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Eleven U.S. states have pending animal abuse registry legislation:
Son of Sam, Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer and the Columbine High School shooters are among the infamous criminals who had a history of hurting animals before they went on to target humans, a tendency that's part of what's behind a movement to create public online registries of known animal abusers.
New York is among 11 states with animal abuse registry bills pending in their legislatures, following Tennessee, which started its in 2016 along with a growing number of municipalities in recent years, including New York City, and the counties that include Chicago and Tampa, Florida.
"Animal abuse is a bridge crime," said the sponsor of New York's bill, Republican state Sen. Jim Tedisco, who noted that Nikolas Cruz, accused of killing 17 people in the Parkland, Florida, high school shooting on Feb. 14, reportedly also had a history of shooting small animals.
While the main goal of collecting names of convicted animal abusers is to prevent them from being able to adopt or purchase other animals, registry backers say such lists could also be a way to raise red flags about people who may commit other violent crimes ranging from domestic violence to mass shootings. But some animal welfare advocates, mostly notably the ASPCA, question how effective they can really be.
[Ed's Comment - Original link unreliable, so I have added additional links]
Additional Sources:
- http://www.vmdtoday.com/news/animal-abuser-registry-legislation-sought-stalled
- https://www.navs.org/state-animal-abuser-registries-proposed-2018/
- http://www.ladbible.com/news/animals-news-us-states-and-counties-are-registering-animal-abuse-like-sex-offences-20180218
- https://nhes.org/animal-abuser-registries/
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 05 2018, @02:45PM (40 children)
Cool, where can I register to abuse animals?
(Score: 4, Touché) by Thexalon on Monday March 05 2018, @03:06PM (39 children)
Lots of places:
- The Royal School of Bullfighting in Seville, Spain
- Horse and dog racetracks
- Many many agriculture jobs
And this is the real pitfall of animal abuse laws: We only seem to really be worried about abusing the animals that we aren't planning on eating and have deemed "cute".
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday March 05 2018, @03:22PM (18 children)
- Horse and dog racetracks
The dog racetracks seem to have mostly died out here in the US. Good riddance.
- The Royal School of Bullfighting in Seville, Spain
Yep, between this crap and the "running of the bulls", the Spaniards are still a pretty backwards and stupid bunch of people. I really do understand why the Catalans want to get away from those morons. Heck, Spain still has a national holiday celebrating Columbus's brutal acts in the New World, complete with a military parade. And don't forget, they were an actual dictatorship only a short time ago, complete with numerous disappearings. They try to act like they're some advanced western European nation, but they're really much more backwards than most of the eastern European countries that only recently joined the EU.
We only seem to really be worried about abusing the animals that we aren't planning on eating and have deemed "cute".
Well to be fair, there *are* supposed to be laws that require livestock to be treated humanely, executed painlessly, etc. Some farms do seem to do an OK job of this, giving them nice pastoral lives until their number is up, but the giant corporate factory farms seem to be pretty horrific, and somehow get away with not following these laws, and worse having corrupt relations with local law enforcement so that activists attempting to document law-breaking end up in trouble with the cops instead of the law-breakers.
What we really need in this country is a federal police force that polices the state and especially local cops, and when it finds illegal actions by them, prosecutes them ruthlessly. We don't have much trust in our police in this country, and part of it I think is because each police department seems to be a separate, independent fiefdom, with very little accountability, outside that provided by civil court suits which isn't really helpful and doesn't punish actual law-breaking. I would say that this should be the job of the state police, but they sure as hell aren't doing it.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Freeman on Monday March 05 2018, @03:46PM (11 children)
Creating a "Federal Police Force" and doing away with local law enforcement would be a monumentally bad idea. Local law enforcement have ties with the local population and I would say are more likely not to be corrupt. They would more likely at least be less corrupt as they have far less power than a "Federal Police Force" would. May as well declare martial law and disband the police at that point.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 05 2018, @04:32PM
That's not what he said at all. Of course you're fully aware.
Why the fuck are you here posting dishonestly?
Pretending not to understand so you can counter with bullshit.
He said federal oversight of local agencies. Which is exactly how people all around the world, across decades, have handled the problem he's described.
We aren't stupid and don't need stupid people here go spout your dumb on youtube .
