May all dogs truly go to heaven

"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated."- Mahatma Gandhi

If what Gandhi said was true, then Taiwan is a moral decayed backward country. Today, the news reported that a man discovered 20 plus dogs dumped on the side of the road in Chiayi County. All of them had their voice cords cut out. The dogs appeared to be the products of mass inbreeding at a puppy mill. The saddest thing was they were actually discovered on Sunday, but the person did nothing about it so three of the pack apparently starved to death. Finally, the person’s friend decided to contact the media and at the moment, 14 of them have found homes.

On the same day, a street food vendor in Hsinchu was caught slamming two kittens to death. The man said the mommy cat had brought the kittens to a place nearby the shop. He got upset when the kittens defecated next to his shop so he picked them up and pounded them into the ground. His excuse—it was bad for business to have kittens litter around his business.

Last week, a German man’s finger was caught in an animals when he trying to rescue two of his dogs that were got caught in the traps in the mountains near his home. He later found a total of nine traps in the area.

Two weeks ago, an Animals Taiwan volunteer found over 25 small sized dogs and puppies all cooped up in a man’s backyard in Taipei. All the voice cords of the dogs were slashed.

As cruel as these stories may sound, they pale in comparison to the child abuse deaths cases reported in Taiwan recently.

In Changhua, an alcoholic and abusive man threw his 1o-months old daughter into a pot of boiling water during a heated argument with his girlfriend, the girl’s mother. The mom said she didn’t notice her daughter was being literally cooked alive until she stirred the noodles in the pot. The girl died of multiple organ failure four day later. My question is, why didn’t the mother leave this man who was chronically abusive? I believe she also needs to shoulder the blame of her daughter’s tragic ending.

On the same day, a two-year old girl was beaten to death by her father who struck the toddler repeatedly with a broomstick. He said he had to punish his disobedient daughter who disregarded his word when she played with water the day before. I hold a master’s in education and never have I heard a case where a two-year old obeyed his or her parents 100 percent of the time.

It is an absolute irony that government is encouraging more people to have kids when they fail completely in providing adequate protection for the little ones. So here is my advice to you President Ma, stop spending money on your jogging shorts and hair grease and start pouring money into child welfare. Instead of investing more in China, start caring for the children of this country. After all, they are the future of Taiwan. One more note to Mr. Ma, adopting ONE stray dog is good, but crying out loud, you are the PRESIDENT, can’t you come up with a policy to put an end to these puppy mills?