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Cockfighting measure on ballot
AP/The Seattle Times ^ | 10/19/02 | Ron Jenkins

Posted on 10/19/2002 12:09:22 PM PDT by ppaul

OKLAHOMA CITY — Animal-rights activism is colliding head-on with rural tradition in Oklahoma, where voters will decide Nov. 5 whether to ban cockfighting in one of the last three states to allow the bloody spectacle.

Supporters of the proposed ban say cockfighting is inhumane and gives the state a bad name. Opponents say the sport, also legal in Louisiana and New Mexico, is a livelihood for people who raise the birds and is no crueler than the way chickens are raised and slaughtered.

Cockfighting became legal in Oklahoma in 1963, when the state Court of Criminal Appeals ruled that a fowl is not an animal and thus is exempt from state law against animal fighting.

Specially bred gamecocks are fitted with razor-sharp spurs or knives. They are placed in dirt pits and often fight to the death. Illegal gambling is often the big draw.

"It's barbaric — abject cruelty to animals," said Janet Halliburton, who led the petition drive to put the measure on the ballot. "It makes us look like a bunch of knuckle-dragging animal abusers."

Oklahoma is one of three states with animal-welfare initiatives placed on the Nov. 5 ballot through citizen petition drives.

• In Florida, voters will consider a proposed amendment that would make the state the first to outlaw the practice of confining pregnant pigs in small metal cages.

• In Arkansas, voters will decide whether to make the state the 38th with felony penalties for extreme acts of animal cruelty.

Most Oklahomans never have seen a cockfight, and polls show the ban is likely to pass by a wide margin. Still, two of three gubernatorial candidates, Democratic state Sen. Brad Henry and independent Gary Richardson, oppose the ban. Republican Steve Largent favors it.

Outgoing Gov. Frank Keating has endorsed the measure, saying, "It is simply embarrassing to Oklahoma to be seen as one of only a tiny handful of locations outside of the Third World where this activity is legal."

However, a former governor, David Walters, opposes the measure, saying it would halt a source of income for some impoverished rural communities.

"Some of these people are dead-dog poor, and I have a hard time telling them we're going to take your livelihood away," he said.

James Tally, president of the Oklahoma Game Fowl Breeders Association, said cockfighters are mischaracterized as animal abusers.

"It's hard for people to understand that a less cruel way of life for these roosters is the way we raise them and take care of them," said Tally, a railroad worker from Kingston.

Nancy Savage, 54, a former teacher who grew up going to cockfights, now edits an industry newsletter, The Cock 'N Bull. Gamecocks, she said, are well-fed, sheltered and often live to be 4 or 5 years old, "compared to those in the poultry houses, who are 5 or 6 months old when they hit the chopping block."

She said cockfighters "are some of the finest people I've ever met" and include doctors, lawyers, preachers, postmasters and firefighters.

The measure on the Oklahoma ballot would make it a felony to hold cockfights, keep equipment or facilities for cockfighting or possess birds for cockfighting. The penalty would be up to 10 years in prison.

Attempts to outlaw cockfighting in New Mexico and Louisiana have failed.


AP - Naconna Bennett, 16, holds a sharp blade that is one of the cockfighting tools he owns in McAlester, Okla. Specially bred gamecocks are fitted with the blades, then placed in dirt pits to fight, often to the death. Oklahoma voters will decide Nov. 5 whether to ban the bloody sport.



TOPICS: Culture/Society; Front Page News; News/Current Events; US: Arkansas; US: Louisiana; US: New Mexico; US: Oklahoma; US: Texas
KEYWORDS: animalrights; chickens; cock; cockfight; cockfighting; cocks; peta; rooster
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Imagine the millions of dollars spent over this issue!
What a waste.
Any cockfightin' FReepers out there?
1 posted on 10/19/2002 12:09:22 PM PDT by ppaul
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To: ppaul
Any cockfightin' FReepers out there?

No, but I had a fascinating tutorial about 30 years ago...drove a girlfriend from L.A. to Salisaw, Oklahoma (hard by Ft. Smith, Arkansas) to her parents' place. Her dad raised fighting cocks and had done so all his life.

Pretty brutal, but the amount of breeding involved could make some cocks extremely valuable.

At that stage, he was retired but kept breeding and manufacturing spurs....in his younger years he'd drive all day and night to Arizona and even Kalifornia to "participate". I seem to recall him telling me that a fight could last as little as three or four seconds - if you had a good bird.

