Buddh Avatar
87. Amongst the quadruped, the dog, the donkey and the fox are damned
Amongst the winged animals, it is the crow.
pets
Pets paying price of slump
Shelter sees numbers triple
By Tamara Gignac, Calgary HeraldApril 18, 2009 7:27 AM
Lindsay Jones, communications manager with the Calgary Humane Society, holds Shadow, a Jack Russell terrier surrendered by its owner due to the impact of the recession.
Photograph by: Leah Hennel, Calgary Herald, Calgary Herald
http://www.calgaryherald.com/Pets+payin ... story.html
The slumping economy has many in the city worried about retirement savings, mortgage payments and uncertain job prospects.
But for some Calgary pet owners, it also means bidding farewell to a beloved furry friend they can no longer afford.
The number of animals surrendered by owners who can't pay for pet food or veterinary bills has tripled since last year, according to the Calgary Humane Society.
For cash-strapped pet owners, it can come down to either paying the rent or giving up an animal that's been a mainstay in their lives, said spokeswoman Lindsay Jones.
In January--as the weakening economy hit many Albertans-- city residents turned in 33 animals to the shelter, compared with only 10 in the same month a year earlier.
The trend has continued this spring.
"It's tough on the owners," Jones said.
"They are already going through a very difficult time and to lose a member of the family doesn't help the situation at all."
The city's animal control officers are also noticing a spike in the number of animals being abandoned in parks by owners who may be too ashamed by their changing financial fortunes to turn their faithful companions over to an animal rescue organization.
In one recent case, a pregnant Shih Tzu was found wandering on a roadside with a collar, but no other identification.
Bill Bruce, the city's head of bylaw services, said he's saddened to see a pet owner treat a cherished animal so callously, even if they are struggling to pay their bills.
"If you're in a situation where you can't manage an animal, work with us and rescue groups and do the right thing. Don't just abandon it -- it's not fair to your pet and if I catch you, you'll be facing some serious charges," said Bruce.
Requests for emergency food hampers are starting to include pet food as Calgarians struggle to make ends meet.
"We've even had people ask us for bunny food," said Nollind van Bryce of the Calgary food bank. "When we have pet food, we give it out, but sometimes the supply is sporadic."
The Meow Foundation -- a charitable organization that rescues cats found on the street -- is starting to get phone calls from people who fear they can no longer afford to take care of their cats.
The group has a "no kill" policy, but because it is staffed by volunteers, it faces limits on the number of animals it can take. Typically, it refers people who want to surrender a pet to the humane society.
"I received a call today from gentleman who said, 'I can't afford my rent, please take my cat.' He loved his pet so much, it was just heartbreaking," said Meow Foundation president Kelly Hyde-Wein.
Hyde-Wein fears the prospects for some cats will worsen because females typically give birth this time of year. She worries rescue agencies will be flooded with unwanted kittens -- or worse, pet owners will simply dispose of litters outdoors.
"Now, more than ever, people need to think about spaying and neutering their animals," said Hyde-Wein.
The Calgary Humane Society shelters approximately 9,000 animals a year, from hounds and birds to ferrets and turtles.
Adoption rates -- while steady -- are not keeping pace with the rising number of animals in need of new homes. The non-profit group is coping, but the facility is starting to feel the squeeze.
The fate of animals dropped off at shelters is uncertain.
It's possible some animals may be euthanized. "We don't have time limits -- it really just depends," said Jones.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
Shelter sees numbers triple
By Tamara Gignac, Calgary HeraldApril 18, 2009 7:27 AM
Lindsay Jones, communications manager with the Calgary Humane Society, holds Shadow, a Jack Russell terrier surrendered by its owner due to the impact of the recession.
Photograph by: Leah Hennel, Calgary Herald, Calgary Herald
http://www.calgaryherald.com/Pets+payin ... story.html
The slumping economy has many in the city worried about retirement savings, mortgage payments and uncertain job prospects.
But for some Calgary pet owners, it also means bidding farewell to a beloved furry friend they can no longer afford.
The number of animals surrendered by owners who can't pay for pet food or veterinary bills has tripled since last year, according to the Calgary Humane Society.
For cash-strapped pet owners, it can come down to either paying the rent or giving up an animal that's been a mainstay in their lives, said spokeswoman Lindsay Jones.
In January--as the weakening economy hit many Albertans-- city residents turned in 33 animals to the shelter, compared with only 10 in the same month a year earlier.
The trend has continued this spring.
"It's tough on the owners," Jones said.
"They are already going through a very difficult time and to lose a member of the family doesn't help the situation at all."
The city's animal control officers are also noticing a spike in the number of animals being abandoned in parks by owners who may be too ashamed by their changing financial fortunes to turn their faithful companions over to an animal rescue organization.
In one recent case, a pregnant Shih Tzu was found wandering on a roadside with a collar, but no other identification.
Bill Bruce, the city's head of bylaw services, said he's saddened to see a pet owner treat a cherished animal so callously, even if they are struggling to pay their bills.
"If you're in a situation where you can't manage an animal, work with us and rescue groups and do the right thing. Don't just abandon it -- it's not fair to your pet and if I catch you, you'll be facing some serious charges," said Bruce.
Requests for emergency food hampers are starting to include pet food as Calgarians struggle to make ends meet.
"We've even had people ask us for bunny food," said Nollind van Bryce of the Calgary food bank. "When we have pet food, we give it out, but sometimes the supply is sporadic."
The Meow Foundation -- a charitable organization that rescues cats found on the street -- is starting to get phone calls from people who fear they can no longer afford to take care of their cats.
The group has a "no kill" policy, but because it is staffed by volunteers, it faces limits on the number of animals it can take. Typically, it refers people who want to surrender a pet to the humane society.
"I received a call today from gentleman who said, 'I can't afford my rent, please take my cat.' He loved his pet so much, it was just heartbreaking," said Meow Foundation president Kelly Hyde-Wein.
Hyde-Wein fears the prospects for some cats will worsen because females typically give birth this time of year. She worries rescue agencies will be flooded with unwanted kittens -- or worse, pet owners will simply dispose of litters outdoors.
"Now, more than ever, people need to think about spaying and neutering their animals," said Hyde-Wein.
The Calgary Humane Society shelters approximately 9,000 animals a year, from hounds and birds to ferrets and turtles.
Adoption rates -- while steady -- are not keeping pace with the rising number of animals in need of new homes. The non-profit group is coping, but the facility is starting to feel the squeeze.
The fate of animals dropped off at shelters is uncertain.
It's possible some animals may be euthanized. "We don't have time limits -- it really just depends," said Jones.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
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star_munir
- Posts: 1670
- Joined: Tue Apr 22, 2003 12:55 am
- Contact:
As I mentioned earlier, the language is figurative with hidden meanings. In different societies different symbols are used for example Owl..in west Owl is condered as wise whereas in east usually owl is considered as stupid. Foolish person are often labelled as they are owl and donkeys whereas in some societies donkeys are considered as hard working animals. In some societies, people do not like dogs as they bark but in some societies dogs are considered as faithful, loyal and friend of human.hungama25 wrote:neverthless our pirs used the term DOG to show impurity which is a fact and even in quran allah[swt] used DOG to show their hunting skills and uncleanliness
Blind Muslim woman guided by tiny horse
Parents wouldn't allow a guide dog
By Mira Oberman, Agence France-presseJuly 31, 2009 9:06 AM
Mona Ramouni'sfingers fly across the text as she proofreads yet another page of a calculus textbook to be published in Braille--with her guide pony sitting patiently by.
It is dull work for tiny Cali who serves as Ramouni's eyes through a world she cannot see, and the pony keeps butting her head into Ramouni's chest.
"Cali! Stop it," Ramouni exclaims, but she can't keep the pride out of her voice when she realizes what the pretty brown pony with a soft black mane has gotten up to.
Rolling back her thick lips, Cali has grasped the tab of the zipper on the bag of treats Ramouni carries around her waist and is slowly pulling it open with her teeth.
"She knows which part has the carrots," Ramouni says in amazement. "She's really smart."
Cali is just one of a handful of miniature horses in the United States known to be used as guide animals for the blind.
Weighing in at under 45 kilograms, miniature horses are about the same size as a large dog, but are much stockier and can help support people with mobility issues.
They also have significantly longer life spans--they can live and work for more than 30 years while guide dogs are usually retired by age 12--but require much more care and bear a far heftier price tag.
Cali is the first guide animal for Ramouni, 29, a devout Muslim whose parents--Jordanian immigrants--would not accept a dog into their home.
