I agree with this: I have the run of the coldwater section in my LFS so more often than not, it's me people talk to when they're buying tanks for the first time, and there are still huge misconceptions out there about keeping goldfish. I get a handful of people every day who just want a bowl with no pump, and a fish straight away. Then there are the people who don't mind buying a nice tank with a filter, but still want to take the fish the same day. Most people are suprised when they find out that goldfish need the same care routine as tropicals. We don't sell any tank without a filter, and people can't get fish until they've A) been questioned rigorously or B) given us a water sample, and I have the power to say no to people, which is liberating, although I've had a few horrible arguments, mostly with parents who want their darling offspring to have fish RIGHT NOW and obviously don't seem to care about the example they're setting for their children; life is precious until it becomes inconvenient. I hear the "Well, I've kept fish for years in a bowl with no pump" schtick at least twice a day, so I show them all the big, healthy fish in big display tanks and say "THIS is how big it should've got and THIS is how long it should live for", which people find quite hard to argue with. (But they still do.)
The problem is that although my shop is pretty strict about cycling, tank size and whatnot, I don't know of many other LFS's that are. So a lot of the time, we give people The Talk, they look at us like we've got two heads and just go down the road to some general petstore that'll just sell them a bowl and three orandas to go in it on the same day. Until ALL the LFS's band together and try and establish some sort of standard, people will just keep going to places that don't give them a hard time, fish will keep suffering and people will keep blaming things like how the fish is bred, or the shop that sold it, or anything, ANYTHING other than themselves when it dies.
My shop is full of growing, healthy, enormous fancies in big display tanks, and magnificent singletails in the huge tanks underneath the main systems. And they're fine. There is no way they should ban fancy goldfish, although if they could ban the people who think they're a low-maintenance (ie, neglectable) pet that will keep a child happy for five minutes, it'd make my job a lot easier.
(I'm not bitter.)
