First off, surprise surprise, the original thread on KS that Kelli linked to is gone.
The entire article is a pathetic attempt at sensationalism by an obviously biased and unknowledgable reporter.
The comments made by Kraplan were expected, but it's still surprising that they would be made so obviously. I suppose when the coverage of the Post is available, trying to maintain your disguise within the comunity takes a backseat.
I would however like to know the context of many quotes in the article. From the way it is written, quite a few people who have a serious stake in this did absolutely nothing to help us.
Quotes by show producer Mike Wade:
"You can get diseases from these animals," he says, "but most of them forget or don't bother."
"Most people who have these huge pythons have them to impress their friends -- come see my huge python!"
Do these people not realize that the media is
not our friend. Outlandish stories focusing on every possible negative aspect of our hobby while completely ignoring anything remotely positive is what the uneducated want to read. Anything said to these people will be used to put us in a negative light or else will never make it in the article.
Bonnie Keller from Virginia Reptile Rescue did nothing to help either, but that too is expected. While there do exist a few decent rescue operations, the majority of them are Kaplanites and are not our friends either, at least not the friends of breeders.
You'll notice I'm sure that the entire article focused on imported reptiles. Using unsubstantiated and often rediculous statistics to make us look as bad as possible, while barely mentioning the fact that captive born animals are available at all, let alone the fact that nearly all the problems they point out do not apply to captive born herps.
And finally the other quote by Kraplan herself:
"unfortunately, I think the monkeypox scare is just going to be a brief blip on the screen."
What exactly is this supposed to mean? That it's too bad monkeypox wasn't worse so it could do some real damage to our ability to keep exotic animals?
This is unbelieveable, even from her. Only Peta would advocate the suffering of humanity to further their agenda. Perhaps that quote says much more after all.
It's no wonder we are getting ready to be legislated out of existance. Not only are the reptile keepers in this country either unwilling or unable to come together to fight for our hobby, but they actively take steps to ensure its demise.
I am amazed by the willingness of some of the people to so easily hand our enemies everything they need to fight us. Even dealers and others who stand to be seriously affected by the results of their comments.
If this were to happen in the real world, Bush would have sent Sadaam a few boat loads of guns and ammunition so we'd be sure to have a good fight when we got over there.
Pathetic.
