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[Lurk]

 http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2008/11/13/waugh.ga.cat.used.as.football.wjxt
I blindly clicked on this link found on the cnn main page this morning. I could'nt watch the video, just reading the headline made may headspin. I googled 'Kitten kicked like a ball', thinking I would find the written news. I thought this would be an isolated incident, how foolish. Kitten lit on fire, kitten dropkicked, kitten abused everywhere. What kind of mediocre subhuman trash fulfills any kind of superiority wet dream by kicking a friggin' KITTEN?! That's a new low for my belief in humanity's capability to climb back from the abyss. I know 1% of the population is considered to be psychopathic (http://www.hare.org/links/saturday.html), but damn it.

psychopathy checklist

Factor1: Aggressive narcissism

   1. Glibness / superficial charm
   2. Grandiose sense of self-worth
   3. Pathological lying
   4. Cunning / manipulative
   5. Lack of remorse or guilt
   6. Shallow
   7. Callous / lack of empathy
   8. Failure to accept responsibility for own actions
   9. Promiscuous sexual behavior

Factor2: Socially deviant lifestyle

   1. Need for stimulation / proneness to boredom
   2. Parasitic lifestyle
   3. Poor behavioral control
   4. Lack of realistic, long-term goals
   5. Impulsivity
   6. Irresponsibility
   7. Juvenile delinquency
   8. Early behavior problems
   9. Revocation of conditional release

Traits not correlated with either factor

   1. Many short-term marital relationships
   2. Criminal versatility

It made me think of the mothers who always defend their sons, regardless of the crime they committed, saying 'he's a good boy!'. Is our society creating psychopaths, which would then be a preventable disease like drug addiction, with a possibility of treatment and relapses? What is the civilized world to do, facing this callous manipulative doppleganger living invisible in its midst?

Discuss.

[Skofo]

AWE someone hurt a cute wittle furry animal HOW COULD THEY DO THAT!?  Those low, subhuman, psychopathic bastards!

*five minutes later*

Oh fuck, a bug! Disgusting! SOMEONE SQUISH IT! 

[Lurk]

Skofo: I used to kill and torture frogs as a kid. And then I saw a small kitten die, crushed by accident/negligence when a door closed on him. It stayed with me. Over the years, I met with people who showed me how even small insects were fascinating creatures, with their own world and struggles. I don't absent-mindedly kill them anymore, I put them outside, or let them be(in the case of spiders or other predatory insects). I know nature is cruel, and that many animals(cats for example) often kill for fun. What distresses me is that we have a HUGE brain, while cats have a small peanuty one. I just don't get how we can act the way we do sometimes. And we don't tend to treat our fellow human beings any better. But yes, you're right, transcending our lizard brain is'nt easy. Maybe not even feasible, but I don't think it's a good reason not to even try.

[Skofo]

My point is: Why do you think that hurting and killing organisms is inherently wrong, cruel and dumb?

[Lurk]

Skofo: I don't think killing is wrong. It's part of a cycle. What is wrong is the useless, meaningless cruelty of inflicting senseless hurt to something you don't even intend to eat. I know in China they eat cats and dogs, but they don't torture them before they prepare the meal, for some twisted enjoyement. I personnaly could'nt hunt and kill my own meal unless pressed in a corner by famine and necessity- right now I can get it at a supermarket. And I don't look down upon hunters who go and get it themselves from the wild, because I don't believe their goal is to prolong the suffering of their prey. But a bunch of teenagers kicking a kitten because they're bored? That's psychopathy- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy read the 'Childhood precursors' part. I have to believe it's something you can cure by a life lesson of empathy, else we're all doomed, because psychopaths are'nt swayed in their rise to power by any kind of conscience.

edit: It might be sadism, also...hopefully

[Skofo]

So basically, when you hurt and kill to satisfy your own agenda, it's all well and good, but when somebody else does and for different reasons than yours then it's cruel and psychopathic?

There are vegan diets, you know. Some vegans would think that you're psychopathic and cruel for even eating other organisms. Many organisms are also tortured and hurt before they're processed into meat.

Truth is, playing with other organisms is organism nature. Cats, as you said, like to hunt and torture things just for the heck of it. Orcas like to skin seals alive in cold salt water and play volleyball with them before eating them. It satisfies animals' curiousity and fun, while perhaps helping them learn behavioural patterns of other living things which may help you survive longer. But even if it's not for that, who cares? Everyone and everything has their own reasons for doing things, but it does not affect the outcome of the matter, so reasons are irrelavent. You cannot say that you're not inherently cruel and psychopathic for doing the basic same thing as other people that you call inherently cruel and psychopathic. It's all relative. I'm sorry that your mind is telling you to feel bad when you see other things get hurt and you see that as pure logic.