2 posted on 10/19/2002 12:25:26 PM PDT by ErnBatavia
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To: ppaul
Oh. For a second there I thought this was another one of those "Puppetry of the Penis" stories. <|:)~
3 posted on 10/19/2002 12:27:03 PM PDT by martin_fierro
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To: ppaul
who cares what someone else wants to do with their animals. animals are property.
4 posted on 10/19/2002 12:28:50 PM PDT by Nayt2
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To: martin_fierro
That's the best way to settle a cockfight: measure.
5 posted on 10/19/2002 12:33:24 PM PDT by dogbowl
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To: ppaul
I used to go to a lot of cockfights in the Red River Bottom north of Wichita County, Texas. Yes, they were brutal and there was a lot of gambling and drinking going on. The birds were treated very well until the fight. If they won they were treated very well. I never gave much thought to whether or not the fights were humane or not, they were just cock fights between food animals. The birds suffered less in a cock fight than they did at the local slaughterhouse where they had their throats slit and while bleeding and alive were dipped into scalding hot water. They were less brutal than the bullfights at Ciudad Acuna at the Macarena. What did bother me was the guy from the local fried chicken house collecting the losers.
6 posted on 10/19/2002 12:40:07 PM PDT by vetvetdoug
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To: martin_fierro
HA! Yea... “sword-fighting”.
7 posted on 10/19/2002 12:42:48 PM PDT by johnny7
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To: vetvetdoug
What did bother me was the guy from the local fried chicken house collecting the losers.

That would bother me too. Roosters (especially fighting roosters) are never used in decent fried chicken; they're too stringy and tough. Stay well away from that guy's business unless you truly enjoy "rubber chicken."

8 posted on 10/19/2002 12:46:57 PM PDT by strela
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To: ppaul
Opponents say the sport...

Sport?? Cockfighting is a sport? What? A couple of tiny fryers duking it out? That's a sport?
Now, dog fighting, that's a sport!

9 posted on 10/19/2002 2:03:03 PM PDT by PaulJ
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To: ppaul
I live if Oklahoma and I intend to for the ban.
10 posted on 10/19/2002 2:03:13 PM PDT by amigatec
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To: amigatec
k
11 posted on 10/19/2002 2:12:29 PM PDT by xrp
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To: amigatec
I live if Oklahoma and I intend to for the ban. I should have said "I live in Oklahoma and I intend to vote for the ban." Fat Fingers on the keyboard.
12 posted on 10/19/2002 2:14:47 PM PDT by amigatec
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To: amigatec
I live in Oklahoma and I intend to vote for the ban

Why?
Just seems like more "do-gooder" government meddling.

13 posted on 10/19/2002 2:45:50 PM PDT by ppaul
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To: ppaul
Cockfighting measure on ballot

As George Carlin would say: "Cock fighting? What?"

14 posted on 10/19/2002 2:50:14 PM PDT by TankerKC
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To: ppaul
"allow the bloody spectacle"

What? Okies aren't happy with the spectacle of the teams slaughtered by the Sooners?
15 posted on 10/19/2002 2:59:35 PM PDT by FryingPan101
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To: PaulJ
Gladitorial combat is even better. Basically, if people want to fight animals that is their business.
16 posted on 10/19/2002 3:05:37 PM PDT by AEMILIUS PAULUS
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To: ppaul
Not a fighter and don't attend 'em, but I'm voting against the ban.
17 posted on 10/19/2002 3:18:16 PM PDT by tal hajus
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To: ppaul
When I first read the headline, I thought that Slick and The Swimmer were going to have a duel.
18 posted on 10/19/2002 3:42:01 PM PDT by Cobra64
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To: tal hajus
Not a fighter and don't attend 'em, but I'm voting against the ban.

Good for you! We had this situation in Arizona, and the ban passed. It was pitiful. The OldDominantLiberalMedia out in force, lying their A** off.

The small minority of dedicated cockfighting enthusiasts, begging for help to defeat the measure, virtually closed out of any debate, because they were right and their was no logical reason for the ban.

Ownership of the birds made a felony, so that all would have to be killed, if the afficionados followed the law.

Passage, with the resultant creation of thousands of new felons, and the state with another victimless crime that it can use to persecute those it chooses to.

19 posted on 10/19/2002 4:05:57 PM PDT by marktwain
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To: marktwain
Hey Butthead: he said "cockfighting".
20 posted on 10/19/2002 4:16:15 PM PDT by Nick Thimmesch
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