Hi,
I can not get the program out of my mine. Did you see it? Bear's were kept in small crates,
they can't even turn over.
With tubes in there stomacks draining the bile out, into bottles for chinese medicine.
They were chewing the bars, and crying. They spend all there life in the crates.
They couldn't move in any direction! It upset me so much I couldn't watch all of it.
Why are people so cruel!

Regards
Denese

They are brought up to see animals in a different way to us. 

My Kiwi friend can't understand why I have a dog as a pet as in NZ they are mostly used for working only. 

Vegetarians don't agree that we should eat animals so it's difficult to judge others by our own standards. 

Denise,

You could argue the same thing with the welfare of donkeys in arabic countries. The dreadful pictures of a donkey and cart which is piled nearly five times the donkey's size in hay or sticks (whatever the donkey may be pulling). It's horrific that they think it's ok for a donkey to drop dead in the road while pulling it's load. Sometimes they even kick and beat at the donkey/mule to get up.

I too agree with you that this is an obscene way to keep animals. And it may be ok for people in NZ to not understand why we have dogs as pets but the majority of the world have domesticated dogs whereas only a small majority keep and treat animals in the many ways you and I have mentioned.

It's shocking that we deal with these backwards countries on a daily basis in MY OPINION.

NB the capital letters in "my opinion" are there to prevent people having malicious go.

>NB the capital letters in "my opinion" are there to prevent people having malicious go.

Not feeling paranoid by any chance are you? :D :D

the point about NZ was just to illustrate that even a "westernised" country can have differing opinions on what animals should be kept for.  Many NewZealanders do not understand why so many of us keep dogs as pets.

IMO how some countries treat their animals is not that surprising when you see how they treat their people and that is why we should perhaps, keep dealing with these countries.

I agree entirely and yes, i am feeling extremely paranoid :D

Back to dealing with these countries day in, day out - I believe we are dealing with them for all the wrong reasons. And all the wrong reasons is business. Even though money makes the world go round I think our politicians should take one step back, look at the picture and think "hang on - these people are suffering from famine, AIDS is killing someone every three seconds and their families have lost innocent lives due to us blowing up the wrong places - and what are we dealing with them for...
the price of oil because we are supposedly running out".

With all due respect to the guys who run our decently civilized countries, I think we should stop dealing with these countries on business terms but try it on humoral rights - just for one week and what a change I believe it would make...

Clearly there is lots of political and diplomatic work to be done to help a lot of these countries but I'm sure they would all rather be trading that receiving charity.

I think you're wrong. If it wasn't for charity then they wouldn't be where they are now.

I'm no charity expert but I have supplied (such a small number - i'm embarrassed to say it :D) five old tractors to three different countries in Africa. They weren't state of the art, turbo, air-conditioned tractors I admit, but the main thing is, they were receiving a tractor for the village in which to help with farming. Possibly saving a few lives of their animals and possibly even younger children

I very much doubt that if they had traded their crops would they have been able to afford a tractor or anything else that has been donated to them by charity as western countries quite simply rip the a**e out of those countries not as better of as us.

Well it is a contentious issue that is for sure and if there was an easy answer I am sure someone would have found it by now. 

Well done to you for the supply of tractors though. They might have been old but I bet the villagers considered them on par with Rolls Royces :)

I don't think I am wrong :)  I think you have misread what I said which was that they would prefer to trade rather than receive charity.  Of course charity is still necessary largely because earlier "charity" was in the form of loans with interest to be paid :(  No, I doubt selling a few crops would buy a tractor but even being given one doesn't help when you don't have the assets to fuel or maintain it either.  The answer lies in recognising and maximimising a countries assests be it agriculture, tourism, oil, minerals, IT, off shore service industries whatever and good governance and security to ensure all the population benefits.  It is complicated and difficult stuff and governments use a barrage of advisors to try to get to the bottom of this but I don't think any Western Government is of the view that we should stop "dealing" with these less advantaged countries.

Also it's only through any sort of interaction that we find out what is happening in some of these countries.  I do agree that sometime Western governments have their own hidden agendas but at the end of the day pulling out and letting the poorer countries get on with it doesn't solve anything either.

I don't think the agendas are all that hidden :), we want oil and we want our own security from terrorism but providing seeking these things improves the lot of the common man in these countries I don't see why what we stand to gain should be an issue especially in this modern world of communication when the NGO's will tend to report back on the human rights issues and as to whether benefits are reaching the common man thus not just leaving it up to Goverments to behave in humanitarian ways ;)

No agendas are not all that hidden and this is why people kick up when they are expected to believe some cock and bull story i.e. WMD.

Well it's wandering away from the charity requirements of the third world a bit :) but I don't think WMD was a cock and bull story or at least it was believed in good faith because of the intelligence available which was never going to be that good due to the difficulties of obtaining it.  I suppose we could have just waited to see ;)

Have to go to work now :rolleyes:

They also use strings of wire in their mouths instead of bits. The donkeys end up with horrendous cut mouths.

http://www.gambiahorseanddonkey.org.uk/Pages/donkeybit.htm

The fact remains that in many countries animals are seen as tools, not pets.  Furthermore as many owners of these animals live a hand to mouth existence they cannot afford to have sick animals etc as they do not have a replacement or another choice of transport etc.

I think that one should not necessarily assume that these owners consciously think it is "ok for a donkey to drop dead etc" but rather that a) they have a different outlook on life and b) it is ignorance.

If, for example, we followed your suggestion tartan tale and refused to deal with such cultures/nations etc we are then removing the ability to offer assistance, education and medical intervention, therefore the animals would be doubly handicapped as it were.

Whilst we may be appalled at some of the conditions/treatment that we see meted out to animals in other countries I think we need to remind ourselves that if we in the UK etc were without stain there would not need to be charities such as the RSPCA etc etc and we have a great deal of pre meditated, malicious cruelty in this country as the media will attest.  We are supposed to be "civilised" but those animals that are a "luxury" and bought purely for pleasure etc are equally badly treated here and elsewhere.

Charities such as the Brooke Hospital exist to educate owners and give animals care and respite and conditions are gradually improving in many areas.

Cruelty to animals exists everywhere just as cruelty to children etc does....... we just have to keep on trying to raise awareness and educate.

Its wrong what people do to their animals in different countries and although alot of it is ignorance some is the pure fact that they dont care.The working dogs may not be kept as pets but then again they are not misstreated,starved and abused.Alot of animals are used as working animals.Sled dogs in the artic,cows in India etc etc but these people realise that if their animals get sick or die then they loose the chance to earn a living so they tend to care about the animals welfare.When you take into consideration how long it takes to train a dog to herd sheep its not worth letting it come to any harm and having to retrain another in its place.