MANILA, Philippines - People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) Asia is launching a new ad campaign to draw attention to two House Bills that would bring greyhound racing to the Philippines. The ad, which features a happy-looking Greyhound and bears the tagline, “She Wants to Be Loved to Death, Not Run to Death,” aims to educate people about the hundreds of dogs who will suffer and die if House Bills 5292 and 5648 — which would permit Greyhound racetracks to be built in Cebu , Tarlac, Pampanga, and Laguna — are approved.
Greyhound racing is so cruel that it has been banned in 34 US states. When they are not racing or training, racing Greyhounds are kept muzzled and confined to cramped cages. Most dogs slow down or suffer career-ending injuries by age four or five and are either abandoned, killed, or sold to laboratories to be used in experiments.
PETA is not alone in denouncing this so-called sport. Last month, Sen. Jamby Madrigal — with her Greyhound Prassad in attendance — called a press conference at the Senate to discuss the cruelty of Greyhound racing and to pledge her support in opposing these bills. Sen. Madrigal joins a growing list of notables, including Cebu Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal, Sen. Kiko Pangilinan, Sen. Juan Miguel F. Zubiri, and Sen. Benigno S. Aquino III, in speaking out against the bill.
“Greyhound racing is a dying industry — in more ways than one,” says PETA Asia campaigns manager Rochelle R. Regodon. “If approved, these bills will doom thousands of Greyhounds to a miserable existence and violent death. If the industry — or anyone else — says otherwise, they are lying. Greyhound racing is opposed by every animal welfare group in the country and has no place in the Philippines.”
For more information, visit PETAAsiaPacific.com.