Banned From Owning Animals

[Vladimir]

A question for those from the UK: Who supports this law? Here's what I'm talking about.

Two students who sent a hamster through the post as a drunken prank have been fined and banned from owning animals. So what else can't you put in a parcel? The hamster found in a postbox is now named First Class. And he's lucky to be alive. If he hadn't gnawed through the envelope and been spotted by the postman, he might have died in the sorting machine.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4623754.stm

It's a HAMSTER! I guess you're allowed to send insects and lower forms of life through the mail but what about the sentence? It was a stupid prank from some of the "best and brightest" but 10 years? Let me guess, because they can feel pain it is abuse? If ants are found to experience pain should there be a penalty for killing them too? Animal cruelty is wrong and (depending on religion) disrespectful but is this a realistic sentence? Are you allowed to kill rats and mice in the UK or do you have to obtain their consent for assisted suicide?

[Fragony]

It's a rather cruel thing to do. Seems fitting to me.

[R'as al Ghul]

It's a HAMSTER! I guess you're allowed to send insects and lower forms of life through the mail but what about the sentence? It was a stupid prank from some of the "best and brightest" but 10 years? Let me guess, because they can feel pain it is abuse? If ants are found to experience pain should there be a penalty for killing them too? Animal cruelty is wrong and (depending on religion) disrespectful but is this a realistic sentence? Are you allowed to kill rats and mice in the UK or do you have to obtain their consent for assisted suicide?

Well, they only got banned from owning animals. Seems fair to me.
10 years is plenty of time to think about it. Clearly they aren't friends
of animals or they wouldn't have done it.
Did you know that horses do feel pain but can't express it?
This is true for most animals and frankly, science doesn't know enough
to determine if an animal feels and what. I just recently saw a program
about ants. One of them was stuck to a carnivorous plant and struggling
to get out. The glue was too sticky but another ant, who passed by, joined the effort and pulled its mate out. Interesting, isn't it?
Mice and rats can at least feel fear and they do express their stress by screaming.
Poor hamster, I feel sorry for him.

[Fragony]

Did you know that horses do feel pain but can't express it?

They sure can. It is the most horrible sound you will ever hear. Horse had broken out, and a motorbike ripped of his leg.

[R'as al Ghul]

They sure can. It is the most horrible sound you will ever hear. Horse had broken out, and a motorbike ripped of his leg.

I'm too afraid to imagine. I stand corrected.
I was thinking about minor pains, not moments of death.
If it has muscle restraints for example (can be very painfull), they tend
to be quiet about it. Only when riding them you'll notice that sth is wrong.

[Ja'chyra]

Seems entirely reasonable to me, I can't stand animal cruelty.

[Devastatin Dave]

Well they're lucky I wasn't the judge, I would have boxed those guys up and labeled the box "Not Fragile, please feel free to kick the shit out of this box" and mail it third class overseas.

[Ja'chyra]

Well they're lucky I wasn't the judge, I would have boxed those guys up and labeled the box "Not Fragile, please feel free to kick the shit out of this box" and mail it third class overseas.

Guess who's back
Back again
Yadda yadda....

[R'as al Ghul]

Seems entirely reasonable to me, I can't stand animal cruelty.

It really makes me upset.
I don't know what's up with me today but just look at this little fellow:

He's sitting on a hand. How can you want to harm a living being so small and fragile? I simply can't imagine the motivation behind it.

[Vladimir]

So again, what about the rats and mice? We all know how beloved the brown rat is in Europe so do you guys adopt them? Maybe turn your home into a “wildlife refuge”? Nothing happened to the poor little critter (that's his picture in the article). A fine would be appropriate and I doubt those people will "think about it" much. So how is that enforced? If a bobby sees you holding a goldfish is he going to beat you with his billy club while blowing his whistle? Or do you have to wear a scarlet "H"?

Hamster mutilation = bad

Hamster in the mail = funny (more like point and laugh funny)

[Fragony]

So again, what about the rats and mice? We all know how beloved the brown rat is in Europe so do you guys adopt them? Maybe turn your home into a “wildlife refuge”? Nothing happened to the poor little critter (that's his picture in the article). A fine would be appropriate and I doubt those people will "think about it" much. So how is that enforced? If a bobby sees you holding a goldfish is he going to beat you with his billy club while blowing his whistle? Or do you have to wear a scarlet "H"?

