Possessed myself of a strong stomach and a hard head, inured to hardship,
cruelty, and brutality, nevertheless I found, as I came to manhood, that
I unconsciously protected myself from the hurt of the trained-animal turn
by getting up and leaving the theatre whenever such turns came on the
stage. I say "unconsciously." By this I mean it never entered my mind
that this was a programme by which the possible death-blow might be given
to trained-animal turns. I was merely protecting myself from the pain of
witnessing what it would hurt me to witness.
But of recent years my understanding of human nature has become such that
I realize that no normal healthy human would tolerate such performances
did he or she know the terrible cruelty that lies behind them and makes
them possible. So I am emboldened to suggest, here and now, three
things:
First, let all humans inform themselves of the inevitable and eternal
cruelty by the means of which only can animals be compelled to perform
before revenue-paying audiences. Second, I suggest that all men and
women, and boys and girls, who have so acquainted themselves with the
essentials of the fine art of animal-training, should become members of,
and ally themselves with, the local and national organizations of humane
societies and societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals.
And the third suggestion I cannot state until I have made a preamble.
Like hundreds of thousands of others, I have worked in other fields,
striving to organize the mass of mankind into movements for the purpose
of ameliorating its own wretchedness and misery. Difficult as this is to
accomplish, it is still more difficult to persuade the human into any
organised effort to alleviate the ill conditions of the lesser animals.
Practically all of us will weep red tears and sweat bloody sweats as we
come to knowledge of the unavoidable cruelty and brutality on which the
trained-animal world rests and has its being. But not one-tenth of one
per cent. of us will join any organization for the prevention of cruelty
to animals, and by our words and acts and contributions work to prevent
the perpetration of cruelties on animals. This is a weakness of our own
human nature. We must recognize it as we recognize heat and cold, the
opaqueness of the non-transparent, and the everlasting down-pull of
gravity.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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