The Killing of Dog Killua is The Tip of An Animal Abuse Iceberg

The recent killing of a beloved golden retriever has sparked outrage across the nation. A neighbor was caught on CCTV chasing the dog before he killed it. The video spread virally on social media even reaching the eyeballs of the inutile politicians who govern the Philippines. Their solution? More laws!!

https://www.philstar.com/headlines/2024/03/21/2342174/killing-dog-killua-slammed

Animal welfare education should be mandated for elementary and high school students after the killing of Golden Retriever “Killua,” according to Sen. Grace Poe.

On March 17, Camarines Sur resident Anthony Solares killed the dog, claiming that Killua was aggressive.

The act was caught in a closed-circuit television footage posted on social media by Killua’s owner Vina Rachelle Arazas. Solares was seen hitting the dog as it ran around trying to escape.

The dog’s remains were later found in a sack.

“I am heartbroken and enraged to hear of the mauling of Killua, a golden retriever. Mr. Anthony Solares admitted to slaughtering Killua, claiming that the dog chased his child. However, his actions, which were captured in a CCTV video, were fraught with excessive violence and showed that it was Killua who was being chased,” Poe said in her privilege speech on Tuesday.

In Senate Bill 2458 that Poe filed, the “Revised Animal Welfare Act” shall include mandatory animal welfare education in the curriculum for primary and secondary education students.

“We hope to pass this bill soon and put an end to despicable incidents such as what happened to Killua,” she added.

Members of the House of Representatives condemned the killing of Killua, with lawmakers calling for amendments to the Animal Welfare Act of 1998.

“I think it would be the best time for us to revisit this law. The maximum penalty of imprisonment for the violation, for instance, on the killing of an animal is six months to one year of imprisonment, with the penalty or a fine of not exceeding P100,000,” said Ako Bicol party-list Rep. Raul Bongalon.

He also urged the Philippine Animal Welfare Society to raise awareness of laws against animal cruelty.

“What should be done? Perhaps we can empower our (local government units) in enforcing this law. It is because they are the ones at the grassroots level,” House Deputy Speaker David Suarez told legislative reporters at a briefing.

“I would understand maybe if he scared the dog. But to kill the animal already speaks of the motive, that there is really an intent to end the life of that animal. To me, it is tantamount to straight-up murder,” said Davao Oriental 2nd District Rep. Cheeno Almario.

It should not need to be said but, "Laws DO NOT prevent crime."

The fact is animal abuse happens all the time in the Philippines and no one cares. The only reason anyone care about Killua is because of the CCTV footage and the pictures of him celebrating his birthday in a tuxedo bib. For every Killua there are other unnamed animals who's death goes unchampioned.

Take for instance the abuse of a cats. 

https://www.gmanetwork.com/news/topstories/regions/901314/cat-found-shot-in-head-with-an-arrow-in-davao-city/story/

A cat was shot in the head with a bow and arrow in Davao City, according to the report of GMA News Regional TV One Mindanao on "State of the Nation" Thursday.

The cat was rescued and rushed to the veterinary clinic by a concerned citizen for an emergency operation.

The surgical procedure was complicated as the arrow hit the cat’s brain. The operation on the cat was eventually declared successful.

The person who shot the cat remains unidentified.

Meanwhile, a house cat was found allegedly bludgeoned to death at an alley in Naga City.

Based on statements from residents, there had already been multiple incidents of house cats being killed within the area.

Barangay officials are working on identifying the suspect behind the string of cases of animal cruelty.

In Davao someone shot an arrow into a cat's head. In Naga City a cat was found bludgeoned to death being one of a number of killed cats in the area.

In Cavite cats at the local pound had to resort to cannibalism.

https://www.gmanetwork.com/news/topstories/regions/901107/cavite-pound-probed-over-cat-cannibalism/story/

A barangay-run animal pound in Dasmariñas, Cavite is under investigation for animal neglect after a video surfaced of cats eating the bodies of their fellow felines.

In a report by Darlene Cay in Unang Balita on Wednesday, a concerned resident made the grisly discovery after she went to the pound to help her friend find a pet cat.

(I became confused because it was the first time I saw something like that. I was very angry and upset. I ended up crying.)

Yvette suspected that the cats in the pound were not adequately fed, so they could do nothing but eat each other. Based on the video, some cats appeared weak, their water bowls were dirty and there was no food inside their cages either.

Yvette said they talked to the barangay chairman, who agreed to transfer the cats to a shelter, but he said she was shocked when the 20 cats were released the next day.

