Two months ago I was looking for a video to base my Grammar assignment on, with the topic of finding its distinctive Grammatical features in an everyday conversation. What I found, however, not only brought me to tears, but it has given me a zeal that I never knew before, to tell others about what I saw and learnt from that video.
In the mentioned video, it was about Oprah who was doing a show dedicated to her late pooch, Sophie. She was doing a segment on the business of puppy mills after a gentleman posted a billboard asking the talk show queen to do a show on puppy mills. He knew that she loved dogs and what better way to bring a topic to life then asking her to do an investigative report on this, headed by Oprah correspondent Lisa Ling.
A puppy mill, as I learnt, is a dog-breeding facility where the dogs are irresponsibly bred without any care for their basic necesities (food, water and shelter), all for the sake of profit. The puppies born at the mill are weaned for only a few weeks instead of the usual eight weeks and are then sent to pet stores to be sold to unsuspecting consumers. The puppies sold from the puppy mills would normally have some illness that is caused due to poor breeding and lack of care from the mills.
In the US, puppy mills are growing as quickly as they are being shut down by animal authorities. In Malaysia, although there has been no reported cases of puppy mills in the country, there is still the case of backyard breeding, where, though it follows the same concept of irresponsible breeding, it is done on a smaller scale.
With the world crumbling at the financial turmoil, I am left with a mixture of wonder and anger at what people would stoop to do, all for the sake of making a quick buck or two. As an animal lover myself, I cannot bear the thought of being cramped in a cage with so little to survive on, knowing that I have no choice, no control of the events that lay out before me and no hope of ever being saved until chance knocks on my door. Perhaps these owners could learn a painful lesson in animal cruelty by enduring the same thing these animals are going through right now.
I write this report in protest and fervent hope that justice will be carried out one day for them. I may be on one side of the world, but my heart goes out to all the dogs suffering from man’s sick pleasure. All I can do, and will do, in the meantime, will be to educate my friends and family through the reports I make and the presentations that I plan to do based on puppy mills. By knowing that more people are aware of this new sick type of animal cruelty, that is the first of many steps I can take to ensure people everywhere (or at least in my own backyard) know what we are up against and what we can do.
What I do ask of you though, is that you stop buying puppies from pet shops. Those who work at the puppy mills are using pet shops as their only channel to sell these puppies to unsuspecting consumers, we are unconsciously putting money into the pockets of those who run the puppy mills business. Opt for adopting a pet instead as they have been more cared for by those who run rescue shelters and can give you more infomation on how to care for your pet.
In conclusion, I would like to ask all of you reading this (animal lovers or otherwise) to take a step back when looking into the oh-so-cute faces of these pupppies. Look at them, not as a commodity for money, but with affection and love that they need. Be careful when buying your pet. A pet is not for show. A pet is for life, meant to be cherished with kindness, nurtured with love and cared for with happiness. Would you ever treat your child with the same way these dogs are treated at the mills?
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