Argh, craigslist flaggers!

I've been browsing Craig's List pets for a few months. I had originally thought I could adopt from it, but after a few bad experiences, I'm mainly just browsing for the pictures. I kitty pics.

Only now, there are almost no kitties listed on the Minneapolis Craig's List I've noticed an ongoing low level war between rescues and others, but it's just gotten insane! I have no idea who started it, but seriously people, grow up! Rescues flag people trying to rehome their family pet, and others flag the rescues for charging too high a rehoming fee. There's almost no listings today.

I hope it blows over soon

Anyone else a Craig's List watcher? Is this normal?

Try switching to the St. Cloud craigslist - the flaggers may not bother with that one.


Found this on Mpls one - hurry and contact them.

http://minneapolis.craigslist.org/pet/940462741.html

I didn't have much luck with craigslist when we were looking for another cat after I had Snickers PTS. No one out of the 15 people I emailed even had the courtesy to reply to me!

I see a lot of people getting flagged on craigslist all the time...and it's not just rescue groups vs. families. It's all sorts of just, well, people wanting to argue about anything and everything. And that's just in the "Pets" section! People honestly really need to just grow up.

I can't fault craigslist entirely, though. We've been selling off things we don't need on there with some success, and we bought a car for $400 off of there this past summer.

I browse the Minneapolis Craigslist pets section to look at the photos too, and I agree, it is completely ridiculous. The last few days it seems that half the listings are just discussion posts about the flagging. It makes that site really frustrating.

I live in NYC and was absolutely blessed with finding my Maia through a Craigslist post! It was Free kittens 2 1/2 years ago and I answered within 1 hour. I traveled out to meet the gentlemen who I spoke to on the phone the next day and he had her in a duffel bag! She was the runt of the litter and fit in the palm of my hand, fell in love immediately with each other.......
I noticed now the rules have changed, only rehoming and adoption fee listings are allowed and carefully screened. No more free kittens listings, but I recently replied to a re homing post for a young kitten...........
This is the link about her story.
http://www.thecatsite.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=181872
Craigslist has been my savior the past few years! I found my little angel Maia, my past 2 jobs, and hopefully our little new member of the family......

I posted a "Free pet books to rescue organizations" and it got flagged. I took out the word "pet" and it was accepted. Go figure.

CL is a crazy place but also very useful. My Daphne is a Craiglist kitten

I fell in love with this one recently http://portland.craigslist.org/clk/pet/939769467.html

Found a free bed frame there and gave away a bunch of stuff. Now need to get someone to actually pick up the cross stitch books Hate when people say they will show and they don't.

I frequent craigslist in the pets section. Mainly because I am looking for people who say they need to get rid of their pet that day, and then bring it in to our shelter as a "stray". Liars. I love catching them.

I do see flags a lot on there. Generally for people trying to sell animals and asking outrageous "rehoming" fees. I have no problem with that. But flags on rescue organizations, is just retaliation from the same people who are getting flagged. Somedays it's more frequent than others. I can sift thru it pretty well though.

Originally Posted by Breal76

I frequent craigslist in the pets section. Mainly because I am looking for people who say they need to get rid of their pet that day, and then bring it in to our shelter as a "stray". Liars. I love catching them.

I do see flags a lot on there. Generally for people trying to sell animals and asking outrageous "rehoming" fees. I have no problem with that. But flags on rescue organizations, is just retaliation from the same people who are getting flagged. Somedays it's more frequent than others. I can sift thru it pretty well though.

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Bet we're checking the same CL posts

I have flagged posts on Craigslist before. Only the people trying to "re-home" 8 week AKC puppies (disguised 'breeders') for $500 each or stuff like that. I don't flag people trying to re-home their own pet, though I generally send bad vibes to them.

I would only adopt from CL if it was someone who had found stray cats/kittens or if it was a rescue group posting there. I would rather rescue a cat or kitten from a shelter or rescue group. If someone has kittens on CL because they didn't spay/neuter their own pets, I wouldn't make it easier for them to re-home the kittens. I know the kittens need homes, but it just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

Originally Posted by Breal76

I frequent craigslist in the pets section. Mainly because I am looking for people who say they need to get rid of their pet that day, and then bring it in to our shelter as a "stray". Liars. I love catching them.

