The question relates to a story – the story of a pit bull who ended up in a California animal shelter after somehow surviving a stint in a dog-fighting ring.
Daddy’s story is recounted in an article posted Thursday on Examiner.com. His body is scarred from his fighting days, but his soul is special and unscathed.
His rescuer, Angel Parisa, was walking the normally calm canine last week, when he began to pull her on a quick-step down a side street and up to women who was in distress from a heart condition. Parisa helped her get to her heart medication, which quite possibly saved her life.
So here is this dog, abused horribly by humans (if we can call them that) in dog fighting ring, and he ends up saving a person’s life. He somehow sensed something was wrong from a distance and raced to her side. Daddy has a special ability we, as humans, don’t possess. He is special.
A percentage of our human population, ain’t so special (as we say in the South). Some people run dog fighting operations or puppy mills or sell illegal drugs to kids or kidnap kids or …. well … you get the picture. So when we compare these people with your standard cat or dog, which one should carry a higher standing in our society?
At times, I hear the drumbeat from those opposing better standards of care for animals – suggesting “the animal rights activists” want to give rights to animals and elevate their standing to that of humans. Well – can’t we agree that animals should have at least the same ‘rights’ as those who engage in cruel and torturous acts against people and animals?
Can’t we agree that Daddy the pit bull is more human than the individuals who forced him to fight and scarred his body?
Let’s at minimum all agree that animals should have rights to a degree that protects them from cruelty and torture. And the people who engage in these acts against them should get more than a slap on the wrist as they walk freely out the back door of the courthouse, on the way back home to engage in more acts of cruelty.
If I had a choice in who should have equal protection under the law, I’ll pick Daddy.
PACK MENTALITY 
Posted by D Gary Grady on August 13, 2010 at 12:13 am
“Well – can’t we agree that animals should have at least the same ‘rights’ as those who engage in cruel and torturous acts against people and animals?” This is one of the best things you’ve written in this blog.
Speaking of the relative worth of humans and animals, in the spring of 1880 in our mutual hometown of Wilmington NC a young riverboat captain named William A. Ellerbrock was walking his dog Boss when he came upon a house fire. Captain Ellerbrock handed the dog’s lead to a bystander and rushed into the burning home to try to help. There was a crash and he was heard to cry out. The dog pulled away from the bystander’s grip and ran inside. Later, when the fire was finally out, the body of Captain Ellerbrock was found pinned under a fallen beam with Boss’s body behind him, his teeth gripping part of the captain’s clothing. Apparently he’d been trying to pull his human friend to safety and had died in the attempt. The two were buried in the same casket in historic Oakdale Cemetery, and local organizations raised funds to erect a monument over the grave honoring both its residents.
There are some who say that it was a shame to allow that dog to be buried in a human cemetery, but I don’t agree, because I don’t think the dog would consider himself too dishonored.
A photograph of the monument can be seen here: http://www.roadsideamerica.com/pet/boss.html
Posted by D Gary Grady on August 13, 2010 at 12:16 am
Minor correction: Several sources say that Captain Ellerbrock and his dog Boss died in April 1880, but the Oakdale Cemetery site gives the date as February 11, 1880, and I’m inclined to think that’s probably correct.