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A girl wanted to keep the goat she raised for a county fair. They killed it

44 points by spekcular 4y ago

411111111111111 4y ago
How does America have such an abundance of police which behave in such an obviously morally corrupt manner? In most nations the police makes at least a token effort to appear trustworthy for plausible deniability. From the states you get weekly reports that are so outlandishly bad that you almost can't believe it. Really strange as a bystander.
- superchroma 4y ago
  I want to believe it's because police departments deliberately preference unintelligent applicants over intelligent ones, but I quietly suspect it's something cultural.
  - alistairSH 4y ago
    Police departments have been known to avoid hiring smart people… https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/robert-jordan-too-smart-to-be-a-cop https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/robert-jordan-too-smart-...
- vogt 4y ago
  The goat became property of the new owner when it was sold at auction, which the family knew they were getting into. I hate defending someone who clearly was being an asshole in this situation by not having the heart to say “This little girl is clearly attached, I can simply buy another goat”, but there were no rights being violated here that I see.
  - johnklos 4y ago
    Cops extrajudicially confiscating property isn't violating rights? Have someone try it on you and see whether you still think that. Cops in the US get off on forcing their will on others.
    - vogt 4y ago
      The parents were the ones who confiscated someone else’s property when the goat was sold. But yeah, I agree, they do, you’re barking up the wrong tree if you think you’re going to stick it to me with ACAB sentiment because I am no fan of the state or police. I am a fan of honoring contracts and sales.
      - joe_guy 4y ago
        > am a fan of honoring contracts and sales. It's perfectly acceptable to violate a contract. It doesn't matter you're not a fan of this. As long as you follow through with the terms of violating it. > Breach of contract is not a crime or even a tort. Punitive damages are generally not an available remedy. The only remedies are to make the non-breaching party whole. The main theory behind this rule is that the law should not punish economically efficient breach. The contract was not in the article but we can assume that it would be whatever financial compensation would be to make them whole. That's something they offered but the other party kept making threats that they would be criminally charged, even though the article states it was within their rights to not sell the goat. IANAL but I can't imagine what permitted the police to be involved.
        JumpCrisscross 4y ago
        > perfectly acceptable to violate a contract. It doesn't matter you're not a fan of this. As long as you follow through with the terms of violating it Every contract comes with its invisible body of law attached. For purchase and sale contracts, particularly those involving livestock auctions, property law comes into play. Withholding someone else’s property is criminal. The police showed discretion in not charging the family. But recovery is totally within their remit.
        joe_guy 4y ago
        They offered to make the other party whole. If they were careless and a wild animal killed the goat, theyd not of unconditionally committed a crime, theyd only need to make the other party whole.
  - DanBC 4y ago
    When was the goat sold at auction?
    - kurupt213 4y ago
      At the fair. It’s part of the showing the animal process. While they are being judged, prospective customers are also evaluating the animals
  - 411111111111111 4y ago
    Sure, they probably had a previous agreement assuring the auction, but it wasn't the police's job to make that decision. They're the executive, not the judicative. A judge would've had to make this assertion, which clearly didn't happen as they didn't have a warrant. The officers still drove all over the state into a different jurisdiction (while using taxpayers money). They likely could've gotten the goat without making it into such a shit show, that's exactly the point I was trying to make.
    - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
      > it wasn't the police's job to make that decision If my car is stolen and I see it in someone’s garage, I absolutely expect the police to do something about it. In this case, the facts about lawful ownership were straightforward.
      - threatofrain 4y ago
        Although the conceptual boundary is thin, stealing is a crime and contractual violation is a tort. If we believe that our rights are secured by the counterbalancing of powers, then we ought not permit police to adjudicate torts.
        JumpCrisscross 4y ago
