We are the 99%
In May of 2009, a cat stuck in the wall of Dallas Animal Services (DAS) was allowed to slowly die of dehydration/starvation. Other than complaining to managers who did nothing, not a single employee of that pound did what conscience demanded: smash through the wall and save the cat. Only after the cat died and began to decompose, causing a smell in the employee break room, was a small hole made in the wall and the cat’s lifeless body pulled out and discarded like trash.
In my blog, “A Culture of Cruelty,” I wrote:
Imagine it. Really try to imagine it. A shelter filled with employees whose job it is to care for animals. Imagine a cat calling out in panic or fear, stuck in a wall, where the employees are eating and laughing and not a single one does anything about it. Sure, one of them calls a cruelty investigator and he comes and determines that yes, the cat is stuck in the wall. But he doesn’t rescue the cat. Others ask managers, each other, “will someone rescue the cat?” But no one does. And they keep right on eating their lunches, they keep right on laughing, they keep right on talking and gossiping and doing those things that people do in lunch rooms. And meanwhile, the cats’ cries are getting more desperate, then more weak, and then they finally stop. And a short time later, the smell comes. The smell of a decomposing body. And only then do they complain in earnest. How can we eat lunch in here, how can we laugh and gossip and talk with that smell? And because it now affects them, they do something about it. They cut open a hole in the wall to remove the dead body, while every single one of us wants to scream: tear open the wall! Why didn’t any of them tear open the wall?
This week, I highlighted that blog, and a follow up where I tried to explain why kill shelters like Dallas Animal Services have employees and directors who could allow this, which earned me condemnation from one person, someone who knows the employees at DAS and said I was not being fair. On my Facebook page, she wrote: “We can both agree that more vigorous and immediate action could and should have been taken.” The very thought is absurd. This is not one of those issues where hindsight is 20/20. This is not one of those issues where you do not realize the gravity of the situation or need time to figure out what the right thing to do is. After managers did nothing, the employees should have torn a hole in the wall and rescued the cat. But they didn’t. They didn’t the first day, despite the cat’s plaintive cries and scratching to get out. All of them went home and went to sleep. They didn’t the next day, despite the cat’s more desperate cries. All of them went about their day, and then went home and went to sleep. They didn’t the third day, despite the cat’s continuing cries. All of them went about their day (a day, I should add, like the others, filled with killing animals), and then went home and went to sleep. They didn’t the fourth day, when the cat’s cries became fainter and fainter. In fact, according to news reports, after five days, the cat could still be heard moving in the wall, but was not meowing anymore. A short time later, he died. When his smell impacted the enjoyment of the employee use of their break room, they took him out.
While only one person defended the employees, I did a poll, admittedly unscientific, where I asked people what they would do in the circumstances. Would they:
- Ignore the cat’s cries and go on with my day;
- Wait until the cat died and complain again; or,
- Make a hole in the wall and pull the cat out.
As of this writing, 210 people said they would pull the cat out, while only 1 said they would allow the cat to die and then complain again. Virtually all of us—99.6%—would have done what conscience demanded. In fact, some of the commenters could not even believe it was subject to debate. But it is, if you work at an animal “shelter.” In fact, the first time many animals are neglected or abused is at the very agency that is supposed to protect them from it.
Even before I conducted the survey, the Naysayer challenged all the commenters, including those that said they would have ripped a hole in the wall after the first meow. I myself made the same comment: “[T]he cat was stuck in the wall for days, crying, in the break room. And not one employee did what conscience demanded. That they spoke out against the former director after the fact is welcome. That a cat had to lose his life for it is unacceptable and unforgivable. You do not go to work each day in a place where an animal is starving to death and not TEAR A HOLE IN THE DAMN WALL AND PULL HIM OUT.”
