Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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194 of 223 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Redemption Ignores The Biggest Issue, May 13, 2008
A no-kill shelter was recently built on 13 wooded acres outside a city near me. The facility has space for 250 animals. A huge budget. Slick marketing. A partnership with a major pet food manufacturer. A variety of innovative programs. 1300 volunteers, 130 foster families and thousands of extremely generous supporters. Last year, 2100 of their animals found new homes. It's the kind of operation Nathan Winograd would call a no-kill success story. And yet the organization admits they cannot accommodate the more than 300 requests they receive weekly from people trying to relinquish their pets to them.
Within 15 miles of this beautiful facility are 2 open admission shelters that have to euthanize for space. They have implemented most if not all of the programs Mr. Winograd claims is necessary to achieve no-kill status. But, unlike their no-kill neighbor up the road, these shelters do not turn any animals away. Last year, they took in 21,000 animals! Anyone out there willing to build, staff, operate and fund a no-kill shelter for 21,000 animals?
Which brings me to what I found most irritating about Redemption. Nathan Winograd never discusses what I believe is the biggest issue separating the two kinds of shelters- what to do with the staggering number of animals no-kill shelters turn away. He only briefly mentions the necessity of no-kill shelters to "occasionally" limit incoming animals. Where I live, however, no-kill shelters only occasionally accept animals! In fact, I don't know anyone who has been successful getting a stray or their own animal into a no-kill shelter. My point is this: EVERY NO-KILL SHELTER IN THE COUNTRY HAS TO FIRST ACCEPT EVERY ANIMAL BROUGHT TO ITS FACILITY BEFORE WE CAN HAVE ANY HOPE OF ACHIEVING A TRUE NO-KILL NATION.
They shouldn't be setting standards for open admission shelters when their very way of operating directly contributes to these shelters having to euthanize for space.
The author crows about his success leading an open admission no-kill in a sparsely populated rural part of New York. Note that, last year, Tompkins County SPCA took in less than 3000 animals. His urban success story - the San Francisco SPCA- did not even take animals from the public if I correctly understand their relationship with the SF Animal Care and Control. Last year, the San Francisco SPCA took in less than 4000 animals. When Nathan Winograd can take over an open admission shelter accepting 21,000 animals annually and still make it no-kill, then and only then will I be impressed enough to jump on the Redemption bandwagon.
I also did not like that Redemption is full of inflammatory, anonymous and dated remarks that cannot be verified easily because the author does not include footnotes and references you usually see in a piece of nonfiction. Fact checking is limited to a 12 page bibliography.
It is a myth that we can somehow save every homeless or unwanted animal without having to first address the disparity between no-kill and 'kill' shelter admission policies and intake numbers. Redemption only gives one side of the story and, unfortunately, the author is promoting it as the whole & balanced picture it isn't. I'm just a little surprised that readers are swallowing his half-truths with such gusto. Dig a little deeper, animal lovers! You can start by asking you favorite no-kill shelter how many animals they turned away this week.
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35 of 41 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
If you wish for a more compassionate society, this book is for you., September 23, 2007
Redemption tells the compelling true story of a social movement born of kindness and love that went astray, and provides a beacon to lead it back home to its roots, to a true lifesaving ethic.
The book will surprise you, revealing the deeply held beliefs and inner workings of animal sheltering today.
But it's more than a lively story about a social movement; it provides a roadmap for creating truly compassionate communities and a rallying cry to the finest sentiments within each of us to fully reconnect animal sheltering in our own communities to our own values.
Winograd reminds us that compassion knows no limits and that when we, as a community, decide that we want change, we can truly achieve it.
The innocence of animals and the trust they put in us is part of what endears us to our own pets. Redemption is a story of hope and promise that we can live up to that trust.
Don't miss this book! It's a must read for anyone who cares about animals or about creating a more compassionate society.
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38 of 45 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Read this book, September 14, 2007
Nathan Winograd's Redemption is one of the most important books about animal welfare to appear in the last decade. In 2001, Winograd became Director of the SPCA in Ithaca, New York, and transformed the county animal shelter that functioned as a death camp into a state of the art shelter that saved 93% of the animals entering the facility. Through ingenuity, leadership and unflagging dedication he was able to marshal the good will, love and compassion of the community in Tompkins County to participate in this new adventure to save lives. Redemption tells the story of this transformation and documents the intractable resistance of the municipal shelter industry to implementing simple programs to save lives.
In the past couple decades there have been major changes in the public's feelings and understanding of companion animals. As Winograd points out they have moved from the backyard into our homes, onto our beds. Untold numbers of people perished in the wake of hurricane Katrina because guardians refused to abandon their companion animals. This change in attitude had not gone unnoticed. In 1997, the London Times Literary Supplement noted a major paradigm shift among scientists and intellectuals in attitudes about dogs, from the behaviorist perspective which saw them as simply instinctive animals, to the modern view which realizes they are highly complicated, conscious, caring animals. A list of books documenting this change in perspective would run for pages. Some of the best known include the following: Thomas's The Hidden Life of Dogs & The Social Lives of Dogs; Derr's Dog's Best Friend Annals of the Dog-Human Relationship; Vicki Hearne's Adam's Task, Animal Happiness, & Bandit; Garber's Dog Love; Knapp's Pack of Two; Schwartz's A History of Dogs in the Early Americas; Thurston's The Lost History of the Canine Race; Coren's The Pawprints of History Dogs & The Course of Human Events; Katz's The New Work of Dogs; Myers' Children & Animals; Nelson's Why The Wild Things Are; Sanders' Understanding Dogs Living and Working with Canine Companions & Regarding Animals. This paradigm shift is not limited to dogs. Other breakthroughs are occurring like Pepperberg's The Alex Studies Cognitive and Communicative Abilities of Grey Parrots or Grandin's Animals in Translation.
What has not happened until more recently was a change in the way society dealt with these companion animals incarcerated in animal shelters in almost every county in America. In the early 1990's Richard Avanzino, Director of the San Francisco SPCA began a campaign to transform conditions in animal shelters by publicizing simple programs he had initiated to help save lives. Essentially the program is very simple, open up the shelters to the public and involve them in the adventure to save lives. Develop a comprehensive volunteer/foster program to help socialize and exercise dogs in the shelter and to provide temporary homes to deal with overcrowding or special needs pets. Transfer pets to outside rescue organizations established for specific breeds or types of pets. Initiate outreach programs bringing adoptable pets out into society at malls or downtown areas which encourage the public to adopt pets instead of purchasing them from back yard breeders. Create an ambiance at the shelter that invites the public to come in and explore the diverse personalities of homeless pets. In short, transform a killing field into an adventure for life., publicize successes, seek assistance for special need pets, attract donations to save more lives.
Winograd provides a much more detailed discussion of these programs and others initiated by the SF SPCA which became known as the No Kill Movement to stop unwarranted murder in animal shelters. He initiated these programs in Ithaca with predictable success. Despite these successes, the book provides a frightening glimpse of the so-called animal welfare agencies brutal attack on animal activists who tried to initiate these programs in other communities across the country. Regardless of the rhetorical frenzy associated with the controversy, the numbers tell the story. Dedication, common sense and a little imaginative problem solving can transform killing fields into an adventure for life where everyone wins.
Thanks Nathan, the nation shares your vision.
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