Dog saliva is considered unclean in Islamic teaching, although dogs are permitted to be used as work animals, such as guards or shepherds.
"There is a saying of the Prophet Muhammad accepted by most Muslims that the angels do not enter the homes where dogs are," said Dawud Walid, director of the Michigan chapter of the Council on American Islamic Relations.
While several prominent scholars have determined guide dogs are acceptable under Islamic rules, it remains a cultural taboo for many Muslims, he explained.
Ramouni says her parents aren't fond of animals in general, although they once let her have a pet rabbit and are warming to the pony, which lives in a small enclosure in the yard of their tidy brick home in Dearborn, Mich.
And after some initial trepidation about how their daughter would fare with only a miniature horse to watch out for her, they have begun to trust that Ramouni will be OK on her own.
"My whole world and my whole outlook on stuff has changed, because I feel that there are a lot more possibilities," Ramouni said.
"Before Cali, I didn't feel like I could go places on my own, although theoretically I probably could have."
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
http://www.calgaryherald.com/story_prin ... 6&sponsor=
Parents wouldn't allow a guide dog
By Mira Oberman, Agence France-presseJuly 31, 2009 9:06 AM
Mona Ramouni'sfingers fly across the text as she proofreads yet another page of a calculus textbook to be published in Braille--with her guide pony sitting patiently by.
It is dull work for tiny Cali who serves as Ramouni's eyes through a world she cannot see, and the pony keeps butting her head into Ramouni's chest.
"Cali! Stop it," Ramouni exclaims, but she can't keep the pride out of her voice when she realizes what the pretty brown pony with a soft black mane has gotten up to.
Rolling back her thick lips, Cali has grasped the tab of the zipper on the bag of treats Ramouni carries around her waist and is slowly pulling it open with her teeth.
"She knows which part has the carrots," Ramouni says in amazement. "She's really smart."
Cali is just one of a handful of miniature horses in the United States known to be used as guide animals for the blind.
Weighing in at under 45 kilograms, miniature horses are about the same size as a large dog, but are much stockier and can help support people with mobility issues.
They also have significantly longer life spans--they can live and work for more than 30 years while guide dogs are usually retired by age 12--but require much more care and bear a far heftier price tag.
Cali is the first guide animal for Ramouni, 29, a devout Muslim whose parents--Jordanian immigrants--would not accept a dog into their home.
Dog saliva is considered unclean in Islamic teaching, although dogs are permitted to be used as work animals, such as guards or shepherds.
"There is a saying of the Prophet Muhammad accepted by most Muslims that the angels do not enter the homes where dogs are," said Dawud Walid, director of the Michigan chapter of the Council on American Islamic Relations.
While several prominent scholars have determined guide dogs are acceptable under Islamic rules, it remains a cultural taboo for many Muslims, he explained.
Ramouni says her parents aren't fond of animals in general, although they once let her have a pet rabbit and are warming to the pony, which lives in a small enclosure in the yard of their tidy brick home in Dearborn, Mich.
And after some initial trepidation about how their daughter would fare with only a miniature horse to watch out for her, they have begun to trust that Ramouni will be OK on her own.
"My whole world and my whole outlook on stuff has changed, because I feel that there are a lot more possibilities," Ramouni said.
"Before Cali, I didn't feel like I could go places on my own, although theoretically I probably could have."
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
http://www.calgaryherald.com/story_prin ... 6&sponsor=
Rescued dog reunited with owners, nine years later
Herald News ServicesJuly 31, 2009
A flea-bitten dog rescued from a squalid backyard is to be reunited with her owners 1,700 kilometres away--nine years after she disappeared.
The dog, Muffy, was found sleeping on a tattered piece of cardboard in a backyard in Melbourne with a bad skin condition and matted coat by the Royal Society for the Protection of Cruelty to Animals after an anonymous call.
RSPCA Victoria spokesman Tim Pilgrim said the white mongrel was found to have been microchipped, which did not fit at all with the circumstances, so they decided to try to track down the dog's owners whom they found in Brisbane.
"It's amazing that the original owners had microchipped her as it wasn't that common nine years ago and it is amazing that she had come 2,000 kilometres from home," Pilgrim told Reuters.
"We are advising people to get their pets microchipped so we can have some more happy endings like this one."
He said Muffy was believed to have been at that house in Melbourne for about one year after being found as a stray, but no one knew where she had been for the previous eight years.
Muffy will be flown home to Brisbane next week to be reunited with her owners who were delighted to hear that their lost pet had finally been found.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
http://www.calgaryherald.com/story_prin ... 0&sponsor=
Herald News ServicesJuly 31, 2009
A flea-bitten dog rescued from a squalid backyard is to be reunited with her owners 1,700 kilometres away--nine years after she disappeared.
The dog, Muffy, was found sleeping on a tattered piece of cardboard in a backyard in Melbourne with a bad skin condition and matted coat by the Royal Society for the Protection of Cruelty to Animals after an anonymous call.
RSPCA Victoria spokesman Tim Pilgrim said the white mongrel was found to have been microchipped, which did not fit at all with the circumstances, so they decided to try to track down the dog's owners whom they found in Brisbane.
"It's amazing that the original owners had microchipped her as it wasn't that common nine years ago and it is amazing that she had come 2,000 kilometres from home," Pilgrim told Reuters.
"We are advising people to get their pets microchipped so we can have some more happy endings like this one."
He said Muffy was believed to have been at that house in Melbourne for about one year after being found as a stray, but no one knew where she had been for the previous eight years.
Muffy will be flown home to Brisbane next week to be reunited with her owners who were delighted to hear that their lost pet had finally been found.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
http://www.calgaryherald.com/story_prin ... 0&sponsor=
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shiraz.virani
- Posts: 1256
- Joined: Thu May 28, 2009 2:52 pm
Buddh Avatar
87. Amongst the quadruped, the dog, the donkey and the fox are damned
Amongst the winged animals, it is the crow.
very nice find, well this says it all !!!
dogs are damned...people say that dogs mouth is cleaner than humans, i guess its just a myth...angels never visit those who have dogs at their place.
very nice find, great job
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shiraz.virani
- Posts: 1256
- Joined: Thu May 28, 2009 2:52 pm
I love dogs and other breeds of wolf's family, very loyal and smart creatures…and I remember seeing Prince Rahim Aga Khan in Houston with a bunch of big chained dogs back in June 2002 when he was accompanied with Hazar Imam on His visit there...I don't know if they were His own or were given to Him as gifts or something...
Mules (half donkey and half horse) are very useful and obedient animals…remember ‘Duldul’ the name of the Prophet Muhammad‘s mule which he gave to ‘Hazrat Ali (AS) as a gift? According to the Alevi tradition, Duldul was a white mule sent to the prophet (PBUH) as a gift by the Egyptian king Mukavkis. He rode it in some battles, the prophet then gave it to Ali (AS) as a present and Ali (AS) also rode it in battles fought against kharijites...
Jo damane shah-e-Duldul sawar hath me hain
Tho samjo rahmate Parwardigaar hath me hai
Hamein ghareeb na samjo, khareed leinge Jinah
Ke asmaan ka Duldul sawaar hath me hai
Mere khadam ko zamaana hila nahi sakta
Ke mera hath kisi zimmedaar hath me hai
Ali ne khai hai Zehra(SA) ke hath ki roti
Jabhi tho qoowate parwardigar hath me hai
Ye sonch kar na dikhaaya Ali ko zakhm apna
Khuda ka shair hai aur Zulfiqaar hath me hai.
Mules (half donkey and half horse) are very useful and obedient animals…remember ‘Duldul’ the name of the Prophet Muhammad‘s mule which he gave to ‘Hazrat Ali (AS) as a gift? According to the Alevi tradition, Duldul was a white mule sent to the prophet (PBUH) as a gift by the Egyptian king Mukavkis. He rode it in some battles, the prophet then gave it to Ali (AS) as a present and Ali (AS) also rode it in battles fought against kharijites...
Jo damane shah-e-Duldul sawar hath me hain
Tho samjo rahmate Parwardigaar hath me hai
Hamein ghareeb na samjo, khareed leinge Jinah
Ke asmaan ka Duldul sawaar hath me hai
Mere khadam ko zamaana hila nahi sakta
Ke mera hath kisi zimmedaar hath me hai
Ali ne khai hai Zehra(SA) ke hath ki roti
Jabhi tho qoowate parwardigar hath me hai
Ye sonch kar na dikhaaya Ali ko zakhm apna
Khuda ka shair hai aur Zulfiqaar hath me hai.
