Why Teach A Child Not To Step On A Caterpillar?

If you have men who will exclude any of God's creatures from the shelter of compassion and pity, you will have men who will deal likewise with their fellow men.
 - St. Francis of Assisi

Getting home from work last night, I happened to pass by a street populated by families of inferior living conditions. As I was nearing the end of it, I saw a dog chained on a steel post being beaten furiously by a man. I halted and my feet were rooted to the ground as my heart is crushed with every painful cry it bellowed. I had the urge to shove the man, seize the wood out of his hand and slam it hard on his back. :) Just then a woman came rushing out of an adjacent house and berated the man for hurting the poor dog. I thanked heavens because the man stopped. The dog huddled in a corner whimpering and his frail body still shivered from the wicked blows of his master. I thought to myself loudly how serious its mistake could be to deserve such savage hits?

We should all realize that we are created with a brain that has capabilities far beyond animals. We have minds, they don't have. Humans have sense of morality, of right and wrong, and has control over his thoughts of what he perceives as right or wrong. Animals, unfortunately do not have this. Just because we are created superior over them does not give us the excuse to exercise that advantage through neglect or worse, cruelty. I hope people could understand how totally helpless animals are, how dependent and trusting like a child who can not defend itself entirely against violence.

All around the globe, the respect for animal life is understated just as the value for human life has gradually desecrated. China has the most cases of publicized animal cruelty. At Hangzhou Zoo, an early January report states that visitors hurled snowballs on lions and smashed rocks and trash on hibernating crocodiles. These are minor cases though, as the grievous and heart-wrenching tortures are suffered by cats and dogs. In case you do not know, some areas in Asia consider cats' and dogs' meat as a regular dish. There are marketplaces in China where you can walk in, pick any cat or dog you want to eat and the vendors will be kind enough to skin it alive and boil it for you. I am not going to post the video I have watched containing extreme cruelty against these animals (cats and dogs) since I have a weak heart and had a real hard time removing the violent images from my mind for a long time.

Though, I admit that I am a carnivore too and that being on the top of the food chain, we have the power to consume anything we want but we don't have the right to treat the animal inhumanely like skinning them alive and boiling them with their eyes all wide open and mouth still gasping for air. Can you imagine the extreme torture these creatures have to endure? Like humans, they are susceptible to pain and tremble before death, too. If there is one thing on Earth who can love you more than you love yourself, I think it's your pet dog but it saddens me much to know the vile fact that dogs are one of the most abused animals in the world.

In Vietnam, moon bears, endangered species of the wild are being kept on cages, bile harvested from their gall bladders with a syringe and sold for its medical benefits believed in Chinese medicine. Around 90% of moon bears in the farms have futile gallbladders. One animal rights activist quoted “You stab them enough times in the same place, you damage the liver, you damage the gallbladder, and it just turns to scar tissue."
 
Lions, tigers, and elephants are beaten savagely with a pitchfork or a burning steel pole in circuses to make them comply. Their skins are punctured and tore with every smash of the sharp prongs of the pitchfork.

There are a lot of ongoing, unregulated cases of animal cruelty. Visit a slaughterhouse or a farm and you'll find the evident maltreatment of animals. I don't go force someone to shift his/her entire diet to green. I am saying that while it is necessary to kill animals for human consumption, can we at least have the decency to spare them the torture of having to feel the slow, painful death?

All animals are put under our dominion and custody. It is our responsibility to deal with all creatures with love and compassion. If he has the heart that goes out to every animal, then can he truly have a heart that cares for every human.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/24/china-zoos-animal-abuse_n_2545494.html
http://www.newser.com/story/94959/puppy-found-with-severed-jaw.html
http://www.newser.com/story/81056/bile-farmers-turn-bears-lives-into-misery.html