I dont think he did the dog fighting thing(actually im still not convinced he had as much to do with it as has been made out to be) because he has a hatred for the canine species or because he hates animals, he was involved because of other aspects. He has obviously reformed himself and taken those"other aspects" out of his life so I have absolutely no problem with him owning a dog or pet and i doubt the dog will mind either.
I know what you're saying. But there is definitely a human element to it. Felons have much harder time getting jobs due to people deciding they don't want to hire them
Never said you attacked me. I said you misrepresented me, which you did right here: I never said that he was punished purely because people like dogs. I said the length of his punishment was due to the fact that they were dogs. The way it was treated was due to the fact that they were dogs. If they were other "lesser" animals, the response wouldn't have been nearly the same. And yet you indirectly did just that through your suggestion. Again, I wasn't talking about personal feelings at that point, I was discussing the response of the general public. I'll ignore the fact that you're attempting to use an exception to prove a rule and jump to the good stuff. So...you're saying that the mentally retarded have the intellectual capacity of certain animals. I'm curious...to which animal would you compare a person with Down Syndrome? Do you believe that special education amounts to animal training? To some sort of crafting of instinctual response? If you'd be so kind as to clarify what you're saying here, I'd be happy to respond. It's just a bit of a mess right now.
Do you really want to go there and equate child molestation and murder to animal torture in severity? I'll play along with this game of inappropriate comparison, though, and point out that we don't stop spousal abusers from getting married in the future. Apparently, we're much more concerned with protecting dogs than women from these criminals who can't be rehabilitated. Is that how this works?
You didn't say that I attacked you, no. What I meant by that is that your response felt defensive, and I was just saying I'm not out to pick a fight or anything. Yep, and I've agreed. I considered my statement as supplementing yours, not contradicting it. I chose deliberately equivocal words in case our views did diverge so that I would avoid putting any words into your mouth unnecessarily. In fact our views do diverge. But regardless, especially on a message board of all places, I can't imagine that my purposefully-non assumptive phrasing could be taken as anything negative. I merely hypothesized that we might have different views, and I left it open for you to say yes/no. Not sure what more I can do there.... I've certainly heard of monkeys and Dolphins with IQs north of 50, and there are certainly humans with lower IQs than that. I'm not denying that I'm operating at the margins here, but I don't see how it can be denied that there is indeed some overlap. I'm not decrying the administration of Special Ed or anything like that. I think the considerations for caring for humans (i.e. special ed) are different than the considerations for using animals for sport, or torturing or killing them. Let me give it a shot. Take whatever characteristic separate humans from animal X. Whatever you fill in that blank, I don't see how that leads to different standards of treatment. For example, is the claim:I'm rational and non-instinctual --> therefore I shouldn't be "used and abused", but animal X can be because he lacks that same quality? The connection between "rationality" or any :quality/ability Z" and differing standards of treatment is not clear to me.
If it was a supplement, it was a poor one and more akin to a detraction. Not an attack, just an observation. You can stop engaging in the needless hedging and half-statements. That would be a start. I would LOVE to see your source on that. Dolphins in particular, since the relative measure of their intelligence has been a point of controversy and difficulty for a number of years now. The prevailing notion is "animal intelligence is different than human intelligence", and so any attempts to measure them against each other uniformly are guesswork at best. This idea that an IQ test can be applied to an animal is new to me, given that IQ is a measure relative to the general human population. If they somehow found a scientifically accepted way to apply the test to an animal from a different population with a different brain structure and exercise of intelligence, I'd love to hear about it. Source, please? I know you have one, since you were so "certain" about it. Again, please tell me specifically where the overlap lies. Where, exactly, does the human mind have to be for you to consider it lesser than an animal's? Given that we've already established that human intelligence and behavior needs to be measured in a human context, and given that our interactions with animals in a human context amount essentially to training, at what point does special education simply amount to animal training? To honing instinctual behavior rather than attempting to tap into what little reason may exist in a mind stricken with retardation? Your last statement again doesn't deserve a response. It's vague, obvious, and irrelevant to anything that I said. In my first statement, I said that animal torture was upsetting. I have never disputed that, so now you most certainly are putting words in my mouth by stating that "animal X can be" abused. My only comment, which is valid, was that the level of reaction would naturally differ based on the perception of the specific animal by humans. So there goes the abuse side of that argument. As far as "use" is concerned, that amuses me. You state that "differing standards of treatment" for, really, any quality/ability that one could apply to humans is unclear to you. I'm just curious, then, which side you lie on, pro-cannibal or vegan? Surely if differing standards regarding the use of animals are inappropriate, and if you engage in the eating of meat, you would have no problem with someone eating a dog, dolphin, chimp, even human.
That's a fair point, actually. Although simply because the law doesn't operate as we might wish it to in one area doesn't mean that it should replicate the same errors elsewhere. There are lots of other comparisons, though, mine was more extreme but the principle remains the same. A drunk driver who serves time doesn't automatically get his licence back upon release. You wouldn't put a convicted thief in charge of the petty cash even when his conviction has been served. And I don't see a compelling argument to allow Vick to own a dog again.
You're suggesting Vick should NEVER own a dog again. Licenses for first offense DUIs generally carry 90 day to 1 year suspensions, NOT permanent revocation. Vick's been out of prison longer than a year. Your thief? Guy robs a liquor store, he's not forever barred from liquor stores. Hell, my mother-in-law's first husband physically abused my wife's older brother. She and my father in law found out 10 years later that he was married with a child. They called to warn the new wife, but the two stayed together for 15 years. Outlasted my wife's parents. I can't see why Vick shouldn't be legally barred from ever owning a dog.