Also, I'd stop throwing psychological "disorders" everywhere if I were you. You could probably find at least two psychological "disorders" for every person you know, and that does not mean that they are bad or unhealthy people.

[Lurk]

Skofo: I would hope we would have grown beyond that as humanity reaches to distant stars. Yes, slaughterhouses and poultry farms are dens of suffering, because humane treatment would either raise the price of food or cut into the farmer's profit, neither option acceptable in current society. But this is where I think we are going wrong. If you go further, vegans are indirectly hurting fauna by destroying habitat to grow their soy fields and other vegetables needed to their diet.

I think this is looking at the finger and not at the moon though. The point is, viscerally, the human response to a kicked kitten, even as a symbol, should be universal revulsion and denounciation. If we chose to extrapolate and go through all we're doing wrong, we miss the point, I think. Give me a reason you could imagine that would explain the act of kicking a kitten, I can't find one.

And I don't agree that 'playing' with other organisms is in nature.Most predators kill swiftly and might eat or skin a prey alive, but it's very often out of a necessity to hasten the feeding process, before the scavengers come. Domesticated cats are different, in that they don't really need to hunt, they're just spoiled and bored, which might be an insight into why we sometimes act in such ways.

[Skofo]

*sigh*

I would hope we would have grown beyond that as humanity reaches to distant stars.

Again, you haven't logically explained why not hurting anything is "beyond" the natural hurting of things, other than with your selfish emotional response.

Yes, slaughterhouses and poultry farms are dens of suffering, because humane treatment would either raise the price of food or cut into the farmer's profit, neither option acceptable in current society.

Why not? If hurting is so wrong and psychopathic, we'd have grown society around not hurting anything, and this wouldn't be an "issue" today. Economy is relative.

But this is where I think we are going wrong. If you go further, vegans are indirectly hurting fauna by destroying habitat to grow their soy fields and other vegetables needed to their diet.

It's logic that when you add something to the physical world, you have to take away from something else. The morality (rights and wrongs) of certain combinations of things to add and take away is disputable on an emotional level (since everyone has different priorities), but it is logically irrelavent, so there is no inherent "right" or "wrong" to it. The point I am trying to make is that you cannot tell everyone what is indisputably right and wrong because you're only thinking about satisfying your own emotional mind.

I think this is looking at the finger and not at the moon though. The point is, viscerally, the human response to a kicked kitten, even as a symbol, should be universal revulsion and denounciation.

Again, why would this be "better" for anyone besides you and people that think like you? Why does the kicking of a kitten have to be universally logically repulsive and not the stomping of a bug or otherwise a disruption of another biological structure? You still have not explained this to me logically, all you have been saying is basically "bawwww, animals are cute and make me feel fuzzy inside and I don't want to see them hurt and anyone that hurts them is BAD."

If we chose to extrapolate and go through all we're doing wrong, we miss the point, I think. Give me a reason you could imagine that would explain the act of kicking a kitten, I can't find one.

Because things that some people say are "wrong" need a reason other than plain emotional fulfillment? I could say the same to you. All the reasons you gave so far are that hurting is "wrong" and "bad" and anyone that hurts animals for general enjoyment is "psychopathic". Give me a real reason. I could give a better reason for why organisms enjoy to hurt other organisms on behalf of all the cats, orcas and humans in the world that like to hurt other things: because they evolved in a way to make them feel "fun" as a reaction to the sensory stimuli they get from hurting things, similarily to how you were raised to react and think otherwise. 

And I don't agree that 'playing' with other organisms is in nature.Most predators kill swiftly and might eat or skin a prey alive, but it's very often out of a necessity to hasten the feeding process, before the scavengers come. Domesticated cats are different, in that they don't really need to hunt, they're just spoiled and bored, which might be an insight into why we sometimes act in such ways.

Actually, cats that are raised in the wild without an owner to feed them do play with things and kill them and more often than not don't eat them. Cats are curious and playful by nature like that. And the orcas I've been talking about (the ones that skin seals alive and throw em around before eating them) are also raised in the wild. If anything, I think the reason you think that animals shouldn't be hurt because you are spoiled and bored. If you were living alone in a forest and killed furry animals to survive, you probably wouldn't be making such an emotional fuss about this.

