This post is quite connected to the last one and could have been called “Circus Animals and Slavery”, but it was, in fact, inspired by Bolivia banning the use of animals for circus acts. But while the similarities are obvious, both being utterly exploited by humans, the difference between farm animals and circus animals is that I really don’t see how anyone could even think about challenging the notion that circus animals are performing jobs no different from those performed by police dogs, for example, as they require training, skills and specific actions under specific conditions.
Under these circumstances, is it right to ban the concept of circus animals entirely? Isn’t that something like banning police animals or even banning employers from hiring people? Sure, an important difference is that it can easily be argued that most police animals and some farm animals, not to mention a part of the human employees, are necessary, while circus animals are not, as they are certainly not required in order to provide entertainment in general, so the ban can be considered to be the easy solution to the problem. But that problem is obviously how they are treated, not the simple fact that they are used.
Do the vast majority of circuses abuse their animals? Absolutely. But do all circuses abuse all of their animals? I’m not so sure. And, either way, since the way those animals are treated is the problem, that’s what the law should regulate. It would in effect be a ban on a lot of practices and acts that couldn’t really be performed if the animals would be treated well, but perhaps not on everything. In addition, such a measure could also serve as a means to inform circus owners and animal handlers of the proper way to treat animals, as some of them, those who are more lenient in their training practices but still offer their animals a poor diet and poor living conditions, may really be unaware of the harm they’re causing.
Such a direct ban on the activity itself, however, may do more harm than good not only to the existing circus animals, but also to those currently caught in the trade, legal and illegal alike, as circuses are likely to be important buyers. When all these circus owners are told to simply get rid of their animals, they may well do just that, by abandoning or killing them. And when the traders will know that circus owners will no longer be buying from them, they may follow suit with their current stock. And things may not be much better for the animals handed over to shelters either, as these are usually not the kind of tenants that animal shelters are used to having, which means that the staff may well be unfit to care for them and the living conditions may not be noticeably more suitable for them than the ones they had at the circus. Not to mention the terrible overcrowding and the strain on the meager resources that such shelters usually have to make do with that will result from any significant number of circus owners and traders actually doing the right thing…
But let me be more specific about the solution I’m proposing. Firstly, all circuses should be required to submit their animals to periodic examinations by qualified professionals in order to determine their condition. Secondly, no new animals should be taken from the wild in order to be used in circus acts, though this should not affect the animals that have already been legally taken from the wild and are yet to be handed over or sold to circuses. And, of course, there should be very harsh punishments for those who break these rules or who, as proven by the periodic examinations, mistreat their animals.
Going into further detail, the periodic examinations should very easily reveal any signs of physical abuse or very poor living conditions, which should result in the immediate confiscation of the animals in question and the punishment of the guilty circus owners and handlers. If no obvious signs of abuse can be found and yet the animals suffer from serious health problems, a team should be sent to inspect the circus. If the conditions prove to be poor, those responsible will be appropriately punished. Otherwise, the animals will be held until they could be nursed back to health and then returned, if possible. Lastly, if the animals would suffer from less serious ailments, the owners should be advised on how to treat them and put on probation. If the animals would be in better shape at the time of the next examination, the probation period will end. If not, it will be assumed that the owners mistreat the animals and they will be appropriately punished.
As for the second rule, we must make sure that animals will no longer be plucked from the wild just to provide entertainment for people. This should also make circus owners treat their animals somewhat more responsibly, as it’ll be harder to replace them. However, as I said, traders should be able to keep and sell any animals already legally taken from the wild at the time the law would come into effect, as otherwise they’d be likely to abandon or kill them. Efforts should be made to obtain, even by purchasing, those animals that could still be returned to the wild in order to do just that, but owners and traders shouldn’t be pressured in ways which could result in an even worse fate for the animals in question than the one they had up to that point.