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shiraz.virani
- Posts: 1256
- Joined: Thu May 28, 2009 2:52 pm
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shiraz.virani
- Posts: 1256
- Joined: Thu May 28, 2009 2:52 pm
if you read BUDDH AVATAR , you would know my beloved peer....well since you are always under the influence of beer lemme tell you the holy name of my holy peer
its " PEER SADARDIN "
84. Bhim then says: Listen, O Merciful Creator,
Who amongst the quadruped is damned?
85. Tell me also, O Merciful,
Who amongst the winged animals is damned?
86. Shri Budh said: Listen, O Bhim,
Let Me talk to you about the damned ones.
87. Amongst the quadruped, the dog, the donkey and the fox are damned
Amongst the winged animals, it is the crow.
88. Amongst human beings, the one who spreads gossip
Is the worst of the damned ones.
there is another ginan called " ALAF NIRAALE" by peer hasan kabeerdeen
ejee ruhjjee dhee sag pee(n)dd paayaa
sohoy rahyaa hayraan jee.....................................7
The soul of Yazzid got into the body of a dog,
and therefore he is in trouble at present.
ejee koddo kaaf geeradhe paannee
so kaayamat ta(n)i hayraan...................................8
He (the dog, Yazzid) stays on the kokesus mountains
which is surrounded by water. Yet he will be suffering
till the day of judgement for want of water.
another ginan :
Eji Ruh Yazidah sag pind paya
so qiyamat tak hayranji
Yazid's soul was reduced to animal life - the disgraceful life of a dog. That is not all, each time, the dog dies of thirst, and it is born. Again the same fate is met - till Qiyamat."
you are free to do whatever you want mehreen, but please dont abuse my peer.
salam
yaa ali madad
its " PEER SADARDIN "
84. Bhim then says: Listen, O Merciful Creator,
Who amongst the quadruped is damned?
85. Tell me also, O Merciful,
Who amongst the winged animals is damned?
86. Shri Budh said: Listen, O Bhim,
Let Me talk to you about the damned ones.
87. Amongst the quadruped, the dog, the donkey and the fox are damned
Amongst the winged animals, it is the crow.
88. Amongst human beings, the one who spreads gossip
Is the worst of the damned ones.
there is another ginan called " ALAF NIRAALE" by peer hasan kabeerdeen
ejee ruhjjee dhee sag pee(n)dd paayaa
sohoy rahyaa hayraan jee.....................................7
The soul of Yazzid got into the body of a dog,
and therefore he is in trouble at present.
ejee koddo kaaf geeradhe paannee
so kaayamat ta(n)i hayraan...................................8
He (the dog, Yazzid) stays on the kokesus mountains
which is surrounded by water. Yet he will be suffering
till the day of judgement for want of water.
another ginan :
Eji Ruh Yazidah sag pind paya
so qiyamat tak hayranji
Yazid's soul was reduced to animal life - the disgraceful life of a dog. That is not all, each time, the dog dies of thirst, and it is born. Again the same fate is met - till Qiyamat."
you are free to do whatever you want mehreen, but please dont abuse my peer.
salam
yaa ali madad
Oh, you meant to say peer as in Pir Sadardin of Indo-Pak…it just hit me.
I thought you were talking about some ‘peer’ as like the English word for some important or noble person…like Duke or Earl.
Anyways, so why would Pir Sadardin or anybody else would consider these animals damned? I mean what makes them damned. I don't see anything wrong in them...
I thought you were talking about some ‘peer’ as like the English word for some important or noble person…like Duke or Earl.
Anyways, so why would Pir Sadardin or anybody else would consider these animals damned? I mean what makes them damned. I don't see anything wrong in them...
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shiraz.virani
- Posts: 1256
- Joined: Thu May 28, 2009 2:52 pm
very good question biryani, allow me to expain
before reading this article given below i want you to watch NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC CHANNEL, there is a show called "MONSTERS INSIDE ME" , ...if you get a chance please watch that show...it shows how bacteria/worms speads inside our body through our pets [be it clean or dirty]
Some lovers of the West in Muslim countries claim to be full of love and compassion for all living creatures and they wonder why Islam warns against this "best friend" of man. For their benefit, I quote here a lengthy excerpt from an article by the German scientist, Dr. Gerard Finstimer, (Translated from the German magazine Kosinos.) in which the author sheds light on the dangers to human health resulting from keeping dogs or coming in contact with them. He says: The increasing interest shown by many people in recent times in keeping dogs as pets has compelled us to draw public attention to the dangers which result from this, especially because pet dogs are hugged and kissed and permitted to lick the hands of the young and the old, and what is worse, to lick the plates and utensils which are used by human beings for eating and drinking.
Besides being unhygienic and uncouth, this practice is bad manners and abhorrent to good taste. However, we are not concerned with such matters. Leaving them to be addressed by teachers of etiquette and good taste. Rather this article is intended to present some scientific observations.
From the medical point of view, which is our main concern here, the hazards to human health and life from keeping and playing with dogs are not to be ignored. Many people have paid a high price for their ignorance, as the tapeworm carried by dogs is a cause of chronic disease, sometimes resulting in death.
This worm is found in man, in cattle, and in pigs, but it is found in fully-developed form only in dogs, wolves and rarely in cats. These worms differ from others in that they are minute and invisible, consequently, they were not discovered until very recently. He continues, Biologically the developmental process of this worm has some unique characteristics. In the lesions caused by them, one worm gives rise to many heads which spread and form other and varied kinds of lesions and abscesses. These heads develop into full-grown worms only in dogs' tonsils. In humans and in other animals they appear as lesions and abscesses completely different from the tapeworm itself .In animals the size of an abscess may reach that of an apple, while the liver of the infected animal may grow from five to ten times its normal size. In human beings the size of the abscess may reach that of a clenched fist or even the head of an infant; it is filled with yellow fluid weighing from ten to twenty pounds. In the infected human it may cause diverse kinds of inflammations in the lungs, muscles, spleen, kidneys, and brain, and appears in such different forms that specialists, until very recently, had difficulty in recognizing it.
In any case, wherever this inflammation is found, it poses great danger to the health and life of the patient. What is worse is that, in spite of our knowledge of its life history, origin, and development, we have not been able to devise a cure for it, except that in some instances these parasites die out, possibly because of antibodies produced in the human body. Unfortunately, cases in which such parasites die without causing damage are rare indeed.
Moreover, chemotherapy has failed to produce any benefit, and the usual treatment is surgical removal of the abscessed parts of the body. For all these reasons we should use all possible resources to fight against this dreadful disease and save man from its dangers.
Professor Noeller, through post-mortem dissection of human bodies in Germany, found that the incidence of infection with dogs' worms is at least one percent. In some places such as Dalmatia, Iceland, southeastern Australia, andHolland, where dogs are used for pulling sleds, the incidence rate of tapeworm among dogs is 12 percent. In Iceland the number of people who suffer from the inflammation caused by this worm has reached the rate of 43 percent. If we add to this the human suffering, the loss of meat because of infection of cattle, and the permanent danger to human health because of the presence of tapeworms, we cannot be very complacent toward this problem.
Perhaps the best way to combat the problem is to limit the worms to dogs and not let them spread, since in actuality we need to keep some dogs. We should not neglect to treat dogs when necessary by getting rid of the tapeworms in their tonsils and perhaps repeating this process periodically on shepherd dogs and watchdogs.
Man can protect his life and health by keeping a safe distance from dogs. He should not hug them, play with them, or let them come close to children. Children should be taught not to play with dogs or to fondle them. Dogs should not be permitted to lick children's hands or come to places where they play. Unfortunately, dogs are allowed to roam about everywhere, especially in places where children play, and their bowls are scattered throughout the house. Dogs must have their own separate bowls, and they must not be allowed to lick bowls and plates used by humans. They should not be allowed inside grocery stores, restaurants, or marketplaces. In general, great care must be taken that they do not come in contact with anything which is used by people for eating and drinking.