        > stealing is a crime and contractual violation is a tort Purchase and sale of livestock has a deep body of law attached. Judicial involvement isn’t always necessary, though either side can petition its review. (These cops had a warrant, by the way [1].) In this case, the parents waited until after the auction, after the seizure and after the slaughter to do that. [1] https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf
      - kittiepryde 4y ago
        An anecdote- my mother's car was stolen, stripped for parts, and the repair shop that stole out, had it visible and out in the open the entire time, police (Virginia, Hampton area, a decade ago) refused to recover property, and we couldn't afford to go to court.
  - alistairSH 4y ago
    The way this article reads, goat was confiscated prior to auction.
    - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
      > goat was confiscated prior to auction The parents told 4-H they changed their mind right before the auction, but the confiscation happened well after [1]. [1] https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article265138311.html https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article265138311.html
  - Hizonner 4y ago
    Wrong. The auction was not legally conducted, there was no actual transfer of ownership, and in any case what the auction falsely represented to the buyer that it had the right to sell was some meat, not a goat. You are making "factual" assertions without bothering to check them. Complaint: https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - vogt 4y ago
      Not sure why you’re repeating this comment in multiple places, but given that you are, I’ll repeat that this is not wrong, as I pointed out to you here: https://news.ycombinator.com/reply?id=32704877&goto=threads%3Fid%3Dvogt%2332704877 https://news.ycombinator.com/reply?id=32704877&goto=threads%...
      - Hizonner 4y ago
        I'm repeating it because of the mind-boggling number of people making contrary assertions of "fact" based on nothing but how they would like things to be.
        vogt 4y ago
        How many livestock auctions or 4H shows have you attended? If the answer is greater than zero, which I truly doubt, how many did not require the entrants to understand that entering your animal is putting it up for sale?
        JumpCrisscross 4y ago
        > the mind-boggling number of people making contrary assertions of "fact" based on nothing but how they would like things to be A judge executed a warrant for the seizure of the animal.
  - david38 4y ago
    It didn’t. It wasn’t sold because the girl backed out. The auction chose to ignore that.
- archagon 4y ago
  And it’s looking like it’s going to get so much worse. Check out this “Sheriffs Fellowship”: https://twitter.com/sifill_/status/1565036537179512832 https://twitter.com/sifill_/status/1565036537179512832
sJ646U9k6c6gME9 4y ago
[flagged]
- kurupt213 4y ago
  Sheriff recovers stolen property.
  - sJ646U9k6c6gME9 4y ago
    found the bootlicker!
msie 4y ago
It's so frustrating! There are just some people who won't just step back and look at the big picture. An exception now and then won't hurt. Maybe they were on a power-trip, afraid of rocking the boat, or just mindlessly doing their job like a cog in a big machine.
vogt 4y ago
Look, I’m an animal lover and what a nightmare for that little girl, but I don’t think that her parents did her any favors by not preparing her mentally for what was to come. The animals being sold at auction is part and parcel of the 4H experience, or many families will opt to have the animal slaughtered themselves. It sounds like they brought this goat to auction where it was sold and then tried to re-neg on the sale. If she bonded that closely to the animal they should have kept it on the property and not brought it to the 4H show. They almost tacitly admit this in offering to repay the income brought into 4H by the goat. A number of years ago there was a dog being given up that my wife and I wanted to adopt off Craigslist. It was being given up by a family who - you guessed it - “didn’t have time for her”. This was in Weatherford TX which was over an hour from our place in Dallas. We got halfway there before the woman who placed the ad called us asking us to turn around, because her 8 year old daughter was having a breakdown after the realization that their dog was about to be rehomed. Six months later they emailed us asking if we were still willing to take the dog, otherwise it was going to the shelter. At that point we had already taken on another. I hope it didn’t wind up in a kill shelter all because these parents couldn’t help their child deal with reality. This story reminded me of that.
- superchroma 4y ago
