Animal Cruelty not Art - petition

lovelyjuvly

Hi,
I came across the informaton below and a link to a petition which has been set up to try and stop the 'artist' below from carrying out any more 'exhbititions'. :mad:
Is it allowed for me to post this link on this forum, in case anyone wants to sign it?

thanks
Lovelyjuvly

In 2007, Guillermo Vargas Habacuc, a so called ‘artist’, took a dog from the streets, tied it up to a short rope attached to a wall in an art gallery, and let it slowly die of hunger and thirst. For various days, the author of this horrible cruelty and the visitors of the gallery were impassible spectators of the poor animal’s torture, until it slowly died after an absurd and incomprehensible agony.

Do you think this is cruel?
But the story doesn’t end here: the prestigious Biennale Centroamericana of Art has decided, incomprehensibly, that the bestiality committed by the aforementioned individual is art, and in such a way Guillermo Vargas Habacuc has been invited to repeat the cruelty at the 2008 Biennale Centroamericanan which will be held in Honduras.

monty_python

that is completly horrible. and the people watching are heartless..


where is the link to the petition??

Alun

We've already had a thread on this subject twice in recent months.

TradLad

Wheres the link...this cannot happen again!

peasant

Here comes the shocker ...

In a way I think this is actually a good idea.

Yes it is cruelty of the highest degree to tie up a dog and let it starve to death. No doubt about that. It is probablyy not just immoral, but also illegal in several jurisdictions, and rightly so.

BUT ...

In those countries hundreds of dogs die in the street every day ...not tied up, mind you, but cruelly neglected and disregarded all the same.

Nobody cares about those dogs dying, ever.

But everybody who goes to that exhibition or hears/reads about it will be enraged about the sheer cruelty inflicted on "the exhibit".
They will feel for that animal and possibly feel guilty for having allowed / condoned for this to happen by going to the exhibition in the first place.

Hopefully this anger and guilt will then transfer to the outside and help to improve the fate of all those street dogs.

I wouldn't like to see this done repeatedly, but one or two dogs dying in this fashion (rather than unseen on a street corner) might actually have a big overall positive effect.

javaboy

peasant wrote: »

Here comes the shocker ...

In a way I think this is actually a good idea.

Yes it is cruelty of the highest degree to tie up a dog and let it starve to death. No doubt about that. It is probablyy not just immoral, but also illegal in several jurisdictions, and rightly so.

BUT ...

In those countries hundreds of dogs die in the street every day ...not tied up, mind you, but cruelly neglected and disregarded all the same.

Nobody cares about those dogs dying, ever.

But everybody who goes to that exhibition or hears/reads about it will be enraged about the sheer cruelty inflicted on "the exhibit".
They will feel for that animal and possibly feel guilty for having allowed / condoned for this to happen by going to the exhibition in the first place.

Hopefully this anger and guilt will then transfer to the outside and help to improve the fate of all those street dogs.

I wouldn't like to see this done repeatedly, but one or two dogs dying in this fashion (rather than unseen on a street corner) might actually have a big overall positive effect.

If an 'artist' held a homeless person against their will and allowed them to die of thirst/starvation in order to highlight the plight of the homeless, would it be ok? The long term effect might be beneficial as you say but really there's no excuse for subjecting one animal to such extremes of cruelty.

I get your point about highlighting the issue but this is a nasty senselessly cruel and attention grabbing way to go about it.

peasant

javaboy wrote: »

If an 'artist' held a homeless person against their will and allowed them to die of thirst/starvation in order to highlight the plight of the homeless, would it be ok? The long term effect might be beneficial as you say but really there's no excuse for subjecting one animal to such extremes of cruelty.

You are right, of course.

But then again, the dogs in the street are dying in almost exactly the same way, minus the tie-down rope. (Which hopefully can't be said about homeless people).

Especially in those countries, everybody is as guilty of animal cruelty as the artist. The only difference is that the general public does nothing whereas the artist just speeds up the process (of dying).

In a twisted logic you could even argue that letting the dog starve over days rather than weeks or months is actually more "humane" (in very inverted commas).

All this under the caveat that the artist IS actually trying to make a statement about the street dogs rather than just wanting to provoke or "be controversial" for the sake of it.


And casting the net a bit wider ...for us here in Ireland ...what good is all the moral indignation about this "artist" and signing petitions and all that ...when every year thousands of dogs (most of them even perfectly healthy!) are killed right here under our noses and most of us just stand idly by?

It wasn't me!

I'm kinda with peasant. Art can be shocking and horrifying, and this was, but it made a very strong point, that's probably the better for having been made. However, it really shouldn't be repeated, for the obvious reason that it detracts from the artistic impact of the first instance, and the point it made.

lovelyjuvly

Hi
I was aware that this had come up already, but wasn't sure if the petition had. Here's the link for the petition:

Sign here: http://www.petitiononline.com/13031953/petition.html you don’t have to pay nor register, and its worth doing it so that this man will never be appreciated nor be called an artist for performing such a heinous act, for such an insensitivity and for provoking another beings pain.


The last 2 boxes are town/city and country.

I hope that it's a successful petition and that he doesn't get to torture another animal and get recognition and fame for it.

thanks
Lovely juvly

cuckoo

Snopes (reference site for urban legends) have an 'undetermined' status on this one at the moment.

http://www.snopes.com/critters/crusader/vargas.asp

stevoman

peasant wrote: »

Here comes the shocker ...

In a way I think this is actually a good idea.

Yes it is cruelty of the highest degree to tie up a dog and let it starve to death. No doubt about that. It is probablyy not just immoral, but also illegal in several jurisdictions, and rightly so.

BUT ...

In those countries hundreds of dogs die in the street every day ...not tied up, mind you, but cruelly neglected and disregarded all the same.

Nobody cares about those dogs dying, ever.

But everybody who goes to that exhibition or hears/reads about it will be enraged about the sheer cruelty inflicted on "the exhibit".
They will feel for that animal and possibly feel guilty for having allowed / condoned for this to happen by going to the exhibition in the first place.

Hopefully this anger and guilt will then transfer to the outside and help to improve the fate of all those street dogs.

I wouldn't like to see this done repeatedly, but one or two dogs dying in this fashion (rather than unseen on a street corner) might actually have a big overall positive effect.

mmmmm. i see your reasoning. cruel? definitly!!! do we realy know the slightest bit about life and culture in the south america's? No! Because of this our hands our tied from forming a proper educated opinion of whats really going on down there.