What kind of sick individual does something like this?

“…trained pit bulls for death matches in which spectators bet on the outcome…”

“…dogs that didn’t show enough fighting spirit, or that lost matches, were put to death by a variety of methods, including shooting, drowning, hanging and electrocution.”

Full report here.

A letter on this by Best Friends Animal Society co-founder, Francis Battista, in The Philadelphia Enquirer here.

Twenty-two dogs in various states of trauma were rescued.

“Vick personally drowned, electrocuted with jumper cables, and body-slammed dogs to death, when he could have paid a veterinarian to put them down with lethal injections. After all, he paid someone to meticulously remove the teeth – roots and all – of Georgia, one of the dogs now at Best Friends, so she could be bred without endangering her male partner.”

“Would someone who expressed that level of aggression and violence against another person, even without a death involved, ever be considered for immediate readmission to professional sports?”

“Animal cruelty is a proven gateway for violent criminals ranging from the Columbine kids to your run-of-the-mill wife-beater.”

While Michael Vick gets on with his life with a mere slap on the wrist, his victims are either dead or have yet to recover from the trauma he inflicted on them.

And this is in the States. Here in Malaysia, the perpetrator gets off scot-free or at most, slapped with a RM200 fine.

Makes my blood boil.

Taken from Mkini :

Wesak Day releasing of birds actually cruel
SM Mohd Idris | May 22, 09 5:33pm

Sahabat Alam Malaysia (SAM) echos the call by the Buddhist Chief High Priest of Malaysia, Venerable Reverend K Sri Dhammaratana against the cruel practice of releasing birds during Wesak.

SAM shares the concern expressed by the Ven Reverend that such act of ‘kindness is actually perpetuating trade and capture of such birds.

Despite an appeal of a similar nature in the past, the Buddhist fraternity remain oblivious to it as they continue with the traditional practice of releasing animals as a gesture of compassion and a repentance for one’s sins.

Little do they know that their compassionate intentions are often lost in the act resulting in unintentional cruelty to the animals.

This is because most of the birds brought from the pet shops are caught days earlier and kept in cages for sale on Wesak day. It is an illusion that by releasing these birds they are returning them to their original habitat.

Released birds and animals when hungry, frightened and fatigued would not be able to find shelter and food, the consequences of which is death. When released at crowded temples, they become absolutely disorientated and are unable to fly and fall prey to predators.

On the other hand, by buying animals from pet shops, the people are actually encouraging the catching of more of these birds and animals. Birds from the wild often die when caught or during the journey to the shops.

Since these are cheap birds, they are treated like dirt. Overcrowding in dirty cages and standing in their own excrement, there is no proper care food or even water.

Similarly, non-native animals released into reservoirs will cause an ecological balance as in the case of the luohans or the red eared slider which prey upon the native species. Either they cannot survive in their new environment or they may affect the well-being of the original inhabitants.

The traditional liberation of animals needs to be reviewed in the light of knowing that released animals can result in suffering for them because of their ecological incompatibility. There is also the danger of introducing virus and bacteria from animal releases.

Compassion needs to be balanced with wisdom and one can ‘liberate’ animals by adopting rescued pets from animal shelters instead of from pet shops, by supporting animal welfare activities, advocating humane methods of animal control, caring for an injured bird or fishes trapped in pond and so forth.

SAM reiterates its stand that the practice should be stopped. NGOs and religious institutions should play a part in educating the public to help animals by not releasing them into reservoirs, nature reserves and during religious festivities.

The writer is president Sahabat Alam Malaysia

… if a person genuinely cares about animals when :

1. S/he asks about my cats whenever s/he meets me (after finding out that I have cats), and

2. S/he asks what my cats’ names are, remembers them, and uses them in proceeding conversations instead of just “your cats”.

Dammit! How come my brains don’t work fast when I need them to?!

Hmph!

I missed a golden opportunity to ‘inform’ someone whom I consider the loudspeaker around my condo area, about my work in spaying/neutering the stray cats around here. Especially since she was so ‘kindly’ telling me that the people around here are getting angry with the cats because apparently they are peeing on cars and such. Which I find rather strange. Cats are finicky animals, especially when it comes to their hygiene and they like to cover their poop and pee. Cars are smooth, metallic objects… nothing to cover their pee. Hmm…

So anyway, she was telling me… ‘Oh, just to let you know, people are getting angry with the cats… bla bla bla… so just letting you know, be careful when you’re feeding the cats to avoid unpleasantness… etc. etc.’