We already know that the Prophet (saws) forbade mixing with dogs, and that he warned against their licking plates and against keeping them without necessity. How is it possible that the teachings of an unlettered Arab, Muhammad, should agree with the latest findings of scientific research? Truly, we cannot say anything except to repeat the words of the Qur'an: Nor does he speak from (his own) desire. It is nothing other than a revelation sent down. (53:3-4)
salam
ya ali madad
before reading this article given below i want you to watch NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC CHANNEL, there is a show called "MONSTERS INSIDE ME" , ...if you get a chance please watch that show...it shows how bacteria/worms speads inside our body through our pets [be it clean or dirty]
Some lovers of the West in Muslim countries claim to be full of love and compassion for all living creatures and they wonder why Islam warns against this "best friend" of man. For their benefit, I quote here a lengthy excerpt from an article by the German scientist, Dr. Gerard Finstimer, (Translated from the German magazine Kosinos.) in which the author sheds light on the dangers to human health resulting from keeping dogs or coming in contact with them. He says: The increasing interest shown by many people in recent times in keeping dogs as pets has compelled us to draw public attention to the dangers which result from this, especially because pet dogs are hugged and kissed and permitted to lick the hands of the young and the old, and what is worse, to lick the plates and utensils which are used by human beings for eating and drinking.
Besides being unhygienic and uncouth, this practice is bad manners and abhorrent to good taste. However, we are not concerned with such matters. Leaving them to be addressed by teachers of etiquette and good taste. Rather this article is intended to present some scientific observations.
From the medical point of view, which is our main concern here, the hazards to human health and life from keeping and playing with dogs are not to be ignored. Many people have paid a high price for their ignorance, as the tapeworm carried by dogs is a cause of chronic disease, sometimes resulting in death.
This worm is found in man, in cattle, and in pigs, but it is found in fully-developed form only in dogs, wolves and rarely in cats. These worms differ from others in that they are minute and invisible, consequently, they were not discovered until very recently. He continues, Biologically the developmental process of this worm has some unique characteristics. In the lesions caused by them, one worm gives rise to many heads which spread and form other and varied kinds of lesions and abscesses. These heads develop into full-grown worms only in dogs' tonsils. In humans and in other animals they appear as lesions and abscesses completely different from the tapeworm itself .In animals the size of an abscess may reach that of an apple, while the liver of the infected animal may grow from five to ten times its normal size. In human beings the size of the abscess may reach that of a clenched fist or even the head of an infant; it is filled with yellow fluid weighing from ten to twenty pounds. In the infected human it may cause diverse kinds of inflammations in the lungs, muscles, spleen, kidneys, and brain, and appears in such different forms that specialists, until very recently, had difficulty in recognizing it.
In any case, wherever this inflammation is found, it poses great danger to the health and life of the patient. What is worse is that, in spite of our knowledge of its life history, origin, and development, we have not been able to devise a cure for it, except that in some instances these parasites die out, possibly because of antibodies produced in the human body. Unfortunately, cases in which such parasites die without causing damage are rare indeed.
Moreover, chemotherapy has failed to produce any benefit, and the usual treatment is surgical removal of the abscessed parts of the body. For all these reasons we should use all possible resources to fight against this dreadful disease and save man from its dangers.
Professor Noeller, through post-mortem dissection of human bodies in Germany, found that the incidence of infection with dogs' worms is at least one percent. In some places such as Dalmatia, Iceland, southeastern Australia, andHolland, where dogs are used for pulling sleds, the incidence rate of tapeworm among dogs is 12 percent. In Iceland the number of people who suffer from the inflammation caused by this worm has reached the rate of 43 percent. If we add to this the human suffering, the loss of meat because of infection of cattle, and the permanent danger to human health because of the presence of tapeworms, we cannot be very complacent toward this problem.
Perhaps the best way to combat the problem is to limit the worms to dogs and not let them spread, since in actuality we need to keep some dogs. We should not neglect to treat dogs when necessary by getting rid of the tapeworms in their tonsils and perhaps repeating this process periodically on shepherd dogs and watchdogs.
Man can protect his life and health by keeping a safe distance from dogs. He should not hug them, play with them, or let them come close to children. Children should be taught not to play with dogs or to fondle them. Dogs should not be permitted to lick children's hands or come to places where they play. Unfortunately, dogs are allowed to roam about everywhere, especially in places where children play, and their bowls are scattered throughout the house. Dogs must have their own separate bowls, and they must not be allowed to lick bowls and plates used by humans. They should not be allowed inside grocery stores, restaurants, or marketplaces. In general, great care must be taken that they do not come in contact with anything which is used by people for eating and drinking.
We already know that the Prophet (saws) forbade mixing with dogs, and that he warned against their licking plates and against keeping them without necessity. How is it possible that the teachings of an unlettered Arab, Muhammad, should agree with the latest findings of scientific research? Truly, we cannot say anything except to repeat the words of the Qur'an: Nor does he speak from (his own) desire. It is nothing other than a revelation sent down. (53:3-4)
salam
ya ali madad
Well, off course, biologically and hygienically, there is always a risk and danger of diseases and infections when coming in the close contacts with dogs and other animals including humans too…and that’s why I don’t personally like doing all that hugs and kisses or even let them in my bedroom or other areas in my home and I always wash my hands after touching them if necessary… I let them be in their space and I keep my space…I like these animals for just their different useful and appealing attributes…I don’t just condemn them as damned…'cause I think they are an important part of the nature and should be treated fairly if not loved.
Dogs sit still long enough to donate blood to ailing pals
Edmonton Journal
August 22, 2009
About 30 dogs donated blood at a mobile clinic in edmonton on Friday, and received a cookie of sorts for their trouble.
the non-profit organization collects blood products for dogs who require transfusions as part of their care.
its head office is located in winnipeg, but it also has a satellite collection office in edmonton. its purpose is twofold: to accept canine blood donations and to give the school's animal-health technicians some hands-on experience.
several students came to Friday's clinic to help calm potentially nervous clients, who, in the end, proved to be very co-operative.
"it's amazing; the dogs can be jumping around, but, once they get up on the table, they seem to know they have a job to do and they sit still," said shauna Lesick, an animal-health technologist with the blood bank.
she said while the practice of canine blood collection isn't new, it is becoming much more common.
"Our pets are so much more members of our family now, and we're willing to do everything for them," Lesick said.
Canine blood is always in demand, she said, for cancer treatments and advanced surgeries.
"we'll always need new donors," she said.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
http://www.calgaryherald.com/health/Dog ... story.html
Edmonton Journal
August 22, 2009
About 30 dogs donated blood at a mobile clinic in edmonton on Friday, and received a cookie of sorts for their trouble.
the non-profit organization collects blood products for dogs who require transfusions as part of their care.
its head office is located in winnipeg, but it also has a satellite collection office in edmonton. its purpose is twofold: to accept canine blood donations and to give the school's animal-health technicians some hands-on experience.
several students came to Friday's clinic to help calm potentially nervous clients, who, in the end, proved to be very co-operative.
"it's amazing; the dogs can be jumping around, but, once they get up on the table, they seem to know they have a job to do and they sit still," said shauna Lesick, an animal-health technologist with the blood bank.
she said while the practice of canine blood collection isn't new, it is becoming much more common.
"Our pets are so much more members of our family now, and we're willing to do everything for them," Lesick said.
Canine blood is always in demand, she said, for cancer treatments and advanced surgeries.
"we'll always need new donors," she said.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
http://www.calgaryherald.com/health/Dog ... story.html
November 22, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
Animal, Vegetable, Miserable
By GARY STEINER
Lewisburg, Pa.
LATELY more people have begun to express an interest in where the meat they eat comes from and how it was raised. Were the animals humanely treated? Did they have a good quality of life before the death that turned them into someone’s dinner?
Some of these questions, which reach a fever pitch in the days leading up to Thanksgiving, pertain to the ways in which animals are treated. (Did your turkey get to live outdoors?) Others focus on the question of how eating the animals in question will affect the consumer’s health and well-being. (Was it given hormones and antibiotics?)
None of these questions, however, make any consideration of whether it is wrong to kill animals for human consumption. And even when people ask this question, they almost always find a variety of resourceful answers that purport to justify the killing and consumption of animals in the name of human welfare. Strict ethical vegans, of which I am one, are customarily excoriated for equating our society’s treatment of animals with mass murder. Can anyone seriously consider animal suffering even remotely comparable to human suffering? Those who answer with a resounding no typically argue in one of two ways.
Some suggest that human beings but not animals are made in God’s image and hence stand in much closer proximity to the divine than any non-human animal; according to this line of thought, animals were made expressly for the sake of humans and may be used without scruple to satisfy their needs and desires. There is ample support in the Bible and in the writings of Christian thinkers like Augustine and Thomas Aquinas for this pointedly anthropocentric way of devaluing animals.
Others argue that the human capacity for abstract thought makes us capable of suffering that both qualitatively and quantitatively exceeds the suffering of any non-human animal. Philosophers like Jeremy Bentham, who is famous for having based moral status not on linguistic or rational capacities but rather on the capacity to suffer, argue that because animals are incapable of abstract thought, they are imprisoned in an eternal present, have no sense of the extended future and hence cannot be said to have an interest in continued existence.
