Animal Removed from Property according to the SPCA. Hopefully they are able to give it the medical care it needs to get back on its feet (paws) and that they'll be able to give it a good home. I hope the people have been put into some kind of database and never get to have another animal again. I pray for the child soon to be born into their family, I pray that they will care for it better than their dog, and I pray that if they don't, someone removes that child from their care before it winds up in the same shape as their dog. Nothing deserves to experience suffering and neglect like that.
I am proud to have adopted from the SPCA.
Original Story
Rarely do I blog angry. Generally speaking, I like to let things sit for a day or two before I fly off the handle and say something I’m going to regret. Even the blogs that sound like I’m foaming at the mouth angry, I let sit for a while and read a few times before committing to it. Today isn’t one of those days. I saw a dog with its guts on the ground before I even had my morning coffee, so I’m fired up.
I like to stay in my lane with education related stuff, but this is a special circumstance that isn’t unrelated to how people treat their kids.
There’s a dog on my street that is frequently loose, but the dog is all around friendly. A medium sized dog, kind of floppy and dopey, but sweet. The owners leave it out all day and night regardless of the weather conditions tied to a tree or anchored to the ground. The neighborhood has really rallied together around this dog. People have left dog houses, brought food and water, and, yes, reported the conditions to the proper authorities. Sound familiar? By now you are either thinking of the woman that got killed by a pack of dogs OR you are thinking of your students that show up to school beaten, stinky, and hungry. Maybe you are thinking about both. Stay with me.
Packs of wild dogs aren’t uncommon in our neighborhood. Much like human gangs, they prowl the neighborhood and prey on the weak. We all know they are there and some of us engage in behavior that is preventative of the violence they can cause. Get an alarm. Watch your kids a little more closely, Call the police. Chase them off. We’ve tried all of these things with the wild dogs. They haven’t been around since Antionette Brown was mauled to death, so we thought the problem was over. We were wrong.
Last night, my neighbor was awoken to loud yelps from the dog next door. Remember how I mentioned that most people take preventative action? These people that own this dog, the one that is left outside at all times without shelter, food, or water, didn’t. This dog was being attacked by a roaming pack of dogs. My neighbor ran our recklessly and chased the wild dogs off. She bangged on the door of the owners to come help their dog which was attacked right next to their door. They never came.
As of an hour ago, the dog was still laying on the ground, panting, with its belly torn open, bleeding out into the dirt. One of the owners said, when confronted by my neighbor, that she was pregnant so she couldn’t take it to the vet. We contacted every animal group in Dallas that handles these things. Hopefully they are able to save this animal.
The debate over whether treating animals this way is culturally, learned, natural, or whatever is something I won’t get into here, but I will say that if this is how you are going to treat your animals, then you shouldn’t have them. If the way we treat animals is a reflection of how we treat humans, then I fear for the future of the child that is on the way for that family. I’m not a scientist, so I can’t say whether or not there is a link there, but it would seem to me that torture of animals wouldn’t be a symptom of psychopathy if there wasn’t at least some relation between animal and human treatment.
There is something objectively wrong about watching an animal suffer that you yourself doomed to suffering. The humane thing would be to allow your neighbors, that are offering to help the animal, help the animal. If not, the compassionate thing would be to put your animal out of it’s misery with your own two hands rather than watch it slowly suffer until it perishes.
This may seem like a lot to write about a dog. Yes, I’m on record for being way more moved by animals than by people. That said, the parallels between the lives of students that i’ve had and the life of this dog are so clear it hurts. Many of us educate kids that nobody wants. Kids that are left out and exposed to all elements of danger. Some of them only get the attention they so desperately need when they’re in a box in the ground. Others never do.
I’ve had public school students that i’ve had to report to CPS because their parent smacks them around for being tardy and show up with bruises. I’ve had private school students who have 2 parents with money that haven’t said a word to them in 3 months. I’ve had students, both public and private, that move every week or live in hotels because they have no stability at home. I’ve taught gang members. I’ve had students die. I’ve had students kill. This is something that impacts all of us regardless of color, location, or wealth.
If we do not take responsibility and care for the least of us, we are all worse for it.
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