I guess I’m glad that she told me so that I know what’s happening (that was because I was walking back to my place and bumped into her and these 2 cats just dashed out and started following me because they thought I was gonna feed them). And I know she’s not fond of the cats either.

But I so missed the chance to tell her about my work because my brains didn’t work fast enough! Something like “You know, I have been working all these years to neuter these cats so that they don’t reproduce so we won’t have so many cats around. But nobody knows it and all they can do is complain and do nothing. At least I am being proactive about this issue and doing something about it. I don’t earn anywhere near as much as the people who stay here do but I use my hard-earned salary to pay for the surgeries myself. But all I hear are complaints. Do you know how discouraging it is for a young person who is trying to do good in this world to hear people complain and do nothing? I don’t get anything out of doing this, except a smaller bank account balance and knowing that these cats can’t reproduce, which maintains the stray cat population, in the hopes that people will be a bit more tolerant and don’t complain.”

I know I know, my approach is totally wrong. Must not be accusatory because it will put people in the auto-defensive mode but seriously, these people just complain complain complain and do nothing and the next thing I know, all the cats disappear and I hear that the management poisoned them to get rid of them. Oh wait, they don’t do nothing. They do do something. They complain to the management.

I don’t know if she or anyone else cares if I’m Mother Teresa for animals (I am not) but at least I make it known that I’m not just feeding them for fun.

Dammit, I don’t know when I’ll get such an opportunity again! *wail!*

Stupid stupid stupid! *smacks head against the wall*

There is an online community for the residents to sign-up to, to share whatever they wish regarding living in this development. Should I sign-up and publicize my work with the cats? At the moment, my cons list is more than the pros e.g. people might not be receptive and jump to the conclusion and point fingers at me for all their cat-related issues or worse, they might harass my parents about it, since I’m not the owner of our unit. And even if they were receptive, they might think that I have all the solutions to the stray problem and dump all their woes on me, when my focus at the moment is to keep the population under control. I can offer suggestions, but I’m not an all-problem solver.

Can someone please advise me??

You know what? I really don’t care anymore. Call it imposing my views on others, but people who don’t give animals the respect they deserve and are unkind to animals, don’t deserve to be treated as humans themselves.

I’ve gone past trying to understand and justify why some people can mistreat animals in so many ways.

They should have done this a long time ago.

Pic from the SPCA March newsletter

This is such a sad story, but at the same time, I’m glad to find more kindred spirits when it comes to animals

I keep realizing more and more these days, how important this is to me.

I totally understand and agree with Terri Irwin (Steve & Me, 2007, page 15) where she writes about the defining moment that led to her work as a wildlife rehabilitator (a childhood encounter with a stray dog) :

“I felt an unusual responsibility toward the stray. I didn’t feel it was enough just to give it something to eat and say that I’d helped it, then move on. I needed to make sure that dog was in a safe place.”

Thank God for people like Terri and Steve.

I hate it that I have to sneak around to feed the stray cats in my area.
I hate it that other people have the power to make me feel bad for doing something charitable like feeding the stray cats in my area (and spending the money to get them fixed so they don’t produce more unwanted kittens).
I hate it that people cannot find it in their hearts to be kind to other fellow living creatures.
I hate it that humans think that they own the Earth, that the Earth is capable of regenerating its resources as fast as we use them.
I hate it when humans play God with other living creatures, like torture animals just to see them suffer, like using puppies as live bait in dog fights, like making dogs/cats breed till they die in puppy/kitty mills.
I hate it that there are so many animals without homes.
I hate it that I can’t fully utilize my entire affinity towards animals to help them be rid of the nasty humans.
I hate it when people don’t try to understand why I (and other like-minded people) try so hard to be nice to animals and provide them shelter and food.

I was watching Oprah earlier and one of the segments was a story on how this family adopted this puppy, who was at death’s door. Police busted a dog fighting ring and rescued the pup in a crate. The pup was being used as live bait in a dog fight. His face was torn off and his skull was shattered. But he was still alive and the vet managed save him. Then this family saw him and fell in love with him and adopted him.

Oogy is now 6 years old (as of the Oprah show) and living happily with his family. And even though he was so cruelly treated by humans, he found it in his heart to bring joy to his family.

Can we humans ever match up to the big heart that this dog and the countless other animals who have been/are abused every day by our species?

I doubt it.

They can give us so much, if only we let them. But we choose to condemn them, before they can even show us what they can do, due to our ignorance and prejudice.