The most penetrating and iconoclastic response to this sort of reasoning came from the writer Isaac Bashevis Singer in his story “The Letter Writer,” in which he called the slaughter of animals the “eternal Treblinka.”
The story depicts an encounter between a man and a mouse. The man, Herman Gombiner, contemplates his place in the cosmic scheme of things and concludes that there is an essential connection between his own existence as “a child of God” and the “holy creature” scuffling about on the floor in front of him.
Surely, he reflects, the mouse has some capacity for thought; Gombiner even thinks that the mouse has the capacity to share love and gratitude with him. Not merely a means for the satisfaction of human desires, nor a mere nuisance to be exterminated, this tiny creature possesses the same dignity that any conscious being possesses. In the face of that inherent dignity, Gombiner concludes, the human practice of delivering animals to the table in the form of food is abhorrent and inexcusable.
Many of the people who denounce the ways in which we treat animals in the course of raising them for human consumption never stop to think about this profound contradiction. Instead, they make impassioned calls for more “humanely” raised meat. Many people soothe their consciences by purchasing only free-range fowl and eggs, blissfully ignorant that “free range” has very little if any practical significance. Chickens may be labeled free-range even if they’ve never been outside or seen a speck of daylight in their entire lives. And that Thanksgiving turkey? Even if it is raised “free range,” it still lives a life of pain and confinement that ends with the butcher’s knife.
How can intelligent people who purport to be deeply concerned with animal welfare and respectful of life turn a blind eye to such practices? And how can people continue to eat meat when they become aware that nearly 53 billion land animals are slaughtered every year for human consumption? The simple answer is that most people just don’t care about the lives or fortunes of animals. If they did care, they would learn as much as possible about the ways in which our society systematically abuses animals, and they would make what is at once a very simple and a very difficult choice: to forswear the consumption of animal products of all kinds.
The easy part of this consists in seeing clearly what ethics requires and then just plain doing it. The difficult part: You just haven’t lived until you’ve tried to function as a strict vegan in a meat-crazed society.
What were once the most straightforward activities become a constant ordeal. You might think that it’s as simple as just removing meat, eggs and dairy products from your diet, but it goes a lot deeper than that.
To be a really strict vegan is to strive to avoid all animal products, and this includes materials like leather, silk and wool, as well as a panoply of cosmetics and medications. The more you dig, the more you learn about products you would never stop to think might contain or involve animal products in their production — like wine and beer (isinglass, a kind of gelatin derived from fish bladders, is often used to “fine,” or purify, these beverages), refined sugar (bone char is sometimes used to bleach it) or Band-Aids (animal products in the adhesive). Just last week I was told that those little comfort strips on most razor blades contain animal fat.
To go down this road is to stare headlong into an abyss that, to paraphrase Nietzsche, will ultimately stare back at you.
The challenges faced by a vegan don’t end with the nuts and bolts of material existence. You face quite a few social difficulties as well, perhaps the chief one being how one should feel about spending time with people who are not vegans.
Is it O.K. to eat dinner with people who are eating meat? What do you say when a dining companion says, “I’m really a vegetarian — I don’t eat red meat at home.” (I’ve heard it lots of times, always without any prompting from me.) What do you do when someone starts to grill you (so to speak) about your vegan ethics during dinner? (Wise vegans always defer until food isn’t around.) Or when someone starts to lodge accusations to the effect that you consider yourself morally superior to others, or that it is ridiculous to worry so much about animals when there is so much human suffering in the world? (Smile politely and ask them to pass the seitan.)
Let me be candid: By and large, meat-eaters are a self-righteous bunch. The number of vegans I know personally is ... five. And I have been a vegan for almost 15 years, having been a vegetarian for almost 15 before that.
Five. I have lost more friends than this over arguments about animal ethics. One lapidary conclusion to be drawn here is that people take deadly seriously the prerogative to use animals as sources of satisfaction. Not only for food, but as beasts of burden, as raw materials and as sources of captive entertainment — which is the way animals are used in zoos, circuses and the like.
These uses of animals are so institutionalized, so normalized, in our society that it is difficult to find the critical distance needed to see them as the horrors that they are: so many forms of subjection, servitude and — in the case of killing animals for human consumption and other purposes — outright murder.
People who are ethical vegans believe that differences in intelligence between human and non-human animals have no moral significance whatsoever. The fact that my cat can’t appreciate Schubert’s late symphonies and can’t perform syllogistic logic does not mean that I am entitled to use him as an organic toy, as if I were somehow not only morally superior to him but virtually entitled to treat him as a commodity with minuscule market value.
We have been trained by a history of thinking of which we are scarcely aware to view non-human animals as resources we are entitled to employ in whatever ways we see fit in order to satisfy our needs and desires. Yes, there are animal welfare laws. But these laws have been formulated by, and are enforced by, people who proceed from the proposition that animals are fundamentally inferior to human beings. At best, these laws make living conditions for animals marginally better than they would be otherwise — right up to the point when we send them to the slaughterhouse.
Think about that when you’re picking out your free-range turkey, which has absolutely nothing to be thankful for on Thanksgiving. All it ever had was a short and miserable life, thanks to us intelligent, compassionate humans.
Gary Steiner, a professor of philosophy at Bucknell University, is the author of “Animals and the Moral Community: Mental Life, Moral Status and Kinship.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/22/opini ... nted=print
Op-Ed Contributor
Animal, Vegetable, Miserable
By GARY STEINER
Lewisburg, Pa.
LATELY more people have begun to express an interest in where the meat they eat comes from and how it was raised. Were the animals humanely treated? Did they have a good quality of life before the death that turned them into someone’s dinner?
Some of these questions, which reach a fever pitch in the days leading up to Thanksgiving, pertain to the ways in which animals are treated. (Did your turkey get to live outdoors?) Others focus on the question of how eating the animals in question will affect the consumer’s health and well-being. (Was it given hormones and antibiotics?)
None of these questions, however, make any consideration of whether it is wrong to kill animals for human consumption. And even when people ask this question, they almost always find a variety of resourceful answers that purport to justify the killing and consumption of animals in the name of human welfare. Strict ethical vegans, of which I am one, are customarily excoriated for equating our society’s treatment of animals with mass murder. Can anyone seriously consider animal suffering even remotely comparable to human suffering? Those who answer with a resounding no typically argue in one of two ways.
Some suggest that human beings but not animals are made in God’s image and hence stand in much closer proximity to the divine than any non-human animal; according to this line of thought, animals were made expressly for the sake of humans and may be used without scruple to satisfy their needs and desires. There is ample support in the Bible and in the writings of Christian thinkers like Augustine and Thomas Aquinas for this pointedly anthropocentric way of devaluing animals.
Others argue that the human capacity for abstract thought makes us capable of suffering that both qualitatively and quantitatively exceeds the suffering of any non-human animal. Philosophers like Jeremy Bentham, who is famous for having based moral status not on linguistic or rational capacities but rather on the capacity to suffer, argue that because animals are incapable of abstract thought, they are imprisoned in an eternal present, have no sense of the extended future and hence cannot be said to have an interest in continued existence.
The most penetrating and iconoclastic response to this sort of reasoning came from the writer Isaac Bashevis Singer in his story “The Letter Writer,” in which he called the slaughter of animals the “eternal Treblinka.”
The story depicts an encounter between a man and a mouse. The man, Herman Gombiner, contemplates his place in the cosmic scheme of things and concludes that there is an essential connection between his own existence as “a child of God” and the “holy creature” scuffling about on the floor in front of him.
Surely, he reflects, the mouse has some capacity for thought; Gombiner even thinks that the mouse has the capacity to share love and gratitude with him. Not merely a means for the satisfaction of human desires, nor a mere nuisance to be exterminated, this tiny creature possesses the same dignity that any conscious being possesses. In the face of that inherent dignity, Gombiner concludes, the human practice of delivering animals to the table in the form of food is abhorrent and inexcusable.
Many of the people who denounce the ways in which we treat animals in the course of raising them for human consumption never stop to think about this profound contradiction. Instead, they make impassioned calls for more “humanely” raised meat. Many people soothe their consciences by purchasing only free-range fowl and eggs, blissfully ignorant that “free range” has very little if any practical significance. Chickens may be labeled free-range even if they’ve never been outside or seen a speck of daylight in their entire lives. And that Thanksgiving turkey? Even if it is raised “free range,” it still lives a life of pain and confinement that ends with the butcher’s knife.
