Breeder Bigotry--on Winning the War

[CavySpirit]

Rescue 1, Breeders 0 -- in the latest minor skirmish in the pet overpopulation war.

bigot (n) 1. one who holds blindly and intolerantly to a particular creed, opinion, etc. 2. a prejudiced person.

First of all, our policies on breeding and breeders and the distinction between the two are succinctly stated on this thread. It has been recently revised in order to clarify our position, in case there is any doubt.

After the latest forum battle with the Cavy Compendium, which was started on two fronts by their administrators, here are the results:

Cavy Compendium staff members' status here:

GraphicW: Cavy Compendium owner/site administrator
Full member here, all rights and privileges

PurrKitty: Cavy Compendium administrator
Moderated status here. Can post, posts will be approved if within posting guidelines. Status had been changed as a result of breaking the posting rules.

AmandaK/MrsHauler: Cavy Compendium adminstrator
Full member here, all rights and privileges

Stipma: Cavy Compendium moderator
Moderated status here, can post, posts will be approved if within posting guidelines. Status had been changed as a result of breaking the posting rules. Will be changed back to full member with some posting activity.

TweetyPie: Cavy Compendium moderator
Moderated status here, can post, posts will be approved if within posting guidelines. Status had been changed as a result of breaking the posting rules. Will be changed back to full member with some posting activity.

Our staff members' status on the Cavy Compendium forum:

CavySpirit: Banned.

VoodooJoint: Banned.

Susan: Banned.

Ly: Banned.

Salana: Banned.

Percy's Mom: Was never a member.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Our members that have been banned:

Fourbwabbys: Banned.

smartorl: Banned then unbanned.

Of course, the bannings will come and go, this is just who we were aware of at one point in time.

The only posts I (CavySpirit) ever made on their site were related to cages. And just prior to my banning, I was told I could not put a reference to my personal rescue site, CavySpirit.com in my signature. However, their signature policy states "Links to personal websites are permitted in signatures, but, links to competing websites or forums and ads in signatures will be considered SPAM and handled as such." Even after questioning their decision and referencing their policy, my site was removed from my signature. So, either my personal RESCUE site, which does not have a forum is considered as competition to the Cavy Compendium or my rescue site is considered spam. Since any normal person would refute both of those positions, the only conclusion left is the exposure of their hypocrisy.

The only posts that Salana ever made on their forum were to help people with lethals. They want people to give advice on their forum and not provide links to competititor's forums, yet they ban the people who can give the best advice. The childish satisfaction of banning our staff takes priority over the lives and welfare of their members' animals.


VJ has frequently been the lone voice standing up for adoption over pet store purchases and advising against breeding. In addition, she has numerous helpful posts on health and illness where she has helped their members. Her style is no-nonsense, tell it like is. These comments pretty well sum up the perspectives.

From GraphicW:

(on Breeding vs. Rescuing) The Cavy Compendium is neutral on this topic and is both breeder and rescue accepting.

From PurrKitty:

(speaking to VJ) ...you joined a board that you knew did not share your views, when you have a forum of your own, which shares your anti-breeding sentiments, so tell me again why you need to be on here?

Voodoo ... you come across as obnoxious.

From iLoveMyAbbys (a CC guru):

She may not do the "cotton candy" version like some people on here... VoodooJoint does not bash, she informs.

From Stipma:

The people who have been banned lately have been extremely rude.

The Cavy Compendium with it's breeder-oriented management is prejudiced, intolerant and hypocritical--as shown by their actions.

Who suffers? Their members and their member's animals. What also suffers? Their reputation and credibility.

The recent attempts of their members to support their case for 'responsible breeding' fell to pieces in short order. So, in retaliation, they resort to mass bannings.

They do their best to try to paint us as 'fanatics' and 'extremists' who put animals above people. When you can't shore up your position with logic, you have to attack the person.

Clearly, using logic to support the case for breeding and showing cannot prevail. Breeders and the breeding mentality cannot stand tall in a public forum and must always resort to closing their doors while pretending to accommodate all viewpoints, when in fact, they do not and cannot.

Guinea Pig Cages: Open Forum. Critical thinking encouraged
Cavy Compendium: Closed Forum. Critical thinking not allowed.

[Sabriel]

A well thought out and rational rebuttal. If I could thank this post right now I would. It is very informative.

[fourbwabbys]

Thanks for putting that up T. They are being so rediculous lately. I'm still waiting for some form of staff to contact me back, but nothing.

[jackie158]

I was a member of Cavy Compendium. However, after losing my privledges from day one, and doing nothing wrong, I decided it was not worth being a member there. I have not posted there since. My privledges did return after I emailed a mod there, however, I feel this site (Cavy Cages) is much more informative and I love the support here. Thanks T for all you have done. I have been wanting to donate and I promise I will, I cannot do it though for another two weeks. My boyfriend just got a new job as a correctional officer and we are tight on money until he gets paid. Once this happens, I promise to donate. Thanks again to T and all the mods who make this site possible.

