Seriously.. the fuck is wrong with people?

This morning I was getting the mail before going to drop off a package at UPS and these two dogs came trotting up to me. They were soaked from the rain last night and filthy. The one chocolate lab (Hannah) looked fairly decent, still normal in build but the white one, I think he's a husky (Zeus), was shaven down to skin and bones (some skin which I could see along his belly and haunches) and he had a catheter in what looked like old bandages stuck in his leg.

I didn't recognize them right away and was nervous as my boyfriend shooed them off, but as we headed down to the store I felt so awful for doing that when they obviously just needed help. They had both approached with hopeful eyes and slightly hunched shoulders - absolutely no hint of aggression. So when I got back home, having thought of a hunch of whose pet Zeus was, I went down to the house where I thought he lived. Sure enough, both of them were on the porch curled up but came near when I approached, both shivering and whimpering a little.

I was so upset that I called my gram for ideas on what to do after repeatedly trying to see if anyone was home (and inside was a well cared for little ankle biter) and after talking to a neighbor who had apparently called the dog warden at least 3 or 4 times because she'd seen Zeus tied to a tree for days with no one home and constantly seen them out and about on their own wandering without being fed. I myself have come across Zeus before on my walks, he's an absolute sweetheart. It broke my heart to see him like that.

So I wound up going to my gram's to get some dog food and bowls, I went back down and fed them and called the dog control in the area after talking to my vet. Were it not for the legal ramifications of it I would have just taken the two to my vet and paid for it myself. The warden came and was very familiar with them, he'd never seen Zeus look so bad. He's taking them to Stray Haven to be looked at and to talk directly to the animal cruelty officer in the area in the hopes that their owners will not get them back this time.

As far as I know, I believe my mother has a bit of a plan to possible try to adopt them if she can (though I'm not sure how well it would fly).


So, my dears, have you ever found an animal like this and had to do anything about it? Did you even have the courage to do it even knowing you'd get into large fights with someone over it?

My parents once called Animal Control about some horses that were being starved on a nearby piece of land. They looked just awful. Honestly, nobody's quite sure whether it got taken care of in a good way... the horses are just gone.

At the shelter I volunteer at, we recently had someone abandon a six-week-old puppy in a styrofoam cooler in front of the door, with a note that just said "Sick puppy, help ASAP." It's lucky that someone brought him in before he spent too much time out in the sun. The only thing wrong with him was a worm infestation...

Doomfishy, that's awful, both stories. :( I hate seeing scrawny horses. It really makes me want to cry. As for puppies, whenever I take trips into chicago, i'm constantly seeing boxes with kittens or puppies on them that say 'take me home' or 'free'. I've taken puppies home on multiple accounts, a lot of farmers around here love having new dogs for their kids or kittens to help with the mice population.

It's mostly kittens getting abused around here. There was one we found in an alley last summer that only had one eye and some kind of skin disease although I'm not sure what. I'm allergic to certain cats and broke out in a rash as soon as I touched this one but I got him into a box and took him home. I have a friend that took him to a shelter, I'm not sure what happened to him after that. It just breaks my heart to see animals left or abused. :(

However, I did call animal control on my sister's neighbors once. They'd had a dog that sat on their front porch for four days when i was staying with her for a week. There was never food or water put out for him and he looked horrible. I was constantly bringing him over food and he really scarfed it down. Not really sure what happened in that case either, the people moved away a few months later.

Where I live, there were three kids who cut the paws off little kittens, took them to the SPCA and said the paws "fell off" They got caught though. i adopted one of the kittens.

nya.. thats horrible..! i seriously cannot understand people who can abuse animals and not feel anything about it..
In iran there's a lot of animal cruelty.. when i was a kid i remember finding a little chick wandering down the street.. turned out it was one that the neighbor had bought for a holiday.. these particular neighbors had never really liked my family, though I'm not sure why. My grandfather and I then walked down to their house to return the chick, and he let me walk in first to give the chick to them.. they didn't know who i was related to cause i was only visiting, and the lady took the chick, but as soon as she saw my grandfather she she threw the chick at the wall, and it broke its neck.. T_T i was really young, so it kinda scarred me.. >_>

I haven't seen any animals like that yet, But if i did I would of taken them home with me and had my mom help me with what to do with them, We use to rescue dogs and we had some that where in horrible condition, But a few months later, they were.. roly poly weenier doggies. literally. You could nudge them and they'd be like... "You fed me, Now pet me." and start poking you with their nose. x.x

The thing wrong with most people and animals is they think taking care of them is no big deal and they have expandable lives. which they don't. I wish people understood that, maybe if they did they'd take better care of them and love them even more knowing they are just cute creatures with souls that want to be loved.

