejoratively)rather than a no-kill shelter, therebydistancing it from “better” organiza-tions.

In fact no-kill proponents felt thatkeeping behaviorally or medically dif-ficult animals was a sign of successand an opportunity to save more ani-mals, rather than evidence of theirinsensitivity or cruelty. One hopefulno-killer said these animals were achallenge to rehabilitate, and hergoal was to make ever sicker animalsinto adoptable ones: “We are raisingthe bar for what we can handle med-ically or behaviorally. We’ve got ani-mals with chronic health conditions.We’ve got aggressive dogs. We are try-ing to rehabilitate them so they canbe made adoptable.” By “raising thebar,” no-kill workers felt they wereattempting to reduce suffering in ani-mals rather than increase it throughprolonged caging. For the most part,they denied the latter happened. Forexample, when discussing a highly


aggressive dog who had been shel-tered for eighteen months, a no-killworker said the animal was not a can-didate for euthanasia because that“means you are ending suffering, andhe is quite enjoying his life.”

Toward aCommonGroundUnearthing the manifest and latenttensions behind the open-admissionand no-kill perspectives suggests thata large and perhaps insurmountablegulf exists between the camps. How-ever it would be wrong to portraythese differences as antithetical. Situ-ations exist where each camp’sdefenses are down, vulnerable to con-cession or change. This offers hope ofa common ground between campsthat would improve dialogue, en-hance cooperation, and mollify ten-sions. Four bases exist that auger wellfor such change, including internaldissent, shared values, mutual identi-fication, and maturation and change.

Internal DissentFar from public posturing that yieldsrigid ideological distinctions, therewas internal dissent within the open-admission and no-kill camps over theproper handling of specific shelteranimals—a dissent that mirrors thesame criticisms made between thecamps.5 It was common to find someworkers within open-admission andno-kill shelters who were uneasy withtheir own shelter’s ideology butremained on the job because theystrongly believed in the importance ofvoicing an alternative view in theirown shelter, even if this marginalizedthem from peers. In larger facilities,there were cliques devoted to suchdissent, but they, too, felt alienatedfrom their own shelter’s dominantoutlook on these issues. Whetherindividuals or cliques, the concerns ofthese workers came to a head overthe handling of particular sheltercases.

For example workers within some

no-kill shelters sometimes debatedthe appropriateness of their facility’sstance on euthanasia when that issuewas raised for certain animals. As theydiscussed the fate of these animals,workers mulled over the various argu-ments now associated with the no-killor open-admission perspective. Work-ers at one no-kill facility were sharplydivided over the proposed euthanasiaof several dogs with threateningbehavior who had been sheltered forseveral months. Most stronglyopposed the death of these animals,believing that their quality of life wassatisfactory and that their riskybehavior was modifiable, while somesupported it on the grounds thattheir lengthy caging adversely affect-ed them and that they were danger-ous to adopt out. Those in the dis-senting minority espoused a view thatat times was closer to the open-admission than the no-kill stance,since it saw euthanasia as an accept-able alternative to the deleteriouseffects of long confinement. The twofactions within the shelter wereengaging in a meta-discussion aboutthe proper handling of all shelter ani-mals who faced a similar quandary. Atthis general level, they were debatingand considering the merits of bothno-kill and open-admission stances;this process allowed for the possibili-ty that features of these perspectivesmight be merged.

Open-admission shelters also hadtheir share of internal dissent. Tradi-tionally, workers who becameattached to individual animals quietlyresisted the euthanasia of their“favorites” or, over time, quit becauseof “burnout” from the routine ofkilling. Perhaps empowered by the no-kill movement and seepage of itsideas into the open-admission camp,these workers were more willing thanin the past to express doubts aboutthe rationale for euthanasia and togarner support for such resistancefrom fellow workers. At these times,workers and shelter managers, muchlike those in no-kill shelters, debatedthe appropriateness of euthanasia inways that echoed sentiments fromboth camps.