  I think, in life, sometimes we just don't quite think things through. You're busy, preoccupied, whatever. You don't get all the facts and just assume the best. You get to the auction and realize your daughter loves the goat a lot. You don't spend all day in an analytical mode, anticipating the worst cases, and then things happen and it's then too late to act. It's like being careless where you park your nice car and having it get keyed. We can hunch over a little more, strive to blend in, build taller fences, be more cynical, make a million plans and expect the worst, or we can advocate for change and try to be more patient, kind and accepting, and, I think, I would like to advocate the latter.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > or we can advocate for change and try to be more patient, kind and accepting, and, I think, I would like to advocate the latter 4-H auctions finance the programme. If the auctions become unreliable because parents couldn’t bother to identify an attachment early and message their intent to renegotiate a contract until right before the auction, the programme is threatened. It’s also baffling the parents didn’t try to buy the goat off the purchaser, its lawful owner, instead of asking the venue to void a contract. (EDIT: It appears they did and the buyer said they were fine reversing the contract. Nobody did anything to document this, however, and the family taking the goat home after the auction prejudiced them.) It’s also against the pathos of the programme? Knowing you’re raising livestock is the point.
superchroma 4y ago
Well that's just a terrible and unnecessary little story. If I was the family, I guess I would have purchased a second goat and pretended it was the first, but why the hell do we have to employ cunning for something this mundane. This is a real vogon story.
- foogazi 4y ago
  > If I was the family, I guess I would have purchased a second goat and pretended it was the first, Or bid on their own goat
uxcolumbo 4y ago
I feel for this little girl - for losing her friend. I think if more parents would explain to kids where meat comes from most would react like Indie-Rose - another little kid[0] - who said: "I don't want to chop up animal people" And there are so many more kids realizing on their own what they are eating. They don't want to eat Peppa the pig & friends and yet we (mostly) force them to eat them. And there are so many more examples of these kids. They seem to instinctively understand what Einstein talked about in the last century [1] [2]. What do you think would happen if we show little kids the reality of slaughterhouses - they'd be traumatized for life and yet we feed them the products of those brutal and inhumane places. One day we might end this barbarism - maybe a few more hundred years - as depicted in this optimistic future [3] EDIT: Would be good to hear why you down vote this comment. --- [0] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3151959/Tearful-five-year-old-girl-s-vegetarian-mother-s-partner-insists-taste-good.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3151959/Tearful-f... [1] "Our task must be to free ourselves by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature and its beauty." [2] "Nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet." [3] The Dietary Requirements of a Star Fleet Officer - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sS7NRtEJBcA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sS7NRtEJBcA
- superchroma 4y ago
  I would guess because the notion of telling children hard truths is not the key issue in this event, and you're kind of taking a moment for animal rights advocacy which people can find obnoxious. Both are an important topic for discussion, for sure.
  - uxcolumbo 4y ago
    Thanks - but this is about animal rights and our culture of eating meat, is it not? If those people who took away the goat had more compassion then this little girl would still have her goat friend. The little girl and the goat had a bond and it was broken because we just view these animals as objects / property and not as sentient beings that 'are too much like us' as Carl Sagan used to say.
zozbot234 4y ago
I mean, that's just the flip side of "cattle, not pets". But you really can't fault a little girl for not knowing all about the latest DevOps practices.
kurupt213 4y ago
So the parents failed at providing the 4-H experience. Selling the livestock is a vital part of the program. But this sounds like there was a contract that the parents were attempting to back out of…because the girl threw a tantrum. It’s ok to ask, but offering to pay the value of the goat doesn’t mean they have to accept the payment and void the contract.
- Hizonner 4y ago
  There was no contract. It "sounds" to you like there was a contract because that's what you want to believe. The article doesn't say there was a contract, and the complaint goes into considerable detail about how (a) there was no contract, (b) if there had been a contract, she would have had the right to rescind it. Also, fuck the 4-H experience...
