Animal cruelty is simply plain wrong

SOCIAL STUDIES - Published Monday February 16th, 2009

Canada has the worst laws in the world when it comes to protecting animals.

We have virtually no protection for wild or stray animals. We do not have any way to protect animals that are used in sport, including fighting each other. It also seems virtually impossible to prosecute anyone for cases of neglect.

The main problem is an antiquated series of laws that treat animals merely as property.

My whole family was sick with stomach flu this week. It is terrible to see a baby, who cannot talk, become sick and unable to express the pain and discomfort except through crying. Of course, it is even worse when you see a sick animal. Our dog, Jacob, has epilepsy. Watching his seizures while helpless to explain or comfort him with words is a hard thing to do.

I always grew up with pets; kittens, bunnies, dogs, hamsters. I grew up in the countryside a lot and have taken care of horses and cows. I guess I have always had an animal around me in some fashion or another; as a companion.

I know that some will argue that just domesticating wild animals is a problem; and perhaps it is, but animals have been domesticated for some 10,000 years. So let's just accept that and say if we have animals as part of our households, we should protect them with the same sense as the rest of our family.

Just recently there was a case of a man in New Brunswick killing his dogs with a hammer. He was not found guilty on most of the charges in the end because; well, because they were his dogs to do what he would like with.

There is a difference between a coffee table, and a Labrador retriever. That difference is sentience. No living thing can be seen in the same category as an inanimate one.

The ruling on the Barton case I mentioned above leaves it up to the individual to determine why, for any reason, one would choose to end the life of a pet. As long as it was done without causing too much pain, it would be okay. So, need the fur for a coat, or the meat for dinner, or the body for a sandbag to stop a flood? As long as you get it over with fast and quick it should be okay.

If you are thinking about your family dog or cat then this seems pretty strange to say, doesn't it? But the thing is there is nothing in our law that distinguishes any type of animal from any other, nor is there anything that protects the life of individual animals.

Over the past 10 years 11 laws have been floated in Parliament trying to rectify this situation. They have never succeeded.

Right now Mark Holland is re-introducing his private member's bill on animal cruelty. Now numbered C-229, which is identical to the private member's bill C-373. Since first introducing Bill C-373, Mark has worked co-operatively with respected national and international animal welfare groups which are campaigning for effective animal cruelty law reform. Their concerted efforts are focused on convincing the Conservative government to introduce his bill as government legislation.

Bill C-229, is so important because it would increase penalties for animal cruelty offences and effectively close the loopholes in the Criminal Code that make it difficult for enforcement agencies and the courts to convict animal abusers.

Despite unfounded paranoia, C-229 protects against prosecution and allows for all regular hunting, fishing, farming, ranching, and industry practices to continue lawfully.

Apparently Belgium has laws that protect every sort of animal, farm animals included. As we become more ecologically aware, and as we start to think about our planet less as a machine and more as an organism, we are going to have to revisit our relationships with the other inhabitants of the planet, be they plant, animal or even insect.

Many scientists would argue that every action we take is somehow interconnected. We have all heard the saying that the beating of a butterfly's wings in China affects the weather patterns here in Canada. Well, what if there is an even higher level of interconnectedness? What if our cruelty and neglect going to come back to us as?

I remember the first time I realized just how outnumbered human beings are. Science fiction writers have been suggesting for a long time that insects, which outnumber all other animals four to one, might some day get angry with the way we treat them.

Of course, that is just fantasy, as was Planet of the Apes; which in its own way talked about what might happen if the tables were turned.

The thing is that a living being is a living being. We should be more respectful and careful of how we interact and care for the ones that cross our path. Since we as humans have very little luck with choosing to do the right thing when given the choice; we need regulations to help us.

The New Brunswick laws need to be changed, as does the federal Criminal Code, to provide a protection for animals based no longer on their status as property, but rather on their inherent self worth.

It is only when we begin to take this seriously that we will start to truly understand the depth of our relationship with our brothers and sisters of other species.