Lancaster Online's Matthew Kemeny wrote an op-ed and posted it on June 28, 2017 entitled, "The Connection Between Animal Abuse and Domestic Violence." He focused on proving that connection's existence and validity while discussing the type of evil with which the heart of a human being can be wrought. In response, the online publication received a letter that attempted to refute this notion, ostensibly defending violence against animals and the general idea of animal cruelty. Bob Rudy, another columnist for Lancaster now posts a response to what he calls the "nonsense" of that letter.
The substance of the debate stems from legislative progress having recently been made for animal protectionists in Pennsylvania, U.S. where Libre's Law has passed—to which Kemeny initially referred in June as "a measure that brings us into modern civilization with increased penalties for animal abuse." Libre is the name of a Boston terrier who reportedly endured abuse and was left to die at a dog-breeding facility almost exactly a year ago in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.
The puppy was rescued under the auspices of swift social media buzz snowballing his story. He went on to recover from the abuse as the story reached national and then international coverage, and this prompted exponentially greater and more effective discussion among lawmakers of animal abuse legislation reform, which finally came to fruition this summer.
Kemeny covered this topic in his op-ed and segued toward explaining the root causes of this kind of behavior. "It probably comes as no surprise that the same criminals who abuse animals have a higher propensity to commit domestic abuse. In fact, abusers of animals are five times as likely to harm humans, according to the Animal Legal Defense Fund. Domestic abuse victims typically have few safe options for their pets when leaving an abusive relationship. Many end up staying in dangerous households because they are afraid of leaving their pets. Some victims never leave the home and end up dead," Kemeny wrote.
In response to this, John Eshleman of the West Lampeter Township wrote in his letter to address Kemeny's post essentially attack not only the points argued but also Kemeny's personal intelligence as if to suggest that only a lesser mind would conceive of such an explanation for animal abuse. More broadly, though, his letter spoke to the obstacles that first necessitated such widespread attention to get Pennsylvania, a state known nationwide and now worldwide for its previously egregious animal conservation and protection laws or lack thereof, to finally pass meaningful legislation in defense of animals.
"Such a statement is so much nonsense it's hard to know where to start. Animals constantly kill and eat each other; are they evil? (Just the predators maybe?) Billions of sea animals and land animals are killed and eaten by Americans each year. Someone (human) killed every one of those animals. I would say almost all Americans have killed or paid someone to kill an animal, including the op-ed writer. So I would guess all humans have a special evil in this area," Eshleman writes.
"Animals must die to control overpopulation and sustain those animals who consume them. We as Americans have gotten so far from raising and killing our own food that this type of nonsense is really starting to abound. By the way, roaming cats are thought to kill as many as 2.4 billion birds and 12.3 billion mammals yearly," Eshleman continues. "Op-eds like this make some people feel good and righteous but are an insult to almost all Americans."
Rudy responded on Lancaster's behalf and referred to Eshleman's letter as nonsensical, arguing that the letter itself had entirely missed the point of Kemeny's discourse. He pointed to the differences between violence as a result of immorality and killing out of necessity, and he highlights the fact that Eshleman only focuses on the concept of killing a living organism as though it were the focal point of Kemeny's op-ed. "The letter writer is obviously confused between the definition of the word 'evil' and the association with regard to intentional harm to victims of violence," Rudy explained.
"Animals kill for survival, food and self-preservation. Granted, there are some animals who taunt, tease or play with their food before they kill it, but that's part of nature, not the implicit attempt to be evil. I challenge you to identify one animal that kills simply for the pleasure it brings. Animals are not evil because they do not possess morals. In order to be evil, one must consciously go against what one knows to be morally right."
At the very least, this exchange between Lancaster Online and its readers exemplifies the fundamental quagmire of op-eds as a concept. Even in defense of animals killing animals, both Eshleman and Rudy insert their biases, which accomplishes little to nothing rhetorically. Aside from the fact that morals are not something to be "possessed," Rudy argues that animals are not and cannot be evil, which is unknowable; moreover, Eshelman misses the knowable fact that human beings can, indeed, be evil and inflict themselves upon animals.
The crux of the matter, regardless of which argument resonates most with anyone, is that evil is known to manifest in at least one animal, Homo sapiens, and it often manifests as abuse against other animals, whether those animals are pets or other human beings. The quandary is both philosophical and bio-sociological as it bridges the gap between knowable morality and the behaviors of different types of animals in relation to each other within civilized societies that encroach upon the natural world.
Kemeny simply made the argument that evil is no respecter of species and that it abuses humans and other animals alike, but undergirding the debate from the very start was really the contentious opinions many expressed during the long road to passing substantive, animal defense legislation in a state where many had long opposed it with all manner of complex (or not so complex) arguments on either side.