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday March 05 2018, @04:58PM (9 children)
Just to echo the AC responder, are you really that fucking stupid, or are you intentionally lying? Because it's plainly obvious that I never advocated for what you claim I did. So either you're a fucking moron or a fucking troll.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Freeman on Monday March 05 2018, @05:22PM (8 children)
Sorry, my brain must have been turned off this morning. I re-read your comment and yeah, I'm not sure what I was thinking.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday March 05 2018, @06:01PM (7 children)
Wow, thanks.
Well, here's another example of where this site needs the ability to edit or delete comments afterwards. This happens to me once in a while on Reddit, and when it does, I just go and delete the angry comment that's no longer called for, which also ends up making it hard to see the rest of ensuing thread which is at this point unnecessary. There's no reason to keep around angry comments that are just the result of a total misunderstanding.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Grishnakh on Monday March 05 2018, @06:16PM (1 child)
Also, I apologize for being overly harsh with my reply.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 06 2018, @05:29PM
why don't you apologize for your seditious post? the feds don't have authority over the locals in this fucking country. if you are native born you are woefully ignorant of how this country is supposed to work.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Monday March 05 2018, @08:14PM (2 children)
There's another fix. Let go of all human emotions, all desires, all motivations. You need to shed the essence of your very humanity so that you'll never be compelled to write the angry comment in the first place. A number of meditative, chemical, or surgical fixes can accomplish this.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday March 05 2018, @08:44PM (1 child)
Fixing the site would be a lot easier.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 05 2018, @09:21PM
Yeah, but the idea of me handing out free icepick lobotomies sounds a lot more fun.
(Score: 4, Funny) by Reziac on Tuesday March 06 2018, @03:16AM
Maybe we need a couple more mod options.
One the poster can use: "Sorry, fucked up"
One the respondent can use "Sorry, didn't mean to jump your shit"
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 06 2018, @05:51AM
Nah, maybe you'll think next time before getting unhinged. After all, the AC apparently expressed your sentiments (which I can definitely understand, there are lots of trolls that appear like that), and yet you still felt you needed to rant off under your name.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday March 05 2018, @05:16PM (5 children)
Be careful what you wish for. Himmler had something similar to what you're asking for. The SS did a lot of things, and policing the police was one of their lesser known duties.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday March 05 2018, @06:05PM (4 children)
The Nazis also had trains that worked pretty well and were on time. Is that a bad thing too?
The Nazis also were proponents of making inexpensive cars that people could afford. Should we not have those?
The Nazis were proponents of spending on science and tech research. Should we stop all of that?
The Nazis preferred attractive uniforms. Should we consciously avoid that too, and make sure all our uniforms are as ugly as possible?
The Nazis did all kinds of things. I'm quite sure many other countries do have national-level police who are there as a check on the local police powers and to make sure they're following the laws and not corrupt.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday March 05 2018, @06:28PM (2 children)
Well, the police have been known to make people disappear, without a trace. Or, if the bodies are somehow found, suicide is the accepted explanation. Think about the SS. They could make the police dissapear. Mayors. Generals. Anyone, in fact. Having a super police force could well have unintended consequences.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday March 05 2018, @08:47PM (1 child)
Again, I'm pretty sure every advanced nation on the planet has something like this, and they don't seem to have any real problems with disappearances, or even excessively-high suicides. Just look at Norway for instance.
Not having this has clear consequences that there's variable or even complete lack of rule of law depending on your locality. You can't have a functional republic that has "rule of law" if the people in some little town are basically living under a dictator who has extra-legal powers and the higher levels of government have little recourse to deal with him, and every town is potentially like this to some degree.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 05 2018, @09:35PM
It's helpful if you have access to explosives like dynamite to deal with tyrants inside their bunkers. [jpfo.org]
You can even fight back and win against the federal government, both with weapons on a potential battlefield [youtube.com], and also in federal [theguardian.com] courtrooms [katu.com] (though some of the observant among us might be inclined to state that 'the process is the punishment').
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 06 2018, @05:22AM
This white supremacist meme needs to die. Like in a fire. Newsflash: I lived for a few years in Germany and I can tell you that the trains were running on time long after the Nazis were gone. As in fifty years after they were gone. And I'm willing to bet, dollars to donuts, that the trains were running on time long before the Nazis ever arrived on the scene.