I believe that such regulations could work towards improving the living conditions of circus animals, which are the real problem, while significantly reducing the problems potentially generated by an actual ban. Most circuses would eventually be forced to give up on animal acts because they’d lack the resources, skills or even the willingness to treat their non-human performers properly, but the practice itself could continue rather well where those animals would be treated as valued employees and offered genuine care and good living conditions. Since we’re mainly talking about animals that’d hardly make good pets but would be equally unsuited for life in the wild, being born and raised in captivity, this may well be the best realistic solution for them.
But, going back to the situation in Bolivia, I certainly hope those senators’ fears will soon turn into reality and bullfighting will be banned as well, as there’s absolutely no way to justify torturing and killing an animal like that!
A new series of regulations coming from the Romanian Ministry of Agriculture and dealing with the comfort of farm animals, especially those raised in factory farms, has prompted a series of very amused reactions from the media and a good part of the population, who feel that it’s simply idiotic to think about the comfort of anything other than humans, plus some pretty angry reactions from certain other people, who are outraged that money are being spent on improving the standard of living of farm animals when people are poor and have so many of their needs unmet, especially since these measures are likely to result in price increases for certain animal products.
Granted that the regulations can give reason for a certain kind of angry or frustrated amusement, but that has nothing to do with the reasons mentioned by the media and everything to do with the fact that some of these measures seem to have little actual purpose and nearly all of them certainly do far more for those who raise such animals, allowing them to claim that they now do so much for their well-being, than for the animals themselves, as the major problems inherent to factory farming are not tackled.
There was a time when people were slaves simply because they were of a different race. Now there is still some actual slavery in certain areas and a lot of paycheck slavery everywhere, but things have greatly improved and hopefully will continue to do so. Yet, while we continue to try to prevent humans from treating other humans as slaves, other animals are treated like slaves simply because they are of a different species. I’m wondering why shouldn’t we make changing this state of affairs the next step, as an integral part of our development and evolution as a supposedly intelligent species?
Sure, other animals are not humans and can’t be treated the same way, but we are responsible for how an animal we raise lives and ultimately dies and should act accordingly! So, while such an animal is raised and perhaps used to provide other products, such as milk or eggs, it should be treated as something similar to a valued employee and offered genuine care and a decent quality of life in exchange for the services it provides. And, while I agree that we have the right to kill other animals for food, I firmly believe that, when such killing is done in a controlled environment and not, for example, by a starving person lost in the woods, the method used must cause no pain or stress to the animal in question. I also firmly believe that any such sacrifices must only be performed out of need and not simply to satisfy the whims of some who desire certain delicacies or luxuries and that, excepting self-defense, food is the only good reason for killing an otherwise at least reasonably healthy animal, though of course certain parts of it can and should be used for other purposes, because nothing should be wasted.
Yet what’s going on now is something very different… Those who haven’t done so already can set aside an hour and a half and then go ahead and click on the “Earthlings” banner in the sidebar for an idea of what I’m talking about. Though I think everyone already has at least some idea about how animals are treated anyway, the question being only whether or not they care and, unfortunately, very few seem to. Of course, the next question would be what would the ones who do care be willing to do about it. After all, the United States needed a war to get rid of slavery based on race, so who knows what it’d take for the whole world to get rid of slavery based on species…
Yes, I’m quite aware that such changes would make animal products a lot more expensive and would also significantly reduce their availability, but eliminating slavery made pretty much everything more expensive and likely also harder to come by in the areas where it was practiced, and offering employees better working conditions and wages has the same effect on the products of their labor. It’s not a question of what’s convenient for those of us who consume or otherwise use certain products, but a question of fairness towards those who produce them. I’m sure pretty much everyone who has a job would agree with that statement when thinking of themselves, so it only makes sense to extend that same reasoning to all other employees as well, regardless of race or species.
And besides, improving the animals’ living conditions tends to result in much healthier animal products and less environmental damage, which implies a lot of benefits for us humans as well, regardless of where we live or what we eat. So making such changes is in the long-term interest of everyone, meaning that all those who can manage to also think about what will happen to them and what world will they live in a few years or decades from now instead of focusing solely on today and tomorrow should fully support these measures that are currently only brought forward by a small number of animal rights activists, as if they’d do nothing but harm humans, or at best as if they wouldn’t affect humans at all.
