Animal Cruelty Essay

Animal Cruelty is a subject that spreads far across the United States and into most civilized cultures. Animal cruelty can either be in the form of intentional abuse, simple neglect, or abandonment of animals.  Whatever forms the abuse takes, however, the animal that is the victim of the abuse is often helpless and may experience extreme suffering. Animal right activist feel if you don’t know how to take care or treat an animal it can be as deadly as physical abuse to care for one.

Even more disturbing, most of these puppies do not receive the correct attention or affection from the very things they love the most; us. They don’t get to run around and exercise the way dogs were meant to. Their well-being is not important to the facilities. Increasing the profit is the sole focus and goal. Because of this, puppies are repeatedly born sick and their life expectancy is decreased. As terrible as this is, these are the very real and disturbing circumstances for puppies living in puppy mills; if you’d even want to call it that. They should be shut down completely, and banned by the government throughout the nation.

Animal Cruelty is a problem that many ignore. People are oblivious to these animals and the negligence their owners show. Animal cruelty is an underlying problem in today’s society, and the only way to counteract these problems, is for this generation to do something about it.

Zoos, SeaWorld, and circuses are places for families to enjoy entertainment. However, most people do not realize how the animals in each of these establishments are handled. Yes, they all bring in revenue and present the tricks these animals can do, yet these places preform detrimental acts to the animals. For example, the killer whales at SeaWorld are sometimes starved if they do not perform the way the trainer wants them to. In comparison, circuses torture lions and tigers until they are submissive to how the show-people want them to act. Zoos do not necessarily torture their animals, but it is proven the animals live much shorter lives in captivity. “Lives of animals in the wild versus captivity are literally worlds apart, and even the best captive facilities can’t recreate the conditions of the wild — not exactly. Most don’t even try, leaving animals in tiny enclosures with no socialization, enrichment or joy. Captivity is unnatural and unhealthy” (Sentenac). People are starting to recognize the danger of continuing these practices, but there’s a long way to go.Furthermore, animals in all of these places have suffered many traumatizing and even deadly events. There was a recent report that two circus lions, whom had severe head injuries, were killed by poachers who snuck into the sanctuary. “Last year poachers bypassed an advanced security system at a lodge near the town of Tzaneen in the Limpopo province, killing two lions by feeding them poisoned meat” (Graham).

Murder and abuse cases never fail to startle society. Moral codes are flouted with unmatched rigorousness by these indubitable egregious crimes. Sufferers in these cases are often people. Nonetheless, these callous obscenities should not be seen as less important when animals are the victims. Animals undergo horrendous abuse due to barbaric individuals, greed, and unnecessary lab testing.

“A Closer Look At Puppy Mills” by ASPCA informs you about the psychological effect on the dogs raised at a puppy mill. They can be aggressive and fearful. Some are so fearful, they don’t want to be touched by people or their owners. Even if in a loving environment could show no progression of getting better. The dogs have chances of being born with genetic diseases or abnormalities. For example, heart disease, kidney disease, and eye sight problems. This affects the owner’s cause in the long run because veterinary bills begin to pile up and there is no worse feeling than having an unhealthy or a dog that wants to be nowhere near you. Although there are many problems that come along with puppy mills, there are also positive things that can be involved with them.

Puppy mills usually house dogs in overcrowded and unsanitary conditions without adequate veterinary care, food, water or socialization. In order to maximize profits, female dogs are bred at every opportunity with little-to-no recovery time between litters. Puppy mill puppies, often as young as eight weeks of age, are sold to pet shops or directly to the public over the Internet, through newspaper ads and at swap meets and flea markets.

(Evidence) The first problem with the puppy mills isn't with the mill themselves. It is with our legislation. The Animal Welfare Act (AWA) regulates the treatment of animals. The AWA set that “ a dog that lives in a breeding facility that has a federal license can be forced to live in a cage that is six inches beyond the dog on all sides of the cage for its entire life.” (Banerjee, 2015). Also under the AWA there is no limit to the number of dogs on a premises. There is no requirement on the number of staff that must be available are for the animals. Dogs may be kept in stacked cages made mesh or wire. The AWA leaves it up to the mills owner to determine what is “adequate” for the animals (AWA, 1966).

Is animal testing a cruelty an experiment in cruelty. There are many good things that come from animal testing, but there are also a lot of bad things. From animal testing, researchers find medicines that help many people. Also, researchers see if drugs are safe to use on humans, and if they work. However, many animals are killed and kept in captivity and will never be free. Also, animals and humans are not the same, so some drugs that work on animals may be harmful for humans. Animal testing is cruel because it is bad on animals, it is expensive, and many animals are killed or are never the same.

There are many different things that fall under the category of “cruelty”, neglect and abuse being the two main subcategories. The most common type of animal abuse involves dogs, Pit-bulls in particular. In 2007, of 1800 media-reported cases of animal cruelty, 64% (1,126) involved dogs, 18% (337) involved cats, and 18% (337) involved other animals. Some of the most common places where animal abuse occur are, in no particular order: fur farms, dog fights, laboratories, races (both Greyhound and horse), slaughterhouses, and puppy mills. Some less thought of forms of animal abuse are crush videos, traditional Chinese medicine, the cat/dog meat trade in Asia, the ivory trade, trophy hunting, and even shock collars. Abandonment is the leading form of animal cruelty. (See illustration.)

All around the world, people are abusing animals. Animal cruelty is a big deal because some people do not look at animals as being important; some people do not see a problem with hurting them. Animal cruelty can be define as being a malicious treatment that can cause undue pain or being mistreated. Seeing an animal get brutalize by some humans seems to be cruel. Getting kicked in the ribs, left for starvation and even used for entertainment seems to be heartless. Why abuse animals when they have not done anything to harm a human. If one must see what they are really doing to these animals, then animal cruelty would not be a big deal.

Every 60 seconds an animal is abused. Dogs, cats, horses, and many other types of animals are being neglected and tortured everyday, yet resulting in few and minor consequences for the perpetrators. Animal abuse is prevalent in the United States and has been an ongoing issue since the 1970's, and prior to. Society as a whole has chosen to avoid the facts and arguments about animal cruelty, because to some it is seen as acceptable and typical. It becomes much more frowned upon when people actually see the results of the cruelty, especially in the media.

Catholic views on animal abuse is varied greatly. The ‘traditional’ view is that humans are made in a different image than animals. It proclaims that humans have been given ‘dominion’ over nature, meaning humans can use animals in accordance to their own needs (gen 1:28). However, many Catholics disagree and believe that God gave human ‘stewardship’ over the animals, which means we are put on this Earth to look after and care for God’s creation (Luke 12:6). There are a number of Catholic authorities that discourage animal abuse;

Intro: Can you imagine having the urge to intentionally hurt or even kill your helpless little puppy? Over the years, animal abuse has increased an unbelievable amount. I believe animal rights need to be enforced to people across the world. Animals are helpless creatures that should only be making the world a better place. I will enforce my belief by explaining what animal cruelty are, animal abandonment laws, and how to report animal cruelty.

Over the centuries, animals have suffered from cruelty from humans. In the United States, animals are beaten, neglected, or forced to struggle for survival. Animals have been inflicted with pain from humans for reasons other than self-defense. They have been slaughtered for their food and fur for personal gain in profit. In a majority of cases they have even been abused for someone’s own personal amusement or out of rage filled impulses. In some cases animals are found and rescued. They are given the second chance in life to experience what life should be like compared to what they once had.