Dear Editor,
I read with sadness and regret about Loki, the dog (May 8). Perhaps it is an occupational hazard that, being on a job for too long, vets have forgotten the meaning of euthanasia. It is carried out to terminate any prolonging of pain and suffering to the animal, not to make life easier for any human being.
I cannot comprehend why a vet would accede to a client’s request to put down an animal to make way for the safety of another. Every life deserves a chance, especially a perfectly healthy one.
It’s a shame that Loki landed in the hands of people who ended his life when they had no right to.
We have to amend the law when it gives the owner of an animal the right to end its life. Both vet and the owners are perpetrators and accomplices. The vet could have alerted Exclusively Mongrels about Loki. I would rather that they had set it free by abandonment. At least, Loki would have had a fighting chance and not have its fate sealed.
A murder is a murder, agenda besides the point. The culprits involved have to be held responsible for the core act itself. There are many humans with an aggressive nature, does it mean we go around putting them down simply because they are a threat to society? If we say no because it’s a human life, then we have double standards and have failed in our attempts to be a gracious society.
If we are to be serious in promoting a gracious and caring country, we have to walk the talk and start respecting the weaker and lesser among us and not exploit them just because we know they are not able to defend themselves.
I would suggest that the vet and the owners come out to make an open explanation as any decent human being with integrity should and not cry foul and hide behind the authorities.
To shield such people and not raise an issue does not make us a gracious society. We need to do justice to ourselves by doing what we should before outsiders takes us seriously.
I have faith in the good nature of my fellow Singaporeans who will not physically harm those concerned in this saga, so I agree hands up to the scrutiny they should be given.
I cannot resonate more than enough with Mahatma Gandhi’s famous quote: “The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.”
We can do better to debunk those who criticise us for being a first class country but one with a Third World mentality.
Yours Sincerely,
Delphine Goh (Ms)