Unfortunately, a very long time is likely to pass before other species will stop being treated as they currently are. But perhaps someday enough people will evolve to the level required to care for anyone or anything other than themselves and perhaps a few loved ones, and to think about the future at least as much as, and preferably way more than, about the present. Perhaps when there will be few enough people in the world and they’ll live much simpler lives than many of those who currently reside in developed countries do… That’d be a crucial moment in our evolution from a species with great mental potential to one that could truly be called intelligent.
The second half of spring and the first half of autumn are the best times to go out and explore the city, or at least that’s how it seems to me. Summer’s too hot and it can even be unsafe to be out because of that, early spring and late autumn are usually too rainy and likely also chilly, and winter may be a nice time to go out but needing to wear thick clothing, take care not to slip on ice and navigate through piles of snow makes it unfit for walking long distances and exploring unknown areas. That last part obviously only applies for real winters, like the last one was, because otherwise what I said about early spring and late autumn would also apply to pretty much any other winter we had during the last decade.
That said and seeing as we’re already well into the second half of spring, I’m starting to poke my nose out way more than I did during the past several months. Right now this was also helped by the fact that, due to unforeseen and highly unfortunate circumstances, I’ve been home alone for the past week, but I was planning to go exploring anyway. Now dad is back home, which in itself would still mean I’d be alone most of the time during the day, but it appears they’ll both be back on Saturday, though at this point I have no idea for how long. Either way, when I’m not alone I’m very unwilling to go out of my room unless I have to, which makes it quite unlikely to get out of the house more than once per week, as that’s the minimum quota I set for myself over three years ago, but going out once per week to explore certain areas of the city is still very different from going out once per week just be able to say that I was out, running right back in after a few minutes.
The first such “exploration” was supposed to take place last Saturday, but that didn’t work out. I meant to check out this supermarket that’s right across the street, as I might have ended up needing to buy something while alone and it could have been useful to know if I could somehow get it from here. But you’re certain to have at least a few pairs of eyes on you when you walk in there, so I only made it to the door, got cold feet and left without even going in.
Then I meant to try again on Monday, and at first that seemed to be an even worse failure, as I couldn’t even get myself to the door that time, panicking and walking right past despite meaning to go in. That left me wondering what to do next for the next couple of minutes, then decided to go to the park, cross through it and come out the other side. Once there, I realized there was little point to keep going, as I wasn’t going to explore anything else while in that state, so I just turned around and went right back the way I came. But just as I was passing in front of this supermarket on the way back, I saw an old man coming out, which suddenly gave me the courage to go in, thinking I can survive it if he can… That was about as uncomfortable as I thought it’ll be, as the place is very cramped and you can’t be “invisible” while inside, but at least I had a look and therefore accomplished what I set out to do.
But I went out yet again the very next day, the target being a farmers’ market that I noticed was supposed to be right next to an area I thought I knew reasonably well. That was another failure, not because I wandered around for a while before managing to find the place I thought I needed to get to, but because the market wasn’t there. I found a better map after getting back and plan to try again next week, however.
And then I also went out today. The target was another farmers’ market, with an added vague intention to have a look at a couple of other shops that are supposed to be close to it. And at least the primary goal was reached, as it was easy to find the market and have a quick look at the offer, but I had to quickly make my way out as soon as the first person invited me to buy something from them as I passed their stall, obviously being in no condition to do any more exploring after that, especially since the shops in question are pretty small and therefore all eyes may very well be on any person who enters.
