My mother was recently attacked and seriously injured by someones 'pet' dog and it ripped apart our dog infront of my mothers eyes. The trama where going though is nothing compared to my mum.
Personally, if i ever see the owner of that dog he will be hospitilised before hes given a slap on the wrist by the plod... cause thats all they will do.
The police statement to the press was wrong-its not a stray it was let out of a car and the owner just watched fyi.
Actually they're not. There is a crucial difference, Self conciousness. Humans, (and a few other apes), have it. Animals don't. They can't suffer to the same extent that human beings can suffer. So giving equality to Animals with Humans is a patently stupid concept. That said, any kind of violent behavior by humans is to be discouraged and that includes towards animals. Just that the punishments should never be on anything like the same levels as violence towards humans.
As has been stated already. It wouldn't be justifiable if he had harmed a human so why would it ever be justifiable because he harmed an animal??
So you mean animals canot get psycichal and mentall damage?
Well, have you ever experienced a abused kitty? We had this kitty down the street that was the neightbours doll, wanting to be cuddled with everyone. After that the cat never has been the same, not even the owner can now touch it without it to get affraight.
Animals gets the same damage as humans, the only difference is that we to some more degree feels the pain mental, but so does the animals, and they remember it.
So a statement like that is absolutely bullshit, and you know it.
Vigilantism and it's acts of harm due upon have no place in modern day society,
rights and law must direct every action taken in every case.
The second the decision is made by any being to bring physical harm upon any another(even in your case plants)is failure, there's no mid ground, kill or not to kill.
The Dark-Ages, now there was a time; primeval hormones flying everywhere and people lumping chunks offa one and other, entertainment for the masses driven by primeval instinct to kill or be killed.
Evolved society should look something different by now!
Anyway, everyone always says that 'oh~as long as someone else does the dirty work it's fine by me!'. The thing that goes against every grain to me is a person would make a decision to bring physical harm upon another human.
How to define Animal?
To draw a line(just for this topics purpose)an animal could come in the form of a warm blooded creature which is un-evolved as a species. Given the chance an animal would bring harm to a human, obviously not pre-meditated, moreso that the species can't control prime instincts to kill instead of just working things out.
Fact is that if all of a sudden somehow by magic your cat was twelve feet tall he'd take you out with not a blink of an eye to get what he wants and feel no remorse.
People who harm or condone to harm other people for any reason(be it in this case harming animals)belong locked up or in the Dark Ages, thats all i'm getting at.
I believe this is incorrect. You often see on these shows on Animal Planet about some tiger that got rejected by it's mother and it's had to be hand-reared. It's quite happy to have a huggle with whoever raised it and for a while is fed with a baby bottle! It's all instictive, if you raised an aligator from birth to full, I doubt very much it would 'go for people' unless either provoked or incredibily hungry, where it's instintic would take over from what we think would be normal behaviour.
Can I change my vote? I didn't get the question when I first read it, but after seeing the People are horrible thread, I not only want for the people who abuse animals to be physically punished, but I want them dead, in the most painful and terrible way possible, depending on how they abused the animal.
Seriously, what the f. did that guy think when he was beating the cat? "zomg tHiS sO cOoLl1!11!"
If they do this to animals, they definitely won't think twice before trying to punch any person, no matter who it is. They've got to be stopped, these people must have serious mental problems.
lol? No, it was supposed to mean "punching the cat" or something like this.
I do eat meat, it's actually my favorite food, I'm not going to be vegetarian just because someone likes to punch cats or any other animal I just didn't agree with what that guy did to the cat. If he does this to animals, he can easily do the same thing (or even worse) to human.
Why not? You do understand the difference between humanely using animals to produce meat, and beating a defenseless animal just because you think it's funny?
If you have to have a dog put down (for whatever reason), would you ask your vet to do it via injection, or would you use a cheese grater and kill it over a period of days with lots of suffering? One is 'an issue', the other isn't (to most people).
There are a lot of things that have no place in society. Take for instance an 'enforcer'. These are people who come round your house and drag you away against your will if you dont pay your protection money. The thing about enforcers is whoever has most of them get's to be Prime Minister.
The "Prime Minister", although lets use their proper term in order not to confuse or dinstinguish them from heads of other groups of enforcers, the "don" then makes up rules for everyone to follow and uses their enforcers to ensure that they are followed. Rules like paying your tithe, I meen taxes.
Now some don's make rules that I disagree with, and sometimes the enforcement of rules I do agree with does not go far enough. The question then becomes: Who decides what is fair and what isn't?
You either leave it up to the don, or you decide for yourself.
As I have no respect for the particular dons to have made it to "Prime Minister" status in recent times, and as their enforcers have consistently failed to deliver on their promises of protection despite having paid my racket money, and as they have routinely sought me out as a target before despite there being no suggestion that I have done much wrong within the statute of their own rules, I find it difficult to have faith in the judicial process offered by any recent "Prime Minsiter" don and his enforcers.
Therefore if I feel sufficiently inclined to protect myself, or to cast judgement upon others in an act of vigilantism, I personally cannot see what is wrong with that.