My dog spends every single one of her waking hours either focused on me, or willing to be focused on me if I so much as call her name. I don't think it's much to ask that I take care of her and spend at least a few of those hours focused on her in return.

That's what I don't get about people; I don't think they know what dogs are supposed to be. You can't just play feed them or play with them when you want to, it has to be about their desires and needs, too.

Even if they don't hurt or neglect animals outright, there is a fundamental problem with the way a LOT of people see their pets. A lot of our shelter dogs get returned, and the reasons for it are usually not serious behavioral issues.

- Birdie was left home alone, without a crate or kennel, for almost the full day, every day. She got bored and chewed on everything. Rather than kenneling her and taking her for long walks before and after work, or finding a "doggie daycare," her owners chained her up outside, where she "destroyed the yard" with her pacing, having been left nothing else to do. Then it was back to the shelter.

- Norville was brought back after his owners found out he wasn't fully potty trained. They couldn't be bothered to train him, so they dumped him back off at the shelter and threatened to file a small claims suit for the vet bills incurred while they had him (he had some dental issues).

- Lily was brought back after she wouldn't stop "barking at the birds" in the backyard.

All of these problems are normal behaviors with dogs that could have been solved with research, exercise and training. Their owners were committed enough to pick out the dog and pay the $75, but not patient enough to accept their problems and work with their new pets.

You get this a lot if you spend much time at a shelter - people want a dog, any dog: as long as it's purebred and well-behaved. Well, good luck with that! You want a well-behaved dog, you have to make a well-behaved dog.

One of my friends saw some horses that looked like they were starving, so she stopped and got out of the car to take some pictures for proof. Then a truck pulled up with a horse trailer behind it. It was animal control, they'd been on the people's case for months and were finally seizing the horses. The people came home in the middle of it and they were so upset that their horses were getting taken away, but they'd been warned so many times and apparently they mostly only fed their horses moldy straw. Not hay, but straw. Ridiculous. It's sad how long the process can take to get the animals out of those kinds of environments.

My family has called animal control on one family for abuse and another for neglect...the dog was in a small cage in the yard all day and they didn't give him food or water. Luckily both those families didn't really want the animals and agreed to relinquish them to animal control right away.

Those reasons for returning animals are really shocking Doomfishy. I volunteer for a shelter too, but I usually work in the records room or directly with the animals, so I don't have to deal with people who do that. I guess at least they're returning the dog rather than going on treating the animal terribly. At the shelter I volunteer for there's a clause in the contract obligating people to return the animal if they decide they don't want it.

My newest kitten, Trixie, we got from the shelter the next town over that takes in abused or unwanted animals to adopt out. She was 2 months old when we got her, with parasites, ear mites, an infection, and she had been starved. So when we got her home, she got even sicker because every time we gave her food, she would inhale it thinking that she would be left without food for so long again. She's gotten better, and we took her to the vet the next few days and got her treated for all the stuff she had. But even now, she's still smaller than she should be, and they think it's because of the malnutrition when she was tiny.

Then, around here there are dogs in just about every house. And the neighbors right next to my bed room, and the ones on the other side of the house leave the dogs out all the time, sometimes even all night. And they bark because they want to be let in. Even in the rain they are kept out there, and the ones next to my bedroom also have cats that they leave outside all the time and don't let in.

We've called animal control, but they said that you have to have 2 other households sign that they've seen/heard it too, but pretty much my whole neighborhood is friends, so they wont sign. ><;

I have 3 cats and 2 dogs and 2 aquariums.
My cat, Lucy was a i guess the smallest of the litter, she used to follow my mother around so one day i just bundled her up and brought her to our home for her birthday.
My neighbours's children did not like it as to them it was their plaything. They came up to our house and said that we should release Lucy and send her back where she was before!
My mother refused very aggressively.

I have seen dogs (pedigreed) being left out in the area when their owners go away and i always take them to Frendicos (an NGO for animals) but since Frendicos does not have a very good generation of income (they spend almost all of it on animals, getting shots, food etc. for all the animals and giving free treatment to pets as well), they are very reluctant on keeping more strays in their homes.

