I just now read an article on the Salon website recounting the author’s experience in China, wherein he was offered meat from a dog he had befriended. Whether this was intentional or simply insensitive is not the point, but the timing is impeccable, since it was just yesterday that I posted my own article about the many abuses going on in China.

Since this is a cat lover’s blog, I do ask you to read my article, but feel free to skip the link there talking about China’s death camps for cats and dogs, since the contents were even too distressing for me to read in detail. And the reason for China’s killing dogs and cats is to simply “clean up the cities” before the Olympics, although they claim it’s to “prevent disease”. The Catholic Church tried killing cats in the Middle Ages, and the result was the disease called the Black Death. Unless you believe there are no rats anywhere in China…especially this year!

In any case, I would like you to take away three main points from all this:

• Cheap Chinese goods are no bargain when they support death.
• We should all try to cut down on our purchase of Chinese-made items.
• Boycott the 2008 Summer Olympics. Don’t even watch it on TV.

Tags: animal cruelty, boycott Olympics, cats, China

s reported in The New York Times and numerous online news sites, a “bird lover” named James Stevenson is on trial for killing a cat that he claimed was preying on endangered birds. He now faces a $10,000 fine and up to two years in jail if convicted on animal cruelty charges in Texas.

The defendant doesn’t even dispute that he shot the cat with a rifle, and even boasts of shooting many other cats he found on his own property. However, this man runs a commercial bed-and-breakfast establishment targeted at bird enthusiasts, so it could easily be proved that he had a pecuniary interest in killing cats. Instead, his defense centers around the idea that the cat was feral and therefore killing her could not be prosecuted under the older state law.

While there’s a good chance the prosecution can prove that the cat, Big Mama, did effectively belong to someone (based on the fact that someone had fed, named her, and provided her with toys and a bed), the essential fact is that someone went out of their way to deliberately kill a cat. Big Mama died in pain, according to a police officer who was at the scene, though predictably the defense attorney attempted to discredit even this witness by saying ?He?s not qualified to know what the cat was feeling.”

Perhaps bird lovers have no feelings for other animals, so they find it inconceivable that other humans could. But it doesn’t take much compassion to realize that animals have the right to live. And I bet James Stevenson didn’t name his birdies, either.

Tags: animal cruelty