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Manhattan Politician Wants To Ban Animal Tattoos & Piercings
By
Ben Yakas
Published Mar 8, 2014
Modified Mar 8, 2014
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By
Ben Yakas
Published Mar 8, 2014
Modified Mar 8, 2014
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This week, animal lovers were up in arms after a Brooklyn tattoo artist posted a photo of his dog, still unconscious after spleen surgery, sporting some newly acquired ink. Artist Mistah Metro (aka Alex Avgerakis) was fired from his job at Red Legged Devil over the controversy. And now, a Manhattan politician wants to ban all animal tattoos and piercings: “It seems crazy to us that it isn’t already illegal,” Lauren Schuster, a spokesperson for Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal, told Capital NY.
Rosenthal is sponsoring the bill, which she hopes will help owners remember that their pets aren't just an extension of themselves: "If a person is weighing whether to get a tattoo, they will consider the amount of pain the procedure will cause both during and afterward against the benefits that they will receive from it," she said in a release about the bill. "As we all know, animals do not have the capacity to make these decisions, nor can they contextualize that the pain they feel might result in what some might consider beautiful body art; sadly, all they know is the pain."
A different version of this bill was first proposed in 2011 in response to a woman selling "gothic kittens" with pierced ears. While tattooing one's pet is not illegal, the American Veterinary Medical Association, which dispenses ethical guidance to vets across the country, would really prefer it didn't happen: "We can't say a tattoo is going to do enormous damage to an animal, said Emily Patterson-Kane, an animal welfare scientist at the organization, "but we do look at whether a procedure is therapeutically necessary first—if it's not, that's not the vets goal."
Zion, the pit bull-mix whose tattoo infamy sparked this latest conversation, finally left the Brooklyn Cares vet clinic yesterday, as you can see in the video below.
Tagged
animals
chris torres
dog tattooing
dogs
mistah metro
red legged devil
tattoos
Ben Yakas
Ben Yakas is a former Gothamist reporter.
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