From California, comes another push for equal rights. This time, however, it’s for pets.
According to Los Angeles magazine, state Assemblyman Miguel Santiago, a Los Angeles Democrat, has offered a proposal “that would grant cats and dogs with a bill of rights, similar to the rights and protections that the American people have.”
Santiago’s bill declares that “dogs and cats have the right to be respected as sentient beings that experience complex feelings that are common among living animals while being unique to each individual animal.”
Accordingly, in an effort to combat both overpopulation and pet euthanasia, Santiago notes in the measure that “while requirements for basic physical care, such as the provision of food, water, and shelter, are set forth in most jurisdictions, as one of the largest and most progressive states in the country, California can and should strive to recognize the importance of animals’ mental well-being.”
How will California do that?
With the “Dog and Cat Bill of Rights,” whose provisions state that canines and felines have the right to:
- Be free from exploitation, cruelty, neglect, and abuse.
- A life of comfort, free of fear and anxiety.
- Daily mental stimulation and appropriate exercise.
- Nutritious food, sanitary water, and shelter in an appropriate and safe environment.
- Preventive and therapeutic health care.
- Be properly identified through tags, microchips, or other humane means.
- Be spayed and neutered to prevent unwanted litters.
The bill, if enacted, would mandate that every public animal control agency or shelter, Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals shelter, Humane Society shelter, or rescue group post a copy of the Dog and Cat Bill of Rights in a “conspicuous place accessible to public view.”
Santiago, LA Magazine noted, has a dog in this fight.
He owns a Yorkshire terrier named Ewok and a German shepherd called Thor.
“Our dogs and cats deserve to be loved, and cared for, and the Dog and Cat Bill of Rights will help inform potential adopters of the care needed to create a healthy environment for their adopted pets,” the lawmaker said in a statement.
In commenting on Santiago’s bill recently, conservative podcast Matt Walsh called the idea both ridiculous and disingenuous.
If so-called animal rights’ activists “have a cockroach infestation in their house, which many of them do because these are dirty people, … all of them are calling the exterminator. There has never been an animal rights activist who had a roach infestation in their house and said, ‘You know what? They have a right to be here just as much as I do,’ while the roaches are crawling all over them at night.
“And so while they pretend that this is about respecting the animals, about equality of animals, it’s actually the opposite of that. It’s a very narcissistic self-centered view of the world, where the animals that you personally like the most and that you think are cute, and you want to be able to cuddle with them …. are the ones that also have rights equal to Europe.”
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