Frank and I were taking one of our walks when we noticed an SUV
stop at the side of the road near a bridge. In the vehicle there were
three people who appeared to be a father (the driver) with his two
children, a girl and a boy.
The boy, who was sitting in the passenger seat, got out first; and in
his hand he held one of those plastic containers full of “night
crawlers” (worms)! Then the girl, holding a tackle box, got out of the
back seat.
I turned to Frank and remarked, “This is an example of ‘selective
psychopathology’.” Frank really “got a kick” out of my remark!
In a previous Blog, I discussed the fact that most people selectively
choose to label what they consider “socially acceptable behavior” and
what is considered “psychopathic” or “sociopathic.” If a person were to
treat another human being the way billions of animals are routinely
abused daily, there would be an enormous outcry; and that person would
be labeled a psychopath. Many, if not most, people would demand that he
or she be executed, or at least imprisoned for life.
We are brought up to regard certain animals as “food” and others as
“pets.” When you stop to really think about it, this is ridiculous, if
not out and out insane! People don’t like it when another “culture”
tortures the animals they consider “pets” (cats and dogs, for example)
in order to serve them as food. They don’t want to hear about slow
strangulation by hanging of dogs in order to improve the quality of
their meat, or the boiling alive of cats. Yet people look the other way
and resent being told about the horrific suffering (emotional and
physical) of the animals providing them with dairy products, meat,
poultry, and fish. And what about dolphins and other animals, who are
considered nothing but nuisances or collateral damage, caught in huge
fishing nets? When people consume animals and their secretions, they are
being “selectively sociopathic or psychopathic” because they are totally
indifferent to their contribution to the pain and suffering that their
diet causes.
Therefore, this father who was taking his children for an afternoon
of killing fish was hardening their hearts and teaching them to have no
empathy for certain other living creatures. And, as you know, a lack of
empathy is what is believed separates the “psychopath” from the
“normal”! Teaching children to kill absolutely qualifies as child abuse.
Rightly does the Bible warn us in Luke 17:2:
2 "It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his
neck and he were thrown into the sea, than that he should cause one of
these little ones to stumble.
~ New American Standard Bible
Frank and I thank God that He opened our eyes to the truth, and that
we are set free from the ignorance of the past. And we continue to
learn. There is no killing in heaven; so, here on earth, we should live
according to the Lord’s Prayer:
Matthew 6:10
10 Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done,
On earth as it is in heaven.
~ New American Standard Bible