How can intelligent people who purport to be deeply concerned with animal welfare and respectful of life turn a blind eye to such practices? And how can people continue to eat meat when they become aware that nearly 53 billion land animals are slaughtered every year for human consumption? The simple answer is that most people just don’t care about the lives or fortunes of animals. If they did care, they would learn as much as possible about the ways in which our society systematically abuses animals, and they would make what is at once a very simple and a very difficult choice: to forswear the consumption of animal products of all kinds.
The easy part of this consists in seeing clearly what ethics requires and then just plain doing it. The difficult part: You just haven’t lived until you’ve tried to function as a strict vegan in a meat-crazed society.
What were once the most straightforward activities become a constant ordeal. You might think that it’s as simple as just removing meat, eggs and dairy products from your diet, but it goes a lot deeper than that.
To be a really strict vegan is to strive to avoid all animal products, and this includes materials like leather, silk and wool, as well as a panoply of cosmetics and medications. The more you dig, the more you learn about products you would never stop to think might contain or involve animal products in their production — like wine and beer (isinglass, a kind of gelatin derived from fish bladders, is often used to “fine,” or purify, these beverages), refined sugar (bone char is sometimes used to bleach it) or Band-Aids (animal products in the adhesive). Just last week I was told that those little comfort strips on most razor blades contain animal fat.
To go down this road is to stare headlong into an abyss that, to paraphrase Nietzsche, will ultimately stare back at you.
The challenges faced by a vegan don’t end with the nuts and bolts of material existence. You face quite a few social difficulties as well, perhaps the chief one being how one should feel about spending time with people who are not vegans.
Is it O.K. to eat dinner with people who are eating meat? What do you say when a dining companion says, “I’m really a vegetarian — I don’t eat red meat at home.” (I’ve heard it lots of times, always without any prompting from me.) What do you do when someone starts to grill you (so to speak) about your vegan ethics during dinner? (Wise vegans always defer until food isn’t around.) Or when someone starts to lodge accusations to the effect that you consider yourself morally superior to others, or that it is ridiculous to worry so much about animals when there is so much human suffering in the world? (Smile politely and ask them to pass the seitan.)
Let me be candid: By and large, meat-eaters are a self-righteous bunch. The number of vegans I know personally is ... five. And I have been a vegan for almost 15 years, having been a vegetarian for almost 15 before that.
Five. I have lost more friends than this over arguments about animal ethics. One lapidary conclusion to be drawn here is that people take deadly seriously the prerogative to use animals as sources of satisfaction. Not only for food, but as beasts of burden, as raw materials and as sources of captive entertainment — which is the way animals are used in zoos, circuses and the like.
These uses of animals are so institutionalized, so normalized, in our society that it is difficult to find the critical distance needed to see them as the horrors that they are: so many forms of subjection, servitude and — in the case of killing animals for human consumption and other purposes — outright murder.
People who are ethical vegans believe that differences in intelligence between human and non-human animals have no moral significance whatsoever. The fact that my cat can’t appreciate Schubert’s late symphonies and can’t perform syllogistic logic does not mean that I am entitled to use him as an organic toy, as if I were somehow not only morally superior to him but virtually entitled to treat him as a commodity with minuscule market value.
We have been trained by a history of thinking of which we are scarcely aware to view non-human animals as resources we are entitled to employ in whatever ways we see fit in order to satisfy our needs and desires. Yes, there are animal welfare laws. But these laws have been formulated by, and are enforced by, people who proceed from the proposition that animals are fundamentally inferior to human beings. At best, these laws make living conditions for animals marginally better than they would be otherwise — right up to the point when we send them to the slaughterhouse.
Think about that when you’re picking out your free-range turkey, which has absolutely nothing to be thankful for on Thanksgiving. All it ever had was a short and miserable life, thanks to us intelligent, compassionate humans.
Gary Steiner, a professor of philosophy at Bucknell University, is the author of “Animals and the Moral Community: Mental Life, Moral Status and Kinship.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/22/opini ... nted=print
February 19, 2010
Op-Ed Contributor
Not Grass-Fed, but at Least Pain-Free
By ADAM SHRIVER
St. Louis
IN the 35 years since Peter Singer’s book “Animal Liberation” was published, jump-starting the animal rights movement in the United States, the number of animals used in cosmetics testing and scientific research has dropped significantly, and the number of dogs and cats killed in shelters has fallen by more than half. Nevertheless, because the amount of red meat that Americans eat per capita has held steady at more than 100 pounds a year as the population has increased, more animals than ever suffer from injuries and stress on factory farms.
Veal calves and gestating sows are so confined as to suffer painful bone and joint problems. The unnatural high-grain diets provided in feedlots cause severe gastric distress in many animals. And faulty or improperly used stun guns cause the painful deaths of thousands of cows and pigs a year.
We are most likely stuck with factory farms, given that they produce most of the beef and pork Americans consume. But it is still possible to reduce the animals’ discomfort — through neuroscience. Recent advances suggest it may soon be possible to genetically engineer livestock so that they suffer much less.
This prospect stems from a new understanding of how mammals sense pain. The brain, it turns out, has two separate pathways for perceiving pain: a sensory pathway that registers its location, quality (sharp, dull or burning, for example) and intensity, and a so-called affective pathway that senses the pain’s unpleasantness. This second pathway appears to be associated with activation of the brain’s anterior cingulate cortex, because people who have suffered damage to this part of the brain still feel pain but no longer find it unpleasant. (The same is true of people who are given morphine, because there are more receptors for opiates in the affective pain pathway than in the sensory pain pathway.)
Neuroscientists have found that by damaging a laboratory rat’s anterior cingulate cortex, or by injecting the rat with morphine, they can likewise block its affective perception of pain. The rat reacts to a heated cage floor by withdrawing its paws, but it doesn’t bother avoiding the places in its cage where it has learned the floor is likely to be heated up.
Recently, scientists have learned to genetically engineer animals so that they lack certain proteins that are important to the operation of the anterior cingulate cortex. Prof. Min Zhuo and his colleagues at the University of Toronto, for example, have bred mice lacking enzymes that operate in affective pain pathways. When these mice encounter a painful stimulus, they withdraw their paws normally, but they do not become hypersensitive to a subsequent painful stimulus, as ordinary mice do.
Prof. Zhou-Feng Chen and his colleagues here at Washington University have engineered mice so that they lack the gene for a peptide associated with the anterior cingulate gyrus. Like the animals given brain lesions, these mice are normally sensitive to heat and mechanical pain, but they do not avoid situations where they experience such pain.
Given the similarity among all mammals’ neural systems, it is likely that scientists could genetically engineer pigs and cows in the same way. Because the sensory dimension of the animals’ pain would be preserved, they would still be able to recognize and avoid, when possible, situations where they might be bruised or otherwise injured.
The people who consumed meat from such genetically engineered livestock would also be safe. Knockout animals have specific proteins removed, rather than new ones inserted, so there’s no reason to think that their meat would pose more health risks for humans than ordinary meat does.
If we cannot avoid factory farms altogether, the least we can do is eliminate the unpleasantness of pain in the animals that must live and die on them. It would be far better than doing nothing at all.
Adam Shriver is a doctoral student in the philosophy-neuroscience-psychology program at Washington University.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/19/opini ... nted=print
Op-Ed Contributor
Not Grass-Fed, but at Least Pain-Free
By ADAM SHRIVER
St. Louis
IN the 35 years since Peter Singer’s book “Animal Liberation” was published, jump-starting the animal rights movement in the United States, the number of animals used in cosmetics testing and scientific research has dropped significantly, and the number of dogs and cats killed in shelters has fallen by more than half. Nevertheless, because the amount of red meat that Americans eat per capita has held steady at more than 100 pounds a year as the population has increased, more animals than ever suffer from injuries and stress on factory farms.
Veal calves and gestating sows are so confined as to suffer painful bone and joint problems. The unnatural high-grain diets provided in feedlots cause severe gastric distress in many animals. And faulty or improperly used stun guns cause the painful deaths of thousands of cows and pigs a year.
We are most likely stuck with factory farms, given that they produce most of the beef and pork Americans consume. But it is still possible to reduce the animals’ discomfort — through neuroscience. Recent advances suggest it may soon be possible to genetically engineer livestock so that they suffer much less.
