Helping People and their Pets
POI DOGS & POPOKI (PDP) is not a traditional "rescue" organization. Many of us have worked in or volunteered with the Hawaiian Humane Society, the Oahu SPCA, and other animal welfare organizations. Their "sheltering" missions are honorable and appreciated and very much serve an important purpose.
However, these rescue organizations - in their zealousness to "save" animals that they consider to be abused and neglected - offer little help to pet owners who want to do better by their pets, but who may lack the tools, resources, funding and even knowledge to actually do better.
Traditionally, we - as animal lovers - immediately make assumptions about how people should treat their pets. When we see a lower level of care being provided than what we would traditionally provide for our own pets, we immediately judge these people as being cruel and inhumane and not worthy of being pet owners. We then perpetuate our "rescue" mentality by removing them from their owner, but in doing so, risk euthanizing these animals because there are simply not enough homes to place them in for fostering or even adoption.
There is a fine line between animal cruelty, abuse and neglect, and PDP would not perpetuate those living conditions on suffering animals. But for those owners who truly love their pets and want to give them a higher quality of life, then PDP is here to try to help them. Surrendering their pets - or having them removed - should be a last resort.