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > was no contract There absolutely was. Between the Fair and the family, when they first put the animal on auction. Between the Fair and the purchaser, when it was auctioned. We don’t have their details. But they definitely existed.
  - kurupt213 4y ago
    4-H teaches responsibility and the realities of life and the food chain. It’s definitely doesn’t warrant such a negative response, even if you have chosen to be vegan.
pigbearpig 4y ago
Completely unnecessary, a lot of adults had a chance to stop and think but they didn’t. How about we don’t hold 10-year old 4-H members to contracts (pretty sure they can’t anyway). Why are Sheriff deputies jumping on a case like this. Maybe the parents should not have let it get that far to be auctioned off, seems like they would have know before that their daughter considered it a pet.
- superchroma 4y ago
  Yes. The amount of people leaping straight to law in this thread is alarming, and I believe that that reflex is a cultural sickness. Why do we as a people bother producing things like Hallmark movies if this is the awful reality of american life, devoid of sentimentality, kindness and patience? I hope people consume such media because they aspire for things to be better some day.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    This is a story of stupid parents. They waited until the day of to bother doing anything. Then they absconded with the animal after it had been auctioned. They should absolutely be allowed to back out of the auction with reasonable notice. And I can empathise—if someone came for my pets I’d do what was necessary, the law be damned. But they proceeded idiotically and are now filing petty suits against the cops of all people, cops who executed a warrant signed by a judge.
    - superchroma 4y ago
      People are careless and stupid. I am extremely grateful for all the times people have gone out of their way to accommodate my failures and shortcomings. The world would be a much grimmer place if we all went through it without being flexible in any way. I think endorsing that style of operating is a cultural sickness; fighting to suppress some of the best qualities we have as a race.
      - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
TimPC 4y ago
There are multiple property right violations here and the body of law is not all that clear. 4-H violated the parent’s property rights to the goat by proceeding with the auction against their will. At this point it becomes unclear who the legitimate owner of the property is, it may still be the parents as auctions of stolen property don’t make ownership legitimate. I think making the buyer of the goat financially whole is a reasonable outcome here and police operating out of county and seizing property without due process is clearly not. 4-H doesn’t get to use its principles to force an auction upon unwilling sellers. If they had partial or full ownership of the goat this might be different but as long as the parents and child have bought the goat as part of raising it they can’t proceed with the auction against the wishes of that parent and child.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > 4-H violated the parent’s property rights to the goat by proceeding with the auction against their will 4-H programs typically loan a goat to a family to raise for the intention of teaching livestock husbandry. The goat is never legally the family’s property. (Not sure about this case.) EDIT: It appears this program involves purchasing the goat. Suing the police is still stupid. They were enforcing a purchase and sale under warrant [1]. There may be a case against the Fair, depending on when the auction contract bound the parents to the sale. (The parents attempted to terminate the auction on the show date. Had they done so literally the day before, this would have been, based on the case, open and shut.) [1] https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf page 9
  - Hizonner 4y ago
    Wrong. 4-H (or somebody) sold her the goat, and in fact their rules required her to maintain legal ownership of the goat. You are making statments of "fact" without checking them. Complaint: https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
swayvil 4y ago
Why didn't they just buy a new goat and hand it over to the sheriffs instead? Seems like the really obvious solution. It wouldn't even have to be alive. Tell them it got hit by the lawnmower. People just don't think these things through.
brij0102 4y ago
Looks like the state senator lost an opportunity to buy and gift the goat to the kid
carride 4y ago
Reminds me of VT agriculture college that upset the town residents when they learned the 2 scenic cows were planned to be slaughtered. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2012/11/01/college-oxen-slaughter/1676227/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2012/11/01/colleg...

