Hey there, Partiers,
I’m back with a rather serious topic: cruelty to animals and cruelty in general.
Today, while I was at Starbucks getting some work done, I saw a dog tied to a pole outside. It was cold and snowing, and I assumed that the owner was just tying the dog up while he went inside and got his coffee. Ten or twenty minutes passed, and the dog was still outside, waiting, and starting to shiver from the cold. I saw the owner come outside, give the dog a cursory petting, pull out a cigarette, and turn back to his two friends. The thumped his tail and looked up expectantly at this owner, who was engrossed in a conversation with his friends. The dog shivered and one of the owner’s companions quickly warmed the dog up with her hands. The owner and his friends went back inside and huddled together, joking and giggling. Anxious and cold, the dog shifted around, moving as much as he could on his short leash. Another 20 minutes pass. “Someone needs to throw a towel on that dog. He looks so cold,” says a woman sitting at the table behind me. “I hope the owner isn’t here inside.” “He is,” I turned toward her and replied. “Someone should throw a towel on the owner,” offered the man across from her.
I squirmed nervously in my seat as I tried to imagine myself approaching the owner and telling him that his dog looked like it was freezing. I’m already a shy person, and I felt afraid of how my comment would be received by the owner and his friends. I know I shouldn’t care, but I did. The woman at the table behind me continued her conversation, but her gaze was fixed on the shivering dog outside. As I inched my way into a standing position, I stared at the owner and his laughing companions. He leaned against the milk and sugar station, and seemed to be sharing one hilarious and secret insight after another. Finally, he made his way toward the door and went outside to pet his dog. I stared more, as if staring hard enough would force him to untie his dog and take it home. After he went back under the eaves of the Starbucks building, perhaps for a final smoke, he walked casually over to his dog and untied it. I felt some relief, but also anger at myself for not having the courage to confront him about how he was treating his dog.
This is just one small situation, but it touches on the larger issue of what to do when we witness cruelty or neglect. If you’re a person with a conscience and some degree of empathy, it hurts to see another being in pain. In a sense, another being’s pain can be our pain, and it can nudge us to act in a moral and responsible way. What gets in the way is when we are afraid of what others will think of us if we speak up, or are afraid of some sort of social isolation or ostracism, or a more serious penalty, if we dare to challenge a person or group who is acting unjustly.
What do you do when you witness cruelty, and injustice in general? Does it matter if it is on an eyewitness, local, national, or international scale?
Claire's Art Party 