I was standing on my veranda and watching a couple of neighborhood kids cycle around the empty courtyard. They were circling around and kept looking at some thing and following their gaze, I realized that they were looking at a stray dog, which was sitting in the sun. Soon, the boys mustered enough courage by encourging each other and as they approached the dog, they went to rubble of pebbles and picked up a few pebbles. Armed with pebbles, they approached the dog.

As they were within striking distence, I told them not to hit the dog, where upon one of the boys said they only wanted to hit as if what I had said, to them, was never said. I could see the pebbles in their hands and the intentions in their eyes that there were bored and wanted to end their boredom by taunting the poor animal. One of the boys looked at me and again, I made a motion of saying "no" by wagging my finger. I had to correct some test papers, but I also knew that if I left; the boys would hit the dog so I waited and observed them. After a while, apprently, sensing that I was not leaving and I was still standing and watching them, they lost interest and started to play "checkers" with the pebbles on a board made by skectching lines in the dirt.

Satifisifed that they were engrossed in their games, I withdrew and went to my room to correct the papers. As I was correcting the papers, I heard the painful wince of a dog in pain. The boys simply could not be humane to animals and when they saw their chance, they took the opportunity and abused the poor dog. I went out again, but the culprits had long vanished and the dog was limping away.

As a nation, it would be naive to accept us to be humane to animals when we are not even humane to ourselves. There is a noted streak of cruelity in us and it seems to be nourished at a very young age. By the time adulthood arrives, there is no humanity left in us and we mock and we taunt and we cause hurt and we inflict pain, because we seem to derive a sinister pleasure from it. It does not seem to be an inflated case of egoism, because it does seem that we geniunely revel in the misery of others.

This national past time can also be seen in the manner in which the police treats crime. Instead of offering succor to the victim, the police protects the criminal by not registering a case againt him/her. The oppressor has all the rights and previleges in this nation and the oppressed has none.

We are, as painful as it may seem and bitter as it maybe to say it, a heartless nation of people. We glorify violence rationalized under a host of reasons and we never raise our collective voices against the commission of any crime against man or beast. Silently, we rejoice in the infliction of pain and quietly relish the idea of inflicting pain on others, because in a wrapped sense the infliction of pain upon others makes us feel potent in our own narrisstic hedonisms.