EDIT: A better debate topic would be why people and animals have evolved into things that at least on occasion enjoy hurting other things. If it was something that was detrimental or not necessary for our survival, we would have evolved our minds to indisputably feel bad to sensory stimuli telling us that something is hurting. Why haven't we?

EDIT2: Typoes

[Lurk]

Kicking kittens is wrong because I don't want to be an emotionless rationally driven machine who coldly goes through life without appreciating the tragic beauty of nature in dignity. I want to retain creativity that is fed by feelings of warmth and fuzziness inside. It is selfish and emotional, but these emotions I have grown to treasure over time, because they are not a weakness, as we are often led to believe through popular opinions, they are in fact a great strength in humanity. Compassion is rarely reciprocated, but should'nt be discarded in any case.

If hurting is so wrong and psychopathic, we'd have grown society around not hurting anything, and this wouldn't be an "issue" today.

I never said our society was'nt wrong and psychopathic, quite the contrary

Why does the kicking of a kitten have to be universally logically repulsive and not the stomping of a bug or otherwise a disruption of another biological structure?

Because the kitten should be easier to empathize with than the bug. I'm starting small, I want people to stop kicking kittens, then I'll move to the bugs.

Actually, cats do play with things and kill them and more often than not not eat them when they are raised in the wild without an owner to feed them. And the orcas I've been talking about (the ones that skin seals alive and throw em around before eating them) are also raised in the wild.

I'm not an animal behaviorist, but I know the feeding frenzy of the orca (and sharks) serves the purpose of 'distributing' the food around. Cats, even growing in the wild, are a domesticated specie, with a wild streak. They tend to be a little erratic.

And you still have'nt given a good reason to kick a kitten.

[shrimp]

Give me a real reason.

What would you think if a large group of people ambushed you and beat you up, leaving you hospitalised? Assume that you have had no previous interaction with them and you have done nothing to offend them.

Would you be thinking something along the lines of: "Oh dear, this is slightly inconvenient, now I can't go to school!"

Or would it be something else?

[moi]

Truth is, playing with other organisms is organism nature. Cats, as you said, like to hunt and torture things just for the heck of it. Orcas like to skin seals alive in cold salt water and play volleyball with them before eating them. It satisfies animals' curiousity and fun, while perhaps helping them learn behavioural patterns of other living things which may help you survive longer. But even if it's not for that, who cares? Everyone and everything has their own reasons for doing things, but it does not affect the outcome of the matter, so reasons are irrelavent. You cannot say that you're not inherently cruel and psychopathic for doing the basic same thing as other people that you call inherently cruel and psychopathic. It's all relative. I'm sorry that your mind is telling you to feel bad when you see other things get hurt and you see that as pure logic.

Also, I'd stop throwing psychological "disorders" everywhere if I were you. You could probably find at least two psychological "disorders" for every person you know, and that does not mean that they are bad or unhealthy people.

PROTIP: we are above animals , at least some of us.
Also: psychopathy, IT EXPLAINS MANY THINGS.

If you go further, vegans are indirectly hurting fauna by destroying habitat to grow their soy fields and other vegetables needed to their diet.

It takes more vegetables to feed one cow until maturity than it takes to theoretically  feed a human for the same length of time.

[Lurk]

It takes more vegetables to feed one cow until maturity than it takes to theoretically  feed a human for the same length of time.

Not if you feed the cow powdered remains of other cows, which is how some solved that problem(because healthy food to bring a cow to maturity would be in fact very expensive, too expensive for the high-density feed-stock we grow).

psychopathy, IT EXPLAINS MANY THINGS.

They're looking at a way, in England, to predict psychopathy in a kid, to have them under stricter observation earlier in life, because of the social cost a full grown psychopath brings to a community. When you think about it, that 1% in any society exhibit psychotical tendencies- which does'nt mean they're all serial killers, they just don't care about you, or anybody but themselves- and then you start applying this percentage to your workplace, or town, it becomes quite scary. I wonder if a psychopath would know he was one...

[Don Andy]

Don't Dolphins kill for shit and giggles, too?

[mjau]

Reasons to not kick kittens!

• Kittens are living beings.
• They feel pain.
• They can't defend themselves very well.
• Plenty other reasons that should be obvious to normal people.
• Why would you feel the need to do this, anyway? What's wrong with you?
• Seriously, what the hell!

