Renee750il said:
The awful thing, Mojo, is that the "farm states" in the middle of the US have been under siege for years - it was one of the first areas where basement meth labs ran rampant. No one expected to find that sort of thing there, so no one really looked for too long. Add to that the ease of finding places that are more isolated to cook in than you have in more densely populated areas, along with good people who don't expect other people to do things like that . . .
Oh I know Renee. I've had arguements with my friends who refuse to believe that there is dog fighting in Madison. "We don't hear about it! You don't see anything about it on the news! That's an inner city problem! You are just paranoid!"
And I just want to scream sometimes, because it's not something that's going to be out in the open. People can run pits in their basements.. or on abandoned farm properties in the country. Just because you don't SEE it or hear about it doesnt' mean it doesn't HAPPEN.
A co-worker told me she was astounded to find out that the Amish are some of the most prolific puppy millers in the US. She was so surprised by this. She asked me how could that be? Weren't the amish more God fearing?
I replied that they may be God fearing, but they see dogs as mere livestock - not as treasured family pets. Plus since they are in the country, isolated, no one knows what actually happens. And very few people would check.
I've seen how some of the Amish train horses. My dad used to take our horses up to them to be trained... and every single one of them would come back with rope scars on their hooves and bruises on their knees. They would tie ropes around the horses legs and then trip them to force them down to their knees when breaking them to saddle or harness.
In any other part of the country that would be considered animal abuse. But they can still do it. I told my dad, when I was 12 years old, that I didn't want anymore of MY riding horses to go back there to be trained. It was not right.
My dad only listened to me in regards to my animals... but continued to take his draft horses up there. He stopped when his last pride and joy Big John came back to us with his knees cut open and bleeding. He said never again.
It is still astonishing to me how cruel humanity can be. Not just to animals but also to children and to each other. And how we still do not do much of anything to change our violent ways.