It's a fair argument. My position would be that never remarrying, never getting your licence back or never entering a liquor store again are unfairly restrictive impositions on an individual's life. I don't accept that never being allowed to own a dog again is an unfairly restrictive imposition on Vick's life, and I like him being a high profile example to other would be abusers of animals. Lifting the ban would send the wrong message. In ten years' time when he has long since left the NFL and is not in the public eye so much, let's reconsider it. Not now though.
He isn't. The terms of his parole state he can't own a dog until 2012. Interestingly enough, if a hunter kills an endangered animal s/he loses the right to hunt for life. Yet, Vick can torture and kill hundreds/thousands of dogs, then get a little pooch a few years later. Foxy
I was responding to the people on here arguing that he should NEVER be allowed to own a dog again. And most first offenses for violating the ESA are a year suspension of the license, not permanent revocation.
I'm one of the ones who believes he should never be allowed to ow and dog or any other animal. I'm not argueing it, it's my opinion and my belief. I said in an earlier post that I was one of those animal people, not on the fringe, but definately pro animal protection, anti cruelty and responsible pet ownership. I have gone as far as, and would do so again, unilaterally * adopting * a few cats and dogs from people I knew were harming the critters. You know, middle of the night, quietly etc. I assure you if I was Vick's neighbor, he would have alot of pooches run away. Just to be clear, cuz I don't want to appear to have broken any TOS or laws : I have never broken into a home, nor gone into a home and taken anyone's pet. I have had the occasion when walking by the home of an anmal abuser to look over and see the doggie chained up and it has looked to me like the chain was caught in his paw or wrapped around the doggies neck. Sooo, being the humane sort, I have checked it out, sometimes I have had to let the dog off the run to check the chain, and the doggie ran off. Funny how things like that happen. Funny how some cats have just follow me home. I guess they went by instinct and could see I was kind and their owner was not. Furthermore... these odd occurances have never happened, except when I have reported the owners to Animal Protection and they have done nothing. That may make me a " bad person ", but I sleep very well at night and my conscience is very clear. Some parents go underground to protect their children from an abusive spouse/parent when the courts don't handle it right. I see what I do as similar. Contorversial perhaps, but I'm OK with it. Foxy
Got it. You feel that way because you love dogs. That was my point from the start. The reaction has been as severe as it is because of the animal in question and man's love for it. I understand it's hard for a dog lover to think rationally about the situation. Thankfully, the decision isn't up to dog lovers, although I'm sure when 2012 rolls around, the ASPCA, PETA, and every dog lover in America will be up in arms over the miscarriage of justice.
Leave him alone. I say he can get a dog or whatever he wants. Do you think he's going to fight a dog he buys after the incidents he had before? Hell no, unless he's just mind-boggingly stupid.
Considering it was mind-bogglingly stupid for him to fight dogs in the first place, nothing would surprise me
I understood/intended my comments differently, but I don't think we need to argue semantics (or whatever you want to call this :lol any further. It's admittedly challenging to compare human IQ to animal IQ, especially because they've evolved to "learn" different things. I've "certainly heard" of it from TV shows and similar things; obviously those fail as sources. Koko the ape is supposed to have tested between 70-95 on the human IQ test, knows a great deal of sign language, and understands many English words. http://www.koko.org/world/ There's been an interesting study trying to measure intelligence cross-species. The first 2 articles discuss the study, and the 3rd link is to the study. Here's the most interesting bit to me: "New research on monkeys finds that individual animals perform consistently on numerous different tests of intelligence – a hallmark of human IQ and, perhaps, an indication that human intellect has a very ancient history. " http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread473675/pg1 http://www.innovations-report.com/html/reports/life_sciences/report-68539.html http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0005883 The smartest primate vs. a person in a persistent vegetative state, at the very least. I'm not sure where you are going with the Special Ed thing? In a previous post, you asked "Do you believe that special education amounts to animal training?" My last statement was a response to that: the issues surrounding the question "Should we educate the least intelligent humans?" are different than the issues surrounding the question "How should human behavior toward non-human animals be viewed?" I think they are apples and oranges. I've never said that you don't think animal torture is upsetting. I'm again just trying to make sense of your position. Regarding my position, you could call me a philosophical relativist, but I think that the construction of society can lead to viable reasons for limiting acts (i.e. cannabalism) even if they're not philosophically/logically consistent. And that last thing is what I've spent a lot of hours thinking about, but have yet to come up with a convincing answer: 1) What qualities separate humans from animals (obviously several in a large majority of the cases). And 2) What about the possession of those qualities give a logical/legitimate reason for different treatment of humans vs. non-human animals? Some things I've read/heard have proposed rationality, logic, self-awareness etc. as sufficient to justify different standards for treatment of humans vs. non-human animals (just to reiterate, I'm speaking philosophically, not as if I think it's a viable position within our societal construct). I don't see how that follows.
I do think that owning a companion dog would be good for him. But, I was thinking about this the other day: would I leave me dog with Michael Vick for a week while I was on vacation? Not without some sort of assurance about how he would treat her. Although, to be fair, I won't even kennel my dog, and there are only a few people I would fee comfortable enough leaving her with, so maybe I'm a bad gauge. Let him have a dog and have some SPCA rep drop by now and then to check in.
