Earlier quoted context omitted.
Compared to “only” 500 millions pigs, the number of dogs is astounding. No wonder many countries also use them as food.
Dogs as food?
Why not? Have you tasted one?
Bhutan declares its entire street dog population fully sterilized and vaccinated
81–90 of 175 posts
Re: Bhutan declares its entire street dog population fully sterilized and vaccinated
#82Why do you even need to have a street dog population?
Are you asking where stray dogs come from?
Re: Bhutan declares its entire street dog population fully sterilized and vaccinated
#83Why do you even need to have a street dog population?
Countries for sure aren't like "Let's have a population of rabid stray dogs. Wouldn't it be nice". Although they can be useful as they get rid of animal carcasses on the streets. But they have to be taken care of, else there numbers become overwhelming and they might pick up and spread rabies.
Re: Bhutan declares its entire street dog population fully sterilized and vaccinated
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
It doesn't necessarily directly starve the other dogs, they'll have less energy to attempt to reproduce with. It's not an attempt to increase the death rate as much as it is an attempt to decrease the birth rate. My "also, wtf" stands.
I think these things usually come down to perceptions of human intervention as basically bad. If you actually witnessed the death of every individual dog in your scenario as compared with euthanasia, it's not clear that it would be more pleasant at all. These dogs will die diseased and malnourished by the roadside. Again, I am not really at odds with your emotional position, I'm just interested in the moral foundatio…
Setting aside the fact that I'd be witness to less deaths because I've chosen a more effective protocol for population control, I think letting them live out their lives isn't a net negative. Why would I expend energy ending lives if they don't impact mine?
Granted, there are times when euthanasia would be necessary. For example, feral dog populations in areas where the vulture population has died off, where they carry disease and attack passersby and the supply of food is basically uncontrollable, I get it. But that's a case I personally would preemptively qualify if I were considering it.
Re: Bhutan declares its entire street dog population fully sterilized and vaccinated
#85Earlier quoted context omitted.
To play devil's advocate here, I do think that human sensibilities about life preservation can be inconsistent and illogical. Your comment itself is contradictory is it not? If I am to understand "Also, wtf?" to mean something like "euthanising dogs is immoral because it shortens their life", your other argument is that sterilisation is superior because it essentially starves the other dogs. How is starvation morally…
It doesn't necessarily directly starve the other dogs, they'll have less energy to attempt to reproduce with. It's not an attempt to increase the death rate as much as it is an attempt to decrease the birth rate. My "also, wtf" stands.
If a government had a goal to prevent humans from reproducing and forcibly sterilized and cynically used the population they could reach to pressure and control the population they couldn't, it would be called genocide.
Re: Bhutan declares its entire street dog population fully sterilized and vaccinated
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
The article says they've been doing it for 15 years, so there's something odd about their numbers.
It's not odd. Sterilization without any additional measures is useless. People will keep buying and abandoning dogs. And if there's enough food, they will reproduce faster than you can catch and sterilize them
Since they have been doing it for 15 years, they now presumably have structures and processes in place to keep up with sterilizing more dogs. They also had lots of volunteers helping. If this keeps going, it's probably manageable in the future.
Re: Bhutan declares its entire street dog population fully sterilized and vaccinated
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not odd. Sterilization without any additional measures is useless. People will keep buying and abandoning dogs. And if there's enough food, they will reproduce faster than you can catch and sterilize them
> catch and sterilize them Whats the limit on hiw fast you can catch and sterilise them? Neither sounds particularly difficult.
I imagine sterilising the ones you've caught is the easy part. How do you actually catch them all though?
They claim to have sterilised 150000 dogs. At the beginning of the programme, you could reasonably assume that every stray dog you see needs to be processed. Later on in the programme, you'll be releasing a lot of dogs that have already been processed, which seems like a lot more effort for the last 10% compared to the first 10%.
Re: Bhutan declares its entire street dog population fully sterilized and vaccinated
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hopefully you don't have to be a Buddhist for that. Also I don't really see the advantage compared to sterilization.
Even though in certain Buddhist countries animals get slaughtered for food, taking lives of animals is a big thing in Buddhism. There is fundamentally no difference between animal consciousness and human in the buddhist view. But to take it to a human level: you dont see a difference in (chemical) castration of people with mental disability and killing them?
Why is forcibly sterilizing animals better than forcibly sterilizing humans, in such a view?
Or in their own framework, did Bhutan just engage in genocide against an unwanted demographic?
Re: Bhutan declares its entire street dog population fully sterilized and vaccinated
#89Re: Bhutan declares its entire street dog population fully sterilized and vaccinated
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
Of course, dead dogs and no dogs at all are better than alive dogs, which is to say that I stand by my point. And no need to read the article as I've grown among stray dogs until relatively recently (as I'm from Eastern Europe), not the best thing ever but certainly preferable to having only us, humans, around.
The few times I've been to some Eastern European countries, the street dogs were indeed not an issue. Just unsightly. They are actually useful as they get rid of carcasses of other dead animals (pigeons, rats, etc.) on the streets. However, there are countries where the street dog population is way higher and attacks and rabies are a real problem. When these countries take action, they often mass-cull the dogs. In Bh…
> They are actually useful as they get rid of carcasses of other dead animals (pigeons, rats, etc.) on the streets.
This is a super-weird argument. I live in a country where a stray dog population just doesn't exist.
We aren't waist deep in pigeon and rat carcasses. The native carrion birds take care of them pretty quickly.