Oh sorry. Did I just give away the punchline?
You may have read the story of the 100 healthy sled dogs that were destroyed in British Columbia for business reasons. People are shocked, of course. Why, killing healthy dogs just like that, imagine!
So of course along came a scholar with the idea of conferring some kind of status on our pets, so as to prevent humans from treating them like vulgar property and disposing of them pretty much at will.
I think it’s a brilliant idea, except I’d start with making sure all human beings are covered before moving on to pets.
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Here is a little article from William Gairder that illustrates what happen when dead babies are found on a street. Not near the hubbub that those unfortunate dogs caused.
http://www.williamgairdner.com/the-street-of-the-dead-fetuses/