[Skofo]

*SIGH*

Kicking kittens is wrong because I don't want to be an emotionless rationally driven machine who coldly goes through life without appreciating the tragic beauty of nature in dignity. I want to retain creativity that is fed by feelings of warmth and fuzziness inside. It is selfish and emotional, but these emotions I have grown to treasure over time, because they are not a weakness, as we are often led to believe through popular opinions, they are in fact a great strength in humanity. Compassion is rarely reciprocated, but should'nt be discarded in any case.

So you're saying that anyone and anything that hurts animals does not see the beauty of life and is cold and emotionless? Quite the contrary. One might say that you're too emotional. Relavent things to you may be less relavent to other people, the beauty of a thing to one person might be the uglyness of another, one person's trash is another person's treasure, which is why there is no inherent "right" or "wrong" to this "issue".

I never said our society was'nt wrong and psychopathic, quite the contrary

So human society has formed over thousands of years around the collective human opinions and nature, but they're wrong because you think so? Again, tell me why you think that your opinion is more logical and more right and better than nature, logic, and/or collective human opinion? Even though your behaviour and opinions are, in fact, natural, because of the particular way you were raised unique from everyone else in the world. But you need to understand that you are an emotional being, and that humans are not a perfect biological canvas that can think and process things completely logically. You are only saying what is right and wrong on your own biologically-specialized and imperfect emotional level. I want to see some logic. Why are people that disagree with you and don't fit your personal "right" agenda cold, machine-like, emotionless, psychopathic and wrong? Your personal agenda being that you're allowed to hurt and kill things if it's beneficial to the economy, if it's beneficial to you because you can buy it at a supermarket without hurting and killing things yourself, but hurting and killing in every other way is BAD.

Because the kitten should be easier to empathize with than the bug. I'm starting small, I want people to stop kicking kittens, then I'll move to the bugs.

Again, why is empathy an inherently good thing? You empathize with furry animals because you do not have to hurt and kill them or see them get hurt and killed to survive or have fun.

I'm not an animal behaviorist, but I know the feeding frenzy of the orca (and sharks) serves the purpose of 'distributing' the food around. Cats, even growing in the wild, are a domesticated specie, with a wild streak. They tend to be a little erratic.

Yes, because "wild streaks" and hurting things is "a little erratic" and "bad". Why, again?

And you still have'nt given a good reason to kick a kitten.

Because there isn't a bad reason. All the bad reasons you have given me, again, are that because it makes you feel bad, so nobody should do it.

I am not going to argue with you anymore. I have asked you repeatedly to give me a universally logical reason why hurting things is bad, but all you have been arguing is that it makes you feel good to not hurt animals, but it's bad when other organisms feel good when they hurt animals (unless they're farmers, economists or slaughterhouse workers). Over and over. I'm done here.

Give me a real reason.

What would you think if a large group of people ambushed you and beat you up, leaving you hospitalised? Assume that you have had no previous interaction with them and you have done nothing to offend them.

Would you be thinking something along the lines of: "Oh dear, this is slightly inconvenient, now I can't go to school!"

Or would it be something else?

Yes, I would feel bad. But that's just it: we are talking about feelings. Different organisms have different feelings about different things, so there is no right or wrong answer to this, just relative right and wrong answers and collective right and wrong answers.

[Lurk]

Don Andy:

http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-184399174.html

A search on dolphins killing for fun led to these kinds of news. I think competition for food or reproducing rights are the main reason why animal kill (aside from the need to feed).
As an exercise, how would you react to seeing a pack of teenagers laughing and kicking a kitten in front of your home? What if they were neighbors kids? Would you feel safe sleeping at night? I noticed a certain number of recent horror movies based on this premise. Is it an unconscious projection of the  fearful ageing population of haves?

[Alex May]

don't feed the troll Lurk

[Skofo]

don't feed the troll Lurk

I am no troll.

What is your problem, now?

[Lurk]

Haowan: I know, but it reminds me of a younger me. I would go on forums and argue impossible positions with a dark, cold wit with a gasping forum audience. I did not really believe my empty arguments, because they were only attacks, and not real principles. But I would ressent the condescending, inevitable post that would deem me a troll or a youngin'. Ah, those were the days...
At least, I can admire Skofo's sharp mind, and he made me laugh out loud in one of his retort, so clever it was. I believe smart people have to come to proper conclusions about life, in time, and I have no doubt he will someday, and contribute greatly to humanity's ascent to something 'better'.

[mjau]

It hurts the fucking kitten, Skofo.

Why don't you go around kicking children or random strangers on the street?  Is it only because you're afraid of the consequences to yourself?