A sense of outrage sweeps across the country every time a macabre killing of an animal or bird hits the headlines. What does this say about Maltese society? Does it reflect a greater interest in the care of animals? Yes, but as in so many other countries there are still people who do not think twice about abusing animals for business or, worse, maltreat them in a manner that stirs deep anger among the rest of the community.

There is a roaring trade today in pet grooming, and there would seem to be no limit to the comfort many are prepared to extend to their pets. Which is why perhaps atrocities of the kind the Mosta cat killer has been resorting to cause so much anger and distress among animal lovers. The revulsion is apparent in the responses invariably given to every story of animal cruelty.

The Mosta cat killer may be a sick man, but he is also smart. How can he possibly go on carrying out such killings without being detected? Mosta is not New York, as someone has sarcastically, but quite rightly, remarked, but the cat killer must by now have developed a very ingenious way of evading attention. When the culprit is caught, those who have distressed themselves so much at the heinous crimes he has so wantonly committed would, quite reasonably, expect the court to inflict the harshest possible punishment on him allowed by law.

Whenever the subject of maltreatment of animals comes up for discussion, the dog who was in the news when it was buried alive after being shot in the head, Star, jumps out of its grave, as it were, to scream out that his was possibly the worst case. This story made headlines not just in Malta but abroad too, all for the wrong reasons – for the sheer, calculated cruelty shown to it by a human being. The case still sends a shiver down the spine of animal lovers.

As Jeremy Bentham put it so well: “The question is not, ‘Can they reason?’ nor, ‘Can they talk? but ‘Can they suffer?’” They can indeed. As do the many dogs that are left on roofs in the baking hot summer days, or the cab horses that are made to trod the asphalt-melting roads at the peak of Malta’s scorching summer days, sweat dripping down their bodies in traffic congested streets.

Beautiful protected birds are shot down out of the sky, just for fun or out of an ingrained thirst for the trophy. The killing goes on, with those with an interest in perpetuating such horrendous habits often bringing up as justification similar, or worse, practices abroad, as if two wrongs can ever make a right. Are fox hunting and bullfighting not horrendous too?

Greater media coverage is helping to sensitise even further to the need for greater enforcement of rules and regulations against cruelty to animals in all its forms. But what would definitely help in creating greater awareness of animal welfare is education, not just in schools, where it is of utmost importance, but at community level too. Organisations involved in the promotion of animal welfare, or in directly taking care of animals, ought to be constantly supported, morally and financially, so that they would be able to step up their campaigns in favour of greater animal care.

Caring for animals is a mark of a civilised society.