That is what the great Henry Bergh would have done and that is what the great Henry Bergh did. One day, people were walking by a building that was under construction. People could hear a cat meowing but they couldn’t find her. Someone ran to tell Bergh. When he came, he realized that the cat was stuck inside the wall. The cat had crawled into a hole in the wall at night and had fallen asleep. The next morning, workers sealed the hole without realizing there was a cat inside. Bergh wanted to rescue the cat, but the owner of the construction company said it would cost too much money to make a hole in the wall. Bergh didn’t care. He ordered the workers to tear a hole in the wall. They did and the cat was freed.
Of course, that is Henry Bergh, and though I doubt very much the Naysayer was aware of it or that it would have opened her closed mind, she responded predictably by claiming that those of us who claim we would have done the same thing or torn a hole in the wall ourselves say that now, but doubting that we would if faced with a similar situation. In her mind, if her friends and colleagues wouldn’t, than no one would. She ignored the whole purpose of the post she was commenting on, “The Banality of Evil,” which sought to explain how seemingly “nice,” “normal” people are capable of doing horrible, horrible things, such as allowing a cat to die in the wall. I believe those 99.6 percenters. I believe they would have rescued the cat, because I would have done it. In fact, I did.
In 1995, I received a telephone call from my then-girlfriend, and now wife, that she received a call from her former employer, a recycling center in San Francisco. They could hear a cat meowing inside the wall of their building (there was a feral colony there) and as they knew she was an animal person, they asked if she could help. They did not want the cat to die. As I worked in San Francisco and as I was a volunteer investigator and Board Member for the No Kill Palo Alto Humane Society, I went over there and could clearly hear a kitten meowing behind the wall. The wall, unfortunately, turned out to be an old bank vault, one of those solid, thick walls with an old combination and spin lock, long forgotten.
I called San Francisco Animal Control who dispatched an officer. He came, surveyed the scene, and determined there was nothing they could do (sound familiar?). So I did what he and every employee at Dallas Animal Services should have done, I smashed through. In order to rescue the cat at DAS, they either had to cut through the drywall or they had to remove ceiling tiles and come in from the top. They did neither. I chose the latter. Unable to get through the thick steel of the vault, I climbed into the rafters of the building (the animal control officer claimed he was not permitted to follow) and, borrowing his flash light, I found a hole at the top and could see inside the vault, where a tiny gray kitten was sitting on this little piece of old carpet. He had apparently fallen through the hole.
I could smash through and force myself down, but how the hell could I get back out? It was a long way down. But I did it anyway (would they have allowed me to die of dehydration or starvation if I got stuck?). I made the hole larger by smashing away the drywall so it was large enough to accommodate a chair and then me. It took several hours, but the kitten and I got out. And I immediately took him home to my girlfriend. After she gave him a bath, it turned out the gray kitten was white, a diamond in the rough. When the time came to find him a home through the Palo Alto Humane Society, we could not part with “Diamond.” Rechristening him “Tofu” because of his color, he lived with us until he succumbed to heart failure in 2006. In short, I would have never left that facility until he was free. It was not only my duty as a humane society investigator, but as a decent human being. But more than that, it would have simply been impossible for me to go on with my life knowing that a scared, trapped animal was slowly dying of dehydration and that it was in my power to help. So I did what I had to do which was what the situation demanded. That is what you would have done. That is what all decent, compassionate, and humane people do. But not the staff at Dallas Animal Services. And not the animal control officer who was called out to the scene.
Don’t think for a second that Dallas is unique. Don’t think that this is the result of a “few bad apples.” Indifference, incompetence, neglect, and cruelty are epidemic and endemic to animal control. This is Robeson County or Lincoln County or Charlotte-Mecklenburg, NC. It is Harrison County, OH. It is Carroll or Floyd County, GA. It is a “shelter” near you. In fact, for many animals, the first time they experience neglect or cruelty is at the “shelter” that is supposed to protect them from it. For an explanation as to why the employees at Dallas Animal Services allowed the cat to die, while the 99% of us who love animals would have saved him, click here.