This dissent can become a buildingblock for establishing a commonground. Although twenty years agoindividuals in shelters expresseddoubts about their shelter’s policies,these questions were unlikely to havecredibility because they were comingfrom a single person having no largervoice. Instead of having their objec-tions considered seriously, dissentersprobably risked being seen as “prob-lem children,” “difficult employees,”not “team members,” or the like,with the expectation that they neededto adjust to the job, become silent, orleave. With the growth of the no-killmovement and crystallization of theopen-admission identity, dissentersnow can name, and thereby attachtheir individual doubts to, somethinglarger and more legitimate. Whenthey speak it is from a position ofstrength. Giving voice to both per-spectives provides an opportunity forhealthy, albeit critical, debate anddiscussion at the ground level. Suchempowered discussions within shel-ters make it possible for previouslydefensive workers to hear the othercamp’s views.

Shared Values While internal dissent over the man-agement of specific cases permittedthe expression of opposing views with-in each camp, there also was moregeneral evidence of mutual subscrip-tion to fundamental sheltering goals.When their guards were down, manyrespondents spoke about their workin ways that were far less polarizedthan the sheltering oral culture andliterature suggested. Linguistic flash-points used for public consumptionand for posturing by spokespersonswere not necessarily accurate reflec-tions of the feelings and actions ofeveryday workers. If workers wereconfronted about their use of theseterms, stark and inflammatory dis-tinctions started to blur or fade. Infact, there was some agreement as tothe meaning of important languagethat typically divided the camps. Inthis regard people in both campsdemonstrated common rather than


conflicting values about basic issuesand concerns faced by all.

To some degree both camps hadsimilar views of what constituted “suf-fering” and what conditions justifiedeuthanasia. Despite what open admis-sionists assumed about no-killers,many of the latter were willing, inprinciple, to euthanize animals whentheir “fates were worse than death,” aposition championed by open admis-sionists. As one no-kill advocateclaimed: “I haven’t heard one person[at the no-kill facility] saying, ‘Yeah, Ithink it is much better if we let theanimal go on the highway then euth-anize them. . . . Better the animal isfree and roaming around with mangeand starving to death than to bekilled.’ I think that’s nutty. [Is thatcruel?] Absolutely. Absolutely. I wouldpick euthanasia over that.” Anotherno–kill proponent, agreeing with thisview, likened the plight of some ani-mals whose suffering merited deathto that of humans facing dire situa-tions. This no-kill worker criticized“sanctuaries” that kept animals aliveto the point where they suffered,arguing that humans do not let thathappen to each other. In her words,

If you are not being humane, andthe animal is in mental or physi-cal distress, that may be consid-ered a ‘sanctuary’ [living outtheir lives until they end natural-ly]. Technically we don’t even dothat for humans anymore. Ifsomeone is in pain, they usuallyare put on a morphine drip withthe dosage slowly increased toreduce their discomfort. The real-ity is morphine suppresses therespiration.

Other no-kill respondents also spokeof euthanasia as a humane option bycomparing the plight of some shelteranimals with that of humans isolatedfrom society. As one said,

What happens when you confinehumans? What happens when youput humans in mental institu-tions? You can make it acceptablefor some time for some dogs.Some can handle kenneling. Oth-

ers need the bond. . .[of] some-thing or someone, and sitting inthat kennel is not the same forthem. They just can’t hack it.

Members of both camps also sawalmost all shelter animals as poten-tially adoptable and not requiringeuthanasia, despite their physical andemotional limitations. Soundingquite like a no-kill advocate, oneopen-admissionist explained: “Most ofthe animals we kill are to us adopt-able. That’s why we don’t use theword adoptable in any of our litera-ture. A kitten with two legs who isfour weeks old is adoptable to a per-son who wants to adopt her. Adopt-ability is only about who wants thisanimal. We had a thirteen-year-olddog with no front legs. She getsaround. She kisses everyone. And shewas placed.” Of course, some open-admission respondents did not workin shelters that had resources to treator keep such compromised and diffi-cult-to-adopt animals. But they clungjust as strongly as their no-kill peersto the hope that almost every shelteranimal, regardless of disability, age,or unattractiveness, could be placedif given sufficient time.

