Here’s What Happens When You Breed or Buy a Dog (It Isn’t Pretty)

Handing over a credit card or cash to buy a dog from a breeder or a pet store is like holding a gun to a homeless pup’s head and squeezing the trigger.

That’s the message PETA supporters will send on Tuesday outside New York City’s Madison Square Garden, where the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show is taking place.

How does buying one dog kill another? It’s simple: Buying a dog takes a home away from a dog whose life depends on being adopted from a shelter.

Westminster and the dog-breeding industry that it props up encourage people to buy dogs from breeders, even though millions of dogs must be euthanized in shelters every year—many of them simply for lack of a good home.

Breeding dogs to conform to “breed standards” also causes many purebred dogs to suffer from painful and sometimes deadly health problems and deformities—as PETA’s humorous new spoof of the “puppybabymonkey” Super Bowl ad points out:

Pugs often suffer from serious breathing problems and are prone to eyes that bulge, are constantly dry, become ulcerated, or even pop out of the socket because the dogs are bred to have unnaturally flattened faces. Most bulldogs must give birth via cesarean section because they have been bred to have massive heads and small hips. Cavalier King Charles spaniels often suffer from an excruciating condition called syringomyelia, which is caused by having a skull that is too small for their brains. These are just a handful of the health problems dogs experience because of breeders’ pursuit of show trophies.

If you’re ready to give a lucky pup first place in your heart, don’t buy into the cruel breeding industry. Save a life instead by adopting a dog from your local shelter.