h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I think this is terrible also. I only have fish at the moment but in the past have had rabbits, hamsters, guinea pigs and Budgies. I think dogs and cats need a lot of looking after and I do not really like them that much but I would never be cruel to them.

I am an animal lover, at present i have three dogs who are all pets. They are taken out at least twice a day for long walks.
I really do get totally pissed off with so called animal lovers who have pets because they think this is what is what is expected from
their 2.5 children life.
Before you all get angry with me, all of my dogs have been rescued from the people i am talking aboult, plus i have helped even more animals.
I also know that children are abused, which i also petition against, but it seems in this soceity we live in its easier to help animals rather then abused children.
Sorry that i have been rather deep, but i have not had a good start to the week

They actually say there is more of an uproar when an animal is abused than a child ?
Surely people do not have a pet just because thay think it is cool.

at the moment in my local news there is a story about a woman with 15 children who is pregnant with her 16th child. she has just been arrested for child abuse where she hit one of her children with a pipe, when the child stated that she broke her leg the mother responded by saying she didn't and hit her again in the same spot
this is only the most recent of the child abuse stories i have heard about, there was the one with the father who left his undressed son in the cold woods while he went off to smoke crack, the ones who left their newborns in garbage cans and so on and so on....
is it just me or does the abuse seem to be getting worse? when i was younger there was abuse but it did not seem to be quite so often as it is now. both against children and pets...
monsy

Perhaps we just hear about it now and we did not in the past. I do sometimes wonder why people have children????? They perhaps do not realise how much work it is to look after children. They just see a baby in a pram and think I would like one of them, Then the reality hits home then it is to late. Probally it is the same with a pet oh I would like a little puppy and it grows into a large dog that need to be walked a lot e.c.t.

I also guess that abuse of children and animals has just become more and more public.
TV longs for such stories. They pay for being able to make some docu about it. In the past you would have never had the opportunity to get to know about such cases.

And about the help: I think it doesn't matter where you start. If you help a child or a dog or a budgie - any help is worth more than you can imagine. A friend of mine was in Greece these days. She saw a donkey being very thirsty, standing in the heat of midday. She organized a bucket of water and hurt herself when doing so (she fell into the river), but the donkey liked that water so much that she herself didn't mention the accident for she thought only:good that I could help. That's it. Little steps being important.

Yesterday I read something about cognitive ethology, that means that animals might think about their behaviour. I find the idea fascinating. Everyone who once had a pet (and I mean: who once had a beloved pet and not a toy) knows at least one story which has made him/her wonder about the intelligence of that animal.

We had two rabbits and I used to think they were not too bright. We felt it was a bit cruel to keep them in a little hutch, so my husband made a walkway across the garden with a run for the rabbits underneath. They used to have burrows and everthing which was great for them. We had wire so they could not get out or another animal could not get in. Well sometimes they managed to chew out and they could not manage to get back in. Or if you put them back in they did not remember where the hole was to get out again. I do not remember them doing anything very bright. My daughter had a rabbit when she was four and it used to run around the garden after her just like a dog, it was so funny to watch.