Are you really ready to have a pet?
A few days ago, my friend bought a puppy from a pet store.
After only two or three days of recuperation, various diseases struck.
She spent a lot of money on treatment, but still couldn't save its life.
After some questioning, I discovered that it wasn't a problem with her feeding method, but rather that she had bought a puppy that had been kept for a short period of time.
So-called "puppy mill dogs" are dogs that originally suffer from various diseases. After being given drugs by black market dealers, they are as lively as ordinary puppies, but none of them live more than seven days.
It's worth mentioning that besides "puppy mill dogs," there are many other similar sick pets on the market.
They all originated from the same place:
The underground pet black market.
Today, I want to show you what kind of chaotic turmoil lies hidden beneath the black market.
01
Beneath the black market, a bloody breeding ground
As we all know, cats and dogs in pet stores can cost several thousand yuan.
When the scene changes to the black market, the price will be reduced by a zero, to several hundred yuan.
This reduction not only cuts costs, but also human dignity.
The reason they can be so cheap is that raising these pets doesn't require much cost.
Pets that may appear glamorous on the outside actually live in filthy environments from birth.
Someone once secretly investigated the underground breeding farm.
As soon as you enter, you can smell a disgusting odor.
The ground was covered in pet feces, sewage, and disgusting food scraps.
The cages inside were all rusty and covered in spider silk.
The water in the water bowl was all murky, the food bowl was disgusting, and pet feces and urine were left unattended.
Each pet was covered in fleas, so many that people would pick up a lot of fleas just by walking by.
And what do they eat?
It consists of unwanted chicken intestines and rice husks, plus some chicken necks and heads. The cost is only one or two cents a day.
These things not only have no nutritional value, but they also often contain insects and have been bitten by flies countless times.
Of course, the breeders know this, but in their eyes, they don't care about the insects; as long as the food is cooked, there won't be any problems.
But it would be a lie to say that eating such food would not cause any problems.
To save costs, these pets are not vaccinated and have virtually no immunity.
To put it bluntly, germs roam freely in breeding farms, and not a single pet is healthy.
It could be an eye disease, a festering wound, or an infestation of parasites...
More than 50% of pets die young.
Only pets used for breeding can live a relatively long time, but even they aren't much better off.
They are constantly subjected to erogenous zones and bred, becoming nothing more than breeding tools. The offspring are born with diseases, and when they can no longer reproduce, they are cruelly abandoned.
Often, when humans are dealing with other animals, they think they are God and can do whatever they want without considering the animals' feelings.
The pain these pets endure watching their children die before their eyes, powerless to do anything about it, is unimaginable to us.
And for them, being forced to reproduce indefinitely is an even greater devastation to their physical and mental health.
Besides these, those that appeared normal were sold across the country through the black market after the full moon.
However, their tragic fate did not end there.
Every final chapter is a prelude; they are merely a fall from one hell into another.
02
Pet Black Market
Pets from underground breeding farms are all gathered in the pet black market, without any quarantine procedures required.
Because of the low prices, pet dealers come here every day to choose their pets.
The bustling black market environment is extremely harsh.
The air was swarming with mosquitoes, and the smells of pets and feces were enough to make one nauseous.
Such an environment is tantamount to a giant petri dish for germs.
Pet dealers are well aware of this, but they're not worried at all.
Because every pet here is already riddled with germs.
Their only fear is that they might cross-infect themselves with germs when choosing a pet.
The saying "Life and death are preordained, wealth and honor are determined by fate" is vividly demonstrated here.
Once the transaction is complete, the pet dealers begin a race against time.
Generally speaking, these sickly pets will develop different symptoms within one or two weeks of being put on the shelves, and then die.
Pets that cannot be sold in time will be ruthlessly abandoned, even if they are barely alive.
All the pet dealers have to do is sell these pets as quickly as possible.
A new nightmare was about to begin.
In an effort to prolong the time it takes for their pets to die, they force-feed them medication and injections—not for treating their illness, but simply to keep them in a state of heightened arousal so they would appear more energetic.
For pets already suffering from illness, this is undoubtedly an even greater torment.
The terms "week-old dog" and "week-old cat" originated from this.
Pet dealers also groom these pets in an effort to conceal their illnesses.
