ABC TV's Extreme Home Makeover builds animal sanctuary

March 30, 2009

Hi All,

Last night I saw an ABC show I never watch- Extreme Makeover-Home Edition. The premise of the show is that they give deserving people new homes.

Sunday's show featured a family who, in a legitimate and responsible way (according to wildlife expert Jeff Corwin and their local vet), rescue abused and neglected big cats, horses, venomous snakes and pigs from abusive situations. The family has 4 human kids, and was living in a decrepit house, putting all the money they could into taking as good of care as they could of the rescued animals (mostly captive-bred big cats). They did all of this with their own money, donations and volunteers.

The show built them a new home and with the help of Jeff Corwin and the vet who has been caring for the animals, much more appropriate lodgings for the animals (climbing and swimming areas, sturdy elevated beds) and an education center. It was actually quite remarkable what they accomplished.

Also, Diablo, a male tiger, had been declawed when they got him and was in extreme pain and the show paid for his needed foot reconstruction surgery. Finally, they sent the family on vacation to Costa Rica, where they were filmed helping at a sanctuary that treats and releases injured monkeys and sloths, and the townspeople (San Bernardino county) chipped in $50,0000 towards the care of the animals.

The cast of the show kept saying how they had no idea such cruelty existed. The show carried a strong message about the cruelty of keeping wild animals as pets, how they are abused for entertainment and how endangered tigers are.

I think they did a world of good in educating the audience, who like the cast, probably had no idea the suffering that big cats in particular are subjected to.

Below is the link to the show. There isn't a comment section, so I put my comment under their " question " section, which is on the left of the screen (Ask EM:HE). At the bottom of the screen, there's a link for comments to ABC and I also wrote to commend them. The website says " watch episodes " , so you may be able to watch some of the episode (it was 2 hours, can't imagine they have the whole thing on there).

Please let ABC know you appreciate that they value animals! We need more of this kind of programming to go mainstream and it is important to counter emails that say " why don't you help a family who helps *people*? "

abc.go.com/primetime/xtremehome/index

Thanks a lot : )

Stephanie

" Our task must be to widen our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. " Albert Einstein " The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the ways its animals are treated. " Mahatma Gandhi