03/08/2025
We Need to Stand Up and Care for Our Detroit Dogs!!!
Let’s Talk About Detroit. And Dogs. And Responsibility.
At Rebel Dogs Detroit, our shelter’s mission has always been clear: we serve Detroit’s dogs.
Not because other dogs across the country don’t need help — they do. But because this city is in crisis. And if you’re based here, your rescue should reflect that.
Every day in Detroit, dogs die on the streets. They die from heat, from starvation, from cruelty. They sit in our local shelters with no rescue commitments. They’re passed over again and again — too “big,” too “black,” too “damaged.” And let’s be honest, they are primarily pitbulls and pitbull mixes.
This is not about competition. It’s about ethics. It’s about prioritization. It’s about being rooted in the reality of the community you claim to serve.
When Detroit’s streets are overflowing with emaciated, injured, chained, and abandoned dogs — when our shelters are full of overlooked dogs who regularly die when no one steps up — how can any Detroit-based rescue justify importing more dogs into our city from hundreds of miles away?
We’re not saying dogs from other locations don’t deserve help. Every dog deserves help. But Detroit dogs have no one else- they are our responsibility and the resources our community has already arent enough.
🦴 Who will help the stray dog who was hit by a car on the Eastside?
🦴 Who will help the nursing mom chained to a fence in the heat today?
🦴 Who will stand up for the young pittie dumped in a field because he wasn't wanted now that he got big?
🦴 Who will help the family keep their dogs safe while being evicted?
Because we get dozens of those calls every day and can only possibly help so many of them. Therefore, we know that all the other shelter/rescue organizations in this city are getting those same calls. Hell, we know they get the same calls because people often tell us they were referred to us by other organizations. Which is great- we will continue to help however and whenever we can. But to really make a lasting change in Detroit’s stray and neglect epidemic we have to commit to combining all our shelters’ and rescues’ resources.
This year alone, Detroit’s Animal Control euthanized over 1200 dogs.
If we — the people who live here, fundraise here, post here, and claim “Detroit” in our names — don’t actually serve Detroit, then who will?
To the public: when you see rescues boasting about numbers and viral transports, ask yourself — are they showing up for the dogs in their own city, too?
We will always choose the hard, messy, emotionally gutting work of local rescue. And we will keep challenging others in our region to do the same — not to tear anyone down, but to raise the bar for what true Detroit rescue should look like.
Love and struggle,
🖤 Rebel Dogs Detroit