Another newsflash: Henry Ford had this idea at least several years before the Nazis showed up.
They also had a nasty habit of excluding Jews from University. It had a debilitating impact on their science and tech research. Just so you know.
FYI, in the USA the DoJ traditionally has the role of stepping in as a check on local police abuses. Most of the cases I am familiar with involve evidence of civil rights violations by state and/or local police. Just so you know.
I do hope this clarifies things a bit for you.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday March 05 2018, @03:46PM (6 children)
The problem is your suggestions all require the registrant to be 18. We are looking for a registry that we can use for kids who might make a stupid mistake, but be branded for life.
A further problem with your suggestion is that the registry does not carry a stigma. And employers won't care to check if you are registered for bullfighting or betting at racetracks.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by ilPapa on Monday March 05 2018, @10:28PM (5 children)
Correct. An example of this was the 17 year-old David Huckabee, son of the former governor of Arkansas, Mike Huckabee. Young David, when he was 17 years old, tortured and killed a dog while he was at Boy Scout camp. Later, Governor Mike Huckabee, being the good father that he is, used the power of his office to cover up this torture and killing of a dog.
We wouldn't want David Huckabee to be branded for life just for torturing and killing a dog for fun when he was 17 years old. And certainly, we wouldn't want this behavior to reflect on any members of the Huckabee family who might be working as press secretary for the Trump administration.
By the way, here is a photo of David Huckabee, who tortured and killed a dog when he was 17 years old:
https://goo.gl/images/3XLv6E [goo.gl]
https://www.snopes.com/politics/politicians/huckabeedog.asp [snopes.com]
You are still welcome on my lawn.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 05 2018, @10:37PM
David Huckabee can rot in hell but such examples do not make a registry good. Kids do stupid and sometimes evil shit, if they can get past that then I don't think they should be stigmatized the rest of their life by a quick registry search. Same thing for felons, once they serve their time I don't think they should be forced to tell people about their mistakes or be barred from voting. You know how to guarantee recidivism? Stigmatize someone for life so that it is near impossible for them to succeed in society.
I said in another comment, case workers are where the focus should be made but emotional appeals have made it impossible to apply reason when a child or animal is hurt. If you don't agree to the most insane reprisals you are labeled an uncaring monster!
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday March 06 2018, @03:40PM (3 children)
That is a poor example. Not what I meant. What Huckabee did is EXACTLY what should be branded for life.
I'm thinking of stupid mistakes, relatively harmless. Things that will be abused in order to force someone onto the list who should not be there. I don't have an example, but an analogy would be to become a registered sex offender for public urination.
An example of an abuse of the system: Oh, you unintentionally ran over a squirrel -- it's the animal abuse registry for life for you buddy!
If this kind of registry is created, it will be abused, unless some protections are built in. It seems like you cannot create any well intentioned mechanism without people trying to abuse it.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by ilPapa on Tuesday March 06 2018, @04:09PM (2 children)
That was kind of my point.
The thing about intentionally hurting animals is that it has to be intentional. Otherwise, it's not intentional, you know? And yes, I would put hunters on the list.
Sex offender registries can be easily fixed. Everybody likes to point to the tens of millions of people who get on those lists for merely urinating in public, but the legislature could have put in a "public urination is not a sex crime" clause into the law. Personally, I'd like to know if the guy who just moved into the apartment above the day care had been incarcerated for unintentionally raping and murdering a toddler while he was urinating in public. And I'd like to know if the young man buying an AR-15 with high-capacity magazines has done time for skinning cats and setting them on fire.
You are still welcome on my lawn.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday March 06 2018, @05:09PM
Me too.
I would like to know if he was registered for raping and murdering a toddler. I think urinating in public is irrelevant.
As for urinating in public. I am all for having a legal penalty for that. But I think being on a sex offender registry is ridiculous. I think it is somewhere between or near jaywalking and parking in the handicapped spot. Or BMW drivers thinking they are entitled to drive in the carpool lane (and urinate in public).
Nobody is going to accuse legislators of being bright, insightful, or thinking through the consequences of their actions. (Hence so many of them being accused of groping or worse.)