[fourbwabbys]

Jackie- Did you explain to them that they scared you away? That's been their excuse that we scared some members away, while they don't realise what they did.

[jackie158]

Some of their members are on this forum and I explained in this thread why I am not going back:

http://www.guineapigcages.com/forum/...ty-thread.html

If anyone from Cavy Compendium is reading this, please see the thread I just posted above. Especially post numbers 48, 53, 58, 63 and 65. Thats why I am not going to their forum anymore. They bascially judged me.

[HandcuffedAngel]

Glad I got referred here and not there.

Thanks, Jackie!

[BabyGrl]

Bravo and amen to that T!!!!

[CavySpirit]

Also, I believe lying to their membership disrespects all of their members.

Keeping VoodooJoint's title as Member, when she is Banned, is an outright lie--at least it is in my book. It makes it LOOK like they welcome her posts, when, in fact, they don't--especially in threads like this one--where she proves her point.

Even if you don't agree that calling someone who has been banned a member is not lying, it is duplicitous at best.

And in my case, I am also banned. I just have no title on my existing posts.

Inconsistency and deceit. Here, when we ban someone, we simply change their title to Banned. We have no need to hide our decisions. We actually stick to our stated policies and guidelines. But then, we don't have administrators cross-posting conflicting policies and philosophies.

[fourbwabbys]

I'm still listed as a member, also. It doesn't say anywhere that I'm banned.

[salana]

I find it very sad and deceitful that they banned all of us mods "to control drama" or whatever they're calling it. The fact of the matter is that we added value to their forum with our knowledge. I did nothing but help people with lethals, yet they banned me "to control drama".

I don't think they care very much about their members' pigs at all. I can only hope that someone will be brave enough, the next time someone on the Compendium has a lethal, to help the lethal's owner get in touch with me.

They call me heartless because I made no reference to something I knew nothing about. They call me heartless because I enforced our rules and gave out the warnings they deserved. But here I sit on the verge of tears for the pigs they don't want to help. Who's heartless? I joined a forum that supports something I violently oppose, just to help. I joined a forum full of people that now despise me, to help guinea pigs. Who's heartless?

[jackie158]

[FONT=Verdana]It seems like they want an in between website. But, it generally clashes. They want a breeder/rescuer forum. But these two both oppose each other. For example, a breeder would rather you buy from them or a pet store to make a profit, so of course they are going to go against rescues, it's one of their competitors. Rescuers on the other hand, as VJ said on cavy compendium, have to pick up the broken pieces. This is mainly because when people get pigs they don’t realize what it entailed to take care of a guinea pig. And, well the pig has to suffer because people are ignorant. Anyways, there is no in between with the two. Rescues surely do not want to adapt to breeders (rescues are over flowing here in NJ with pigs and breeders just contribute back to the rescues problems). And second, the point to rescuing is to help the over flow in rescues. So, in my opinion, there will always be debates over there at that forum until they decide weather they are pro rescue or pro breeder. I will stick with the rescues. There are way too many here in NJ. Just look at Have a Heart on Petfinder. You will see all the cute pigs from Have a Heart.[/FONT]

[VoodooJoint]

As laughable as Graphic's "explaination" is on CComp I feel I need to respond to a few points

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

A Word of Truth on the Banning of Cavy Cages Staff Members from this Site!

I would like to start out by first making it known that I did not originally intend on making it public that we banned the staff of Cavy Cages from this in interest of preventing a forum war.

No, instead Brion/Graphic came onto the GPCages site to try to induce a fight and obviously trying to get himself banned.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

Teresa, the owner of Cavy Cages could not let it rest and has posted several threads on her site slamming the Cavy Compendium as well as taking stabs at the credibility of the staff of this site and myself.

Teresa only did that once the Ccomp staff joined her forum to start a war.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

Now that she chosen to put the issue in the light, I have no choice but to respond and give the reasons they were banned from this.

Strange that the Mods/Admin from CComp never bothered to give the actual people that have been banned and explanation despite multiple requests for such from myself and most of the other banned members.

Yet, when members of the CComp staff Pmed me to ask about why they were restricted in their posting I answered them promptly and politely tried to give them the answers they were looking for. I’m certain that Graphic has seen the Pms your staff and I shared.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

She [VoodooJoint] was quick to lay into anybody that posted about getting their Guinea Pig from a Pet Store or that discussed breeding them.

Not quite. I didn’t "lay into anybody" I laid into irresponsible breeders and I suggested rescue over buying with very rational and truthful reasons.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

She clearly knew that this site allowed both, yet decided to engage in at times inflammatory behavior to our members who had opinions that differed from her own, especially in the areas of breeding.

