{"id":1019,"date":"2008-01-07T15:40:19","date_gmt":"2008-01-07T20:40:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.vallentyne.com\/blog\/2008\/01\/07\/animal-cruelty\/"},"modified":"2008-01-07T15:40:19","modified_gmt":"2008-01-07T20:40:19","slug":"animal-cruelty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vallentyne.com\/blog\/2008\/01\/07\/animal-cruelty\/","title":{"rendered":"Animal Cruelty"},"content":{"rendered":"

Recently several teenagers<\/a> broke into a house and placed a cat inside a microwave<\/a>, which of course killed it (likely very painfully).\u00c2\u00a0 The public outcry<\/a> is predictable, and justifiably so.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Animal cruelty is a terrible crime and deserves harsh punishment.\u00c2\u00a0 Humans have long lived with domesticated animals, chiefly cats and dogs, and each provides the other with comfort and companionship.\u00c2\u00a0 The partnership used to be much more equal when dogs (probably cats were not kept for the same reasons, but maybe pest control was the primary reason originally) were kept for protection and guard duty, but this role has dwindled since man has so successfully conquered the natural world.\u00c2\u00a0 Now we look after our pets with a protective and nurturing hand, much like our children (but with more milk bones).\u00c2\u00a0 A crime like this shocks people because it’s such a violation of the contract between pets and humans.\u00c2\u00a0 We take care of them and feed them and they give us unconditional love and comfort in return.\u00c2\u00a0 These kids broke that contract and they seem alien and frightening to most people as a result.\u00c2\u00a0 No pet owner could imagine doing that to an animal.\u00c2\u00a0 Even sport hunters don’t want to see animals in pain.\u00c2\u00a0 The public will call for a harsh punishment for these kids, and they deserve it.<\/p>\n

It’s kind of interesting that most people react to the opposite problem in basically the same way.\u00c2\u00a0 When a dog attacks a person without provocation most people (including my own dog-loving self) call for the destruction of the animal.\u00c2\u00a0 That animal has broken the human\/animal pact and can’t be further trusted.\u00c2\u00a0 Nevermind that as a rule the only way most animals would do that is if they had already been terribly mistreated by a human, dogs that bite people can’t be allowed to co-exist in our society and given the same level of trust and freedom as other pets.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s a one-shot deal.\u00c2\u00a0 I trust Harvey with my family’s life because I know him very well.\u00c2\u00a0 But if he were to bite someone without provocation with intent to harm, he would be gone from my house immediately.\u00c2\u00a0 My family would certainly come first.<\/p>\n

We have bantered<\/a> about<\/a> this<\/a> topic<\/a> quite<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0a bit<\/a> here<\/a> before<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 Any thoughts to add?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Recently several teenagers broke into a house and placed a cat inside a microwave, which of course killed it (likely very painfully).\u00c2\u00a0 The public outcry is predictable, and justifiably so.\u00c2\u00a0 Animal cruelty is a terrible crime and deserves harsh punishment.\u00c2\u00a0 … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5,6],"tags":[12],"class_list":["post-1019","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-stupidity","tag-pets"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/piGNU-gr","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vallentyne.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1019","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vallentyne.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vallentyne.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vallentyne.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vallentyne.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1019"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.vallentyne.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1019\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1445,"href":"https:\/\/www.vallentyne.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1019\/revisions\/1445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vallentyne.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1019"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vallentyne.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1019"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vallentyne.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1019"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}