Toby is a bunny with wheat-colored fur and innocent brown eyes. He's about 10 inches long and the picture of fuzzy-wuzzy cuteness. Sadly, in a matter of months Toby will be chopped, skinned, sauteed and served in a wine sauce. Maybe. The anonymous operator of Savetoby.com has vowed to take this beloved pet to a butcher, slaughter the animal and then devour him in a midsummer feast, unless visitors to the site send $50,000 by June 30. You read it right: Send money, or the bunny is dinner. I don't want to eat Toby, the site operator writes on the home page, he is my friend, and he has always been the most loving, adorable pet. However, God as my witness, I will devour this little guy unless I receive 50,000$ USD into my account from donations or purchase of merchandise. To underscore the gravity of all this, there is a section with recipes for, among other dishes. To date, if the site's claims are to be believed, more than $18,000 has been raised to rescue Toby from the crockpot. But verifying that figure is impossible, and the site could be nothing more than a darkly comic and rather inspired way to make some quick cash. This is not the first send-money-or-Fluffy-gets-it scheme in history. What's certain is that a) Whoever runs this site owns a very cute bunny, b) the site is selling more than 90 Toby-related products and c) thanks to some careful planning, the identity of the bunny's keepers is a well-kept secret. Oh, and d) some animal-rights people are really really peeved. Also appalled: PayPal, the eBay-owned online payment service. When Savetoby launched, a PayPal account was collecting money for the site. But after fielding complaints, the company took another look and decided that the site violated its offensive-materials standards. I get a little sick to my stomach every time I look at that site, says PayPal spokeswoman. We have discontinued service. She wouldn't say how much Savetoby had collected by the time PayPal opted out, citing privacy issues. But Savetoby is hardly out of business. A spokesman at Godaddy.com, the company that is hosting the site, says it has no plans to kick Toby's keepers off the Web. There's nothing illegal about eating rabbits. And we haven't been contacted by any authorities with regards to any fraudulent activity on the site. Toby will be dinner unless $50,000 is raised. So $49,500 won't do? Uh . .That's right. It might be hard to understand, For me I think this is a sick way to get money. This person has some really mental issues!!