If you are to ask me whether in a modern world that I should feel acts of vigilantism are justifyable then I would say no, and agree with you.
The fact is, however, society just has not evolved far enough for me to accept their rule yet.
Most animals don't have a sense of self-awareness like humans and therefore certain elements of suffering are precluded from their ability to percieve them. Humans taken hostage for example can suffer due to the fear of future harm or death, they have a sense of self mortality. Animals don't have this ability because they have no sense of self. They only have a learned response to pain, they can't suffer from pure mental torture like humans can.
Don't misunderstand my position. I think cruelty to animals is abhorent and to my mind it is somewhat indicative of a persons mental capability to be able to be violent towards humans as well, (though I don't believe there is a direct relationship). So I do believe that animals suffer and need to be protected. I just don't believe they are completely equal with humans in this regard. So I will never accept equal punishment for violence towards animals verses violence towards humans.
I see my cat balance perilously and try to avoid falling every day, there is definately an acknowledgement that if she was to fall she'd be in pain. This trait has remained constant both before and after the time she fell.
Can I suggest the possibility that some animals, particularly hunting animals, live more in the moment and exhibit traits that in a human we'd describe as sociopathic ?
Animals can definitely be unhappy, one of my cats used to be my sisters and she was quite happy until my sister got a dog when she became quite noticeably unhappy. I took her into my home and she changed dramatically and is now clearly very happy. The dog, the fear of the dog, clearly effected her mood.
I think if the subject of animal psychology is approached from the angle of the Godly "prove they are equal to humans" then a million examples can be found in different species to suggest they are not, but if you approach it from the angle of justifying why animals are not equal to humans then it becomes somewhat harder to deny them their place in the world.
I'm glad you agree cruelty is wrong, and i'm not arguing with you, rather instead hoping to discuss an interesting topic that I wont pretend to be educated on.
animals have a whole range of feelings and emotions. There was a scientific study done a few months back which 'discovered' that dogs can get jealous. But this trait is apparent to any dog owner. I know that they get jealous because of my two dogs, if one is getting more affection than the other then they will try and disctract attention away from the one getting more attention.
But however much we try and see animals as 'equal' to humans, the bottom line is they can, like humans have all the emotional responses and senses of danger, anger, fear in the world but the bottom line is they aren't human. Some may have very human like features, some unlikely animals can exhibit incredibly clever behaviour for what they are (think for example the octopus opening jars - but it has to be re-taught that every day because it lacks the memory power to remember how to do it) but in no way should animals be shoved into the same category as humans.
It is interesting to see certain peoples responses in this thread - particularly those of the type 'people who hurt animals should be killed/have the same thing inflicted upon them'. What would you say if the person killed or hurt a human? Would you be one of the people to condone capital punishment and/or torture then?
Well although I didnt go as far as saying i'd have hurt the kid in question, I did agree that I didnt give a damn if he got hurt. In regards to this direct question I would willingly kill a murderer or rapist in several situations:
A) In self defence
B) In defence of somebody else
C) Because there was significant certainty of them doing it again
I agree animals don't perceive these complex situations like humans do but I do believe animals have a sense of self mortality and that they can suffer from mental torture though.
Take a basic scenario of mental torture and animals will respond, though they may not know what it is or why it's happening they certainly do suffer mentally. TBH that is a really odd way to look at it, you can not justify inflicting pain because you believe there will be no suffering
Na. Bottom line is - it does not matter if they are human or not, by rational terms the incident should not have happened in the first place, the accused and the blood hungry condoning punishment and death are all in the same boat, one as bad as the other.
Yes, thats the whole point, if you condone physical or mental punishment then you are just as bad as the accused, the world would be a better place without the two of you.
Obviously if you are in danger you will defend yourself and inflict as much damage humanly possible to survive.
The poll question asks 'is it ok to condone bringing harm upon others?', the fact that the animal is the victim is not relevant in this case, the poll just shows the amount of killers among us.
I think the point where animal becomes human is when the animal is mentally able to retain the intellect and capacity to conjure up the worst sin of all - pre-meditated murder. I would have no problem doing a day's work in a slaughter house killing cattle etc but seeing another human harmed in any way(especially for throwing a ruddy cat aginst a wall)is beyond me. Jail sentences or slavery are the only option for punishment.
I guess we find it wrong within ourselfs to harm other 'intelligent' species and we try to ballance our morels by drawing lines to sepperate the right killing from the wrong.
I dunno how to get it across it's just wrong to harm or even think about harming any other person. Unless we as a species loose this cancerous trait of killing one and other we'll never have peace and go extinct.
All in all, a life is a life and there is no way any living animal should have to go through such torture then have it ripped away from them. Animals can still feel like we can, for example if you trod on a dogs paw it will yelp, same way you would if I stamped on your foot, unless you were punch-drunk (TVE?)
And I heard this book from ages ago says "a life for a life, eye for an eye, praise jesus" and stuff. If God says it, it must be true. God condones violence.
I just didn't agree with what that guy did to the cat. If he does this to animals, he can easily do the same thing (or even worse) to human.
ants: LOLZ1!!11 - seriously it all made sense in my head at that time