If the buyer needs it, they can also obtain health certificates, birth certificates, and other documents.
With a makeover, sick pets are transformed into prestigious pedigree pets, entering newly decorated pet stores and fetching prices in the thousands.
Not only that, they also post all sorts of fake sales information online.
Buying these sick pets would undoubtedly be a huge torment to a person's physical and mental health.
Xiao Zhou from Hunan has loved playing with cats and dogs since he was a child, and as a result, he was infected with echinococcosis by a sick pet. Afterwards, the echinococcosis slowly grew in his bones.
Starting at age 14, she was bitten by insects, and every six months she would have a high fever, swelling in her right leg, and large red patches.
Soon after, he became paralyzed and bedridden.
Source | Guangzhou Daily
In addition, contact with such sick pets can easily lead to various tinea infections, papules, blisters, abscesses, and so on.
Not to mention treating sick pets, treating yourself alone will cost a considerable amount of money.
The cruel reality is that while they can heal themselves, most sick pets are already terminally ill and beyond saving.
Watching your beloved pet get sick and suffer in front of you is undoubtedly a blow to your will.
Even until death, when they are powerless to do anything about it, some people will feel guilty and depressed for a long time.
They might even develop depression.
It can be said that the black marketeers have already cast the bloody hook, and all that remains is for the big fish to bite through it.
The waiting time won't be too long.
03
Black market merchant tactics
On Baidu Tieba, a student recounted how she was scammed by unscrupulous pet dealers.
After adding a pet dealer online, she selected a pet dog.
The pet dealer then told her that the puppy was still young and had a sensitive stomach, so she should buy a professional dog food package.
Image source | Baidu Tieba
Eager to keep her pet, she readily agreed and spent a few hundred yuan more to buy three months' worth of dog food.
Little did she know that she had already fallen into a trap.
The puppy arrived shortly after, but I had to pay several hundred yuan for shipping myself.
The dog food didn't arrive with them, and whenever the pet dealer asked about the dog food, he would give evasive answers or change the subject.
Image source | Baidu Tieba
That's not all; the real trick is yet to come.
The puppy was lively and energetic on its first day after arriving home, and most people wouldn't have guessed that this was because it had been given medication.
The side effects will take effect quickly.
Starting the next day, the puppy had diarrhea, vomited, and remained lethargic.
In a panic, she suspected it was parvovirus, the equivalent of SARS in humans.
At that time, she opened the pet dealer's chat window and asked how to rescue the puppy.
The cunning pet dealer repeatedly emphasized not to go to the vet, fearing that a problem would be found during the examination.
After offering some comforting words, the pet dealer said that as long as the treatment was done according to his method, everything would be fine.
It was called treatment, but in reality, it was a process of gradually killing the puppy.
Afterward, the puppy was on the verge of death, and when it was taken to the hospital for examination, the initial suspicion was confirmed: parvovirus.
He passed away not long after.
The pet dealer kept making excuses, saying that the puppy had a sensitive stomach and only had acute gastroenteritis. To dispel any suspicion, he even promised to send a replacement message.
Of course, this was all a lie. The replacement dog never arrived, nor did the original dog food, and he had already been blocked.
The number of victims like this is increasing daily.
To my surprise, they were almost all the same routine.
In addition, on some websites, many people use the slogan "free giveaway, cheap sale" to actually use the same deceptive tactics.
Pet shops, on the other hand, aren't as safe as you might think.
Driven by the lure of huge profits, many shop owners buy various sick pets at low prices from the black market and then resell them at high prices.
Many people have been infected.
One transaction after another takes lives, and we will eventually pay the price for these unscrupulous merchants.
04
Behind the rampant black market
The rampant black market has only one purpose: exorbitant profits.
Behind the exorbitant profits lies people's current obsession with purebred pets.
To cater to people's preferences, many unscrupulous pet dealers force pets to be inbred in order to obtain purebred pets.
The fact that offspring from inbreeding will suffer from many hidden diseases is a truth we all learned in school, but it is completely insignificant in the face of huge profits.
Pets are thus forced to serve human desires.
Many dog owners are unaware that beneath their pets' adorable appearance lies a great deal of suffering.