44 points by spekcular 4y ago

How does America have such an abundance of police which behave in such an obviously morally corrupt manner? In most nations the police makes at least a token effort to appear trustworthy for plausible deniability. From the states you get weekly reports that are so outlandishly bad that you almost can't believe it. Really strange as a bystander.

superchroma 4y ago
I want to believe it's because police departments deliberately preference unintelligent applicants over intelligent ones, but I quietly suspect it's something cultural.
- alistairSH 4y ago
  Police departments have been known to avoid hiring smart people… https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/robert-jordan-too-smart-to-be-a-cop https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/robert-jordan-too-smart-...
vogt 4y ago
The goat became property of the new owner when it was sold at auction, which the family knew they were getting into. I hate defending someone who clearly was being an asshole in this situation by not having the heart to say “This little girl is clearly attached, I can simply buy another goat”, but there were no rights being violated here that I see.
- johnklos 4y ago
  Cops extrajudicially confiscating property isn't violating rights? Have someone try it on you and see whether you still think that. Cops in the US get off on forcing their will on others.
  - vogt 4y ago
    The parents were the ones who confiscated someone else’s property when the goat was sold. But yeah, I agree, they do, you’re barking up the wrong tree if you think you’re going to stick it to me with ACAB sentiment because I am no fan of the state or police. I am a fan of honoring contracts and sales.
    - joe_guy 4y ago
      > am a fan of honoring contracts and sales. It's perfectly acceptable to violate a contract. It doesn't matter you're not a fan of this. As long as you follow through with the terms of violating it. > Breach of contract is not a crime or even a tort. Punitive damages are generally not an available remedy. The only remedies are to make the non-breaching party whole. The main theory behind this rule is that the law should not punish economically efficient breach. The contract was not in the article but we can assume that it would be whatever financial compensation would be to make them whole. That's something they offered but the other party kept making threats that they would be criminally charged, even though the article states it was within their rights to not sell the goat. IANAL but I can't imagine what permitted the police to be involved.
      - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
        > perfectly acceptable to violate a contract. It doesn't matter you're not a fan of this. As long as you follow through with the terms of violating it Every contract comes with its invisible body of law attached. For purchase and sale contracts, particularly those involving livestock auctions, property law comes into play. Withholding someone else’s property is criminal. The police showed discretion in not charging the family. But recovery is totally within their remit.
        joe_guy 4y ago
        They offered to make the other party whole. If they were careless and a wild animal killed the goat, theyd not of unconditionally committed a crime, theyd only need to make the other party whole.
- DanBC 4y ago
  When was the goat sold at auction?
  - kurupt213 4y ago
    At the fair. It’s part of the showing the animal process. While they are being judged, prospective customers are also evaluating the animals
- 411111111111111 4y ago
  Sure, they probably had a previous agreement assuring the auction, but it wasn't the police's job to make that decision. They're the executive, not the judicative. A judge would've had to make this assertion, which clearly didn't happen as they didn't have a warrant. The officers still drove all over the state into a different jurisdiction (while using taxpayers money). They likely could've gotten the goat without making it into such a shit show, that's exactly the point I was trying to make.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > it wasn't the police's job to make that decision If my car is stolen and I see it in someone’s garage, I absolutely expect the police to do something about it. In this case, the facts about lawful ownership were straightforward.
    - threatofrain 4y ago
      Although the conceptual boundary is thin, stealing is a crime and contractual violation is a tort. If we believe that our rights are secured by the counterbalancing of powers, then we ought not permit police to adjudicate torts.
      - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
        > stealing is a crime and contractual violation is a tort Purchase and sale of livestock has a deep body of law attached. Judicial involvement isn’t always necessary, though either side can petition its review. (These cops had a warrant, by the way [1].) In this case, the parents waited until after the auction, after the seizure and after the slaughter to do that. [1] https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf
    - kittiepryde 4y ago
      An anecdote- my mother's car was stolen, stripped for parts, and the repair shop that stole out, had it visible and out in the open the entire time, police (Virginia, Hampton area, a decade ago) refused to recover property, and we couldn't afford to go to court.
- alistairSH 4y ago
  The way this article reads, goat was confiscated prior to auction.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > goat was confiscated prior to auction The parents told 4-H they changed their mind right before the auction, but the confiscation happened well after [1]. [1] https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article265138311.html https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article265138311.html
- Hizonner 4y ago
  Wrong. The auction was not legally conducted, there was no actual transfer of ownership, and in any case what the auction falsely represented to the buyer that it had the right to sell was some meat, not a goat. You are making "factual" assertions without bothering to check them. Complaint: https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - vogt 4y ago
    Not sure why you’re repeating this comment in multiple places, but given that you are, I’ll repeat that this is not wrong, as I pointed out to you here: https://news.ycombinator.com/reply?id=32704877&goto=threads%3Fid%3Dvogt%2332704877 https://news.ycombinator.com/reply?id=32704877&goto=threads%...
    - Hizonner 4y ago
      I'm repeating it because of the mind-boggling number of people making contrary assertions of "fact" based on nothing but how they would like things to be.
      - vogt 4y ago
        How many livestock auctions or 4H shows have you attended? If the answer is greater than zero, which I truly doubt, how many did not require the entrants to understand that entering your animal is putting it up for sale?
      - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
        > the mind-boggling number of people making contrary assertions of "fact" based on nothing but how they would like things to be A judge executed a warrant for the seizure of the animal.
- david38 4y ago
  It didn’t. It wasn’t sold because the girl backed out. The auction chose to ignore that.
archagon 4y ago
And it’s looking like it’s going to get so much worse. Check out this “Sheriffs Fellowship”: https://twitter.com/sifill_/status/1565036537179512832 https://twitter.com/sifill_/status/1565036537179512832

sJ646U9k6c6gME9 4y ago

[flagged]

kurupt213 4y ago
Sheriff recovers stolen property.
- sJ646U9k6c6gME9 4y ago
  found the bootlicker!

msie 4y ago

It's so frustrating! There are just some people who won't just step back and look at the big picture. An exception now and then won't hurt. Maybe they were on a power-trip, afraid of rocking the boat, or just mindlessly doing their job like a cog in a big machine.