Hamster mutilation = bad

Hamster in the mail = funny (more like point and laugh funny)

I don't find it funny, I find it cruel. Poor little guy must have been terrified. I don't understand it, why harm something when it isn't needed. Rats carry diseases, that doesn't make killing them fun.

[Ser Clegane]

Hamster in the mail = funny (more like point and laugh funny)

[Vladimir]

Interesting. I suppose it's illegal to own snakes too as they tend to eat LIVE animals. I imagine that they don't go peaceably and without fear.

[English assassin]

We all know how beloved the brown rat is in Europe so do you guys adopt them?

As it happens I had pet rats when I was a kid. They make very good pets for children. Much better than hamsters, which don't really do much.

Are you allowed to kill rats and mice in the UK or do you have to obtain their consent for assisted suicide?

You are allowed to kill pests provided you do not cause them unnecessary suffering. So eg traps or poisons have to be approved. Seems reasonable to me.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Okay, I don't follow the PETA line about animals needing to be treated as well as humans (better?).

My deeper concern for the hamster is absent...sorry.

That noted, the actions taken were insipid and cruel. Cruelty, as my sig suggests, is more of a tantrum than anything else and, as with my own toddler, tantrums cannot be rewarded if socially acceptable behavior is to result.

If we can ban felons from owning guns, we can prevent these yahoos from owning animals (at least to the extent that such is enforceable).

Cruelty to animals is demeaning to the humans involved and has been correlated with a tendency toward cruelty and violence to one's own species. A bit of a "watch" on these chaps in order to ensure that it was the ethanol that sparked it is not unwarranted.

[R'as al Ghul]

A fine would be appropriate and I doubt those people will "think about it" much. So how is that enforced?

You have a point here. The enforcement can't be guaranteed.
I suggest to fine people like them to do a fair amount of "social hours"
in an animal asylum where they can learn to treat fellow living beings
with respect.
Btw, not all snake owners feed living food. Besides, an animal killing
another animal to sustain itself is the course of nature.

[Papewaio]

I guess you're allowed to send insects and lower forms of life through the mail but what about the sentence? It was a stupid prank from some of the "best and brightest" but 10 years? Let me guess, because they can feel pain it is abuse? If ants are found to experience pain should there be a penalty for killing them too? Animal cruelty is wrong and (depending on religion) disrespectful but is this a realistic sentence? Are you allowed to kill rats and mice in the UK or do you have to obtain their consent for assisted suicide?

The sentence was appropriate, if a little tepid. There are plenty of links between abuse of animals and humans. People who torture animals for fun are more likely later on to escalate to humans compared with the general population.

If they were the "best and brightest" they should have known better. If I was Chancellor of their university I would also suspend them for bringing the reputation of the university down.

There is a definite difference between quickly killing something for sustenance and slowly killing or torturing something for fun. One is survival the other is sick.

Nor do I think the fact that the Hamster survived should lessen their sentence that they got. Their actions were to have fun at the Hamsters and Royal Mails expense. A dead hamster would have left a rather foul stench on peoples mail... a live one would probably left a few pellets that would not have been nice either.

As it is they have shown themselves to be cruel idiots. Not someone I would have looking after kids, have as inlaws, hire as employees or teach as students. I would think though that the real justice would have been sentencing them to be human guinea pigs for science experiments... in mail transport, economy class flying or test crash dummies.

[Vladimir]

If they were the "best and brightest" they should have known better. If I was Chancellor of their university I would also suspend them for bringing the reputation of the university down.

I have to read the article again but I think they were from Cambridge and whenever you go to a "named" university (and not just: "I went to university") in the UK chances are you're pretty smart. I did not think of this aspect though. These people did damage the reputation of their school and should face some punishment for that.

Plus I take it no one has heard the joke routine about the fragility of hamsters right? It's an old bit and I'm not sure who did it but he had jokes like "Hamster [hamburger] Helper", etc., really good stuff. My pain in the arse gerbil outlasted 3 of my brother’s hamsters which seems to indicate the validity of his premise.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

there are two cambridges... the famous one and another... i know this cos my brother has applied for a position there but says he applied for 'the' cambridge whereas he applied to the lesser of the two