Take a pug as an example. It may look normal, but it is actually riddled with hidden ailments.
Its kneecap has dislocated from the joint.
The stomach has entered the chest cavity, the nasal cavity is very narrow, and the skin is growing towards the throat, causing difficulty breathing.
Inward rolling of the lower eyelid can cause friction damage to the eyes.
In addition, its spine has developed severe scoliosis and twisting, increasing the risk of lesions in other parts of the spine.
And this is not an isolated case.
Cavalier King Charles Spaniels like these often have seizures because their skulls are too small to accommodate their brains.
When the disease starts, it hurts as if a human's bones have been broken.
Pugs are prone to epilepsy, and during each seizure, they lose all control of their bodies and foam at the mouth.
Many purebred pets on the market are like this; they may appear healthy, but they actually harbor hidden diseases.
Compared to other pets, their lifespan is pitifully short.
There is only one reason for this result: inbreeding to obtain purebred pets.
Of course, besides purebred pets, some pets bred for their attractive appearance also suffer from varying degrees of disease.
For example, Scottish Fold cats do not have healthy bones.
Therefore, they all go through the same painful process: bone hyperplasia, then bone spurs, and eventually paralysis.
To date, there is no cure for this disease.
All of these symptoms are rarely visible when pets are young, but as time goes on, all their diseases become more and more obvious, causing various kinds of harm.
In other words, you spend a lot of money to buy a pet that is actually riddled with diseases.
Under these current unhealthy breeding methods, the number of hereditary diseases is increasing alarmingly.
If this continues, they will eventually lose their ability to reproduce, and at that point, a species will become extinct.
But what about the pets? They can't complain, they're powerless to resist, they can only silently endure this pain.
The root cause of the problem is that pet dealers are only a superficial reason. What truly causes suffering for pets is people's obsession with their appearance.
What many people are saying is just Schrödinger's beloved pet.
Looking back now, the saying "no buying, no harm" resonates even more deeply.
05
Are you really ready to have a pet?
According to the "2019 Pet Consumption Ecosystem Big Data Report":
In less than five years, the pet industry market has reached 170 billion yuan, a threefold increase.
The data confirms that more and more people are keeping pets these days.
Many of these people don't actually love pets; they're just following the trend.
Anyone who has ever owned a pet knows that pets can be even more mischievous and naughty than children.
Destroying things, chewing up things, and making noise in the middle of the night are all common occurrences.
In order to solve these problems, some horrific methods have emerged.
Thus, Schrödinger's way of showing affection for his pets became increasingly apparent.
For example, declawing a cat.
It involves surgically cutting off the ends of all the cat's toe bones, similar to cutting off the bone at the base of a human fingernail.
Claws are a cat's defensive weapon. Removing them can affect a cat's personality and behavior, leading to various strange behaviors and even illnesses.
They also remove the dog's vocal cords.
This kind of surgery is more difficult and riskier than sterilization. Imagine what it would feel like to turn someone into a mute?
There are many, many more similar cases of animal abuse.
Frankly speaking, all the shady dealings in the pet market are caused by these people who claim to love pets but are actually extremely selfish.
Compared to those unscrupulous pet dealers, how much better are these fake pet lovers?
So today, I really want to ask:
If you're thinking of getting a pet, are you ready?
Can you tolerate being woken up in the middle of the night and subjected to endless noise?
Can you tolerate it chewing up your sofa, tearing up your clothes, and destroying your house?
Can you tolerate scooping its poop and putting up with all the stench?
Can you tolerate being scratched or bitten by it and having to go to the hospital for injections?
Can you truly care for it for its entire life, loving it as much as ever, regardless of its life circumstances, from birth to old age, sickness, and death?
Of course, there are many other things to consider before getting a pet. You should ask yourself these questions before you get one.
For us, it might just be a period of time in our lives when we had a pet.
But for them, we are all they have in their lives, and whether they live well or poorly depends entirely on us.
If you can't truly love them.
Please stop keeping them and leave them alone!
References
1. Half an Hour of Economics: The Black Market in the Pet Economy
2. Cat Prince's "In-Depth Filming: How Cruel is the Reality of Cat Breeding Farms?"
3. BBC's "Purebred Dogs Exposed"
