From My Cold, Dead Paw

This is why the Second Amendment is important: so we can defend our families against violent assaults.

Comments

[bain]

Jesse:
OK, I'll buy that. Misunderstood the reference to personal protection and the Second Amendment.

[Curious Party]

I'm actually curious as to what the libertarian viewpoint is on animal cruelty. Do libertarians simply view animals as property and therefore a person can do ANYTHING they wish to the creature? Or do they feel that liberty does not include the right to torture an innocent animal? Opinions?

[Dear Leader]

He should have just sent the puppies to North Korea.

[Fred Gillette]

Curious Party, This member of the Libertarian Party strongly believes that all animals are sentient beings deserving of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Many of you H&R posters know that Rene Descartes' view on this subject is very much the opposite, but he was a puppy killing idiot.

[SR]

After reading the above story, I trust the Secret Service frisks Barney before his walks with the President. He's got a reason to hold a grudge:

http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/graphics/bush_dogdrop.jpg

[Lord Duppy]

Curious Party and Fred Gillete -

There really is no truly Libertarian position on animal rights. I personally do not believe animals have rights. If I'm not allowed to shoot unwanted puppies I guess I'll just abandon them.

However, an excellent debate on animal rights can be found in Robert Nozick's "Anarchy, State, and Utopia."

[kevrob]

Whether you believe animals have "rights" or not - I think not - treating animals with unnecessary cruelty does habituate individuals, especially children, to committing similar cruelty on their fellow humans. I have no problem with hunting, as any decent hunter takes care to use methods that minimize pain and suffering. The "slob hunter" is properly a figure of derision and scorn among all my friends who take hunting seriously.

Dogs evolved side-by-side with man.* One could almost describe our relationship as symbiotic. Our two species work together, and we, as the senior partner, ought to take care not to treat our canine pals as if they were mere things. Don't overbreed, and if you must euthanize pups, do it as quickly and painlessly as you can. Best to get a professional to do it, to be sure. The idiot in the story probably didn't take that route, either out of ignorance, or to hide any violations of law he may have already committed.

Kevin

*Cats, too, I guess.

[Syd]

It took many tens of thousands of years for cats to successfully domesticate people.

[Ruthless]

This topic illustrates my faith in anarchy. We started with a lemon and you guys made it lemonade.

[kuros]

being a gay man and a gun owner
i agree
"gay men who are armed are not bashed"

[Isaac Bartram]

Florida's animal cruelty laws have little to do with cruelty per se. You basically have to have a veterinarian euthanize an animal. Like most regulations it's mostly about cartel protection.

That said this guy seems to be a moron.

[Scatalogicus]

On Tuesday, the puppy can get an AK with 20-round clip and bayonet mount. He doesn't need our protection anymore.

[Psuedo]

Fred Gillette,

Doesn't like animal rights are a natural extension of libertarian philosophy. Not incompatible, but not coextensive or related either.

I know the Rand cult believes that humans have natural rights because they require them to survive as rational beings. Animals, not being rational, have no rights. Seems to make sense to me.

Animal rights is a slippery slope. Nobody wants to see sadistic or unnecessary cruelty. But once you admit that animals have ANY rights, it becomes difficult to draw aline regarding what treatment is cruel. Defending any percieved "mistreatment" such as humane slaughter for food, no matter how rational, begins to seem like, well, rationalization.

This guy should be punished for being an idiot, but animal rights is really a black and white issue.

[Spot]

Hand over the rawhide or Mittens gets it!

Grrrrrrr.

[Ruthless]

Pseudo said:
"But once you admit that animals have ANY rights, it becomes difficult to draw a line regarding what treatment is cruel."

"We are family!"

Families should be able to define themselves.
If an animal is not fortunate enough to get its mangy ass defined into a human family, then...
it's like that cartoon in a recent New Yorker showing a parent and child at a fork in the pathway in a big zoo:
The sign pointing left said "Petting Zoo." The sign pointing right said "Tasting Zoo."

[JusticeMan]

"I'm actually curious as to what the libertarian viewpoint is on animal cruelty. Do libertarians simply view animals as property and therefore a person can do ANYTHING they wish to the creature? Or do they feel that liberty does not include the right to torture an innocent animal? Opinions?"

Um, no offense, CP, but to think that any decent human being would dismiss animal torture as a "personal liberty" is absurd. Just because animals are "not rational" does not justify in any way creulty towards them. A newborn baby isn't rational, but does anyone doubt their right to be treated humanely? Personally, I think that someone who contributes to the suffering of ANY LIVING THING (with the possible exception of those who make innocents suffer) should be shot in the fucking grill.

[JusticeMan]

... by that puppy.

[Ruthless]

JusticeMan,

Justice would be more precise if it were not precise. It's one of many of the Catch 22's of existence.

I thought I had done set you straight re: the tasting zoo.

btw, what is the "grill"?
Does it have anything at all to do with First or Second Base?

[JusticeMan]

"Justice would be more precise if it were not precise. It's one of many of the Catch 22's of existence."

Say what?

"btw, what is the "grill"?
Does it have anything at all to do with First or Second Base?"

Were we talking about baseball (or sex, for that matter)? The "grill" is someone's face.

[clark]

When guns are outlawed, only cats will have guns.

[Torquemada]

My name's Fido, I got an AK
Don't mess with my bitch, or I'll blow you away.

All you dumb humans better leave me alone
Or they'll be burying you like I bury a bone.

I'm quick on the trigger, I'm quick on the draw
You better think twice before you shoot my paw.

[Rob]

They charged the guy with felony animal cruelty.

So it's okay for me to stick a whitetail with an arrow, which, depending on shot placement, kills the deer within 5 minutes or 3 hours, but cruel to shoot a puppy in the head with a .38, killing it instantly?

Don't get me wrong, the guy's an idiot. An idiot for holding a loaded handgun and 3 squirming puppies at the same time.

[bain]

I'm just not seeing how this is funny or proves any significant point.

Unwanted puppies are frequently abandoned or put to death; the fact that a gun was used to kill them really has nothing to do with the Second Amendment. They could have been run over by a car or hit with a baseball bat. Or simply taken to the local shelter where they would have likely been euthanized.

Hopefully the four survivors will find loving homes...

[Shirley Knott]

The idiocy started with breeding dogs for which there was no hope of placing the resulting puppies. That is both idiotic and constitutive of animal abuse. Far more common than holding 3 squirming puppies and a loaded gun, and as idiotic.
Shirley Knott

[Jesse Walker]

bain: What makes the story "funny" (or "unusual," or maybe "cute," in a Bronson-meets-Benji way) isn't that someone used a gun to shoot some dogs. It's that one of the dogs shot back.

[TWC]

You want cruel? In the old days people tied unwanted puppies up in a burlap sack and dumped them in the nearest body of water (think Andrea Yates). I'm with Rob, I fail to see how instant death is animal cruelty.

Don't get me wrong though, I do think the guy is an idiot. He can't handle guns or dogs and you can't charge a person with being terminally stupid. So the authorities did the next best thing. Not very libertarian but certainly understandable.

[mobile]

It just goes to show that the environmentalists' best hope of advancing their agenda is to defend the right to arm bears.

[galleries-free]

galleries free