So far, my primary targets when I went out exploring were often parks, either meaning to learn the best route to a particular park or to explore certain areas of the park itself. Occasionally, when I either needed something and thought I could get it myself or at least wanted to see what my options were, I’d change the primary target to a hypermarket. And when I learned of a potentially interesting fair, especially if it wasn’t strictly during the weekend, that could become my target, despite obviously not buying anything. But this time I think I want to make farmers’ markets the primary target, to learn where they are, what’s for sale and what the prices are there, and hopefully also get an idea about where you can find actual farmers’ products and where you’re likely to just be tricked with supermarket goods. If nothing else, it’ll give me something more to say to dad when I pointlessly try to talk to him about healthy food and the like…
As for the expected strange event, as Jen was noticing some time ago that I keep attracting strange people, it happened on Tuesday and involved me walking down the sidewalk and spotting three obviously Gypsy men coming from the opposite direction, pretty much blocking the entire sidewalk. There was a guy riding a bicycle behind them and trying to find a way to get past, moving slowly and looking back several times once he did. After he went past me as well, I made towards the street, as it seemed the best way to get around the three. Just then, I noticed a stream of yellow liquid coming from between the legs of the one who was closest to the street. The source, as expected and as noticed a moment later, was my esteemed pedestrian colleague’s dick, out of his pants and flapping about with each step he took. So I quickly made for the other side as the pissing guy yelled “forgive me for I know not what I’m doing”. Said other side appeared quite fully blocked by the other two, but they moved single file just when I reached them and allowed me to get around, with them in between me and the pissing guy. The one who actually moved aside to make room for me also threw a “making jokes mister, eh?” just as I passed him.
Now a guy pissing while walking, with his dick out and flapping freely, is certainly not what you expect to see while walking past the commercial area of a relatively important street! And, after checking my pants to make sure I didn’t get sprayed, the surprise quickly turned into amusement, making me struggle to keep from bursting too loudly into laughter on the way back.
As you may, and very likely should, already know, today is Earth Day! Not that we should need a day to be reminded of our planet, and certainly not that we should only care for it one day per year, but it can’t hurt to have a day to celebrate this, or this, or this, or this. It is, after all, our only home.
Yet we seem to be awful housekeepers, don’t we? At least when it comes to emissions and climate there are some volcanoes that have something to say about it, like the unpronounceable Icelandic one. Sure, such eruptions spew forth immense quantities of harmful substances, but they shape the Earth and, most importantly, are completely natural events, which means they can’t be “bad”. On the other hand, reducing the amount of air travel can only benefit the Earth, considering the tremendous amount of emissions that this form of transportation is responsible for and the fact that those emissions are much more harmful for the planet up there than at lower altitudes. Not to mention that such a fast and easy mode of transportation is indirectly responsible for the spread of disease and even partially for overconsumption.
But it’s not Earth who needs us, it’s us and all the other species we share it with who need it. And there may still be time to turn the tide. So try to think about the true environmental consequences of your actions and behavior patterns, as well as the real costs of your purchases. This last part is very important, because you don’t only vote during elections, but also every time you buy something. And fight for the cause, persuading, helping or even, if need be, forcing as many others as you possibly can to live sustainably from an environmental perspective, pressuring governments into passing laws that will truly protect the environment and companies into operating in an environmentally sustainable manner. The actions, habits and purchases of a single person may matter extremely little in a world with nearly seven billion of us, but everything adds up, every bit of help matters. Who knows when you’ll end up being just the one to make the difference?
And, of course, as a very militant GINK was bound to say, keep in mind that the single most important thing you can do for Earth is not breeding. (Though I obviously firmly disagree with the position stated by the author of that manifesto regarding those who do have children. Being childfree primarily for environmental reasons and yet saying that you have nothing against those who do have children is something like being a cop and saying that, while you are proud to state that you’ll never commit murder yourself, you have nothing against those who do. If those who want to have children could have and raise them on another planet, using that planet’s resources, then it’ll be all right, but breeding under the current circumstances is a crime on this little blue sphere.)
Until next time, may you all live in harmony with yourselves, each other, all the other species we share this planet with, and the planet itself.
I find it pleasing that two news pieces regarding population control efforts have caught my eye one after the other during the past few days, though I’m sure nearly all human rights activists are appalled by both of them. This time, it’s about the authorities from Puning county, Guangdong Province, China, who are so determined to sterilize those who have violated the one-child policy that they are rounding up the relatives of those who refuse, in order to pressure them into it. And it seems to be a far more effective tactic than applying the penalties according to the law.
