What can be done to reduce the occurences of pet abuse?

How far can you deal with it? When the cost starts to take away from what the direct needs of the people are.
Do we put money into preventing pet abuse or a cure for cancer?
Self awareness is the cheapest and easiest form of education.

Increase penalties for neglect and abuse.

Give animals rights as live creatures instead of chattel.

License people to own pets instead of the other way around and make them take basic courses (like for a motorcycle license).

None of that will stop it. We can’t stop child abuse, for goodness sake, but it will help.

there is only so much information you can put out there, and ultimately, if people don’t want trouble or to be bothered, they’re not going to report it. Same with the amount of unreported rape cases. I think that aspect, unfortunately, is not able to be helped.

(focusing on the part about abuses not being reported, not what gets done about the abuse)

More pets need to come forward and confront their abusers.

pet care classes are a good idea, too. but let’s stop kids being abused first.

How do you compare pet abuse to unreported rape?

One we can live with, one we cant.

Human is at the top of my list. Animals (as much as I love them) are a bit down the list.
I am all about saving the human first.

@ChazMaz Serial killers tend to get their start by torturing and killing smaller animals. That’s not something I think we can live with.

@Chaz: I’m talking about why people don’t report things to authorities. Not the act.

Right, got ya! :-)

Report! Report! Report!

For starters, the law has to create a new legal category for “pet”. A “possession”, which is what they are classified as now, doesn’t cut it.

@Quagmire I couldn’t agree more… in Philadelphia Case Utley (of the Phllies) and his wife have done much campaigning for the ASPCA< I’d love to see more local celebs donate their time and effort

Really it’s up to people in general to educate others and get the word out too.

All great ideas, especially giving animals rights and increasing penalties. Also, the connection between animal abuse and general violent
behavior should have more bearing on penalties. People are responsible for themselves, animals only have us to protect
them.

laws with teeth.
abuse is brushed off the shoulder all the time, unless it’s a famed person, or a really major case that can’t be ignored.
if animal abuse was treated at least half as severely as child abuse, maybe it wouldn’t happen as often.

Why are some people posting as though addressing animal cruelty means we don’t address human needs? What makes it an “either/or” thing? Why can’t it be done at the same time? First of all, we HAVE to. Animals are living creatures.

Surely you don’t think there are no dollars given to “human needs” which are far more frivolous then animal cruelty? Do we rank disease? Do we say the middle aged man’s cancer has a higher priority then juvenile diabetes? No. Both get addressed. So it HAS to be with animal cruelty. And it CAN be addressed without humans having to sacrifice anything.

Why have Veterinarians? Why study animal diseases? Why even waste resources on pet food? Let’s close down all animal related things until…until what I don’t know.

I completely agree with @Marina!

I would gladly pay a licence fee to keep my animals if it meant that people who obviously don’t love animals would be less inclined to buy animals simply as a status or to abuse because of the extra cost.

I think one of the problems is it is so easy and cheap to get hold of certain animals and a lot of the time it is the amount of backyard breeding that goes on that is to blame. I think this type of breeding should be dealt with as well in order to make it harder to get hold of animals. Maybe, in order to breed, there needs to be a qualification. People who intend to breed (and ultimately make money) from their animals should know about health issues, breed standards etc. It shouldn’t just be a case of getting a dog and a bitch together (for example) and selling the off spring. I see too many unhealthy, pathetic looking bitches who have been used as puppy machines and it makes me sick.