I've never come across any really sickly strays, or abandoned pets that I can think of. So that I'm thankful for. But, after hearing that people will just put animals in containers-boxes, bags ect.- I always check, to make sure there are no poor little critter in there.
x' D


@ Beetle ::

How freaking stupid can people get.
Apendages don't just "fall off" for no reason.
Crepes....How old were the kids, and did all the kittens find homes?

@Popcorn Gun: They were all under 9. It makes me wonder how they were brought up. One of the kittens I adopted, they other ones went to loving homes.

A lot of times in situations like these, if you talk to the owner directly, without being accusatory, they more than happy to give you their dogs, in my own experience and in a couple of similar accounts I've read.

A lot of people in my area have what they call "outside dogs". These animals get left outside, chained or kenneled because the families that own them want dogs but don't want to take the time to train them to stay of the furniture or don't want to deal with the mess that comes with pets. I just can't see how you can buy an animal just to leave it outside and only give it attention when you happen to go outside.

I know it's not as bad as some other forms of abuse, but it's still bad. I adopted a dog not to long ago and he had lived outside all his life. When I first brought him home, he was skinny, with a shaggy coat and his tail looked like a disaster. Now he's fat, has a nice glossy coat and full tail. He's such a cuddle-bug and loves to lounge on the furniture. I'm pretty sure he enjoys his new lifestyle much more than the last one. I think living outside has also effected him in that he is terrified of thunderstorms. He hides under the furniture and a few times he was shaking because he was scared so much.

@ Beetle ::

That's really a shame.
How could you be so rotten to any living creature?
I hope the parents stepped up after that incident, AND that they find some
better, more constructive ways to pass the time.
Poor kittens.
At least they all found good homes.
:' )
How many (not including the one you adopted) were there?


@ Sho-Shonojo ::

I don't like the whole "outside dog" concept much, either.
To me, if you bought the dog, you should want to love it and take good care of it.
Even IF you got it as a guard dog, puppy still needs love.
:' )

That is so sad.. The poor BBs. D:
I haven't seen anything like that before or it would break my heart.
I wouldn't even care if someone got mad at me for it, I would take the dogs in and give them a nice bath and give them food and lovin's.
I can't stand how people can be so cruel to animals just because they can't really defend themselves.. It makes me want to do the exact same thing to them. D:

I would definitely take those kids and cut off their hands if it wouldn't get me thrown into jail. xD
Just saying.

@popcorn gun: Those are my thoughts exactly. Who gets a dog so they can leave it outside? What is the point. Last night it was raining and I could hear my neighbors dogs barking outside. :| WTH.

I used to work at animal control in a few other cities. I've seen some pretty sad things. I think the worst thing that comes to mind is when someone brought in a kitten that was around 6 weeks old that had severe burns all over its body. Apparently the man that had the kitten was mad that it scratched his pant leg and thought it was okay to punish the kitten by burning it on his stove. The kitten was in such bad shape that it had to be put to sleep.

Another case of abuse that really got to me is the lady that I got my iguana from. She had him in a 10 gallon tank with no lighting and she was trying to feed him crickets. Iguanas NEED heat and UV lighting to live and they only eat plants, no insects at all. He was so skinny and dehydrated when I got him I wasn't sure if he was even going to make it. She wanted to give him up because her daughter got tired of him and he was not eating. The reasons he would not eat were because he was cold and dehydrated and he had mites. Luckily now the mites are gone and he's a fat happy iggy.

I've got a lot more but those two are the ones that bothered me most seeing them. What people do to animals does not surprise me any more. I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who does something about it.

I just read an article on Pharyngula about a sadistic 17-year-old girl who tossed her ex-roommate's kitten in the oven and turned on the heat. She called it a "joke."

When the cat was finally removed, she was so badly burned that a necropsy had to be performed to figure out that she was female.

Sociopaths often start with helpless animals and work their way up to human prey. I wouldn't be surprised if she ends up being a suspect for child abuse or serial crime in the future.

I used to know some kids when I was younger who would to treat their animals like toys. Hauling cats from the ground into trees by means of some rope around their front legs, laughing as they struggled and miaowed. Not bothering to get them medical attention for any injuries they ever attained... ):

Originally Posted by Sho-Shonojo

I just can't see how you can buy an animal just to leave it outside and only give it attention when you happen to go outside.

