Accompanied by his dog Simone, adopted from a shelter, Julien Courbet figure in a brand new PETA campaign to remind you that « Animals are not toys » As the holiday season approaches, he warns against the serious mistake of giving a cat or dog as a gift to loved ones, which can lead to neglect, mistreatment, and abandonment. Every year, shelters fill up with animals abandoned by people who didn't expect to receive one for Christmas and weren't prepared to take on the responsibility of caring for a sentient being with specific needs.
"Even with good intentions, the idea of giving an animal as a gift is irresponsible, especially during this busy holiday season; welcoming an animal into your family is not a decision to be taken lightly, and certainly not on behalf of someone else.", says Julien Courbet. "To truly protect animals and reject their commodification, I encourage you to adopt from a shelter, as I did with Simone. Let's avoid buying animals because shelters are full, and you can't even imagine the love an adopted animal will give you."
Welcoming an animal into your home is a long-term commitment—on average 13 to 15 years for a dog or cat—requiring financial resources to feed it, cover veterinary care and potential boarding fees, as well as a significant time commitment for walking, training, and providing all the love and attention it needs and deserves. Forcing this choice on someone can be tragic for the innocent, sensitive creature who will suffer the trauma of being abandoned by its new family and languishing for weeks, or even years, in a shelter cage, waiting to join a home that truly wants it. It risks euthanasia if, faced with the waves of abandonments that flood shelters each year, there isn't enough space or resources to care for it.
Julien Courbet and PETA emphasize how important it is to end the "production" and sale of cats, dogs, and other animals by breeders and online sites (such as The good corner), garden centers or pet stores, which treat sentient beings as if they were commodities to be profited from. Every time a puppy is bought, a perfectly adoptable shelter dog loses its chance to join a family.
PETA, whose motto includes the following: "Animals do not belong to us and we have no right to subject them to any form of mistreatment."For those certain that their relatives are ready to welcome a new family member and have the necessary resources to care for it, it is advisable to offer them an "adoption voucher" covering the adoption fees. The recipients can then visit a shelter near their home—after the relatively busy holiday period—to meet their ideal companion.
Julien Courbet thus joins a long list of personalities who have partnered with PETA entities to promote responsible adoption, including Pamela Anderson, Tom Hardy, Greg Guillotin, Nathalie Baye, Marilou Berry, Laëtitia Bléger, Jacques Dutronc, Karine Ferri, David Hallyday, Bérengère Krief, Lambert Wilson and many others.
