so a co-worker of mine bought a couple of super cute painted tetras for the aquarium.

flush them? why add on to the cruelty?

It's not the fishies fault, don't flush them.

mulch said:

Dude! I was so PISSED!!! I yelled at him pretty good, but kinda felt bad as most people don't know any better. I started to get over it but everyone just loves busting my balls about it every chance they get. HEY ERNIE, I REALLY LIKE THE PINK ONE! I can only hope that they didn't give the rest of the tank the walmart super plague. I want to flush them when noone is looking.

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Why yell at him at all? Like you said, he didn't know better. Just let him know they're painted/dyed and that it's cruel, and let him decide himself.

It's the people who KNOW and still buy the fish that you should be going after.

if you're going to yell at somebody, go to the fishstore and yell at the manager.

unfortunately the painted practice is only expanding.
I was in a LPS the other day where they were selling
Parrot cichlids painted Blue, Green, Yellow and Violet.
needless to say, I no longer buy from that pet store.

I just seen painted mollys. White mollys with blue and pink spots and lines on them. They called them tattooed mollys. That is just wrong I told the girl at the fish store that was just wrong and her replie to that was do you have any tattoo's? I said yes but I wanted them not like the fish said color me up I want to look good. I told them that it is just wrong for them to have them.

I think that while more people are aware of injected dyes, fewer are aware of painting, because it's more subtle. Surprisingly, Petco and Walmart don't even sell painted fish anymore.

Atleast those painted fish looks somewhat bareable (kidding) I've seen parrot fish for sale during Valentines day that had a "I(heart shape)U" tattoo. WTF? That was ugly.

I was at a large and very nice LFS in another town in another state recently. They were selling "personalized" dyed fish - some large (8"+) white fish that you could get customized with whatever you wanted on its side (your name, your business name, design, etc). You had to wait a couple of weeks, but they would do it. Very strange and sad. I think it was like $30 a fish.

Yea i think yelling your your co-worker was wrong, At least he was cool enough to buy you some Fishes and add to the aquarium. I sure would be piss, If i got yelled at ALOT* for getting my Co worker the Wrong. Glue, Plant,Wood,Fish

And why is everyone hating the Painted fishes. The damage is Done already, And they lived through it, you cant do anything about it anymore
I sure would be busting your balls too.Lol That Fish is so Colorful, You should get more!! Sure looks hot

frozenbarb said:

And why is everyone hating the Painted fishes. The damage is Done already, And they lived through it, you cant do anything about it anymore

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Not true. It's about supply and demand, people do this to fish because there is a profit to be made. If people don't buy them, hopefully fish stores stop ordering them, then it's not economical to do it.

True But you wont be able to tell everyone in the world,

frozenbarb said:

True But you wont be able to tell everyone in the world,

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If I could quote a shampoo commercial:
"if you tell 2 friends, and they tell 2 friends, and so on, etc...."
Listen, it has to start somewhere, why add to it.

You CAN tell everyone in the world, it would just require quite a bit of money for distribution and translation. You won't be able to CONVINCE everyone in the world, however. Heck, you've seen what humans do to each OTHER in the name of beauty, right? We still crop ears and tails from certain breeds of dogs thinking that it's "necessary" and ... we could go on and on about this. To be honest, we do cover this issue about once every two months. Most of us agree that it is inhumane and extremely stressful to the fish, and that painted fish tend to die a lot sooner than their unpainted brethren due to disease and stuff.

So... yes, that's my opinion.