vogt 4y ago

Look, I’m an animal lover and what a nightmare for that little girl, but I don’t think that her parents did her any favors by not preparing her mentally for what was to come. The animals being sold at auction is part and parcel of the 4H experience, or many families will opt to have the animal slaughtered themselves. It sounds like they brought this goat to auction where it was sold and then tried to re-neg on the sale. If she bonded that closely to the animal they should have kept it on the property and not brought it to the 4H show. They almost tacitly admit this in offering to repay the income brought into 4H by the goat. A number of years ago there was a dog being given up that my wife and I wanted to adopt off Craigslist. It was being given up by a family who - you guessed it - “didn’t have time for her”. This was in Weatherford TX which was over an hour from our place in Dallas. We got halfway there before the woman who placed the ad called us asking us to turn around, because her 8 year old daughter was having a breakdown after the realization that their dog was about to be rehomed. Six months later they emailed us asking if we were still willing to take the dog, otherwise it was going to the shelter. At that point we had already taken on another. I hope it didn’t wind up in a kill shelter all because these parents couldn’t help their child deal with reality. This story reminded me of that.

superchroma 4y ago
I think, in life, sometimes we just don't quite think things through. You're busy, preoccupied, whatever. You don't get all the facts and just assume the best. You get to the auction and realize your daughter loves the goat a lot. You don't spend all day in an analytical mode, anticipating the worst cases, and then things happen and it's then too late to act. It's like being careless where you park your nice car and having it get keyed. We can hunch over a little more, strive to blend in, build taller fences, be more cynical, make a million plans and expect the worst, or we can advocate for change and try to be more patient, kind and accepting, and, I think, I would like to advocate the latter.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > or we can advocate for change and try to be more patient, kind and accepting, and, I think, I would like to advocate the latter 4-H auctions finance the programme. If the auctions become unreliable because parents couldn’t bother to identify an attachment early and message their intent to renegotiate a contract until right before the auction, the programme is threatened. It’s also baffling the parents didn’t try to buy the goat off the purchaser, its lawful owner, instead of asking the venue to void a contract. (EDIT: It appears they did and the buyer said they were fine reversing the contract. Nobody did anything to document this, however, and the family taking the goat home after the auction prejudiced them.) It’s also against the pathos of the programme? Knowing you’re raising livestock is the point.

superchroma 4y ago

Well that's just a terrible and unnecessary little story. If I was the family, I guess I would have purchased a second goat and pretended it was the first, but why the hell do we have to employ cunning for something this mundane. This is a real vogon story.

foogazi 4y ago
> If I was the family, I guess I would have purchased a second goat and pretended it was the first, Or bid on their own goat

uxcolumbo 4y ago

I feel for this little girl - for losing her friend. I think if more parents would explain to kids where meat comes from most would react like Indie-Rose - another little kid[0] - who said: "I don't want to chop up animal people" And there are so many more kids realizing on their own what they are eating. They don't want to eat Peppa the pig & friends and yet we (mostly) force them to eat them. And there are so many more examples of these kids. They seem to instinctively understand what Einstein talked about in the last century [1] [2]. What do you think would happen if we show little kids the reality of slaughterhouses - they'd be traumatized for life and yet we feed them the products of those brutal and inhumane places. One day we might end this barbarism - maybe a few more hundred years - as depicted in this optimistic future [3] EDIT: Would be good to hear why you down vote this comment. --- [0] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3151959/Tearful-five-year-old-girl-s-vegetarian-mother-s-partner-insists-taste-good.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3151959/Tearful-f... [1] "Our task must be to free ourselves by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature and its beauty." [2] "Nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet." [3] The Dietary Requirements of a Star Fleet Officer - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sS7NRtEJBcA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sS7NRtEJBcA

superchroma 4y ago
I would guess because the notion of telling children hard truths is not the key issue in this event, and you're kind of taking a moment for animal rights advocacy which people can find obnoxious. Both are an important topic for discussion, for sure.
- uxcolumbo 4y ago
  Thanks - but this is about animal rights and our culture of eating meat, is it not? If those people who took away the goat had more compassion then this little girl would still have her goat friend. The little girl and the goat had a bond and it was broken because we just view these animals as objects / property and not as sentient beings that 'are too much like us' as Carl Sagan used to say.

zozbot234 4y ago

I mean, that's just the flip side of "cattle, not pets". But you really can't fault a little girl for not knowing all about the latest DevOps practices.

kurupt213 4y ago

So the parents failed at providing the 4-H experience. Selling the livestock is a vital part of the program. But this sounds like there was a contract that the parents were attempting to back out of…because the girl threw a tantrum. It’s ok to ask, but offering to pay the value of the goat doesn’t mean they have to accept the payment and void the contract.

