Lost Cause

Just like so many of the things going on in our country today, the decline in purpose and meaning of the NAACP saddens me.

Once upon a time, the NAACP meant something. Stood for something noble and idealistic. Something that mattered. I don't know that this is true any more.

Not when the president of the Atlanta chapter can stand up and say something as ridiculous as his statement that equates deer hunting with dogfighting. Is he serious? Does he really not see the difference?

Does he not understand that deer hunting culls the population to a livable level, reduces the spread of disease, deer are eaten, and that when deer are hunted, they have a chance of getting away? How about that deer are wild animals and if they weren't hunted, they would starve to death?

Let's see how that compares to a dog that is chained up and beaten, thrown in a pen and forced to fight another dog to the death, and if it doesn't or doesn't win, is then drowned, or electrocuted, or shot at close range. Yeah...that's a lot like deer hunting.

Look. I get it. I know that a lot of African-Americans do not like dogs or fear them because there has been a long and sad history of dogs being used to torture and attack blacks going all the way back to the days of slavery. Still, does that justify cruelty to an innocent animal?

I believe that anyone who could do those things to an animal, would just as soon do it to a human. It's all just a matter of time. And I think it's a real shame that race has even been brought into the equation. This really has nothing to do with race, but a total lack of respect for life of any kind except his own on the part of Michael Vick.

Too bad the NAACP doesn't use its power for something or someone who actually deserves their efforts.