Posted by:
TammyJoseph
at Sat Mar 6 04:32:54 2010 [ Email Message ] [ Show All Posts by TammyJoseph ]
For those of you who haven’t watched the March 3rd Fish and Game Commission meeting, I suggest you do to get the real story. What is being presented on here and by email, by a lot of people, is not the truth of what happened. We did not win on March 3rd. The Fish and Game Commission is not dropping the ban on non-native frogs and turtles. They stated plain and clear towards the end of the meeting, that this was only the first step, and that the majority of the Commission, if not all, were for the 671 proposal.
For those of you taking credit for a “win” for the reptile community, shame on you. I shouldn’t have to remind you that there is a video of the meeting, and to recommend that they watch it.
For all the people that are falling for these falsities they are claiming, and those who are praising them; I have to say, watch the video. Do your own research; do not just believe what you read, or what people tell you. That is why the HSUS has so much support. They say a lot, but the facts say differently. I suggest you look into the facts.
Instead of beating around the bush, like the Fish and Game, I will lay it out clearly. I’m not attacking anyone, for the record. I’m only trying to paint the factual picture for those who are believing lies. I just think that if we want to be a logical, aware, and successful community, we need to not only look into opposing groups actions and intentions, but our own.
USARK in their latest email claimed a win for California. “USARK succeeds in California”. I do not see how we in any way succeeded? They are just delaying the ban, and they have made it clear, either way they are going to try to do a blanket ban on these animals. Yes I’m positive USARKS’s involvement did help our cause, by creating awareness and by people sending emails. But, just a note, they did not post an alert on here or send an email until March 1st; a month after it was proposed, and with two days to prepare. Also, if anyone watched the video, or was there, you know that the speech given did nothing for us and wasn’t even relevant to the topic at hand. Most of the speech was spent on explaining what USARK was. It was hurried and unemotional. I realize that talk-time was cut down to two minutes, but why then was it mostly spent talking about USARK and not on the reasons why what they are doing is wrong. At the meeting I was given a copy on the USARK press release. It was a great write-up of what was going on, and reasons against it. I wish that it had been read there. I also wish it would have been release to more press than Bizjournals.com. I was also surprised after reading the article that the impact on the Asian community and markets was not brought up. Thank you for coming out and supporting us, and for work that they do, I know with all the bills and regulations going on they must be spread thin.
Scott Solar, thank you for coming out and supporting our community as well, but this was not a victory, and the fact that it keeps being said that there is, is extremely frustrating. I was very surprised that you are staking claim to this as your victory. You also stated that you brought to the Commissions attention the 261 exemption, was this before the meeting or after? Because you did not state it in your public comment. When you went before the Commission you asked the same question that the person before you did, which made them realize they needed to show a slide from the last presentation to make the resolution clear. And with your most recent statement that you knew what the Commission was proposing before it started, is surprising, since your speech sounded so taken off guard and you didn’t post anything till the day after. Your comments on the Heloderma issue were great and made some excellent points to the Commission. Thank you.
The real hero’s of the March 3rd meeting were Mike Luhrs, for the great speech and starting off the process of solving the political puzzle the Commission laid out before us; Christine Roche, was a GREAT voice for our community, and really solved the puzzle and got their real agenda on the table. Great work!! You confronted them on their conflicting information and hidden agendas.
Like I said before, please do not just believe what I say, or anyone else. With everything, if you want to know the truth, you need to find it or see it yourself. That’s what is great about this because there is actually video of what happened. And really, this is just my interpretation of what I saw.
On a personal note, those of you attacking someone for voicing their anger and frustration on a topic that is not only a source of their income, but a life-long passion, is wrong. Do we not live in America, where we are (supposed to be at least) allowed to voice our opinions and concerns? Are we all supposed to be unemotional robots, trying to be so P.C. that our point is never made, and the whole point to our mission gets lost? WE FIGHT THEM, BECAUSE WE LOVE WHAT WE DO. If you don’t, you are never going to win. A little emotion, passion, and drive in 15 seconds should mean more than a world of monotone, rehearsed chatter.
I know this post might get a lot of backlash, that’s not what I’m after. I’m not trying to attack anyone, like I said, or make any sort of problem. I just don’t want our community to be misled, and I think we should have more integrity than that. I want to encourage everyone to join together, stay informed, and communicate as much as you can to protect out rights to do what we love.
One more thing … Lets bring the animal rights movement down!
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 We did not win March 3rd - TammyJoseph, Sat Mar 6 04:32:54 2010
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