Pro-Life
 
I follow Tom Friedman and his op-ed column in the New York Times.  Today he straightened out my thinking on this pro-life vs. pro-choice business.  Basically, he said you can't call yourself "pro-life" if you oppose gun control laws, environmental protection regulations, universal health care, etc.  Being "pro-life" can't start at fertilization and end at birth; it demands a pro-life position on all the issues of our lifetimes.  That shines a new light on a major polemic in the news today.  Picking and choosing some life issues while opposing others trying to make life longer, better, more enjoyable, and healthier is little more than political clap-trap.  And such fragmented thinking wastes our time and deflects our thinking away from issues government can do something about, like the economy, national security, etc.

 

As I mused over this way of looking at life issues, I realized that what we are doing in The Aniplant Project and at Aniplant in Havana is certainly pro-life in a broad sense.  By sterilizing thousands of dogs and cats, I suppose you could say we're interfering with their God-given reproductive lives.  But doesn't that sound silly?  We're really promoting a lifetime of well being, and we're diminishing the animal's chance of future abandonment, hunger, and illness.

 

Yes, and some of the dogs and cats who show up for our sterilization clinics are already pregnant.  In those cases, sterilization becomes abortion, but few people would militate against ending these pregnancies because those pregnancies only make the possibility of animal abandonment and the terrible life that follows more likely.
 
Even those who have a holistic pro-full-life point of view probably would not object to terminating unwanted pregnancies when discovered in our s/n clinics, especially in a place like Cuba where abandonment sometimes follows animal pregnancies.  It's not a callous, heartless attitude that causes pets to be left to live in the streets; it's a generally depressed economy that makes feeding every living thing in Cuba an iffy proposition.  While a family might have enough scraps and leftovers for their cat, they know there won't be enough food for the family, the cat, and a litter of kittens.  Once nursing has ended, it becomes time for separation.  The children cry, and the adults insist, while not showing how terrible they feel.  It's so much better to have Tabby spayed, and that's where Aniplant steps in to help about 5000 families a year sterilize their pets.  The weekly clinics move through Havana's neighborhoods offering sterilizing services on a love offering basis..  Those with no money to pay for it get it for free.

I never really thought about it before, but in a sense, like Tom Friedman I'm a pro-lifer.  I'm working for better, longer, healthier lives for Cuba's companion animals and happier lives for Cuba's pet owning families.  If you want to help, visit our website at https://www.theaniplantproject.org.  All pro-lifers are cordially welcome.
 

Les Inglis