Becca, maybe others are just more sensitive to it because they
are on the "other side." But you know that if someone talks about buying a puppy, without fail, at least one person will say "why not rescue, instead?" And I see nothing wrong with illustrating the options that a person has, but many people just wont let it go. Add to that the bar against kennel links, even in profiles, but no bar against posting rescue links, Petfinder postings, etc. To add more, consider that people have been banned for buying from breeders that were considered less-than-reputable, even though there was some debate about what constituded reputable or not. And there are threads from time to time all about the evils of breeding. (Search "hate breeders" for a locked thread that was a real doozy, and part of the reason I stepped down as a mod.) Some on there feel that
no breeding is acceptable.
I like PBF. I like it in spite of its shortcomings. After all, all boards have shortcomings. Its a really good forum, but the militant anti-breeder people do occasionally get out of hand. The moderation tries to keep things in hand, but -- and God love you guys, if you cruise by and read this -- the majority of them are also rescue people, and don't always notice how one-sided the forum feels. (And I am not trying to get myself banned, so I hope none of them sees this and takes it the wrong way.
) I felt like the odd man out when I was moderating. But maybe that's just me. I don't want to say too much, because I really consider the mods over there my friends, especially after seeing the amount of work and turmoil that is involved in moderating a forum like PBF.
PBF is a great forum. But it can be a bit overwhelming for those who are not "in the know" and who don't know to tread lightly on some subjects.