Top Ten Most Karmic Moments for Animal Abusers in 2008
Ever notice how bad begets bad? Well, in the world of animal abuse, folks often have a way of getting themselves hurt and even killed when trying to do the same to other animals. Besides the obvious “eat meat and die” connection, we at The PETA Files have seen quite a few instances of folks more creatively or elaborately harming or endangering themselves over the years—including large-scale property destruction and truly ironic animal attacks.
With that in mind, I bring you our Top 10 “Payback Is Hell” moments of 2008:
10. While striking his dog with a gun to make him release a bone, a man managed to shoot himself. Granted, I don’t think there’s any safe place to point a gun, but letting the “business end” face you as you swing it like a club? Wow. Maybe he’ll think twice about hitting his dog next time—if he, ya know, survived.
9. What happens when you anger a 10-foot python who’s been stuck in a cage for a long time? An intern at a Venezuelan zoo found out when he decided to play with the snake during his night shift. Turns out that snakes are fond of strangling and swallowing their prey (someone really should put that on Wikipedia).
8. Some people shoo wasps away with their hands. Others think it’s fair play to go after them with lighted torches. One monk learned that when you play with fire, you (and your entire temple) might get burned (to the ground).
7. While tracking a deer whom he had shot and was in the process of killing, a hunter apparently misjudged a cliff’s edge and fell off.
6. A New Jersey man tried to kill insects in his apartment with bug spray, but the propellant chemicals in the spray seemed to have some unforeseen consequences. He succeeded in killing many bugs, but probably not so much because of the poison as because of the explosion, which destroyed 80 percent of his apartment.
5. Though the purpose of “sea kitten hunting” is to dig a hook painfully into another being’s skin, one guy seems to have misread the how-to manual and managed to drive the hook into his own hand.
4. Have you ever seen bears who were forced to perform in captivity and felt sorry for how helpless they look? Well, it turns out gigantic land mammals with sharp, sharp teeth aren’t always that helpless—as demonstrated by the fatal attack that a bear at Predators in Action wild animal training center made against a trainer.
3. Why don’t we allow children to drive? Because it’s dangerous. Why do we allow children to kill animals with loaded firearms? Good question. Though some folks argue that children can be trusted with firearms if trained properly, I don’t think that helps the two men who were allegedly shot by one eight-year-old boy who had reportedly been taught how to use a deadly weapon to hunt animals.
2. After being jailed on burglary charges, a man was attacked by another inmate who chewed off a part of his ear (ewww!). What are the odds that something so disgusting and awful would happen to someone? To top it off, what are the odds that it would happen to a man who had previously been charged with cutting off a dog’s ears?!
1. Proving that using a .44 Magnum to kill mice is not a good idea, a trailer park resident managed to shoot herself and a bystander while trying to fire at a rodent who was simply trying to share her space. Is anyone else stunned that two accidental injuries occurred? PETA’s humane mousetrap, on the other hand, has never hurt a living soul.
I guess it just goes to show that what goes around may actually come around, so please make wise decisions when interacting with animals—you might have to answer for your actions.
Do you have your own “payback is hell” story, in which someone’s misdeeds to an animal don’t go unpunished? If so, comment below; we’d all love to hear it!
Written by Sean Conner
