Arab Throws a Dog Off a Building

This is a seriously messed up video. Two Arab guys grab a dog and take it up to the top of a building. Then one of them throws the dog off the 4-5 story building while they both laugh. The dog hits the ground below and you can hear it whimpering. It's not sure if the dog lived or not.

The video was supposedly shot in Egypt. The date and location of the video are not known, the identity of the animal abusers is not known, nor is it known what happened to them afterwards, if anything.

This video has been making the rounds for a while now, and it's gotten pretty viral.

Skinned Alive

German translation (in deutscher Sprache).

This video is called Skinned Alive, by PETA, the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Despite the title, I had a hard time finding any animals in this video that were actually being skinned alive.

The video is about the fur trade in China, which is notorious for its cruelty. The first part of the video shows the treatment of raccoon dogs, which are raised for their fur in China.

They are kept in small cages under terrible conditions in all weather. Then they are taken from their cages and beaten to death with iron bars in front of the other raccoon dogs, who watch and await their fate. The raccoon dogs writhe on the ground, suffering, for a long time after they are beaten.

Then we move on to footage of raccoon dogs being skinned. The skinned carcass is then thrown onto a sickening pile with the rest of the carcasses.

Next we see footage of rabbits. These are White rabbits, apparently also raised for their fur. A rabbit is taken out of its cage and apparently strung up with some kind of rope. Then a worker grabs the rabbit and quickly breaks its neck. Now the rabbit is hanging upside down, but I am not sure if it is dead yet. The worker begins to make a cut near the rabbit's rear end.

The video ends with a message about the cruelty of Chinese fur farms and urges people to not buy fur.

More here.

Un Perrero Serbio Estrangula a un Perro

I am looking for translators to translate this post into German. Email me if you are interested.

This is the Spanish translation of the Serbian Dogcatcher Chokes a Dog post.

Este es un vídeo demencial que apareció en internet hace unos diez días, sobre el día 2 de noviembre de 2010. Es bastante difícil de encontrar, pero está recibiendo mucha prensa. En él aparece un perrero serbio que está estrangulando a un perro que había capturado de la calle. Aunque la calidad del vídeo es algo pobre, se puede ver un río de sangre fluyendo del cuello del perro mientras el perrero lo estrangula.

La población de perros y gatos callejeros en Serbia está fuera de control. Desde que la guerra acabó hace diez años, la población de perros y gatos en las calles se ha disparado. Las ciudades y pueblos no saben qué hacer con los ejércitos de animales callejeros, y la gente está tan disgustada por la enorme cantidad de animales callejeros que deambulan por los alrededores que ya no se preocupa demasiado por los sentimientos de los animales.

Las ciudades contratan empresas privadas capitalistas, llamadas Shinters, que compiten entre ellas para ver quién puede matar más animales callejeros de una forma más rápida y barata. ¡Esto es el capitalismo neoliberal, amigos! Ey, matarlos humanamente es una ineficiencia, como Frederick Hayek.

Estos equipos reúnen grandes grupos de animales, los almacenan de forma inhumana en cajas minúsculas donde comida y agua les son negadas, y luego rápidamente los matan apaleándolos, machacándolos, enterrándolos vivos o envenenándolos.

Lo municipios no tienen suficientes refugios donde alojar los animales, la población nunca ha sido concienciada sobre el tratamiento humano de los animales, y Serbia nunca ha iniciado un programa de esterilización o castración para los animales. Las ciudades serbias tienen leyes contra la crueldad animal, pero no se respetan.

Se han formado algunas organizaciones para protestar contra el cruel trato a los animales por parte de la sociedad y para ofrecer soluciones. "La Voz Serbia de los Animales" quiere que se autorice un programa de esterilización como en muchas localidades de los Estados Unidos.

Algunos estudios de Estados Unidos han demostrado que enviar perreros para capturar animales callejeros en masa no afecta a la población de estos, ya que se aparean mucho y de este modo los que han sido asesinados son reemplazados por los que nacen. Estos animales llevan una vida corta, salvaje y peligrosa llena de peleas, ataques de depredadores y enfermedades.

En vez de esto, se propone que los animales callejeros sean capturados y esterilizados, que se les dé atención médica y luego los vuelvan a dejar en libertad. Este programa ha servido para reducir realmente el número de animales callejeros.

Uno de los problemas que hay en Estados Unidos es que la población de animales callejeros está siendo continuamente reemplazada por nuevas generaciones, por culpa de gente de pueblo de raza blanca y tonta que vota a los republicanos, que continuamente dejan en libertad los animales que ya no quieren en vez de llevarlos a la perrera para que les hagan la eutanasia como debería ser.

