Support animal shelters; avoid pet stores

Two paws up to Macerich shopping malls for banning pet stores in more than 70 malls across the U.S. and offering space for adoption centers for homeless animals instead. This follows the company’s compassionate decision last year to ban booths that sell sugar gliders — exotic animals who may die from the stress of loneliness in captivity.

Most pet stores obtain animals from hideously cruel mass-breeding facilities, where animals are locked in tiny, feces-caked cages; deprived of adequate food, veterinary care, and shelter; and are never given any love, attention, or even a chance to roll in the grass. Mother dogs often lose their minds after years of confinement and neglect in puppy mills, and may be killed when their worn-out bodies can no longer produce puppies.

Let’s hope that many other malls follow Macerich’s humane lead by banning sales of live animals.

Each of us can help, too, by never buying animals from pet stores and giving a grateful dog or cat from a shelter a loving, lifelong home instead. For more ways to help, visit www.PETA.org.

Lindsay Pollard-Post
The PETA Foundation
Norfolk, Va.