At first sight it seemed incredible to me to have to explain why we are opposed to Greyhound racing. The wealth of information on my web site alone should be enough, I thought, to demonstrate to anyone, that it is the cause of a lot of suffering of gentle, loving Greyhounds. The trouble is, however, one always seems to take for granted that the other person knows and has experienced what the writer or speaker has experienced. Unfortunately, or perhaps in this case thankfully, this is not the case. If everyone had seen what I have seen in the Greyhound racing environment, then Greyhound racing could not survive. The weight of opposition would destroy it. What I want to do in this essay is try to show why we are so opposed to Greyhound racing.

As you browse the web site you will find poems and stories that are written by people who have had direct experience of the horrors caused by the racing industry. Poems like Eternal sleep. This is a graphic account of what happens to healthy, loving Greyhounds every day. Mel, the needle man is what happens at a racing track near where I live, no doubt it is the same at all tracks. Then there is the quintet of stories on the "Muses" page. Bridges Hitched Thirsty Bonfire Genocide These five muses were written by a man who used to be a racing enthusiast. He visited our home and spoke to my wife and I about the atrocities he had seen on the tracks. He swore never to take part in anything like it ever again and as far as I am aware he never has. There are well over one hundred poems on Greyhound Muses now. One or two of them are funny and are there to bring a little light relief from the majority of the rest, which are, quite frankly, downright depressing. That is not the reason they are there, to make you depressed, they are there to try to make you understand that if you place a bet on a Greyhound race you are condoning and even supporting by your financial involvement, what you read about on the website.

Sometimes people say, "but don't the dogs love to run?" Well maybe they do love to run but they don't know what they are a part of do they? It's like a baby or small child who loves to do something that you as an adult can see is clearly dangerous for the child. The race tracks in the UK, and as far as I am aware in the USA also, are oval in shape. There is no beginning and no end, the dogs go round and end up back where they started. A Greyhound can achieve a speed of up to 45 mph and they have to turn with the contour of the track at this speed. This is where a lot of the injuries occur. They range from a broken toe to a broken leg. Once the injury has occurred it depends upon the owner what treatment, if any, the dogs receive. If the dog is not winning races and making money for the owner he may not get any kind of treatment and just be left in pain.

A "good" racer may continue for four or even five years, then what? A Greyhound tends to live longer than most other breeds of similar size and it's not uncommon to expect them to live to 15 or 16 years. I personally have had several Greys who lived to this age, so when they "retire" from the track at 4 or 5 years old they have at least another 10 years of life, if they are allowed to live. Unfortunately, most are not allowed to live. At this point I could give you a host of details about what happens to these loving trusting dogs but that is not within the scope of this essay. There are poems and stories on the website that will provide this kind of information so there is no need to repeat it here. Instead, I will refer you to poems like, The sport of death. A Greyhound's last words. Born a Greyhound.

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