Estos mismos idiotas tampoco esterilizan a sus animales nunca, ya sea porque no tienen suficiente dinero o porque tienen la tonta creencia de que es cruel privar a las mascotas de su instinto sexual.

Otra organización en Serbia, la Alianza por los Derechos de los Animales, además de pedir la esterilización y castración, recomienda cerrar los refugios actuales, registrar los animales que ya tienen amo, concienciar al público sobre el trato humano de los animales y hacer que se cumplan las leyes contra la crueldad animal.

Cuantas más cosas de estas leo, más me convenzo de que los serbios tienen algún tipo de problema grave. Los Balcanes siempre han sido los que han quedado rezagados en la raza europea, y no van a llegar a la civilización tan deprisa.

Serbian Dogcatcher Chokes a Dog

I am looking for translators to translate this post into German. Email me if you are interested.

Spanish translation (en Español).

This is a hot viral video that was sneaked onto the Net about 10 days ago, around November 2, 2010. It is quite hard to find, but it is getting a lot of press. It shows a Serbian dog catcher choking a dog that they had captured on the street. Though video quality is poor, you can see a river of blood flowing out of the dog's neck as the dogcatcher strangles him.

The stray dog and cat population in Serbia is out of control. Since the war ended 10 years ago, the population of dogs and cats on the streets has exploded. Cities and towns don't know what to do with the armies of strays, and many people are so upset by the huge numbers of stray animals roaming around that they no longer care much about the feelings of the animals.

Cities hire private capitalist firms, called Shinters, which compete with each other to see who can kill the most strays in the fastest and least expensive way. Neoliberal capitalism at work, folks! Hey, killing them humanely is an inefficiency, just as Frederick Hayek.

These teams round up large numbers of animals, store them very inhumanely in tiny cages where they are denied food and water, and then quickly kill by such means as clubbing and crushing them to death, burying them alive and poisoning them.

Municipalities do not have enough shelters to house the animals, the population was never educated about humane treatment of animals, and Serbia never instituted a spay and neuter program. Serbian cities do have laws on the books against animal cruelty, but they are not enforced.

Some organizations have formed to protest society's cruel treatment of the animals and offer solutions. Serbian Animals Voice wants a trap neuter and release program such as is in effect in many US localities.

Studies in the US have shown that just sending animal catchers out to mass catch strays does not effect their population numbers since they breed so much and are always being replenished. They lead short, nasty and brutish lives full of fights, predator attacks and diseases.

Instead, strays are trapped, neutered, given medical care and then released back to the wild. This program has been good at actually reducing the numbers of strays in the wild.

One problem in the US is that stray populations are continually being replenished by stupid rural White people, who all vote Republican, who continuously dump their unwanted animals in the wild instead of taking them to the pound to be euthanized as is proper. These same idiots also never spay their animals, either because they are too broke or because they think idiotically think it is cruel to deprive a pet of its sex drive.

Another organization in Serbia, the Alliance for Animal Rights,in addition to asking for spay and neuter, recommends closing the present shelters, registering owned animals, educating the public about humane animal treatment and enforcing laws against animal cruelty.

The more I read stuff like this, the more I am convinced that there is something terribly wrong with Serbian people. The Balkans have always been the backwater of the European race, and they are not coming to civilization in a hurry.

Girl Throws Live Puppies into a River

I am looking for translators to translate this post into German. Email me if you are interested.

This video appeared suddenly on the Internet about a month ago, on August 30, 2010. It was uploaded to Youtube by the girl's brother, intended to be a humorous video.

The sight of a teenage girl gleefully throwing live puppies into a swift river to their certain death quickly outraged an army of viewers, and the video was removed. The brother then uploaded another video of himself apologizing for the video. Before the video was removed, it was copied, and it soon appeared on shock video sites.

The video shows a young blond haired girl who we later learn is a 19 year old girl. She is standing by a swift moving river in a forest. She has gloves on and has a white bucket beside her. She reaches down into the bucket and picks up a newborn puppy.

Then she throws it into the fast moving river. She reaches in again and again until she has thrown about six puppies into the river. All of the puppies appear to be alive as she is throwing them. When she throws one puppy, she says, "Whee!" and laughs. In the video, she is speaking a foreign language.

The video caused widespread outrage when it appeared on shock sites. Viewers quickly learned the details of the video. The action took place in Bugojno, Bosnia.

The story was that a wild dog had given birth to the puppies in the backyard of the girl's grandmother. The dog was known to be very sick with parasites. The puppies also had parasites from the mother, so the grandmother told the girl to get rid of the puppies by throwing them in the river to prevent the spread of diseases.

On September 4, 2010, the girl was identified as Katja Puschnik. Bosnian police investigated the incident, but declined to charge Katja due to her age. Animal cruelty carries a fine of up to $5,000 Euros.

