Niki wrote:I haven't posted for along time and most won't know me but I lived in Cyprus for 3 years and moved back to the UK. My overriding memory is of animal cruelty in Cyprus. Not the beautiful country or it's people who were wonderful but the attitude towards animals by many, not all but it is the majority.
I am not saying the UK is perfect, it is far from this but in Cyprus animal cruelty is a way of life. I will never forget the starving dog locked 24/7 in a cage across the road, the 7 puppies thrown on to the busy main road outside my house, the dog with a broken leg and severe malnutrition that all in my village ignored (it broke my heart when the amber eyes looked at me when the vet put her to sleep), the starving family of dogs at my daughter's school..... The list goes on and I simply can't lose the memories. We have a beautiful Cyprus poodle in the UK rescued from the Limassol dog pound starving and badly beaten and he is gorgeous.
Of course people are defensive and bring up the many examples of animal cruelty in the UK but IT IS DIFFERENT! People in Cyprus have a different perspective and this can't be denied. Attitudes have to change.
Hello Niki mou - hope you and the family have resettled well back in the damp, dark satanic mills, so to speak.
I agree attitudes have to change (they usually do over time, anyway, for good or bad). However, where we differ, in opinion, is that you seem to think that just because you cannot SEE the cruelty, that it does not occur. You are only shocked by what you saw in Cyprus and now safely back in the UK - the opportunities to SEE the cruelty are fewer. For sure, Cypriots are intolerant of animals being indoors, and often negligent of their needs as pets. But because all this intolerance and negligence occurs OUTDOORS in Cyprus, it is there for all to
see.
There are many cases of severe, sociopathic cruelty against animals in the UK but mostly these occur
indoors. For every one cruel act caught, there are reportedly hundreds occurring in total oblivion to neighbours and passers-by. Because animals are kept INDOORS in the UK, it is only by severe intervention that the RSPCA gets to hear when a cat has been microwaved, a hamster deep fried, dogs brutally kicked and starved indoors, or a kitten put in a washing machine etc etc etc (all true cases). Very few cases happen
outdoors in the UK because it's an indoor kind of lifestyle and that is where the cruelty is safe from VIEW- behind closed doors. Of course, that stupid woman got caught by CCTV just casually flinging some person's cat into a giant bin because she thought the streets were empty, dark, and there was no one to SEE her being cruel - generally cruelty in the UK is harder to detect- but it doesn't mean it happens any less in the UK than it does in Cyprus, Niki mou.
Yup,
attitudes HAVE to change!
Nope, we don't have an equivalent to that in Cyprus.