Still, the barangay captain maintains they did not abandon the cats and fed them twice daily.

(The truth is that I have two caretakers of the cats but we still can't watch them for 24 hours, so when they noticed the cats being fed they would end up fighting.)

The people at the cat pound suspected that three cats died because of fighting. They said the more aggressive ones ate the dead cats.

According to the veterinarian Dr. Ferds Recio, extreme hunger may be the reason for the cannibalistic behavior. He said that cats are natural hunters.

(It can be due to starvation since they don't have any food. It is also true that they will kill their fellow cats for them to eat. It doesn't mean that one hundred percent they have nothing to eat, so they will kill their partner. It is possible, but it is not one hundred percent sure.)

If it is proven that cats were neglected or abused, the barangay officials can be held responsible for violating the Animal Welfare Act.

There are also reports from time to time of tricycle drivers being apprehended for collecting dogs set to be slaughtered and eaten. The point here is that no law is going to stop animal abuse in the Philippines. Abuse happens because some people simply do not care about the well being of animals. 

This issue is not much different from the weekly slaughter of current and former political officials. Once in a while the violence is recognized at the national level and passionate speeches condemning the violence and calling for an investigation are made in Congress but for the most part it is an endemic problem about which no one cares. Stopping animal abuse in the Philippines will take a huge cultural shift and that is nowhere in the cards at this point. 

The Philippines is Great for Expats, Not So Great For Filipinos

It's a tale of two surveys released within a few days of each other. One ranks the Philippines as the 24th best place to live and work.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/panosmourdoukoutas/2019/07/06/dutertes-philippines-among-the-best-places-to-live-and-work-ahead-of-china/#c11313f676b8

Philippines has been ranked 24th best place to live and work, just behind the US, which ranked 23rd, and ahead of China, which ranked 26th. 

That’s according to the 2019 HSBC Expat’s annual survey, which is based on responses from more than 18,000 expats across 163 markets on three metrics: living, career opportunity, and family life. 

The Philippines jumped up the rankings from 26th place last year.

The other ranks the Philippines as the fourth most dangerous country in the world for civilians.

https://globalnation.inquirer.net/177866/us-based-data-group-ranks-ph-fourth-most-dangerous-place-in-the-world-for-civilians

The Philippines ranks high among countries where civilians are most unsafe as a result of what was described as “targeted attacks” arising from government policy, landing at No. 4 next to civil war-torn Yemen on a list of countries where violence against civilians is leading to rising casualty figures, according to a United States-based research and analysis group.

Quite a stark contrast and like all of the regular surveys taken in or about the Philippines ripe for politicisation. 

https://twitter.com/MarkYu_DPT/status/1147867067112153089

https://twitter.com/gorilla_truth/status/1149979268337659904

Both of these Twitter armchair assessments are wrong. The HSBC survey has not "slapped the life out of the dilawans" (which means the Liberal Party but can be extended to mean all those who oppose Duterte's policies.) Neither is all the killings "the way we like it." Plenty of Filipinos are worried about the flood of violence surging across the county. The ACLED is also not a human rights organisation. They merely collect data about political violence and analyse it. They do not advocate policy.

The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED) is a disaggregated conflict collection, analysis and crisis mapping project. ACLED collects the dates, actors, types of violence, locations, and fatalities of all reported political violence and protest events across Africa, South Asia, South East Asia, the Middle East, Europe, and Latin America. Political violence and protest includes events that occur within civil wars and periods of instability, public protest and regime breakdown. ACLED’s aim is to capture the forms, actors, dates and locations of political violence and protest as it occurs across states. The ACLED team conducts analysis to describe, explore and test conflict scenarios, and makes both data and analysis open to freely use by the public.

https://www.acleddata.com/about-acled/

Let's take a look at the second report first which consists of two reports. The crowning of the Philippines as the 4th most dangerous country in the world actually took place back in May with the release of ACLED's "Fact Sheet: Civilians in Conflict."

https://www.acleddata.com/2019/05/28/fact-sheet-civilians-in-conflict/

There are two sets of data in this first report. "Countries with the highest number of civilian targeting events" and "Countries with the most reported fatalities from civilian targeting." As you can see the Philippines did not make the second list. This data also extends only from January 1 to May 18, 2019. 

