IT IS TIME TO STOP MICHAEL VICK

Michael Vick, convicted animal abuser, has been signed to do a reality show on BET about his life.

Let’s review: Vick, a college dropout who had a four year paid scholarship, opts to become a pro-NFL player. He’s good. Real good. But he’s a thug. Between 2001 and 2007 Vick the Thug makes minor headlines with keywords like marijuana, transmission of genital herpes, airport security skirmishes, more marijuana and oh…yes…dog fighting. Vick’s barbaric treatment of dogs finally lands him in prison, and as we all know, he emerges from his incarceration victorious, with a new NFL contract, great suits and a poorly executed appearance on CBS 60 Minutes. The next thing we know, the Human Society of America is shining spotlights on him and having him deliver animal cruelty speeches to kids. Nobody’s buying it and everybody wants him to go away. Poll after poll shows he’s persona non grata among football fans, animal lovers and well, just about everybody.

Now comes word that the BET Network will produce an eight-part “docu-series” called “The Michael Vick Project,” which will tell the story of Vick’s life from childhood to incarceration. You know, because we haven’t heard enough about the dog-murdering thug.

Vick told the L.A. Times, “I just want people to really get to know me as an individual. What I want to do is change the perception of me. I am a human being. I've made some mistakes in the past, and I wish it had never happened. But it's not about how you fall, but about how you pick yourself up."

Those of us who love and protect dogs, who realize the vital importance of treating all animals with kindness and respect, do not see Michael Vick as a fallen victim. We see him as a street thug who condoned the vicious use of dogs for blood sport. We do not have any interest in seeing Vick pick himself up. We do not understand a television network paying Vick a reported $600,000 to tell the story of his life. We might have at least minimal tolerance for the docu-series if we knew that Vick was donating all of the money to animal rescue organizations. But, of course, he is not. He is using the money to pay down the enormous debt he has incurred as a street thug.

Here is what you can do. First, write letters to Debra Lee, Chairman and CEO of BET, and to Scott Mills, President and COO of BET. This is their address: One BET Plaza, 1235 W Street NE, Washington D.C. 20018. If you wish to call them instead, this is the phone number: (202) 608-2000. Tell them you are boycotting BET until such time that the decision to air this program is reversed. Then, contact every animal rights organization you can and lobby them to put pressure on BET to cancel this program before it begins. If the program does indeed make it to air in 2010, as announced, boycott all of the show’s advertisers and write to each company’s executives to inform them of your actions.

It is time to stop rewarding young, deliberately uneducated athletes and others for their fully unacceptable behavior. When animals become the victims of these people’s sense of entitlement, we have to step up, en masse and take action. I urge you to take a look at your own pets after you read this piece and think about how important they are in your life. All of the dogs that Vick killed or allowed to bleed to death on his property could have had quality lives and could have been loved. They were not afforded that opportunity and it is up to all of us to see that the perpetrator of the crime is not granted airtime to rehabilitate his image. Please do it.