Animal Cruelty - What Can We Do?

[JulesB]

A man (and I use the term loosely) has just been given an 8-week jail sentence for a 20 minute assault on his staffie puppy: My link

 

A group of his friends were stood around laughing during the attack and the dog has not been found yet:mecry:

 

Apparently he was confident outside the court before the hearing, then sobbed during the cctv footage. Somehow, I doubt he was sorry.

 

I'm not sure if society is 'more' cruel to animals now, or whether we just hear more about it via the media. Other than trying to promote animal welfare, whether that's encouraging kids in our own circles, or joining welfare and campaigning groups, I don't know what can we do to stop animals being treated so badly, but I wish I did.

[Laura_E]

This makes me so angry and so sad at the same time

 

Lots of people spend time in care and don't become sadistic bastards that mistreat helpless animals to make themselves feel like big men. He is a pathetic little boy and I hope that the staff at whatever prison he has been sent to make sure that those four months are the worst of his life.

[celeste]

This sort of senseless cruelty always leaves me speechless, it just doesn't compute in my brain how any one can be so callous, cruel, and devoid of any empathy to be able to carry out a sustained attack, owning Staffies myself I know how eager they are to please and really all they want in the world is to be with you and administer snogs, sadly they have earned a tough image which is a fallacy, and that will always attract dickheads, just like Dobermann's did in the eighties.

Not sure if cruelty is worse now, I think the general public is more intolerant of cruelty and is more news worthy because of that, if you compare the way animals were treated in the past to how they are treated now I think you'd find they are, in the main, better off now, dogs and other animals were openly baited in the street in Victorian times and nobody would bat an eye, although I wonder how many people walked past that poor dog and did nothing because they were to scared to speak up.

Realisticly apart from stiffer sentencing I don't know if there is much that can be done to prevent cruelty to animals, and even then it probably wouldn't stop sickening attacks like this one, humans are capable of inflicting the most horrendous cruelties to their own children, what chance do animals have.

I don't like my own species much

[Laura_E]

.I don't like my own species much

 

Me either

 

I remember when I was very young (in the 80's) some thugs on our estate got hold of a dog whose owners used to let him roam the streets all day. They took him to the multi story car park in town and dropped him from the top of it This dog was sweet, affectionate and completely trusting of everyone

 

Amazingly he survived, but people were so disgusted by the whole thing that they decided to do something about it. I remember a number of men from the estate took the five scum bags responsible back to the same car park and dangled them over the top by their ankles. They all s**t themselves and had to walk back home through town with soiled clothes. Their lives were made hell after that and nobody wanted to be associated with them, even their own families.

 

But these days people are too scared to say anything, let alone do anything.

 

 

 

 

[Fee]

That clip is sickening, I could hardly bear to watch it

 

Worryingly the little scumbag is a father, I wouldn't let anyone capable of that sort of mindless violence anywhere near a small child.

 

As to what we do - I really don't think tougher laws or harsher sentencing would have much effect to prevent something like this. None of us on this forum are prevented from harming a puppy because there's a law against it, we find it inconceivable that anyone would want to do it.

 

My own theory (for what it's worth) is that babies aren't born with empathy or compassion, they learn it at a vital developmental stage from positive contact with the adults around them. It becomes hardwired into their brain in the same way as language skills or socialising puppies at the right time in their development, and missing out on this gets carried through from generation to generation.

 

There is some evidence that early intervention - getting children from these backgrounds into quality nursery places or daycare from a young age - can help to break the cycle. I certainly know from experience teaching in an inner city school many years ago that by the time children reach school it's too late, at age 5 you can already pick out pretty accurately which kids have a hope in hell of turning into reasonably decent human beings and which don't. It's very depressing.

[Greygal]

<<<My own theory (for what it's worth) is that babies aren't born with empathy or compassion, they learn it at a vital developmental stage from positive contact with the adults around them. It becomes hardwired into their brain in the same way as language skills or socialising puppies at the right time in their development, and missing out on this gets carried through from generation to generation.>>>

 

I think you may well be right about this Fee. There certainly seems to be less empathy in youngsters these days and I do think parents are not teaching children to feel and care about other people and animals as they did in my childhood. Like most things these days I expect they think (if they think at all) that this is another thing the schools should be responsible for.

 

I couldn't have stood by and watched that happening to that poor little puppy though and I bet there are many here who couldn't have either. I just hope he really pays for that one way or another but I'd be worried if I were the mother of his child.

[celeste]

My own theory (for what it's worth) is that babies aren't born with empathy or compassion, they learn it at a vital developmental stage from positive contact with the adults around them. It becomes hardwired into their brain in the same way as language skills or socialising puppies at the right time in their development, and missing out on this gets carried through from generation to generation.

 

 

Good debating topic, nature or nurture. I dunno, I've met a few kids who were from animal loving family's but were still untrustworthy round animals, although I know one of them is fine now, not sure about the other one who was the worst, that little charmer took his family's puppy to the top floor of the tenament and dropped it , puppy did survive thankfully, and was rehomed through a spot of intimidation .

 

 

[Laurel n Hardy]

if i saw someone doing that i would lose my temper, and i have a real nasty one buried away.

and they would end up in hospital