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 06 2018, @05:37PM
why? you think the government will protect you with bullshit lists , spies and pigs everywhere? you're a fucking slave. carry a pistol, like a free man (don't get a license/permit like a little groveling bitch) and defend yourself and your family like you're supposed to.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 05 2018, @03:47PM (12 children)
This is a natural progression after 30 years of toleration of PETA and their ilk. They should have been involuntarily committed long ago to institutions able to care for those individuals. Now we have fruitcakes trying to drag peacocks onto commercial airlines as "comfort animals." Every time I go to a big box store, I regualrly see some nutcase dragging along Fido dressed in some Amazon purchased knockoff vest to help them shop. Last week, I saw some loony millennial dragging her miniature German Shepard puppy around in the damn cart at the grocery store. It yapped incessantly at every customer she passed. No store employee seemed to care. I sure as Hell don't want to put my food in a cart where Rover has been sitting and slobbering. And I am sick to death of grandmas bragging about their "grand puppies." Seriously? It's a dog. If that's the highlight of your existence, you have no life at all. If your kid ever manages to breed you'll have a stroke trying to contain yourself.
We have allowed crazies to elevate animals up to the level of human beings and sometimes sainthood. Rome is falling. Nero is tuning up his fiddle.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Monday March 05 2018, @06:13PM (9 children)
Oh please.
This is a natural progression after 30 years of toleration of PETA and their ilk.
This is stupid. This is a natural progression of actual science which has proven a connection between kids abusing animals and adults who become mass murderers or serial killers. PeTA fruitcakes (who think that swatting flies is somehow horrible) have nothing to do with this.
Every time I go to a big box store, I regualrly see some nutcase dragging along Fido
It yapped incessantly at every customer she passed. No store employee seemed to care.
This too has nothing to do with PeTA, this is just a modern trend, stupid as it may be, and is mainly the fault of retailers for not having stricter policies and enforcing them.
I sure as Hell don't want to put my food in a cart where Rover has been sitting and slobbering.
Why not? You probably don't have any trouble putting your (packaged) food in a cart that someone's nasty, snot-nosed kid has been sitting and drooling. And that nasty kid is likely carrying some disease that you can very well catch, unlike anyone's dog. I haven't heard of any viruses that work on both dogs and humans. I'm no fan of dogs at all, and don't think people should be able to bring them in stores, but be realistic: kids are a much bigger threat to public health.
And I am sick to death of grandmas bragging about their "grand puppies." Seriously? It's a dog. If that's the highlight of your existence, you have no life at all.
Maybe they're bragging about their "grandpuppies" because their grandkids are a bunch of little shits. Most kids, in my experience, are. At least most dogs are friendly. I don't really want to be around them because they smell and drool, but I'd rather be around people with small dogs than people with little kids. Dogs are generally much better behaved.
(Score: 3, Informative) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Monday March 05 2018, @06:55PM (7 children)
Viruses? Not really - they require DNA or RNA compatibility.
But ringworm, hookworm, roundworm, tapeworm, giardia, campylobacter, brucellosis, cryptosporidium, MRSA, salmonella, leishmaniasis, bubonic plague, rabies. Yes, a lot of those require fecal contact or similar, but not all.
(And none of that had anything to do with the rest of your post as you actually made excellent points. Just that I don't want to have my cart previously occupied by Fido or the child.)
This sig for rent.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Grishnakh on Monday March 05 2018, @07:36PM (3 children)
Yes, that is a very good point. However, I'm much more worried about catching a cold or the flu from being in public than I am hookworm, roundworm, salmonella, plague, etc. People really do catch colds and flus all the time, in huge numbers, every winter (as well as other times of year, but "flu season" is a real thing); I don't think I've ever heard of someone catching plague, rabies (without being bitten by a rabid animal), worms, etc. just from being in a public place. Almost all those things are easily avoided by simply washing your hands, and also not putting your hands into strange bio-matter (and especially not putting your hands in strange goo, and then putting them in your mouth! Something that stupid kids are always doing.).
