How cruel are human beings?

[malaise]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/west_midlands/6566935.stm

I'm ashamed to be one.

<snip>
A man has been jailed for four months after admitting organising dog fights at his home in Birmingham. He was one of several people arrested during a massive RSPCA operation last year.

n Friday Adio Clarke, 28, pleaded guilty to ownership of a dog fighting venue, causing dogs to fight, possession of 11 pitbulls and three cases of causing unnecessary suffering.

"He had turned one room in the house into a ring simply by removing the furniture. There were bloodstains all over the walls," he said.

[Fresh_Start]

1. Apparently 'humanity' is another Orwellian term.

We think it means milk of human kindness, when in fact it means cruelty virtually unknown in any other part of the animal kingdom

[valerief]

16. Well, the dogs doing the fighting weren't exactly lovey dovey either.

But I get your point.

[porphyrian]

2. How long is a piece of string?

Don't lament the cruelty of others, show an alternative by example.

[Duer 157099]

3. To answer your question

As cruel as you can imagine. And then some.

It's weird isn't it?

[ThomCat]

4. Nothing else in all the world even comes close

to the deliberate cruely we inflict simply for pleasure and convenience. x(

[democraticrevolution]

6. Mankind is deeply flawed

Look at what we've done over the centuries.....

Look at what we're doing to this planet....

I hate to get all Hobbesian here, but we do a lot that is wrong.

All I can do is my part to fight for what's right..................

[Rosemary2205]

7. Well not exactly

Female praying mantis eats it's husband.

Very few of us go that far. :)


IMHO humans aren't necessarily any more vicious than the rest of nature.

[ThomCat]

10. Key word = deliberately

A Praying Mantis is following instinct, not choice.

There is no animal, insect or creature of any kind that chooses to have wars, vendettas, mass murders and genocides over abstract ideas.

Nothing else in nature chooses to deliberately exterminate or enslave other species in vast quantities

[Rosemary2205]

12. I saw a thing last night about chimps

they had more than enough food for everyone, plenty of habitat, but still raided each other's camps, killed the kids and actually ate the babies they killed.

Ant colonies routinely attack and kill off other ant colonies in mass quantities.

Yes, I know we are a disgusting species. With that I agree. But IMHO our violent instincts, wars, vendettas etc, can also be seen in the animal world. Yes, it would be nice if we could function at a higher level but I think the animal part of us causes problems for us too.

Just MHO.

[malaise]

18. Or is entertained by watching

other animals fighting.

[rainy]

5. Over all I'd have to say we are complete failures. We can't keep guns out of the

hands of our youth, we are distroying our home, our planet for personal wealth and greed, we allow corporations to control our actions and the way we raise our children, we allow our sons and daughters to fight in wars that are for the benifit of war profiteers, we are blind to the suffering of the poor all around us and so on and so on.

[TahitiNut]

8. That's about a 4 on the human depravity scale, sadly enough.

:cry:

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

9. We're the "top" of the evolutionary ladder only because we tell ourselves we are.

[AndyA]

11. Have you ever watched Animal Planet?

There's a show on there that travels around with the Animal Rescue people in different cities.

It's such a contrast: to see the loving, caring dedicated workers who will do anything to rescue an endangered animal, whether it be trapped or in a bad home.

I can't believe what some people do to their animals. It's just shameful.

On one show, a judge told the pet owner: "I wish I could impose more punishment on you. What I have seen here is very disturbing, and frankly I don't understand how you could bear to show your face in public after abusing a dog the way you have.

I strongly suggest that you NEVER have a pet OF ANY KIND again. Period. I am going to flag this case, and if I ever see your name on a court docket again for something of this nature, I will personally see to it that you never be given the opportunity to charged with the care of an animal again. Have I made myself perfectly clear?"

The woman, I am sure, literally crapped her pants. The look on her face was priceless, but I was very upset by this story. Her dog was malnourished, had been chained up in the back yard with no food or water, with a heavy chain around its neck. It had become so tight that the dog was literally strangling, and the skin around its neck where the chain was located was a raw, bloody mess. The dog was in tremendous pain.

It found a good home, though, and a few months later seemed to be happy and well adjusted.

Pets only want to be loved, and love in return. They are not normally born vicious. They learn that from people.

I too am often ashamed to be a human. I love my pets more than most people, because they are kind and caring. People very often are not.

[bobbolink]

14. To bad there aren't "rescue teams" for people who are abused.

[BuelahWitch]

25. What do you call Child Protection Services?

There are welfare agencies that cover seniors and handicapped adults too.

Animals can't speak for themselves and are at the mercy of humans.

[bryant69]

13. We are all bastards

If you boiled out all the niceness of the human race, removed it and distilled it, well, you'd barely notice the difference.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[AZBlue]

15. I hate to say it, but the American culture is one of the worst.

That's obviously not to say there aren't horrible people in other countries and horrible things don't happen outside the U.S.

But, we praise and applaud bullies, angry people, violent games, gory movies, and so on without any balance or discussion. No wonder it's all so messed up.

[Bobbieo]

17. No America is not the worst culture for inhumantiy - here's the worst!!!

Edwin Tholley wasn't yet ten years old when rebel bosses first injected cocaine into his face, a quick way to get it surging ito his brain.

The wanted him high - an unthinking, vicious little warrior for their campaign of terror in Sierra Leone.

From today's Arizona Republic - I don't have the link

[AZBlue]

20. Wow.

That's horrific.

No, we're not the worst. Maybe it's more accurate to say we're one of the worst for a country without a rebellion or internal conflict going on? It's just that violence is so prevelant here - perhaps individual instances aren't the worst, but when you add it all up, it's not good.

[Igel]

19. You heard about the guy in New York that tortured a

Columbia co-ed for 19 hours? Raped her, slit her eyelids, etc., etc., then set her futon on fire and fled? (She used the fire to burn through her bonds, and escaped.)

Think overlapping bell curves: For cruelty, there are many in the middle of only moderate and attenuated cruelty, with outliers that are very cruel or very not cruel. Same for compassion. You're very unlikely to get somebody who's both very cruel and very compassionate (although I think I knew one), or neither cruel nor compassionate.

[CrispyQ]

21. Years ago a man I dated turned me on to science fiction.

We would talk about contact with alien species & I naively thought he was out of his mind when he said that we would be hard pressed to find a species more brutal & savage than human beings. I now agree completely with that statement.

[MedleyMisty]

22. Humans suck

I much prefer cats.

[genie_weenie]

23. Much cruely than nature mostly because many

wallow in the self-righteousness thinking they are doing good whilst committing evil.

Deaths in nature are amoral.

[aikoaiko]

24. how cruel are humans? Dog fighting barely registers compared to the worst cruelty.

IMHO.

[Marie26]

26. Incredibly cruel

My Grandpa used to say, "if you call someone an animal, you're paying them a compliment!" Animals would never do the things humans do.