They say human beings are the finest creation, gifted with intellect, conscience, and that elusive thing called morality. It is a comforting thought, repeated in sermons, textbooks, and political speeches. But the comfort evaporates the moment one looks at what this supposedly superior species does to the voiceless lives that share the world with them. A civilisation is most truthfully measured not by its GDP nor by its highways and flyovers, but by how it treats its weakest dependents. If that is the scale, we may soon need to stop calling ourselves superior and start applying for probationary status in the moral universe.
The story began with several cats in Dhanmondi whose eyes were gouged out, a scene so disturbing that even strangers online felt their hearts clench. Before the outrage could settle, another cat's throat was slit open for allegedly eating fish in Bogura. The cruelty required no motive beyond the perpetrator's ability to act without consequences. A fishing cat, an endangered species, was brutally killed by a fishing spear by a man in Chuadanga. There have been incidents of burning living, breathing cats inside cages, migratory birds trapped and shot, and countless unnamed animals disappearing without a record.
What makes these events unbearable is not only their brutality but also the uncanny normalisation that follows. The perpetrators roam freely, sometimes even justifying their actions with impeccable shamelessness. A society that once took pride in its warmth and generosity now produces spectacles that would disturb even the sternest stoic. One wonders whether compassion is becoming an endangered species, trailing closely behind the animals we keep erasing from the map.
None of these incidents, however, prepared the nation for the story of two mothers, one of human children and another of eight newborn puppies. The dog carried out her maternal duties, nursing and guarding her puppies in a corner of the upazila nirbahi officer's residence in Ishwardi. However, the actions of Nishi Rahman, who is the parent of two kids, made her title of "mother" tremble under its own weight. She killed the eight puppies by stuffing them into a sack and throwing them into the water.
Nishi reportedly claimed she was protecting her own children. The logic, if taken seriously, would imply that violence is justified as long as the victim does not belong to one's own species. Yet even basic knowledge of animal behaviour suggests that dogs raised in the same neighbourhood become protectors rather than threats. Fear is not the real explanation here. Indifference is. The kind of indifference that grows slowly in societies where moral education is weak, legal enforcement is weaker, and empathy is treated like an optional trait instead of a necessity.
Ironically, the country that excuses such cruelty also produces the most tender stories of compassion. Locals rushed to save the drowning puppies. Ordinary citizens demanded accountability. Fisheries and Livestock Adviser Farida Akhter intervened after seeing the heartbreaking images. The tragedy revealed that Bangladesh is not devoid of humane people. What it lacks is a system consistent enough to protect humane impulses from being overshadowed by brutality.
The incident demands punishment under Section 429 of the Penal Code. It allows for imprisonment if the animal is worth fifty taka or more. The irony is again too convenient. The law measures an animal's value in money, not moral weight. Yet it is the only tool available. Nishi deserves punishment because society must draw lines somewhere or risk dissolving into the kind of moral chaos described by Thomas Hobbes, where life becomes "nasty, brutish, and short."
But cruelty to animals is not only a legal problem. It is a reflection of something more troubling. When a nation's children grow up without learning the basics of compassion, when textbooks ignore the emotional development of students, and when families and religious institutions fail to cultivate empathy, cruelty becomes easier, casual, and invisible. That is why teaching compassion for animals at the primary level is not sentimental overreach but a moral necessity. Children learn values long before they learn definitions. Stories, pictures, and simple lessons about kindness shape their sense of what it means to be human. If children learn early that every creature has value, society changes, households change, and moral decline slows down.
No one needed a philosopher to tell us this, though philosophers certainly tried. Immanuel Kant argued that cruelty to animals deadens the human capacity for moral feeling. Leo Tolstoy insisted that the first step towards kindness is abstaining from violence towards creatures weaker than us. George Orwell warned that the veneer of civility is only as strong as the weakest life it protects.
Across literature and history, animals have often shown more loyalty than humans who claim to be superior. The stories of Fido in Italy and Hachiko in Japan stand as monuments to devotion. Fido waited fourteen years for a master who never returned. Hachiko kept returning to Shibuya Station long after his master had died. Their loyalty became a lesson for nations. Statues were erected. Stories were preserved. Children were taught to honour companionship.
Meanwhile, in Bangladesh, stray dogs are chased, beaten, poisoned, and treated as disposable obstacles. The contrast is embarrassing. It suggests that the failure is not in the animals but in us. Many are born human, but not all remain humane as they grow.
Perhaps the real question is not whether animals deserve our compassion. The real question is whether we deserve the title of superiority when we fail the simplest test of moral maturity. A society that treats animals with cruelty eventually turns that cruelty inwards. Violence never stays confined to one species. History is full of examples.
If human beings wish to retain their cherished title, they must earn it. Not with words or slogans, but with the simple act of choosing kindness where cruelty is easy, of protecting the vulnerable where indifference is convenient, of seeing value in every life, even the lives that do not speak our language. Only then can we claim to be more than just another species with superior tools. Only then can we begin to resemble the humans we so proudly insist we already are.
H. M. Nazmul Alam is an academic, journalist, and political analyst. Currently, he teaches at International University of Business Agriculture and Technology (IUBAT), and can be reached at [email protected].
Views expressed in this article are the author's own.
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