Sure, punishing the relatives of the culprits is completely unfair, though the fact that they’re made to listen to lectures on the rules limiting the size of families while in detention is a nice twist. The right thing to do would have obviously been to go after the actual culprits who refused to come voluntarily like after common criminals, round them up, sterilize them and then make them listen to those lectures. Admittedly, picking up whatever relatives the authorities could get their hands on and then waiting for the culprits to give themselves up in exchange for their relatives’ freedom makes it much easier for the officials, but it’s really not right.
China’s one-child policy is wrong in many ways, starting with the fact that in its most basic form it allows every couple, from brilliant scientists or athletes to wretches with the IQ of a newt and enough genetically transmissible diseases for an entire village, to have the same number of descendants, then because there are so many exceptions that its effectiveness is marginal at best, but mainly because the children often suffer for their parents’ crime of having had them. Yet it is an attempt to reduce the number of births and ultimately also the population, and that fact in itself should be appreciated.
That said, the punishment for having more than the legal number of children should obviously be sterilization, by force if necessary, while the resulting illegal children, if they have already been born or the pregnancy was only discovered in the final trimester, which is likely too late for abortion to be the proper solution, should be treated just like legal ones, because it’s most definitely not their fault that they were born. Actually, to send a clear enough message, the punishment for giving birth to an illegal child should involve neutering in such a way as to make sexual activity impossible from that moment forward, and it should obviously apply to both parents unless they broke up well before the date of the birth and the father can prove that he was unaware of the pregnancy. Entering the final trimester of pregnancy or even giving birth while being unaware that you are pregnant, or unaware that the woman you live with or at least see frequently is pregnant, is not an acceptable excuse.
I’ll say that making these changes to the punishments listed in the policy would be a huge improvement, both greatly increasing its effectiveness and ensuring that only the culprits are punished, leaving their relatives and especially their illegal children, if they ended up being born, alone. Fairness and efficiency in the same package is not something that you often see…
Of course, that would still leave the problem of the policy itself. In order to solve that, exceptions would need to stop being made for any reason other than the actual genetic qualities that the parents are likely to pass on to any potential children. Sure, saying that any couple can have one child and truly worthy ones, from a strictly genetic point of view, can also have a second one is very far from my idea, but it would at least be a huge improvement over the current situation.
In fact, if all countries would adopt such a policy, allowing only one child for most couples and two for the few who would actually be worthy of having any, it could be a reasonable first step in the right direction. In itself, such a measure would be far from sufficient, something far more drastic certainly being needed no later than 2030, and preferably even before 2020, but I guess there may still be a little bit of time to take it a little slower. There will most definitely be a price to pay for taking it slower, but it will be much smaller than the one we’ll be paying for doing nothing at all, and such a measure may even have the tiniest bit of a chance to be adopted in some places, unlike the plan I have in mind…
Still, seeing as at the start of the year I was saying that overpopulation is unlikely to be an issue the world will care any more about this year than in the previous ones, it’s good to see that reducing the number of births and ultimately the population is an issue for at least a few countries and that news about this make it out now and then, despite the tone of most of those articles. The problem, of course, being that the countries in question are among those that are otherwise very bad examples to follow, considering their authoritarian governments. Yet it appears that such regimes are required in order to even attempt to enact a population control policy, as all but an extremely small number of people think only with their gonads when it comes to the issue of reproduction.
On the other hand, the very bad news is that there are certain other countries, such as Russia, Ukraine or Japan, who strongly push their citizens to have more children, thinking of nothing but their own economic growth. And most developed countries also tend to encourage their citizens to have children, though without being so adamant about it, for the exact same reason. So I need to rephrase the above statement and say that, when it comes to the issue of reproduction, all but very few common people think with nothing but their gonads and all but very few of those who are in positions of authority think with nothing but their pockets.
