Ego Feeding Beasts

Do animals have feelings? This is the question that run through my head quite a few times in certain moments when I intuitively felt that they had and even when I simply had no clue and it is myself who always answered that question. Multiple times, so I can't forget it. The last time when I was touched by an animal's feelings was when a friend of mine left the town, after his vacation, and headed back to Sweden with his golden retriever named Chilli.

Chilli is in my opinion the most selfish dog I have ever met. He lives only for himself. Period. He never ever does anything to please anyone, but he has also has feelings, as almost all the animals, and he proved those to me when he left. When I was saying good bye to them he came from the back seat of the car to the front seat and licked my hand. Something that he never did before that for me was nothing else than a simple good bye and a confirmation that "he knows me" and he had to salute me somehow, knowing also that he is leaving. That was a thing that touched me and reminded me again that animals have feelings too. Some of them even seem to have more than we have...and this is where the post suddenly transform into a rant, so, if you are not in the mood for this type shit "swipe to the right* and you will get a bonus. Three minutes of your life will be saved from resonating with my sadness and anger.

Yesterday I watched a video of two tigers that lived almost their entire life in dirty cages like prisoners and were rescued by a foundation that built an enclosure for them in the wild and even made them a pool so they can experiment the feeling of taking a bath and what a joy was to see them taking that first bath and how they "tasted" the water and "digged with their paws" in it. It was the same feeling that you get when you see a child playing without labeling the situation in any way and call it in anyhow. Until the video finished...Then I started labeling and judging in my imagination.

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Yeah, I labeled the ones that got those tigers living in dirty cages as beasts. Nothing more than that because that much cruelty they manifested would make a tiger seem just like a kitty cat. A tiger only shows his cruelty when he feeds himself and his cubs and even then it is the nature expressing through him, but such persons that put animals in dirty prisons for years or maybe for their entire life manifest a different type of cruelty. One that has nothing to do with nature. One that only feeds their ego and a worthless pride. Because that's the only reason I would imagine someone would kidnap an animal from its natural environment and enclose him into a cage just to have him at his disposal and show of with him ocasionally.

Such situations happen with different species of animals, but very often I noticed that it's the exotic ones that end in cages to feed some rich sicko's dirty ego. You can't show off with a rabbit don't you, so, you'd better get yourself a lion or a tiger to do that. And, unfortunately, it's not happening only in the US or UAE to see such exotic pets living "the human life". In my own country there have been also several cases of such animals being captive inside cages at rich men's mansion. So this seems to be a world wide spread mental disease. Yeah, I consider it a disease as it is against the human nature to kidnap and what they do is kidnapping and condemning some poor souls to suffering.

The question now is what should authorities do to stop such practices? In my opinion the enforcement of harsher punishments for such behavior would be a quick solution and that's the "clean one". I can imagine quite a few others also, but there's no need for myself to become a beast..now. Not even in my imagination. Plus I don't consider that the mentality of "eye for eye and tooth for tooth" is still a trend so I am going to only wish for harsher laws to frighten such bests that keep captive animals for years to stay away from such practices. Maybe if they would spend some time in captivity(prisons of course) would at least intuitively understand the suffering of those animals and never do that again.

Making the story a bit brighter at the end and taking your attention away from suffering I will tell that if I was a tycoon and an animal lover at the same time I would rather sponsor a foundation that takes care of such animals rather than bring them to my home and keep them in suffering as my pets just to feed my ego. I see this as the perfect way of showing your love towards animals and also a way of showing off, if you really feel like. You can take your wealthy friends to a tour there and show them "what you did" for those poor animals and what a great man you are. Maybe they'll makes some small donation also if you know how to tackle their feelings.

Thanks for your attention,
Ace