Tuesday, September 26, 2006

Bastards!

Two things I need to get off my chest today. Cruelty to animals and Dubai driving.

I've read cruelty to animals stories in two papers today. Emirates Today has a feature on the increasing popularity of dog fights.

Highly organised, two different sets of rules - European and Asian, locally-bred dogs, prize money and huge bets.

Twenty-first century? We're back in the Dark Ages.

Then an awful story in Gulf News Saluki found in Abu Dhabi with jaw broken but still wagging his tail.

The poor animal was found with his jaw snapped, so badly disfigured that the person who found him thought he'd been shot. He was still trying to show he wasn't aggressive and wanted to be friendly by wagging his tail.

Sorry, but I have to include the photo to show just what sick, depraved bastards we have amongst us.


The vet, Dr Jonathan Hale, said the injury was about five days old and "he had been kicked out on the street". Dr Hale added that this was a 'particularly sad case' as the dog did not demonstrate any signs of violent behaviour when he was found. "There was no excuse for someone to injure him," he said. "I want to make people aware of these things, so we don't become accepting and blasé about it all. It won't change anything for this dog, but maybe it will help avoid something like this in the future." The dog had to be put down of course.

We need a complete change of attitude to animals, education from a young age, parental example...and we need to punish the sick bastards who do this. I mean draconian punishment. We need a deterrent to stop other sick bastards from doing it.

And for those who think I have my priorities wrong with so much inhumanity to people happening around the world, understand that people who carry out deliberate sadistic acts of cruelty on animals are one step from doing the same to people.

Moronic drivers.

The other thing that made my blood boil today is morons endangering other road users by their cretinous driving.

I drove from Dubai Marina into Knowledge Village, a distance of maybe six kilometres. At the beginning of the drive I was behind a car driving erratically. The blonde female driver was chatting on her mobile phone, which was much more important, obviously, than thinking about her driving.

At the Al Sufouh Road junction my filter light goes green, I go - and am nearly wiped out by a cretin doing an illegal U-turn into my path. It happens on this junction several times a week so I'm prepared and manage to miss him. When they sit at the lights there's a big sign next to them telling them that U-turns are not permitted. They can't miss it, so doing the illegal U-turn is obviously quite deliberate.

Stop at the next set of lights, they go green, I go - and am nearly wiped out by yet another cretin, this one jumping the red light to do a U-turn in my path, and he's talking on his mobile.

It's at this point that blondie I mentioned at the beginning comes past me - and she's still talking on her mobile.

By the way, ignore all the letters to the papers complaining about local and Asian drivers, these were all Caucasians.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

I don't mean to be rude, but I've heard dogs are not particularly liked in the Islamic World.

Can you tell me why this is?

Regards,
Ayasha

Anonymous said...

My family might be moving to Dubai early next year and the rise in road related accident deaths is very alarming. Some people just drive like morons!

Seabee said...

Ayasha, I don't know the answer - maybe someone else can answer your question...

grace - today's papers say that we have a 45% increse in road deaths in the first 8 months of this year, with 214 people killed in Dubai. We're not the worst in the world but far too many accidents happen, and almost are down to stupidity.

Anonymous said...

We adopted a rescue cat that was found abandoned after he had been shot a number of times with an air rifle and had his jaw broken.

There is no end to the cruel and unusual punishments I can dream up for people who can inflict the kind of treatment such as the above or that the poor Saluki was subjected to.

Khaled Zamer said...

I can’t understand the way people drive here; I can’t understand where they got the driving license from. And the big point, is after a while you turn to be and act they way they do. Before I used to abide the traffic rules and order but this resulted in * always being late in arrival for the meetings and work *people takes advantage of me *no respect to the safety distance *no respect for being in the row for long time *etc.

And another thing is you have to suffer everyday only for six kilos. And the other (including me) who lives in Sharja has to suffer this for more than 80 Kilos.

It is so irritating when people doesn’t drive carefully; example if you drive on the fast lane on emirates road you have to drive 140 and above, or you will be tortured by other drivers coming behind with their lights and bumper-to-bumper driving style. Now if you move to the second lane you have to reduce the speed to be 80 or even less!

The way this city is designed and the way the traffic is engineered are to make people suffer everyday. And I usually call this the Art of torturing because people need to commute everyday to get to their work. The only way to solve the traffic issue is by reducing the rents in Dubai and putting more strict regulations in obtaining the driving license. In my country (Jordan) things are not better however we have alternatives Cheaper Taxies, public transportation and on top of that better weather where you can walk for short distance.

I guess there is a price for everything.

Khaled Zamer said...

I can’t understand the way people drive here; I can’t understand where they got the driving license from. And the big point, is after a while you turn to be and act they way they do. Before I used to abide the traffic rules and order but this resulted in * always being late in arrival for the meetings and work *people takes advantage of me *no respect to the safety distance *no respect for being in the row for long time *etc.

And another thing is you have to suffer everyday only for six kilos. And the other (including me) who lives in Sharja has to suffer this for more than 80 Kilos.

It is so irritating when people doesn’t drive carefully; example if you drive on the fast lane on emirates road you have to drive 140 and above, or you will be tortured by other drivers coming behind with their lights and bumper-to-bumper driving style. Now if you move to the second lane you have to reduce the speed to be 80 or even less!

The way this city is designed and the way the traffic is engineered are to make people suffer everyday. And I usually call this the Art of torturing because people need to commute everyday to get to their work. The only way to solve the traffic issue is by reducing the rents in Dubai and putting more strict regulations in obtaining the driving license. In my country (Jordan) things are not better however we have alternatives Cheaper Taxies, public transportation and on top of that better weather where you can walk for short distance.

I guess there is a price for everything.

Anonymous said...

Some form of warning would've been nice before showing that picture. But still, good job on enlightening the rest of the world on what goes on over here (Well its just as well anywhere else in the world)

I can't say UAE doesn't care for animals, because I do see several intiatives taken by the UAE Government to protect them, but its certainly not enough.

Seabee said...

anon, a horrible photo I agree. But it was in Gulf News, so I wasn't showing something that hasn't already been seen by a lot of people. I assume the vet arranged for it to be shown because he said he wanted to make people aware of these things.

caz said...

I, like so many others, was very distressed to read your blog about athe maltreatment of the dog. Particularly so, when these animals offer unconditional love, which is a bloody sight more than humans do.

Why do people do it?, read my blog, 'A sad conclusion', may be the answer lies therein.

Caz.

Go to 'Why is it?' go to first ten of everything and you will find it there.

Felicity Grace said...

Things like this are common in Kuwait too. I've read that cruelty to animals is a trait common to serial killers (guess I can't prove that)but it makes sense that if you enjoy doing this, you can't have much sympathy for human suffering either (look how some maids are treated). Which is curious considering how tolerant Muslims say they are. So where is the root of the problem?
On the roads, it's safer to drive like the maniacs in some ways (sometimes - not by being on the phone and near collisions of course). I've seen many ex-pats blocking the middle lanes sticking to the speed limit while everything else flies around. I don't think we should apply our laws of driving to a foreign country's. That said, there is no easy answer when half the drivers are morons going too slow, the other half are morons going too fast. Education is the only thing that's going to sort it out. (And despite what it sounds like, I think Caucasian ex-pats taking on those bad habits are adding to the problem and there's no excuse for them.)