This prospect stems from a new understanding of how mammals sense pain. The brain, it turns out, has two separate pathways for perceiving pain: a sensory pathway that registers its location, quality (sharp, dull or burning, for example) and intensity, and a so-called affective pathway that senses the pain’s unpleasantness. This second pathway appears to be associated with activation of the brain’s anterior cingulate cortex, because people who have suffered damage to this part of the brain still feel pain but no longer find it unpleasant. (The same is true of people who are given morphine, because there are more receptors for opiates in the affective pain pathway than in the sensory pain pathway.)
Neuroscientists have found that by damaging a laboratory rat’s anterior cingulate cortex, or by injecting the rat with morphine, they can likewise block its affective perception of pain. The rat reacts to a heated cage floor by withdrawing its paws, but it doesn’t bother avoiding the places in its cage where it has learned the floor is likely to be heated up.
Recently, scientists have learned to genetically engineer animals so that they lack certain proteins that are important to the operation of the anterior cingulate cortex. Prof. Min Zhuo and his colleagues at the University of Toronto, for example, have bred mice lacking enzymes that operate in affective pain pathways. When these mice encounter a painful stimulus, they withdraw their paws normally, but they do not become hypersensitive to a subsequent painful stimulus, as ordinary mice do.
Prof. Zhou-Feng Chen and his colleagues here at Washington University have engineered mice so that they lack the gene for a peptide associated with the anterior cingulate gyrus. Like the animals given brain lesions, these mice are normally sensitive to heat and mechanical pain, but they do not avoid situations where they experience such pain.
Given the similarity among all mammals’ neural systems, it is likely that scientists could genetically engineer pigs and cows in the same way. Because the sensory dimension of the animals’ pain would be preserved, they would still be able to recognize and avoid, when possible, situations where they might be bruised or otherwise injured.
The people who consumed meat from such genetically engineered livestock would also be safe. Knockout animals have specific proteins removed, rather than new ones inserted, so there’s no reason to think that their meat would pose more health risks for humans than ordinary meat does.
If we cannot avoid factory farms altogether, the least we can do is eliminate the unpleasantness of pain in the animals that must live and die on them. It would be far better than doing nothing at all.
Adam Shriver is a doctoral student in the philosophy-neuroscience-psychology program at Washington University.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/19/opini ... nted=print
Dogs too 'unclean' to be kept as pets: cleric
By Robin Pomeroy, Reuters June 20, 2010
A senior Iranian cleric has decreed dogs are "unclean" and should not be kept as pets -- a move aimed at discouraging western-style dog ownership in the Islamic state, a newspaper reported Saturday.
Dogs are considered "unclean" under Islamic tradition but, while relatively rare in Iran, some people do keep them as pets. By issuing a fatwa -- a religious ruling -- Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi has sent a clear message this trend must stop.
"Friendship with dogs is a blind imitation of the West," he was quoted as saying in Javan daily. "There are lots of people in the West who love their dogs more than their wives and children."
Guard dogs and sheep dogs are considered acceptable under Islamic law, but Iranians who carry dogs in their cars or take them to public parks can be stopped by police and fined.
The Qur'an does not explicitly prohibit contact with dogs, Shirazi said, but Islamic tradition showed it to be so. "We have lots of narrations in Islam that say dogs are unclean."
The interpretation of religious rules on personal conduct is a constant source of debate and potential conflict in Iran, which has been an Islamic republic since a revolution ousted the Western-backed Shah in 1979.
In a television interview last week, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad weighed in on the issue of the Islamic dress code, saying women who fail to cover their hair completely should not be harassed by the police.
Morality police are conducting their annual crackdown. Ahmadinejad's surprisingly liberal view was condemned by fellow hardliner politicians and senior clerics.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
Read more: http://www.calgaryherald.com/life/Dogs+ ... z0rQilRbWq
By Robin Pomeroy, Reuters June 20, 2010
A senior Iranian cleric has decreed dogs are "unclean" and should not be kept as pets -- a move aimed at discouraging western-style dog ownership in the Islamic state, a newspaper reported Saturday.
Dogs are considered "unclean" under Islamic tradition but, while relatively rare in Iran, some people do keep them as pets. By issuing a fatwa -- a religious ruling -- Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi has sent a clear message this trend must stop.
"Friendship with dogs is a blind imitation of the West," he was quoted as saying in Javan daily. "There are lots of people in the West who love their dogs more than their wives and children."
Guard dogs and sheep dogs are considered acceptable under Islamic law, but Iranians who carry dogs in their cars or take them to public parks can be stopped by police and fined.
The Qur'an does not explicitly prohibit contact with dogs, Shirazi said, but Islamic tradition showed it to be so. "We have lots of narrations in Islam that say dogs are unclean."
The interpretation of religious rules on personal conduct is a constant source of debate and potential conflict in Iran, which has been an Islamic republic since a revolution ousted the Western-backed Shah in 1979.
In a television interview last week, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad weighed in on the issue of the Islamic dress code, saying women who fail to cover their hair completely should not be harassed by the police.
Morality police are conducting their annual crackdown. Ahmadinejad's surprisingly liberal view was condemned by fellow hardliner politicians and senior clerics.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
Read more: http://www.calgaryherald.com/life/Dogs+ ... z0rQilRbWq
http://communities.canada.com/calgaryhe ... i-say.aspx
What would Gandhi say?
By Valerie Berenyi Mon, Jan 24 2011
When I read this story today on the news wire about Indians going gaga for their pets North American-style, I immediately thought of Gandhi's famous quote:
"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated."
I doubt that the painting of one's cat's claws or the waving of crystals over a sick dog is what the father of India's civil rights movement had in mind when it comes to animal welfare.
India pet lovers spark new fads as ownership surges
Rohan Dua, Reuters
NEW DELHI -- As incomes surge in economically booming India, pet lovers are driving the growth of a whole range of new trends, from organic pet toys to crystal healing and even nail painting for cats.
The pet care market in India has risen from $31 million in 2003 to $64.34 million last year, says pet care magazine Creature Companion quoting Euromonitor International, as millions of people moved into the middle class and disposable incomes grew.
Pet care services such as grooming, pet-sitting and boarding are becoming hugely popular, while the rapid spread of the internet has also boosted virtual stores and digital networking platforms to such an extent that the market is projected to double yet again, to $144 million, by 2015.
But at the India International Pet Fair in New Delhi at the weekend, some of the most popular areas catered to pet owners looking for advice on how to cope with grumpy and ageing pets.
More than 3,000 visited a stall devoted to crystal therapy, or using gems and stones for healing, over the first two days of the three-day fair, a ticket taker said.
"My six-year old St. Bernard has been troubling me with his unfriendly and obnoxious behaviour over the past year, though before he was always very affectionate and showed a pleasant demeanour with everyone at home," said Christina Paul.
"The veterinarian I took him to helped changed his eating habits but he continues with his hostility, so I am very excited to learn about this stone therapy."
Madhu Kotiya, who began pet healing five years ago, offers packages of crystals and stones to deal with things such as "Anger and Aggression" and "Accident and Emergency."
The prices range from $10 to $12 — in a country where the per capita income was $945 as of fiscal 2010.
"Apart from using crystals, we are also doing energy healing called ‘angel communication healing,’ which helps people find their lost dogs," Kotiya added.
But others at the fair sniffed at the idea of New Age care, recommending old-fashioned methods such as lavishing pets with time and company.
"It’s not easy to domesticate any pet in the house. They require hygiene, love and training which not many pet owners are willing to provide," said one exhibitor.
The three-day fair, now in its fifth year, was begun originally as a trade fair to help organise the industry, which despite its rapid growth still remains a bit of a free-for-all.
Dogs accompanied their owners as they strolled from stall to stall, lazing around or engaging in playful mock fights with other dogs. At one stall, cats could get their toenails painted in bright colours.
Also on tap were races, a dog obedience show, and a fancy dress competition won by Moni the Cocker Spaniel in a butterfly design and Jojo the cat for a "Save the Tiger" theme.
Despite many modern options, pet toys, including rubber space stations and studded chops and bells, remained a show stealer.
But even here there was a nod to present-day sensibilities — many of the more popular toys were advertised as "eco-friendly" by virtue of being made out of natural rubber.
What would Gandhi say?
By Valerie Berenyi Mon, Jan 24 2011
When I read this story today on the news wire about Indians going gaga for their pets North American-style, I immediately thought of Gandhi's famous quote:
"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated."
I doubt that the painting of one's cat's claws or the waving of crystals over a sick dog is what the father of India's civil rights movement had in mind when it comes to animal welfare.
India pet lovers spark new fads as ownership surges
Rohan Dua, Reuters
NEW DELHI -- As incomes surge in economically booming India, pet lovers are driving the growth of a whole range of new trends, from organic pet toys to crystal healing and even nail painting for cats.