I do see flags a lot on there. Generally for people trying to sell animals and asking outrageous "rehoming" fees. I have no problem with that. But flags on rescue organizations, is just retaliation from the same people who are getting flagged. Somedays it's more frequent than others. I can sift thru it pretty well though.

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That is a good idea, I wonder if our humane society has people watching for this too. Now that more and more cats are micro-chipped, I hope that it makes it harder for people to claim that their pets were 'strays'. I know that our local cat rescue checks CL all the time. Someone once posted trying to re-home a cat and said that they adopted it from the cat rescue. Well, obviously the cat rescue would want the cat back rather than it going to some random person through CL (I believe it's probably in the adoption contract that you have to bring the animal back). Anyway, I e-mailed the cat rescue to make sure they knew about the post and they said that they had already seen it and had picked up the cat earlier that day. So I'm glad that people like you and them browse CL for that stuff.

aha, looks like it might just be a bunch of pot stirrers who go around to different cities and try to rile everyone up:

http://minneapolis.craigslist.org/pet/941349051.html

Yea, I had listed a couple of my cats to be given away on nebraska craigslist, only to have them flagged in like 45 minutes! I did some googling to find out more about pet flagging, and found alot of information regarding the subject. Needless to say, I noticed a site called craigshitmen.com and they claim they get rid of ads against craigslist terms of service for a price. I had e-mailed craigs hitmen to tell them about my situation, and they straight didn't even care, so here we are not able to use craigslist to even give cute little kitties away. Someday, a solution to this problem will come and I will post it here

I wish they'd just get rid of the pets section entirely. I love it for everything else, we sold a car on there pretty effectively and its free.

But the pets! *sigh* It's heartbreaking to read some of the posts, and it makes it way too easy for people to give away free kittens/puppies. Or become mills. Or, like you said, have wars. I understand where the rescues are coming from, but the giving away / adoption fee / profiting from irresponsible breeding wars are just to... prone to explosion for me. You don't really see those kind of arguments over the price of old appliances.

For posterity-- Craigslist SPECIFICALLY has a rule against giving away pets for free, and it also has a rule against charging too much, so the flaggers are flagging something that is appropriate. It is a matter of opinion as to what is "too much" and that's where the war comes. But you aren't supposed to "give pets away", and they're right to flag for it.

Partial list of items for sale and services the advertisement of which is not permitted on craigslist: ... Household pets of any kind including but not limited to dogs, cats, primates, cage birds, rodents, reptiles, amphibians, fish. Re-homing with small adoption fee OK ...

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We must be lucky. We occasionally get the crazy flagger, but for the most part people let other people be. I got both Nora and Milo from Craigslist for free.

The only real arguments that we get are people saying that you shouldn't get your pet off Craigslist, you should get one from the shelters b/c they are so crowded, but the way I figure is that if people stop buying from Craigslist and giving homes to those animals, a lot of them are just going to end up in the shelter anyway so either way you lose.

Originally Posted by Zissou'sMom

For posterity-- Craigslist SPECIFICALLY has a rule against giving away pets for free, and it also has a rule against charging too much, so the flaggers are flagging something that is appropriate. It is a matter of opinion as to what is "too much" and that's where the war comes. But you aren't supposed to "give pets away", and they're right to flag for it.

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That isn't what that means. It means that you can't SELL your animals, like if you are a breeder, and you can't solicit a breeder or a mate to breed your animal with. You are more than free to give away your pet for free or "charge a small rehoming fee" but nothing more than that.

Partial list of items for sale and services the advertisement of which is not permitted on craigslist:

Household pets of any kind including but not limited to dogs, cats, primates, cage birds, rodents, reptiles, amphibians, fish. Re-homing with small adoption fee OK

It doesn't say anywhere there that you can't give your pets away for free. Just that you can't SELL them.