Don't be Cruel

A friend just sent me a link, via Yahoo! Messenger, to a petition to the Prime Minister to increase the fine for cruelty to animals, from RM200 to RM10k. Of course I signed it, and have decided to post it here. In case you didn't notice a link in the previous sentence, here it is again.

I do hope the petition will be granted, because I would soooo love to see my neighbours, an old man and his wife, get fined for mistreating their dogs. He has 2 - one called Happy (but I doubt Happy is really happy at all) and the other one (you're not gonna believe this) is without a name! I don't understand how someone can keep a dog for >10 years without giving it a name (right, this is no big deal in terms of physical cruelty, but imagine the major psychological effect on the dog's mental health!!!). While No-name seldom venture outside the compound of my neighbours' house, Happy occasionally run off to look for bitches (female dogs la), and would return with fight wounds (I assume he fought with other male dogs over the females). And then, instead on bringing Happy to a vet for proper treatment, or at least getting proper dog medication for him, the old man would simply bathe Happy in water added with Dettol, and splash yellow or purple solution all over him. Happy's fur is of pure white, but frequently splattered with spots of ugly yellow or purple, that would remain for very long.

In these few recent years, Happy's wounds on his ears have been infected so badly (obviously the yellow flavine did nothing for it) that one of it had almost rotted away completely. You won't see the remains of an ear there unless you looked really closely. Imagine the pain and discomfort Happy has to go through, his ears wounded, infected, and rotting away, while his "master" provided nothing more than yellow solution. As for No-name, he'd also gotten sick as of the recent years - the areas surrounding his eyes and nose were swollen and turned an ugly colour. But still, I doubt if the old man did anything for him - I don't think the term 'veterinarian' exists in his vocabulary.

Now, if denying the poor dogs proper medical attention is not cruel enough - here's more. Just recently, the old couple went away (on holiday, or otherwise, I didn't care to remember) for some days and left the dogs at home to fend for themselves - without any arrangements, even for feeding! We know because, their house being a corner lot, we're their only neighbours! The old man's wife requested my mother to help her keep any delivered letters, but mentioned nothing about the dogs. Sick! Subsequently, we gave the dogs some food every evening on our own initiative and, believe me, I know hungry dogs when I see two.

Other than his own pets, he also caused lots of gravity to the birds in our area. Between his front porch and ours, there's a hidden space where little birds love to build their nests and have their young. It is a lovely and sweet thing - but for this old man. Everytime a nest is almost done, he'd poke and prod with a pole until it fell down. And everytime I see that, I'd almost cry, thinking of the amount of time and energy (not to mention patience and love!) the poor birds spent in making it. I doubt if he would refrain from destroying nests even if there are baby birds in them!

Very cruel? Definitely. This is one of the reasons I dislike that old man so much. The other reasons? I'll write about those at another time.

Qualitative Research question for the day: Why do people over 60 years of age believe that animals have no feelings?