Most respondents from both campssaw shelters—even the “best” ofthem—as unhealthy, if not destruc-tive, environments for animals. Every-one agreed that, in an ideal world,shelters would not exist or, if they did,would serve only as temporary waystations to rehabilitate and homeneedy animals. One no-kill workeradmitted that even her own “nice”shelter was “still” a shelter, as shequestioned the “quality of life” of oneanimal who had been in her shelterfor more than five hundred days. “Idon’t care how wonderful we make itfor them, they are still institutional-ized. Caretakers are there for thirtyminutes to an hour and then the dogis alone, not able to do any of theinnate things that a dog is supposedto be doing.” Another no-kill workeragreed with this sentiment, saying,“We’ve had dogs here for a year or twoand you look at when they came in

versus when they went out or wereput to sleep, and they get worse notbetter. Shelters aren’t always greatplaces for dogs. And the longer theyare here, the more likely we are tomake them worse.”

Recognition of shared values is animportant tool for building commonground. Most workers in both campsare not absolutists; they neitherunthinkingly carry out every euthana-sia nor rigidly oppose every possibili-ty. Despite such overlap in values,however, most workers believed thatmembers of the other camp did notshare their own broad, if not ambigu-ous, perspective toward fundamentalanimal sheltering issues. This think-ing served only to polarize further theno-kill controversy because it empha-sized differences in values and exag-gerated the ideological distancebetween the two camps. Discovering,noting, and acknowledging sharedvalues would help proponents andworkers “see” their common inter-ests and change their current think-ing and practice.

Mutual Identification Although public posturing towardand stereotyping of the no-kill andopen-admission approaches common-ly occurred, when individuals airedtheir thoughts in private, they some-times identified with those in theopposing camp. Research on pro-lifeand pro-choice supporters also hasfound their differences to be less pro-nounced than their public rhetoric(Dworkin 1993; Kaufman 1999).Among shelter workers, mutual iden-tification was evident when respon-dents spoke informally with peers orwith the author; at these times, polit-ical and rhetorical guards were low-ered enough to reveal more overlap inhumane identities than many mightrealize or admit.

For example, there were occasionalexpressions of empathy for workers inthe other camp. No-killers, as seenearlier, reported pity for open-admis-sion workers who had to euthanizeanimals, or even work in a shelter


that did this, because of the emotion-al toll such actions were believed totake. One no-kill worker felt thatopen-admission shelter staff mightresent the greater resources availableto the few well-endowed no-kill shel-ters. She explained,

It’s a horrible thing to have toeuthanize animals every day. Ifeel fortunate that I am workingin an organization where wedon’t have to do that. I can un-derstand them [open-admissionshelters] being resentful that wehave the resources that we doand are able to run things theway we do. And that is where this[tension] is coming from. Theyhave the same amount of com-passion that we do have, but be-cause they have fewer resources,they can’t do what we do.

Open admissionists sometimespitied no-kill workers who had to say“no” to people wanting to drop offtheir pets, only to tell them there wasno room or a very long waiting listand that they either had to take theiranimals to some other shelter, go to aveterinarian for euthanasia, or find aneighbor or friend to adopt the ani-mal. One respondent said that hethought it was at least as upsettingfor no-killers to tell many people “no”as it was to euthanize animals “eighthours a day.” How hard, he conjec-tured, it must be to turn away peoplewho sometimes are pleading for theiranimals to be taken. He even comput-ed the number of people who are told“no” at a prominent sanctuary, esti-mating many thousand each year, andfinding the thought of doing this tobe mind boggling.

Mutual identification was manifest-ed in ways other than pity. There wasrecognition by some that, in the end,both camps resorted to a similarprocess for deciding the fate of ani-mals when space became limited. Atthese times, said one respondent,“You go through your populations andyou are going to try and euthanizethe animals that are the least place-able. . . the ones with the worsthealth, or the oldest, or the ones not

doing well in the shelter environ-ment.” Workers who shared thisthinking felt that their peers in theother camp were forced to go throughthe same excruciating decision mak-ing to decide the fate of shelter ani-mals. Because they did this too, theyfelt collegial and cohesive rather thanconfrontational and competitive.

Identifying and acknowledgingmutual identification can help tolessen the present polarization thatleads to overgeneralization and blan-ket assumptions about those in theopposite camp. In such a hostile envi-ronment, people are likely to feelunfairly and negatively judged by oth-ers, and certainly unappreciated fortheir emotional and ethical labors.Sympathy can be the starting pointthat opens lines of communicationand support for different, but not nec-essarily antagonistic, ways of manag-ing shelter animals.