The pet care market in India has risen from $31 million in 2003 to $64.34 million last year, says pet care magazine Creature Companion quoting Euromonitor International, as millions of people moved into the middle class and disposable incomes grew.
Pet care services such as grooming, pet-sitting and boarding are becoming hugely popular, while the rapid spread of the internet has also boosted virtual stores and digital networking platforms to such an extent that the market is projected to double yet again, to $144 million, by 2015.
But at the India International Pet Fair in New Delhi at the weekend, some of the most popular areas catered to pet owners looking for advice on how to cope with grumpy and ageing pets.
More than 3,000 visited a stall devoted to crystal therapy, or using gems and stones for healing, over the first two days of the three-day fair, a ticket taker said.
"My six-year old St. Bernard has been troubling me with his unfriendly and obnoxious behaviour over the past year, though before he was always very affectionate and showed a pleasant demeanour with everyone at home," said Christina Paul.
"The veterinarian I took him to helped changed his eating habits but he continues with his hostility, so I am very excited to learn about this stone therapy."
Madhu Kotiya, who began pet healing five years ago, offers packages of crystals and stones to deal with things such as "Anger and Aggression" and "Accident and Emergency."
The prices range from $10 to $12 — in a country where the per capita income was $945 as of fiscal 2010.
"Apart from using crystals, we are also doing energy healing called ‘angel communication healing,’ which helps people find their lost dogs," Kotiya added.
But others at the fair sniffed at the idea of New Age care, recommending old-fashioned methods such as lavishing pets with time and company.
"It’s not easy to domesticate any pet in the house. They require hygiene, love and training which not many pet owners are willing to provide," said one exhibitor.
The three-day fair, now in its fifth year, was begun originally as a trade fair to help organise the industry, which despite its rapid growth still remains a bit of a free-for-all.
Dogs accompanied their owners as they strolled from stall to stall, lazing around or engaging in playful mock fights with other dogs. At one stall, cats could get their toenails painted in bright colours.
Also on tap were races, a dog obedience show, and a fancy dress competition won by Moni the Cocker Spaniel in a butterfly design and Jojo the cat for a "Save the Tiger" theme.
Despite many modern options, pet toys, including rubber space stations and studded chops and bells, remained a show stealer.
But even here there was a nod to present-day sensibilities — many of the more popular toys were advertised as "eco-friendly" by virtue of being made out of natural rubber.
a dog, a cat and a rat
For your enjoyment:
This is a video of a homeless man in Santa Barbara and his pets.
They work State Street every week for donations.
The animals are pretty well fed and are mellow.
They are a family.
The man who owns them rigged a harness up for his cat so she wouldn't have to walk so much (like the dog and himself).
At some juncture the rat came along, and as no one wanted to eat anyone else, the rat started riding with the cat and, often, on the cat!
The dog, will stand all day and let you talk to him and admire him for a few chin scratches.
The Mayor of Santa Barbara filmed this clip and sent it out as a holiday card.
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=D8 ... r_embedded
For your enjoyment:
This is a video of a homeless man in Santa Barbara and his pets.
They work State Street every week for donations.
The animals are pretty well fed and are mellow.
They are a family.
The man who owns them rigged a harness up for his cat so she wouldn't have to walk so much (like the dog and himself).
At some juncture the rat came along, and as no one wanted to eat anyone else, the rat started riding with the cat and, often, on the cat!
The dog, will stand all day and let you talk to him and admire him for a few chin scratches.
The Mayor of Santa Barbara filmed this clip and sent it out as a holiday card.
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=D8 ... r_embedded
The most famous statue in Japan is arguably one of a dog
The most famous statue in Japan is arguably one of a dog, Hachiko, who exemplified loyalty, perseverance and duty. Hachiko met his owner at the train station when he returned from work each day, but the owner died at work one day in 1925 and never returned. Until he died about 10 years later, Hachiko faithfully went to the station each afternoon just in case his master returned.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/20/opini ... emc=tha212
The most famous statue in Japan is arguably one of a dog, Hachiko, who exemplified loyalty, perseverance and duty. Hachiko met his owner at the train station when he returned from work each day, but the owner died at work one day in 1925 and never returned. Until he died about 10 years later, Hachiko faithfully went to the station each afternoon just in case his master returned.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/20/opini ... emc=tha212
Hunter in critical condition after being shot by HIS DOG
By Daily Mail Reporter
A hunter is in critical condition after he was shot in the thigh – by his dog.
Billy E. Brown, 78, was driving to go deer hunting on a bumpy road near Tampa, Florida when his American bulldog became excited in the truck.
As he moved about the vehicle, the pet, named Eli, bumped a loaded Browning .308 and possibly released the safety catch.
More....
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... S-DOG.html
By Daily Mail Reporter
A hunter is in critical condition after he was shot in the thigh – by his dog.
Billy E. Brown, 78, was driving to go deer hunting on a bumpy road near Tampa, Florida when his American bulldog became excited in the truck.
As he moved about the vehicle, the pet, named Eli, bumped a loaded Browning .308 and possibly released the safety catch.
More....
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... S-DOG.html
A millionaire cat!!
Tommaso the cat now a millionaire meower
Tommaso, a four-year-old Italian puss who began life as a stray, is now believed to be the richest feline in the world after inheriting a real estate empire worth €10 million ($13.3 million).
The newly-minted millionaire meower is now living at an undisclosed location outside Rome with his trustee, identified only as Stefania, after the death of his 94-year-old mistress last month, the Guardian newspaper reported.
Under Italian law, animals cannot inherit directly, but can be named beneficiaries once a trustee is found.
Tommaso's owner, the childless widow of a successful builder, initially tried to find an animal welfare association to take care of him but, according to her lawyer, felt none provided adequate assurances for his future.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/b ... 6218742665
Tommaso, a four-year-old Italian puss who began life as a stray, is now believed to be the richest feline in the world after inheriting a real estate empire worth €10 million ($13.3 million).
The newly-minted millionaire meower is now living at an undisclosed location outside Rome with his trustee, identified only as Stefania, after the death of his 94-year-old mistress last month, the Guardian newspaper reported.
Under Italian law, animals cannot inherit directly, but can be named beneficiaries once a trustee is found.
Tommaso's owner, the childless widow of a successful builder, initially tried to find an animal welfare association to take care of him but, according to her lawyer, felt none provided adequate assurances for his future.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/b ... 6218742665
Dogs in Heaven? Pope Leaves Pearly Gate Open
Pope Francis' remarks to a distraught little boy whose dog had died have caused a new debate on whether animals have souls, suffer and go to heaven.
More...
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/12/world ... 05309&_r=0
Pope Francis' remarks to a distraught little boy whose dog had died have caused a new debate on whether animals have souls, suffer and go to heaven.
More...
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/12/world ... 05309&_r=0
Little girl shows new meaning of "dog bed"
Sierra believes she has discovered the world's best dog bed and it looks like we have to agree with her! Watch her sprawl out on a pair of giant Newfoundland dogs, Bella and Sebastian. How precious is that? Credit to 'brenmichelle'.
http://www.msn.com/en-ca/video/viral/li ... lsignoutmd
Sierra believes she has discovered the world's best dog bed and it looks like we have to agree with her! Watch her sprawl out on a pair of giant Newfoundland dogs, Bella and Sebastian. How precious is that? Credit to 'brenmichelle'.
http://www.msn.com/en-ca/video/viral/li ... lsignoutmd
Pets make us happier and healthier. FACT!
VIDEO
http://www.msn.com/en-ca/video/animals/ ... lsignoutmd
VIDEO
http://www.msn.com/en-ca/video/animals/ ... lsignoutmd
World's Most Patient Dog
VIDEO
A little boy poors sand on his dog and the dog does not seem to mind.
http://www.msn.com/en-ca/video/comedy/w ... lsignoutmd
A big friendly dog plays with a small adorable kitten.
http://www.msn.com/en-ca/video/comedy/b ... lsignoutmd
This boy tries to teach his dog fetch but then just ends up giving him a hug.
http://www.msn.com/en-ca/video/comedy/a ... lsignoutmd
VIDEO
A little boy poors sand on his dog and the dog does not seem to mind.
http://www.msn.com/en-ca/video/comedy/w ... lsignoutmd
A big friendly dog plays with a small adorable kitten.
http://www.msn.com/en-ca/video/comedy/b ... lsignoutmd
This boy tries to teach his dog fetch but then just ends up giving him a hug.
http://www.msn.com/en-ca/video/comedy/a ... lsignoutmd