I defended myself and my position when I was attacked or people attempted to discredit my opinions and facts to back my opinions up.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

Truth be told, we nearly lost members from this site as a result of her behavior because they believed she was officially sanctioned to represent the site in some way.

I guess it is my no nonsense, unyielding and educated manner of posting. It appears that I did more to educate members of the Ccomp about why not to breed or buy then any of the moderators or Admin ever did.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

We allowed her to continue to speak her piece though it was certainly to our detriment.

I have no idea why speaking about not breeding or buying animals would be detrimental to a forum. Unless that forum happens to be breeder oriented.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

We had protected Cavy Cages from being spoken badly of here and removed any threads bashing it or any other sites for that matter.

As we also had in the past.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

It was disappointing to find several threads bashing our site at Cavy Cages after what we had done to keep such threads off this site.

The gloves come off when the owner of another site comes onto ours, along with some of his mods and admin to start a war. People need to notice that none of the members from this forum went onto Ccomp to retaliate nor did we have to instruct them not to.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

To top it off, numerous greeting threads from members of this site were found on Cavy Cages with Voodoojoint saying "Glad you could make it here!"

It’s wrong to be polite?

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

We decided to take a peak at her PM's past and current and found she was advertising Cavy Cages through our PM system as well as bashing our site and our standing on the issue of breeding to our members here.

I knew the Adimns were reading my Pms (not a very honorable thing to do by the way, but a helpful warning to CComp members of the depths to which the Admin are willing to sink). They left telltale signs. I never advertised to anybody about Gpcages unless they Pmed me first to ask. I never sent unsolicited Pms to any of the Ccomp members. If I bashed The CComp site and the breeding of certain members there it was because I was either asked or I wanted to clarify a point I was making to a member on the boards ( I believe I did that once) and chose to take the ugly truth off the public board because of the extreme backlash I knew it would have.

If that is the reason I was banned though it does not explain the reasons other members from here were banned.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

Once again, we had not engaged in that kind of behavior on Cavy Cages and had been very honorable in our dealing with Cavy Cages.

Honorable? That is rather laughable. Graphic's intentions on this site were obvious. His plan just didn’t work out how he wanted.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

Upon realizing these new discoveries, the staff of the Cavy Compendium and myself decided to join Cavy Cages. We properly introduced ourselves and got to discussing our standing on breeding because we were misrepresented at Cavy Cages.

There were no discussion about the Ccomp forum on this forum so Graphic's lies about why he joined this forum are once again obvious.

The rest of Graphic’s retaliatory post is mostly geared towards members other then myself and they can negotiate his dubious accusations for themselves if they feel like it.

There are a few more statements I can comment on

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

Teresa in her presumptuous nature had taken it upon herself to accuse our site of supporting breeders and discouraging rescuers. Nothing could be further from the truth and I am sure that those of you who have been long time members here know that to be fact. We have always openly supported responsible breeding practices as well as rescuers at the Cavy Compendium. This has been our stance since the site opened and has never changed.

It is not just Teresa. I have witnessed first hand the rather anti-rescue stance of Ccomp. If one dares suggest that a person should rescue instead of buy and in most cases, if someone dares suggest a person is not being a responsible breeder then there are many members that rise to the attack to support buying and irresponsible breeding and rarely does the staff dare defend the rescuer either because they are pro breeding/buying or because they fear they will not appear "neutral" thus getting in trouble with the owner of the site.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

The staff and the members were heartless and free of most human compassion. It seemed as though they disliked their own species.

This is so laughable it’s nearly insane. Fighting for animal welfare has nothing to do with not having compassion for humans.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

There were several references made to losing one of our administrators (PCfew) to lung cancer as well as Tweet posting there herself with people knowing PC was her mom. Not a single member of Cavy Cages, including the staff expressed any remorse at such news.

It is hard to express remorse about a person I never knew. It is also hard to tell a member you are sorry about her mother dying while she is busy attacking members and staff on this forum.

Should I in turn ask where all of Graphic’s concern was when Hurricane Katrina destroyed my town? I won’t because I don’t expect him or most of his mods or admin to be concerned about someone they have never had a personal conversation with.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

Some of the Cavy Compendium Staff remained and continued posting. A full assault was launched against their credibility and some had their posting abilities limited for rather innocuous posts.

The reasons for the member’s demotions have already been addressed. Their credibility was attacked because they were making statements that conflict with the standard of care this forum supports.

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

Nobody will ever be accused of being a "criminal" here for having differing views.

Then why were GPCage members blanket banned without being given any reasons?

Originally Posted by As posted on Cavy Compendium by Graphic

We hold a level of compassion here that allows our members to post here and discuss where they got their pig and their breeding/rescue intentions without worry of being slammed or mobbed.

Once again I’m laughing. My personal treatment on CComp was anything but compassionate.