Hizonner 4y ago
There was no contract. It "sounds" to you like there was a contract because that's what you want to believe. The article doesn't say there was a contract, and the complaint goes into considerable detail about how (a) there was no contract, (b) if there had been a contract, she would have had the right to rescind it. Also, fuck the 4-H experience...
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > was no contract There absolutely was. Between the Fair and the family, when they first put the animal on auction. Between the Fair and the purchaser, when it was auctioned. We don’t have their details. But they definitely existed.
- kurupt213 4y ago
  4-H teaches responsibility and the realities of life and the food chain. It’s definitely doesn’t warrant such a negative response, even if you have chosen to be vegan.

pigbearpig 4y ago

Completely unnecessary, a lot of adults had a chance to stop and think but they didn’t. How about we don’t hold 10-year old 4-H members to contracts (pretty sure they can’t anyway). Why are Sheriff deputies jumping on a case like this. Maybe the parents should not have let it get that far to be auctioned off, seems like they would have know before that their daughter considered it a pet.

superchroma 4y ago
Yes. The amount of people leaping straight to law in this thread is alarming, and I believe that that reflex is a cultural sickness. Why do we as a people bother producing things like Hallmark movies if this is the awful reality of american life, devoid of sentimentality, kindness and patience? I hope people consume such media because they aspire for things to be better some day.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  This is a story of stupid parents. They waited until the day of to bother doing anything. Then they absconded with the animal after it had been auctioned. They should absolutely be allowed to back out of the auction with reasonable notice. And I can empathise—if someone came for my pets I’d do what was necessary, the law be damned. But they proceeded idiotically and are now filing petty suits against the cops of all people, cops who executed a warrant signed by a judge.
  - superchroma 4y ago
    People are careless and stupid. I am extremely grateful for all the times people have gone out of their way to accommodate my failures and shortcomings. The world would be a much grimmer place if we all went through it without being flexible in any way. I think endorsing that style of operating is a cultural sickness; fighting to suppress some of the best qualities we have as a race.
    - JumpCrisscross 4y ago

TimPC 4y ago

There are multiple property right violations here and the body of law is not all that clear. 4-H violated the parent’s property rights to the goat by proceeding with the auction against their will. At this point it becomes unclear who the legitimate owner of the property is, it may still be the parents as auctions of stolen property don’t make ownership legitimate. I think making the buyer of the goat financially whole is a reasonable outcome here and police operating out of county and seizing property without due process is clearly not. 4-H doesn’t get to use its principles to force an auction upon unwilling sellers. If they had partial or full ownership of the goat this might be different but as long as the parents and child have bought the goat as part of raising it they can’t proceed with the auction against the wishes of that parent and child.

JumpCrisscross 4y ago
> 4-H violated the parent’s property rights to the goat by proceeding with the auction against their will 4-H programs typically loan a goat to a family to raise for the intention of teaching livestock husbandry. The goat is never legally the family’s property. (Not sure about this case.) EDIT: It appears this program involves purchasing the goat. Suing the police is still stupid. They were enforcing a purchase and sale under warrant [1]. There may be a case against the Fair, depending on when the auction contract bound the parents to the sale. (The parents attempted to terminate the auction on the show date. Had they done so literally the day before, this would have been, based on the case, open and shut.) [1] https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf page 9
- Hizonner 4y ago
  Wrong. 4-H (or somebody) sold her the goat, and in fact their rules required her to maintain legal ownership of the goat. You are making statments of "fact" without checking them. Complaint: https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf https://dig.abclocal.go.com/kgo/PDF/2022-08-31-Complaint.pdf
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]

swayvil 4y ago

Why didn't they just buy a new goat and hand it over to the sheriffs instead? Seems like the really obvious solution. It wouldn't even have to be alive. Tell them it got hit by the lawnmower. People just don't think these things through.

brij0102 4y ago

Looks like the state senator lost an opportunity to buy and gift the goat to the kid

carride 4y ago

Reminds me of VT agriculture college that upset the town residents when they learned the 2 scenic cows were planned to be slaughtered. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2012/11/01/college-oxen-slaughter/1676227/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2012/11/01/colleg...