Katja is actually from Germany. She hails from Aying, Germany, where she is a student. It's not known what she was doing in Bosnia, possibly she was visiting her grandmother in Bugojno. She speaks Serbo-Croatian in the video. She's apparently a Bosnian native who is going to school in Germany.

Killing puppies by throwing them in a big river is a time-honored way of killing unwanted newborn dogs in many parts of the world, and was the preferred method in rural areas of the US and Canada up until about 40 years ago.

Veterinarians and pounds are in short supply in much of the world, and vets usually charge a good fee, say $50 or so, for each animal they kill. A lot of people just say forget it and kill the animals themselves. To this day, on US farms, unwanted puppies and kittens are killed by putting them in a locked box and lowering the box into a farm pond. Death is swift.

Some Observations on Felines and Canids

The latest death toll figures from Hurricane Katrina can be seen on this website here. The famous Russian neo-Nazi video is on this blog here.

I've been having some conversations lately with some of my smart friends about felines and canids, and here is some what we think we have worked out.

First of all, a cat is supposedly as smart as a 1½ year old human. As a human, albeit a human who is also a cat-lover, I find such a comparison insulting. I just spent some time with my 1½ year old niece. No way on Earth is my cat as stupid as that kid was.

I'm spending some time as a caretaker for my 86 year old father who lives 33 miles away. My folks have two cats and recently acquired another one. This one is a Siamese named Cleo. When I met this cat, very quickly, I thought it was one of the smartest cats I have ever known. I don't know why, but someone said that Siamese are an intelligent breed.

The other night, one of other cats, Callie, got the night-crazies and took off running across the house for no reason. Cleo saw this and immediately chased her for equally no good reason. I immediately began to reassess my opinion of her as the smartest cat I've ever known. I asked around about this.

Turns out that in general, if a cat sees another cat take off running for any reason, the observer cat will often give chase. Why? Possibly instinct. They seem to be programmed to chase after any non-predatory moving object.

Many prey animals, like the rabbits who live around here, practice freezing as a form of predator avoidance. On the principle that predators generally hunt by following rapid movement rather than attacking stationary objects. The rabbits around here will freeze and let you walk right up next to them before they take off running.

There have been some mountain lion attacks here in the West recently. Attacks have, in general, been on little kids or on adults either jogging or riding bicycles.

Reason? A little kid is about the size of many of the mountain lions more slow-moving prey objects. An adult human really is not, except if it is running or riding a bicycle fast, in which case apparently it is about the size and speed of a deer, one of the lion's favorite prey animals.

As long as you are strolling along in the woods, the cougar usually won't bother you. But start jogging, and you turn into a human deer and you might just get nailed.

Observations of wild cats have shown that wild domestic cats make few sounds except when fighting or mating. Why do cats meow? Probably because we make sounds, and their meows are their way of trying to speak human language back at us.

Cats are generally solitary, and the cat adaptive style is to hide. If you notice, your cat at home likes to hide in really weird and hard to find places. Often a place where it can see out but you can't see in. They will do this whether they are threatened by other cats or by dogs or not.

The reason cats hide? Probably instinct. The cat style is to hide and only come out at night. Wild felines such as bobcats and mountain lions hide much of the time and are mostly nocturnal.

This is also why cats bury their shit. They are probably not naturally fastidious, but instead, I suspect that they do this to cover up their trails from predators. This is also why they roll around in the dirt. They are covering themselves with dirt to hide their scent from predators.

On the other hand, the dog has a different adaptive style. Does a dog ever hide? What for? A dog is always walking around, right out in the open, afraid of nothing. With wild dogs it's pretty similar. Coyotes and wolves are active all hours of the day and tend to roam around in plain sight. Foxes do hide, but they are pretty small, and they also spend time hunting in broad daylight (I've watched them).

Cats are generally solitary (although lions are an exception), and dogs are pack animals. Cats hide because they are solitary, and dogs walk around in plain sight because they are instinctively pack animals with little to hide. Wolves, jackals and hyenas travel in packs. If something wants to kill a hyena (and a lion might), it would have to deal with a whole pack of howling hyenas that would come to the defense of the hunted one.

Hunting in packs is also a strength. A pack of hyenas could possibly even kill a lion, and I suspect that they do sometimes.

Since dogs are pack animals and find strength in numbers, they don't give a damn about burying their shit or rolling around in the dirt. There is no need to cover one's tracks when one has strength in numbers.

One of my friends insisted that canids and felines are closely related, and that both go back to some ancestral canid-feline duoform. Raccoons and bears are related to dogs, but they supposedly split off from proto-dog after the split from proto-dogcat. I don't know enough to comment on this, as I've never heard of dogs and cats going back to a feline-canid ancestor.

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