My central point was that if someone's worried about disease or hygiene from other peoples' pets, they should be much more worried about other peoples' kids, but somehow peoples' disease-ridden, snot-nosed brats get a pass. It's even worse for housing: most apartments will restrict pets altogether, or charge you "pet rent" and additional fees, supposedly to cover damage, but there's no such extra fees for having kids, who cause far more damage to apartments than pets do on average.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 05 2018, @09:18PM (2 children)
I'll try to keep that hygiene point in mind next time I see Rover dragging his ass over the carpet, or lapping water from his bowl and dribbling it all over floor. However, last I checked, nobody's little "snot nosed brat" went apeshit and bit off some poor fucker's face for looking at them wrong. My wife and kids were pinned in the house by a neighbor's loose "pet" one time and had to call the police to walk out to our car. The cops drew on the mongrel and held a bead while my wife and kids walked in our own front yard. Fido would have gone to the dog park in the great beyond if he had charged them like he did earlier that morning.
I can't tell you how many news stories I have seen from dog attacks where the owners were shocked, totally shocked, that their beloved baby would try to eat some poor bastard who just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. Hell, just last week some woman was found dead in Virginia, on the path she normally walked her dogs. And she had been mauled and eaten by her own beloved dogs.
So yeah, when I see an obvious asshole taking advantage of well meaning laws meant to protect truly disabled people just so they can carry their little shit factory into a grocery story, I get sick to my stomach at their self entitled ego. These are not trained animals by and large. They are someone's baby surrogate that they can't leave alone at home long enough to buy their fucking groceries.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 06 2018, @12:02PM (1 child)
My son's grandparents on his mother's side have a "rescue" dog that has attacked me twice, he literally tore my clothes off, and bit me multiple times as fast and as hard as he could. I could see the look in his eyes, and it was scary, no regard for anything but to fuck me up.
He also pushed my son over as he opened the door to go into the house, and ran up and bit my father in the side of his belly and proceeded to try and tear off a chunk of his belly fat as he got back in his car.
The dog has also attacked neighbors the same way.
I love animals, but if that dog ever charges at me again, I'm going to kill it right then and there with my bare hands, and my booted feet.
I won't let it suffer, but I will not give it another chance to attack me.
If he ever attacks my family again I'm going to demand it be put down, either by hunting accident, or by animal control.
I've told his grandparents exactly that, and the dog is lucky that when he bit my father that their other dog had just recently died, so I didn't want to push the issue, and be the bad guy that took their other dog away.
And no, I've never harmed an animal, even though I grew up a farm boy, and a hunter.
But if you just heard about the guy who killed his in-laws dog, you might feel they should be on that list, even tho anyone who knows the truth would disagree.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 06 2018, @01:19PM
My girlfriend has a Jack Russel that thinks he's Billy Badass. He periodically flips out and finds the nearest cushion and shakes it in his mouth then he runs up to you and growls. He's not bitten me yet, but he's got a history. If the little bastard ever does, I'm gonna go for the field goal with his ass and I'm sure that will cure him of trying to intimidate me. I've warned my girlfriend that I will retailiate if he bites me. You let it go and it reinforces the behavior.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 05 2018, @08:29PM
These diseases are all much more easily spread from human to human, or require circumstances that aren't plausible, or are so rare as to be irrelevant, or aren't actually spread by dogs. The only genuine health risk you have from a dog is if you are allergic or if one bites you.
(Score: 2) by ilPapa on Monday March 05 2018, @10:34PM (1 child)
I can count at least six items on that list that I caught from your Mom.
You are still welcome on my lawn.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 06 2018, @03:25AM
That's funny. I made the list from all the items I caught from your daughter.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 06 2018, @01:31AM
These laws have nothing to do with that other than as marketing to get them passed. If you want to track such people then you want them to continue to have pets so you can track how much they're abusing them. These laws are one strike and you're out forever of having a pet near you. You won't find out who likes abusing animals thus they'll be further underground when they 'suddenly' come out and kill a bunch of people.
If they actually wanted to keep these kids from becoming serial killers then the laws would be proposing educational classes to teach these people how to respect others. Instead it's the expect opposite. Here's a new list of people we're legally compelled to oppress and thus in turn cause them to hate society even more. These types of lists tighten the lid on a pressure cooker allowing it to explode with far more force rather than adding a pressure relief valve like they should.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 05 2018, @07:10PM (1 child)
Do you even know what PETA stands for? Certainly not pets. Or saints...
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 05 2018, @09:22PM
People Eating Tasty Animals?