EDITOR'S NOTE: Iditarod’s days are numbered

In my years as a sports editor in the Lower 48, I was always fond of the Iditarod as refreshment from the predictable grind of the daily sports pages.

The AP photos were especially charming because they revealed Iditarod dogs to be not the Siberian Husky/Arctic Wolf hybrid you might expect, but rather run-of-the-mill mutts you’d expect to find at the local pound. Such innocent champions, such adorable all-stars, they were blissfully unaware of just how much they were like people-athletes to us.

At the same time, social media was on the rise, and a dozen years since the advent of Facebook, I would argue it has produced no bigger winner than the ensouled dog. Post after post, meme after meme of dogs behaving just like people made it difficult to come to any other conclusion that dogs were individual spirits, deserving of individual rights. Interestingly, the advancement of dogs as citizens has come at the expense of cats. Once considered separate but essentially co-equal house pets, cats are now reviled, their personhood not earned because they couldn’t mug so well for a smartphone lens.

Anyhow, that’s a topic for another day.

Fast-forward to a few months ago and I’m at the Alaska State Courthouse in Palmer, covering closing arguments in the case of ‘Flash the Dog’, wherein a couple of drug addicts stole some dude’s 1999 Dodge van and abandoned it in the woods in the middle of an unusually hot summer of 2016. Locked inside the van was the 12-year-old golden retriever Flash, who died, presumably from heat exhaustion before the van was found.

The van wasn’t even worth a thousand bucks and the animal cruelty charge against the co-defendants was the fourth charge on a list of misdemeanors, but here we were more than a year after the incident with attorneys on both sides arguing the case with Atticus Finch-like passion.

The defense attorney for the accused dude tried to beat back the prosecution’s attempt to elevate the cruelty charge from something negligent to something intentionally heinous by arguing that a necropsy (autopsy and necropsy are synonymous terms, but for whatever reason we still only apply the term autopsy to humans) revealed Flash’s gumline was corroded indicating likely heart disease, insinuating Flash probably wasn’t long for the world in any event and could have died from any number of causes in the van.

This fancy lawyering probably only added more coals on the head of his client who was found guilty of all charges.

I couldn’t help but wonder whether prosecutors pushed so hard in the case in order to set a precedent for prosecuting mushers or handlers in the event of dog sledding casualties. If, say, doping a dog in the Iditarod wasn’t just cheating at sport and defrauding honest, god-fearing gamblers, but a willful act of felonious cruelty, well then, dog racing itself is mushing on some pretty thin ice, I should say.

No one would like to see the sport of dog sled racing as a whole, and its Super Bowl of events, the Iditarod, fall right through that ice more than People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

Prior to Saturday morning’s ceremonial start to Iditarod XLVI in downtown Anchorage and Sunday’s official start in Willow, PETA members, led by Nashville-based organizer Tricia Lebkeucher, and sympathizers staged a protest on Fourth Ave. and D Street. This wasn’t just any protest, it was a funeral with stuffed animals laying at the feet of protestors holding up signs that spoke to the cruel deaths inflicted upon hundreds of dog athletes, during races or as a result of culling, a practice which continues to be alleged.

“We like to stick to the numbers that we know and we know more than 150 dogs have died and that’s what we know of; that doesn’t include dogs died during race or during training,” Lebkeucher said of culling. “They’re going to keep dying if they keep going at breakneck speeds, and they’re going to keep dying as long as they keep giving prizes for racing these dogs to death.”

Only a relative handful of the thousands of spectators Saturday morning who walked past the demonstration paid it much mind. From their vantage point, the protest of these few killjoys had little support and even less impact. That’s probably true, but the impact Lebkeucher really makes is when she’s back in the Lower 48.

“I’ve been working with Iditarod sponsors for several months now, doing demonstrations in and around my hometown of Nashville; I was in Atlanta protesting Coca-Cola, which is a sponsor of the Iditarod,” she said. “I’ve been in Lynchburg protesting Jack Daniels and I’ve made several trips to Detroit to protest Chrysler.”

Those efforts are having some effect. Last summer, Wells Fargo dropped its sponsorship of the race, which may have prompted the Mat-Su Borough to pull its account. The borough’s mayor, himself a veteran musher, commented at the time that pulling the sponsorship contributed to the decision.

“Sponsors dropping from the race is a good way to make changes,” Lebkeucher said.

The largest placard at Saturday’s mock dog funeral carried the line, ‘Pull yourself’, which was wryly funny, but for Lebkeucher, like any fanatic takes ironic things literally, and all the while insists her demands are reasonable.

“We wouldn’t have any problem with this race if the dogs weren’t involved,” she said. “If they wanted to focus on human talent instead then we would obviously stop pursuing any action against the Iditarod.”

So it would seem for PETA, taking the dog sled out of a dog sled race is the only concession that would make them back off.

“They could take the dogs out of the race; they could race on snowmobiles or run themselves — those types of races do exist,” Lebkeucher said. “That’s the only way we could know the participants chose to be there.”

Yeah, but the dogs look so happy out there.

“That is not what I saw. I was surprised so many people used that line of reasoning,” Lebkeucher said. “I saw dogs with tails tucked between their legs, even the ones wagging their tails were doing it in more of an anxious manner than a happy one.”

Could a handful of buzzkills like Tricia Lebkeucher really kill the ‘Last Great Race on Earth?’ They not only can — they will.

Look no further than Sea World to see the Iditarod’s future.

Not very long ago at all, people flocked to Sea World and places like it to watch trained marine mammals perform tricks. The shows left everyone with a warm, glowing feeling about their relationship with the animal kingdom. The orcas and dolphins seemed so happy, and so smart — they were just like us.

Dolphin and orca trainer was the dream profession of countless little children — right up there with astronaut and professional athlete — but now, after a handful of documentaries and a whole lot of protests, it’s a profession that’s gone the way of the milkman in a hurry.

Sea World has ended its orca shows, and with blood in the water, dolphin shows won’t be far behind.

Lebkeucher appreciated that victory but pointed out that the demise of the Ringling Bros. Circus was a bigger feather in PETA’s cap.

“They shut down because people were not willing to pay to see abused animals pay for their entertainment,” she said. “There’s been a huge cultural shift and we’ve realized animals are individuals who feel pain, love, fear and happiness and they deserve to live their life on their terms with their needs being met — not being used for someone else’s gain.”