Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Annotated Bibliography


Annotated Bibliography

"Animal Cruelty Facts and Statistics: The Humane Society of the United States." The Humane Society of the United States: The Humane Society of the United States. Wayne Pacelle, 21 July 2011. Web. 01 Apr. 2012. http://humanesociety.org/issues/abuse_neglect/facts/animal_cruelty_facts_statistics.html.
            This source provided us with several useful statistics about the frequency of animal abuse and information about the species of animals that are most commonly abused or neglected. The most common victims are generally cats and dogs, in particularly pit-bulls. The source also provided us with an approximate amount of reported animal cruelty cases in the year 2007, and out of that number, it gave us the percentages of animal cruelty involved with either cats or dogs. This information was extremely helpful for our documentary because current animal cruelty in our own community most often involves dogs and cats. By presenting our audience with the harsh facts of this frequent crime, we can effectively emphasize our point that animal cruelty does happen in our town.  This source also provided statistics about how animal cruelty is strongly linked to domestic violence, which we found very interesting, and we think our audience will too. Teenagers typically know about the seriousness of domestic violence and  by showing our audience how closely related these two crimes are, we can emphasize our point about the immorality of animal cruelty and motivate our viewers to desire a change in our community.

Bill, Henry. The Relationship between Animal Cruelty, Delinquency, and Attitudes toward the Treatment of Animals. 3rd ed. Vol. 12. 2004. Print.
            Henry’s novel, The Relationship between Animal Cruelty, Delinquency, and Attitudes toward the Treatment of Animals, provided us with information about the links that abusive criminals have with the way they treat animals and the way they treat their children or spouse. Domestic violence and child abuse are both very serious issues, and they are closely related to animal cruelty. The source also gave statistics about the pasts of animal abusers, which often include physiological problems and previous delinquencies.  Lastly, this novel gave information about the gender and age of animal abusers. Generally, they were males over the age of 40, which is similar to the age and gender of sex offenders. Although these two crimes may seem very different from each other, they are both committed by the same types of people and they are both very serious crimes. This helps us to emphasize our point that animal cruelty shouldn’t be thought of just as a misdemeanor crime, but rather, a very serious problem that desperately needs a solution, very much like child abuse. Because this source showed us the relationship between animal cruelty and other serious crimes, it stresses the severity of our topic.

PETA. "Issues: Companion Animals." Www.peta.com. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, 2012. Web. 5 Apr. 2012. <http://www.peta.org/issues/companion-animals/default.aspx>.
            When gathering information on specifically domestic animal cruelty, this section of the PETA website proved extremely useful. In the issues section, we found research and statistics on abuse specifically towards "companion animals" such as dogs and cats. With these two specific kinds of animals being a major and most well-known type of animal abuse, this website provided information that is very useful for our documentary viewers to know. Not only did this website provide wonderful information on the topic of cruelty, but it also talks about spaying and neutering your pets, the "pet trade", local animal shelters, euthanasia, and about the overpopulation crisis which is directly related to spaying and neutering your pets. Overall, this website was crucial to our documentary. It covered a broad range of issues related to animal cruelty that we had not even thought of yet to include in our documentary. This will strengthen our documentary's message as a whole now that we can corroborate with this excellent information, facts, and photos.  


"Fight Animal Cruelty." ASPCA. 2012. Web. 01 Apr. 2012. <http://www.aspca.org/fight-animal-cruelty/>.
              The ASPCA website was a very beneficial source for our documentary. Several of the other websites covered facts and statistics about abuse and cruelty, but this website mainly provided ways to take action. The website even included an easy-to-use pledge application that says you will fight to end animal cruelty in your community. Although providing information about the problem we are presenting in our documentary is vital, providing information on how to take action is the most important part of this entire project. ASPCA.org told us very simple ways that people can step up and make a change that will only take ten minute out of your day at the most. This website provided information on how to repot animal cruelty, how to recognize animal cruelty, and how to fight animal cruelty. This information opened our eyes to see how easy it is to help in the fight for animal cruelty, so by sharing it with our viewers, the awakening message will only be spread to more people, hopefully resulting in a domino effect around our community and eventually around the world.

"Pet-Abuse.Com Animal Cruelty Database." Pet-Abuse.Com. 2001. Web. 01 Apr. 2012. <http://www.pet-abuse.com/pages/animal_cruelty.php>.
            This source supplied us with information about the two main types of animal cruelty: passive cruelty and active cruelty, and provided us with several examples. The two types of animal cruelty are basically either neglect or violence towards animals, and both happen quite often. The website showed us some examples of animal cruelty, which included: neglect, hoarding, animal fighting, poisoning and shooting. Whether the owner has deliberately caused pain to his/her animal, or has simply neglected his/her pet, they are still causing incredible pain and suffering to their animal and they deserve to be punished. This source showed photos of abused pets, and gave detailed examples of actual animal cruelty stories. In addition to this information, this source also gave great advice on how to prevent animal cruelty, or report local abuse. This source aided us in our documentary making process because it helped us appeal to the pathos of the audience. This information about the actual types of animal cruelty and real life examples can show our viewers the truth about what actually happens to the animals, and sway our audience to feel sympathetic for the animals. The advice on reporting abuse also helped us because a main section of our documentary will consist of us discussing several solutions to this problem, and we can reference the solutions mentioned in this source.

Thursday, April 12, 2012

Works Cited



"Animal Cruelty Facts and Statistics: The Humane Society of the United States." The Humane Society of the United States: The Humane Society of the United States. Wayne Pacelle, 21 July 2011. Web. 01 Apr. 2012. http://humanesociety.org/issues/abuse_neglect/facts/animal_cruelty_facts_statistics.html.
Bill, Henry. The Relationship between Animal Cruelty, Delinquency, and Attitudes toward the Treatment of Animals. 3rd ed. Vol. 12. 2004. Print.
"Cruel Practices." PETA | People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. 2010. Web. 21 Mar. 2012. <www.peta.org/issues/Companion-Animals/Cruel-Practices.aspx>.
"Fight Animal Cruelty." ASPCA. 2012. Web. 01 Apr. 2012. <http://www.aspca.org/fight-animal-cruelty/>.
"Pet-Abuse.Com Animal Cruelty Database." Pet-Abuse.Com. 2001. Web. 01 Apr. 2012. <http://www.pet-abuse.com/pages/animal_cruelty.php>.