The Michael Vick Law

Michael Vick, a known dog fighter, bought a puppy and was allowed to. This sickens me to my stomach, and it can be so easily fixed:

Make a law that would make it illegal for someone convicted of any animal cruelty offence (whether just beating them or fighting them) to purchase or adopt an animal, especially the one that they were convicted of abusing.

This is a mind-numbingly simple solution that will solve all kinds of problems: there is no chance that the convict will be able to legally obtain an animal that s/he could abuse, the convict learns responsibility for their actions, and the media will not be in an uproar when a dog fighter strolls out the door of a shelter with a brand-new puppy.

Of course there are still problems: the life of a fighting dog may not be glamorous, but certainly it would be better than one getting euthanized? Wrong. Fighting dogs are taken young, and so any family would be eager to take it and give it a loving home. Instead, its tail and ears are docked without anesthesia and it is taught how to be aggressive. If the animal is "saved" from the dog fighting, it may be too aggressive to trust humans and will have to be euthanized then.

And then there's the uproar from the pro-dog fighters. Vick actually got support for training dogs to basically kill each other. Apparently dog fighting is like hunting. In the latter, humans go out into the woods for pure sport and attempt to show their skill by killing an animal that is plentiful and wild. The meat is usually either eaten directly or given to someone to eat, and the skin can be used for clothing or economical purposes through taxidermy. (I'm not endorsing hunting, mind you. I'm sure that will be a lengthy rant soon). In the former, a puppy is taken and trained to kill anything its sight. One day when it grows up it will face something bigger and stronger and will be killed. The body is thrown away and another dog is raised for the same fate. Sounds exactly the same to me.

Another argument for dog fighting is that it's a dog fighter's business if he wants to pit two canines against each other for money. But the thing is, when it involves another living thing and the difference between life and death, it isn't his business anymore. It becomes a case of right and wrong. If he got it from a specific shelter, it becomes the business of a shelter when they learn that somebody is using one of their animals for malevolent purposes. It becomes the problem of those that the dog comes into contact with during the brutal training process. Bottom line, it's not just his business if he wants to raise animals to kill.

Yet another argument is that dogs fighting will happen. Yes, but there is a difference between two feral dogs who have never known humans fighting each other over a scrap of meat and a dog with a home being beaten into submission and learning to hate and attack living things. In the former, the dog knows that this is the way of life and how they will live. In the latter, they were forcibly made to believe that at a young age.

These arguments are inherently flawed and show a lack of respect for all forms of life. If we simply add the law above, everything would be better.

(P.S. How's that for a lengthy rant?)

Profanity vs. Vulgarity

If there are two words that are less interchangeable than "done" and "finished" or "can" and "may", they would be "profanity" and "vulgarity". They are not the same. Would you like me to emphasize that more?

Profanity: Classified as anything against the Second Commandment. For those of you unfamiliar with Christianity and/or Judaism, that would mean anything that can be used in reference to God or hell. According to any religion that follows the Ten Commandments, these would be legitimately wrong.

Vulgarity: Average words that society has attached a false stigma to. They are technically "wrong" to say in public in that, as mentioned, society has attached a false stigma to them and so if you use them you can appear crude and uncivilized, but they bear no real meaning and cannot actually get you in trouble.

Also, for any of you who have been worried that my rants weren't lengthy as promised, don't worry. I'm just getting warmed up. Wait until I get to a topic that I can really rant about.

The Only Beasts of the Southern Wild are the Humans

I'm not a total animal-rights activist. I support zoos licensed by the AZA, and I eat turkey burgers--quite frequently, actually. But I'm also opposed to circuses, wouldn't eat a cow, deer, or pig to save my life, and am firmly opposed to hunting, furs, and irresponsible breeders. Last night I saw Beasts of the Southern Wild after getting it on Netflix to see for myself what it was like and was horribly distressed at what I saw.

I assume you're familiar with the story, since, you know, it was nominated for Best Picture, the little girl (Quvenzhane Wallis) was the youngest person to be nominated for Best Actress, yadda yadda. If not, let me recap: A girl named Hushpuppy (Wallis) lives with her abusive father in the Bathtub, a Louisiana bayou community. A storm comes and all hell breaks loose. People die. Homes are flooded. Meanwhile, Hushpuppy's father is dying and creatures called "aurochs" (which actually existed; however, the movie portrays them as fuzzy, carnivorous boars; in real life, they were gentle cows) are invading.

The aurochs were the only CGI animals, however. In one scene, Hushpuppy's father is showing her how to fish with her hands. He pulls a fish out of the water and shows her how to hit it on the head. In other scenes, giant amounts of fish and lobster are shown writhing with piles of each other around. An owl is shown in a cage. A horse is tied to a tree. Random chickens are squeezed by Hushpuppy and held to her head. Two crabs, already dead, are broken in half and have the juice sucked out of them. Multiple alligators are shown and killed, including one being put into something reminiscent of butterfly shrimp. They have little to no purpose in the story. This was merely to give it a few extra minutes so that it actually looked like a movie instead of a too-long short film.

I'd rather it be a too-long short film.