My family has an outside dog. She's a mad little mutt of a thing, a cross between a Jack Russell and a Fox Terrier. And while it's true that part of why she stays outside is the mess she makes-- chewing everything, stealing socks, going through the bins, peeing on the carpet, and she's about eight now rather than a puppy...-- it's also because with her breed it would simply be cruel to have her inside all the time. She sleeps inside at night, and comes in when we're up to trying to keep her still, or when there are fireworks, or storms.

She spends all her time running in circles around our garden, which is more than big enough for her, barking at birds (and shadows), and napping in the sun. When it's cold, we put dog jumpers on her, and she's got a kennel right near the door that's wind-proof and has a sheepskin blanket inside. She gets walked at least once a day, attention multiple times a day (though she usually gets bored after five minutes and wanders off unless you have food), and weekend mornings she spends curled up at my mother's feet looking content.

But some dogs just aren't inside dogs. As long as you give them enough attention, have a large enough yard, and let them in at night, I can't see where the problem is.

I once saw a rescued cat at the pet store that absolutely broke my heart. Its owner had let one of its eyes rot out and there was nothing but an empty socket left. If I hadn't been a broke college student at the time, I would have probably very much considered adopting it.

I know that most other people wouldn't adopt a cat like that, but it just so happens that I already have one one-eyed cat. One of our neighbors shot her with a pellet gun while she was still in our own yard. The eye is still there, but it's white-blind. She's lived with it for years, and the jerk got away with shooting her. He swore he was shooting at a raccoon, and she does sort of look like one, but I know that he has abused animals before. He's a somewhat unstable person.

My sister's cat was poisoned with antifreeze once. We were able to save her though. A little known fact is that ethanol (drinking alcohol) inhibits the effect of antifreeze in the body. It was close, but my sister and I kept the cat warm and dropped sake and milk down her throat, and she eventually came around.

There were 5 kittens. I got a call from people who adopted them, They are happy and recovering well.

Thankfully, I've never seen an animal in such distress, so I have never had the need to call animal control. But I'm a dog lover, as is the rest of my family, and we tend to be nice to any stray dog that comes near us (unless its viciously trying to attack our dogs... which has happened), giving them food and water.

Stray dogs are very common where we live, but thankfully they lead good life's. Here dogs go around in packs, living off the generosity of people and household dogs. They are not savage, and tend to follow you around the neighborhood if your walking. Personally I'd much rather let them live their lives than to call the pound and have them killed (put to sleep) a few weeks later.

I noted you talk of guard dogs. I use to have a pair of "guard dogs", if you so call them. But to say they lived an awful life just because they were outside? No, not at all! We spoiled them rotten. I think people have the wrong misconception about what it is to be a "guard dog". My dogs were huge, and my house was tiny. They were extremely hyperactive and hard to manage inside, so we usually kept them outside in the backyard. But that doesn't mean they didn't come inside. When there were puppy's they slept inside, when there were storms, really cold nights (we live in a desert, no snow), or when the female had puppies. I would put ice in their water every day, and during the summer several times a day! XD

Oh... and they ate like gods. They were so fat....

They were very shy about being indoors. They would come in and enjoy it, but soon get tired and want out.

Aww! That is very sweet of you. Poor animals can't help themselves, they depend on people to help them & still some don't. It's so sad. My family & I are very caring for animals. We have 5 dogs right now, 1 cat, & 1 baby bird that my sister found under a tree (fallen out of his nest). I have seen a few animal cruelty cases. Cats are wandering around, in the pouring rain, (with a name tag) trying to get back into the house. There are a few neighbors that leave their 2 beautiful dogs out on the porch, they run away sometimes & we have rescued them twice. & both times their fur was matted. And when we returned them, the owner didn't even really care. All he said was 'okayy, you can put them in the yard' There was no thank you, not even a sign that he cared that they were out all night, & very filthy...

I was so disappointed in the way he treated his pets. :( && If I had the choice, I would adopt every single animal in the shelter :]

The thought of what people do to animals angers me.
I don't want to read anybody else's posts because it makes me hurt. Dx

Anyways, my little brother had friends who used to melt plastic onto frogs to hear them scream..
I think that's really sick..
People do crap like that all the time and it just bothers me.