The second report about the Philippines from ACLED has data that extends to June 29th, 2019.

https://www.acleddata.com/2019/07/03/press-release-data-confirm-wave-of-targeted-attacks-in-the-philippines/

The report states that there have been 450 attacks targeting civilians which have resulted in 490 fatalities. I suppose that would have to include a single attack where multiple people are killed. They don't explain the math here. How do you get 490 deaths out of 450 attacks? The majority of the deaths are of drug suspects and the rest are of current and former government officials. State forces, the PNP, log the most kills but the ACLED posits that many of the motorcycle assassins could be linked to the state. 

With only 490 fatalities that would tie the Philippines with Mali but since the first data set is only from January 1 until mid-May it is likely that Mali has now surpassed 490 fatalities. I think this data needs a lot more clarification. It's not clear that the Philippines is the 4th most dangerous country in the world. According to ACLED's own data that honour goes to Mali. The data set being used to label the Philippines as the 4th most dangerous country does not include fatal events but only non-fatal events where civilians were targeted. Not to downplay the seriousness of 340 non-fatal events targeting civilians but a fatal event is certainly more dangerous than a non-fatal event.

The ACLED does include an "other" category in this data set but it is much smaller compared to drug suspects and government officials. However that data should not be ignored. The deaths of farmers, activists, and lawyers at the hands of unknown men, often alleged to be government assassins, is appalling. I also find it strange that police operations against drug dealers constitutes political violence.

It must be kept in mind that the ACLED is also only tracking political violence and not regular murders so the numbers represented here are a lot lower than they would be if all types of violence were factored in. What is clear is that being a politician or a drug user could lead to your death at the hands of the state or of assassins likely connected to the state. 

While Filipino politicians and drug users are being killed foreign expats are having the time of their life. Here are the results of the 2019 HSBC Expat Survey which ranks the Philippines as 24th best place to live and work.

https://expatexplorer.hsbc.com/survey/country/philippines/chart:table

What these numbers mean I have no idea but here is Forbes to give us some useful analysis.

That may come as a surprise to some for a couple of reasons. One of them is that the Philippines has a reputation for sending its own people overseas in droves rather than attracting foreigners who want to live and work there. 

The other reason is that the country is mired in violence, which has taken a huge human toll. 

Apparently, that isn’t what foreign expats are concerned about. They find it easy to relocate to a country of friendly people and a reasonable cost of living. “With its tropical climate and steadily growing economy, the Philippines is quickly becoming one of the most popular expat destinations in Southeast Asia, “ says the report. 

Meanwhile, the results of the expats survey should be interpreted with extreme caution. People surveyed are usually more affluent and better educated than the average immigrant, and they are on short assignments. This means that an overseas assignment may be seen as an “adventure.”

https://www.forbes.com/sites/panosmourdoukoutas/2019/07/06/dutertes-philippines-among-the-best-places-to-live-and-work-ahead-of-china/#c11313f676b8

Foreigners aren't concerned about violence because it does not affect them. They are not the targets of motorcycle assassins. That is not to say foreigners are never targets. Plenty of foreigners have been murdered in the Philippines but when you are working for a company making Dollars or Euros in a land where the Peso is devalued and you can purchase more why would you care about anything else? With more money to spend foreigners are also more likely to live in gated communities where less violence occurs. 

A judgement about the state of the economy or the strength of Duterte's polices cannot be made with this survey. Expats come and go and many may have no real grasp on the political or even economic situation as they are busy with work. Many are even busy with play. Anecdotal stories about Filipinas being easy pickings for any foreigner abound!

Then again there are also horror stories about having to deal with the minutiae of Philippine bureaucracy which can require stacks of paperwork just to get your factory running. Foreigners also cannot own real property in the Philippines meaning land or houses. Any foreign business must be 60% Filipino owned. How is the Philippines a good business environment when you cannot even wholly own your business? At least the labor is cheap!

Overall these two surveys don't really tell us anything meaningful about the Philippines. One is a survey of expats and the other is data about political violence. Anyone who reads these surveys will inevitably project their own interpretation upon them. Labelling the Philippines as the 4th most dangerous country in the world is misleading as there are two lists in the ACLED data and the one with fatalities does not feature the Philippines. Also political violence is going to be directed at a very small subset of the population. Thinking a true picture of the Philippine economy will emerge by surveying expats is foolish because of their tenuous and brief connection to the country. Who did they survey anyway? I assume it's the more affluent Westerners and not the Chinese being sneaked over here to work in illegal online gambling casinos.

One thing is for sure though: The world of the poor Filipino with a target on his back because he is a drug user or a land activist and the world of the Foreigner expat with a target on his back because he is white and wealthy live in two different worlds.