Comments on: The Public Hanging of a Circus Elephant

By: erica

erica — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 18:16:02 +0000

This is barbaric. The poor elephant was being tortured and like all others would have done, she snapped. I do agree with the desicion to put the animal to sleep, but not humiliate her and, make her suffer while you do it. She had no idea what she was doing, and if, she was treated properly, she would not have acted the way she did. Even the worst of human crinimals are not killed in such a way, they are slowly, but painlessly put to sleep by a lethal injection. We as humans should show mercy and let the animal do what the good Lord intended for it to do, roam free!

By: Choocher

Choocher — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 04:06:59 +0000

You’re just repeating yourself, like I did when I thought my first post wasn’t submitted. You’re not clear on my point – there is an appalling degree of unnecessary cruelty in the WAY animals are slaughtered. Your sophomoric retort [you're welcome] is that people need meat. If you think that excuses billions of chickens spending beakless existences in fetid cages where they never stretch their wings, that this kind of horror is perpetrated on untold numbers of animals on a daily basis, and that the sum total of this horror is eclipsed by a single elephant’s hanging, then you best reconsider.

By: Thomas Davie

Thomas Davie — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 15:38:50 +0000

Choocher, I’m sorry my ‘facile rejoinder’ was not clear enough for someone such as yourself to understand. By your own words the manner in which animals are killed is the concern of the article: it may well be true that the slaughter of thousands of animals for sustenance (not to ‘pad profit margins’ as your ‘facile rejoinder’ claims) constitutes the greatest act of animal cruelty in history. The point of the article was to show the needless barbarity of HANGING an animal in order to kill it, not to assess the rights and wrongs of eating meat. You dispute the fact that the purposeful hanging of a circus elephant is among the cruelest acts committed by humans?!?!? Animals are not hung from railroad cars 24/365. All clear now?

By: Choocher

Choocher — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 11:34:33 +0000

Killing animals for food is a separate issue, although whatever you think you can’t argue against the fact that eating other living things is a natural impulse. The point is that the animal was hung, a needlessly cruel and unusual punishment that is completely unnatural.

It’s the MANNER in which they’re killed I’m alluding to, Davie, horrifyingly cruelly for no more reason than to pad profit margins, although getting revenge is a natural impulse, too, to respond to your facile admonition. All clear now?

By: Choocher

Choocher — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 11:26:29 +0000

The issue is cruelty, and the cruelty exercised in killing animals for food each day eclipses the cruelty of killing one elephant. I wasn’t talking about whether it’s right or wrong to kill them, although revenge is a natural impulse too, to take your facile rejoinder into account. The conditions under which they’re killed, to deafening silence, for no more reason than to pad profit margins is where the cruelty lies. And THAT cruelty, compounded 24/365, beats killing one elephant. All clear now?

By: Vijay Prozak

Vijay Prozak — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 23:15:50 +0000

That sounds like retribution, not a solution — killing an elephant like that. We don’t even kill all humans who murder humans. We send them to expensive prisons, even though they’re no smarter than an elephant. Humanity is its own worst enemy.

By: Antiglobalism

Antiglobalism — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 21:46:19 +0000

When profit is the highest value in society, we exploit anything and anyone for money.

By: Thomas Davie

Thomas Davie — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 21:17:59 +0000

Killing animals for food is a separate issue, although whatever you think you can’t argue against the fact that eating other living things is a natural impulse. The point is that the animal was hung, a needlessly cruel and unusual punishment that is completely unnatural.

By: Choocher

Choocher — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 00:15:09 +0000

THAT’S one of the greatest acts of animal cruelty ever? For ages, people executed animals for crime, and the collective cruelty of getting the world’s meat to table every day eclipses the hanging of a pachyderm.