Maturation and Change New common ground will be discov-ered over time as the “no-kill issue”matures in the humane community.This is likely to happen as more peo-ple reject simplistic characterizationsof the no-kill “debate” or “controver-sy” that pit one camp against theother, even though the present studycould be faulted for doing so.Although many people consider theno-kill controversy to be highly polar-ized, it is more accurate to think of itas a range of views about the appro-priateness of killing shelter animals.While some tension no doubt occursas these differences are negotiated, aworking order probably will be creat-ed that, despite occasional bumpi-ness, allows most shelters to draw onand be comfortable with different per-spectives toward euthanasia. Thisdiversity of views should be seen as ahealthy form of organizational con-flict that allows both perspectives toexist under the same roof. Such aplan means that the humane commu-nity will have to live with some resid-ual uneasiness about the nature and

role of euthanasia and to see that dis-comfort as a sign of correctly manag-ing a complex and subtle issue.

As the no-kill issue matures, otherorganizational changes are likely toreduce the distance between camps.Some no-kill groups will become insti-tutionalized over time, if they havenot already, moving them closer to ahumane centrist position. As this hap-pens, they will reject, with the sameconviction and vehemence as tradi-tional humane groups, “fringe” or“lunatic” groups also claiming to beno-kill. Some no-kill leaders haveacknowledged the existence of thesemarginal “shelters,” and the need forthem to be improved or eliminated.More centrist no-kill organizationswill move to some degree toward theopen-admission camp. To wit, therehas been some response to the open-admission plea for less provocativelanguage and to stop using the label“no kill” or inflammatory terms thatcompare open admissionsts to Nazis,criminals, or other killers. Aware thatthe no-kill language hurts or angersothers, some in the movement sympa-thize with this concern and have cur-tailed use of such terms. In oneinstance the director of a major no-killshelter publicly acknowledged that,because the term no-kill can offendothers, he consciously tries to stopusing it when speaking publicly. Andseveral shelters whose policies wereno-kill in practice and principalrefused to label themselves as no-killbecause they had various problemswith the term’s meaning and its effecton open-admission shelters and staff.In one case, the president of a no-killshelter claimed that she did not“tout” her organization as no kill:

The only reason we are “no kill” isbecause, unlike animal shelters,we have the ability to turn peopleaway. . . . Just because one organi-zation is not killing does not meanthat animals are not dying enmasse. The animals we unfortu-nately must turn away very likelyend up at the end of a needle in ashelter. (Stinson 1997)

Finally, the organizer of the national


no-kill conference decided to drop “nokill” from the name of this meeting,so as to include rather than excludepeople from the open-admission per-spective. The organizer renamed it the“Conference on Homeless AnimalManagement and Policy.”

More progressive open-admissiongroups, in turn, are likely to rethinktheir mission and identity, movingsomewhat closer to the no-kill campby adopting more aggressive adoptionpolicies; questioning long-standingdefinitions of what constitutes“acceptable” rates of euthanasia; andtrying to lower these rates. Someopen admissionists also have shown awillingness to embrace a no-kill iden-tity in their speaking. For instance atone shelter that has had great successin controlling dog overpopulation, asenior staff member commented, “Weare no-kill with puppies.” Even if saidtongue in cheek, his language sug-gests a recognition that no-kill is aworthy aim and a sign of success. Afew open admissionists are evenstyling themselves as “no-kill advo-cates,” although this is laughable tono-kill workers. Perhaps there is moresubstance to this claim; certainly, noshelter worker wants to euthanizeanimals. If these organizationalchanges take place, friction betweencamps will subside, leaving a smallnumber of marginalized humaneorganizations outside the boundariesof mainstream shelter culture.

ConclusionMaturation and change in the no-killcontroversy is likely to lead to newlanguage and ideology for speakingand thinking about issues facing allshelter workers. This will happen asthe humane community chooses notto fan the fires of current tensions, oreven focus on them, but rather tolook upon them as an opportunity toredefine to shelter workers and thepublic its identity and mission. Somedivergent ideas from both camps willbecome synthesized and appeal tomost shelter workers, while others

will be dropped by the waysidebecause they lack this broad interest.The result will be a new humane ide-ology that can be embraced by no-killand open-admission advocates alike.

