Animal abuse is all too real
PET BULLETIN
‘Mews and Yips’ from the Central Aroostook Humane Society
By Gail Wieder
Sometimes there can be a fine line between discipline and abuse, but not very often. Dogs might be man’s best friend, but they don’t have the same level of thought patterning as a human. Applying human characteristics of discipline onto a dog to cause it pain is abuse, plain and simple.
It isn’t just a focus on dogs, either. There’s a focus on specific breeds of dogs, mostly perpetrated out of fear for the dog. Pitbull’s account for 1 out of every 4 dogs that are abused, a rate that has doubled in the past decade. Some of this data might be because more families are choosing to own this breed, but having communities ban the breed helps to condition an attitude of fear, which can lead to an attitude of abuse. 
About 1 million animals per year are abused because of domestic violence that occurs in the home where they live.
Seventy-one percent of pet-owning women entering women’s shelters reported that their batterer had injured, maimed, killed or threatened family pets for revenge.
In 2007, 7 percent of media-reported animal cruelty cases either occurred in the context of a domestic dispute or involved a person with a history of domestic violence.
Before 1986, there were only four states that had laws against animal cruelty.
There are up to 2,000 cases of animal hoarding per year reported in the United States, resulting in more than 250,000 abuse cases.
The problem with abusing dogs is cyclical. Women who are abused by their domestic partners tend to seek out comfort from their dogs when their stress levels are high. When domestic violence happens, the target becomes the dog for two reasons: 1) the abuser knows that they will be able to hurt the victim more by hurting their companion; and 2) most dogs aren’t going to fight back when they see someone they trust trying to hurt them.
What is particularly disturbing in these facts, however, is the prevalence of children abusing animals. This shows that the patterns of domestic violence begin early in a third of domestic violence households and without intervention, more dogs and more people will simply be abused later on.
To be fair, many humans probably don’t intend to abuse their best friends. Many of them likely don’t even see it as abuse. Yelling at a dog because it just stands in the yard, looking at you because you’re telling it to “Come” and it won’t — that’s not often seen as abuse. The problem is that all abuse is harmful, whether intended or not. Words hurt. An angry tone of voice hurts.
If dogs are being seen as “furry children” and they’re being treated this way, and then imagine how real children would be treated? Until humanity gets over itself, the benefits that a dog can bring to someone will never be fully realized.
There is so much information on animal abuse and where to report it at animalabuse.com. If you see animal abuse, please report it to the local authorities.
Be responsible pet owners: spay and neuter your pets.
Gail Wieder is a member of the Board of Directors of the Central Aroostook Humane Society.
