'Pugs Struggle to Breathe. Don't Buy Them!' demonstration for @officialPETAIndia

On September 14, 2023, PETA India held a demonstration of "Pugs Struggle to Breathe. Don't Buy Them!" And here is the soundbite I gave.

Often sought after cute-looking short-legged or flat-faced dog breeds have their appearance through selective breeding. Animal breeders reduce animals to baby-making machines.

Mother dogs are forcefully impregnated, their babies stolen from them, and sold off, year after year. And once you can't exploit the mother further, she is thrown away, and discarded.

Breeders do it because of the demands of people who buy animals to love them. Question is, "Why do we buy someone whom we are going to love?" Lovers don't trade lovers.

Pause and ponder, where did these animals that you buy come from? What happened to their mother and father and siblings? What makes it okay to be trading beings?

If you want to look after someone, there is an option to adopt, rather than purchasing them. When you adopt, instead of shopping for these animals, your actions indicate that you won't be supporting trading beings, and that you will not fund raping of animals.

The other advantage of adopting is, that when you adopt a community animal, their quality of life becomes easy.

Put yourself in the position of a street dog. Where you never know when you would get the next meal, or even a place to stay the night, and things get worse when it rains. You never know who will run over you, or throw stones at you. Noone would want to live a life of a street dog, because we fundamentally understand, their quality of life is bad. And our actions to scare them off, or our actions to stop others from hurting them only makes it worse.

These community animals did not ask to be born in these pathetic conditions, and by adopting them, instead of paying a breeder to bring them into existence, one life isn't forcefully coming into existence, and those who are already here, can be looked after and cared for.

If your genuine reason, is to look after, care for, and provide for an animal, it shouldn't be hard to find animals in need.

Don't put a price on someone's life. Don't pay for trading beings. Don't support the breeding industry. Don't think animals are commodities. Adopt. Don't Shop.