This change will require refashion-ing the meaning of familiar conceptsor creating entirely fresh ones thatbridge tensions rather than createthem. The very ambiguity of suchterms as shelter, humane, andeuthanasia frustrates people, but thisvagueness can benefit those who wantto give them new meanings that res-onate for all shelter workers. Tobridge the tensions, superordinateconcepts must draw from commonground between camps—shared prac-tices, values, and identities—so thatmost workers can agree with andextol them in professional and publicarenas.

The notion of welfare could serveaptly as one superordinate concept tounite rather than divide the sheltercommunity. Although somewhattricky to reinvent because of its pre-sent political connotations in thegeneral animal community, the termnevertheless has the potential tobridge tensions underlying the no-killdebate, just as others have suggestedusing the concept of welfare to quellthe abortion controversy (Kaufmann1999). Concern for the welfare of ani-mals deeply motivates both no-killand open-admission advocates. It is amajor area of common ground, lead-ing virtually all shelter workers,regardless of their camp, to preserveand improve the quality of life for ani-mals. When threads of commonground surface in dialogue betweenmembers of the two camps, workerscan understand how the same con-cern for animals triggers one person’sdecision to be no kill, the other’s tobe open admission. The lifeworkinspired by this motivation is differ-ent for the two camps, but it is workthat both parties can admire. Focus-ing on this common ground can fos-ter mutual respect, as the enemyimage is replaced by the actual pres-ence of another shelter worker strug-

gling to respond to the difficult situa-tions of everyday life. Workers see forthemselves that within their worldviews is a shared concern for animals.

Certainly there are many othernotions, long familiar to shelter work-ers, that can be infused with newmeaning to connect rather than sepa-rate open-admission and no-kill sup-porters. Indeed, entirely new conceptsunfamiliar to the shelter world may bebrought into this community tobridge its camps. Whether old ideasare being reinvented or new ones arebeing imported, to succeed they mustbe based on common ground betweencamps. The challenge facing theAmerican sheltering community is todiscover additional bases for this com-mon ground and to articulate a newlanguage to reaffirm it.

AcknowledgementsI wish to thank Kathy Savesky, NatalieDiGiacomo, and Anne Lindsay forproviding advice and criticism. I amalso grateful to the Edith Goode Trustand the San Francisco Society for thePrevention of Cruelty to Animals fortheir support of this research.

Notes1My use of the term kill, except when specificallydiscussing its meaning to shelter workers or quot-ing them directly, is made without symbolic orpolitical connotation.

2Throughout this report the terms openadmission and no kill are used because mostmembers of the respective camps accept theselabels as self descriptions, while rejecting otherterms for themselves. Open-admission advocatesreject the label “kill shelter,” and even the lesssensitive language of “full service” or “tradition-al” are received ambivalently. Similarly no-killproponents reject the term limited admission fortheir facilities.

3Open-admission advocates use the same argu-ment against no-kill proponents when they con-tend, in so many words, that “all that money andeffort on keeping animals alive keeps them fromtheir mission of preventing births in the firstplace.”

4While this piggybacking on the pro-life move-ment’s symbolism offers cachet to the no-killidentity, it also escalates the controversy becauseit confuses two reasons for believing thateuthanasia is often, if not always, wrong. Like thepro-life movement’s ideological confusion overwhether it is wrong to abort a fetus because thefetus has a right to live or because all life hasintrinsic value (Dworkin 1993), the no-kill move-ment’s confused ideology argues both that theunwanted or undesirable shelter animal has a


right to live and that euthanasia as commonlypracticed shows disrespect for animal and humanlife.

5It is important to be cautious about the sig-nificance of such dissent, especially when itinvolves a new social movement. Rather thanserving as a common ground, internal diversityand emotional fervor can divide and weakencamps. Hints of this can be seen in tensionsbetween behavior/training staff and adoptionstaff in some no-kill shelters or, at a differentlevel, between doctrinaire no-kill advocates andother no-kill proponents who occasionally resortto euthanizing their animals.

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the no-kill controversy: manifest and latent sources of tension by arnold arluke

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