Animals and Cruelty

Two dogs found in squalid conditions. Photo: RSPCA

It's weird that I wrote a post about a newspaper that I picked up in the town of Goondiwindi when I was leaving the town to head back home to Brisbane -

You Wouldn't Read About it ... But I Did
And just after I put that post up, I saw a disturbing story about a dog farm not far from the town of Goondiwindi - 
Dozens of dogs seized from alleged puppy farm near Goondiwindi in southern Queensland

"Malnourished and injured dogs have been seized from an alleged puppy farm near Goondiwindi, with police and the RSPCA finding nearly 100 animals at the Glenarbon property."

I don't have that newspaper anymore, it went into the recycling bin last week, but I had snapped some extra pictures that I was going to use in the post I wrote, but that would have made it a long rambling post ... a bit like this one now;-)

I took a photo of this page of the Goondiwindi MAPR offering a home to two cats from their shelter, and to tell the truth, if I had of been in Goondiwindi earlier during the week I probably would have been the new owner of one of these cats, because on my first road-trip to the town of Manilla I picked up the magazine pictured below -
Manilla, NSW

I don't have that magazine anymore either, I gave it away to my niece, but I thought after reading the magazine article that if I ever got another cat I would get one that looks like the one above, as I've "owned" a ginger and a black and white coloured cat, but I don't recall ever seeing a real live cat with this colour pattern, even though I'm sure it's common.

Had I have read that paper when I was in Goondiwindi I would have seen this as a sign that I should take the cat home with me, so I was glad I read it when I was 300 kilometres away, as I would have been torn between taking the cat, or not.
While I do want to own another cat sometime down the track, I don't really want to look after a cat now while I have the travel bug.

I also saw the above article in the same paper where a family was trying to save wild horses from a government cull in the Kosciuszko National Park.

I love the RSPCA's work and hate the idea of animals like the ones in the dog farm story being tortured or horses being culled, but then I started wondering where I draw the line on animal cruelty myself when I saw the advertisement in the same paper for an Australian fast-food restaurant.

I remember years ago breaking my year of being a vegetarian by eating a chicken pack from this fast-food franchise.
I just couldn't take following the vegetarian way of life with the social pressures on me (my family were all meat eaters) and my own health seeming to tank over that year without meat.
I remember thinking it was heaven eating a chicken breast after a year of vegetarianism and I thought animals eat other animals in nature, that's never going to change and I'm an animal, too.
So, what's the big deal with killing an animal for the table when other animals like cats and dogs do it, too?

I mean I love birds (especially chicken;-) and look at what killers they are when it comes to eating other animals, even eggs of other birds.

I mean I love pelicans but have a look at that above clip and see what they eat.
That guy would probably love Red Rooster, too;-)

2017: Year of the Rooster?-)

Hypocritically though you might think, is that I'm reading the above book about French food and some of the food they eat over there I couldn't think of eating.

For starters while I eat meat, I won't eat pig and it's not because I'm into eating Kosher foods, because to me that way of life is even harder than a vegetarian way of life.
I couldn't really give you one definitive answer as to why I don't eat pig-meat, it's not because of cruelty reasons, maybe it's because I once read about a western guy who ate some food that a cannibal gave him to eat (human thigh) and he described it as tasting like pork and I didn't want to be one degree away from cannibalism.
It may be that I don't eat pig meat to be in a kind of solidarity with religious Jews, Muslims and vegetarians.
It may be that I don't like all of the nitrates and other things that go into preserving pig-meat.
Probably a bit of all of the above, but I won't eat pig the same way as I won't eat kangaroo, dog, cat and humans.

And don't get me wrong about the French foods, because Australians probably love pig-meat better than the French and a lot of Australians must eat kangaroo meat when you see how much of it is for sale in supermarkets and butcher shops.

There is a big stink in social media about the lamb ad that is out at the moment ... and fair enough, but I've got lamb steaks in the freezer to cook up on Australia Day, because I like lamb steaks ... and cow steaks for that matter.

I respect the vegetarian viewpoint, but some vegetarians seem to look at the world through unrealistic rose coloured glasses ... because the world we live in is almost literally a dog eat dog ... well cat anyway ... world and you're never going to stop humans eating meat.
Mind you, if I had to kill what I ate, then I'd probably have to go back to being vegetarian again. 

The Storytelling Animal
I mean whatever superpower put animals on the planet, put them on it to eat each other, so even if you do feed the right wolf, what are you going to feed it? 
Tofu?
The animal world is a real mindf#ck when it comes to diet and what if those stories about plants screaming before being cooked when being monitored in science experiments are true?
Do you stop eating plants if you find out that's true?

And while I'm not into sports like bullfighting and rodeos I do like and have no problem with horse-racing, as I grew up around the track and I never witnessed any real cruelty to horses, not to say that there wouldn't be no "cruelty" at all in the industry, but overall, most racehorses are well looked after compared to other household pets around the country.

It's a cruel world out there, that's for sure, but what can you do?

I'm reading a book at the moment about the old days of whale hunting in Eden and how killer whales would round up other whales for the whale-hunters so the killers could eat the lips and tongue of the whale once the whale-hunters had killed it.
And killer whales are supposed to be smart animals ... and maybe they are, but they are as ruthless as the most ruthless of animals on this planet ... humans.

And Happy Chinese New Year from Saturday to all my vegetarian and non-vegetarian friends on the subject of Red Rooster and chicken take away;-)

Inflatable 'Trump' rooster:-) 

We can barely cope with that Trump cock either, mate;-)