Hating on the ginger kids/kittens? 
I have rescued cats for most of my life. You never, never kill them. Take them to a vet, and nurse them back to health and place them in a home where people love them. Only twice was it necessary for the vet to put them down. We are talking about life here, and life is sacred.
You’ve ignored the scenario presented; the choice is kill it or let it die of its neglected condition. This is not the Kobayashi Maru test, you will not be commended for altering the scenario to allow you to “win”.
That said, I would leave the cat to its death. Not because doing so is noble or good for the cat, but because I care little for animals and additionally have a personal aversion to touching or interacting them. (Not religious or anything, just…keep your animals to yourself.)
Were I noble and sympathetic to the doomed animal, I would attempt to kill it as quickly and painlessly as possible.
I agree with begbert2, just leave it be. I’d rather not chance the “no good deed goes unpunished” maxim. Also, I find it interesting that kittens automatically get more consideration than less adorable animals like snakes or slugs or cockroaches.
Do they? The only other animal I see mentioned in the thread before your post was a suffering snake, who was dispatched.
Hell, I’ll stomp on a cockroach even if it isn’t suffering!
When dealing with a starving, injured shark, the best thing to do is to not be threatening. So before getting in the water, it’s a good idea to make yourself look as much as possible like a friendly seal.
Now you know why we are so different. I could never leave any animal starving or suffering without at least trying to get assistance even if I had to pay for it myself. Which I have numerous times. I would do the same for humans also. Animal lovers have a saying “never trust anyone that dislikes animals.” We are miles and miles apart in our feelings and emotions and spiritual awareness.
Do you have any idea how many bacteria die every day just so you can go about your daily business? Are you not responsible for their deaths? Is their life not sacred?
Yes, thousands of people die every day also. Death changes nothing, all life is sacred. To see a need and not respond is unthinkable to me. Perhaps not to others. Each walks their own path.
But is not perhaps the need a quick death?
Bear may have $1000 dollars in his pocket, but not have the time, nor the ability, nor the resources to find someone else to help this cat.
What then? Is that not the question of the OP?
I am the rescurer, not the judge. I have live-trapped animals too wild to be caught. True, some had to be put down, but others survived and became pets.
I do this from a position of love, I let the vet make the decisions. One can always make a phone call. I remember a baby bird saved in a rain storm, the bird lady lived 50 miles from my home and drove to my house at night to help the baby bird. The bird died the next day, but we tried, did all we could. That is what life is all about. Doing the best that you can, rising to the challenge, sharing love.
No, darling, one cannot “always” make a phone call to a vet. That’s sort of the point of the NON-HYPOTHETICAL OP.
How can anything so fleeting as life be sacred? The spirit is sacred, because it’s eternal. Flesh is not sacred. Experiences are sacred, the bodies we’re in are simply vessels for experience. Once suffering outweighs the glorification of god, isn’t it more goodly - more godly - to shuffle off the mortal coil and assume heavenly form?
The best you can do is to pay attention and stop ignoring what people are saying to you. We are not interested in storytime about your avian heroics; that’s not what this thread is about.
In this scenario, you have PRECISELY TWO options:
- KILL the mewling kitten now.
- LEAVE the mewling kitten, to die later of its injuries and poor health.
You’ll notice, or maybe you won’t, that there’s no third option there. There’s no option that includes the kitten leaving the house alive or getting better. It’s death, or death.
Now do the best you can and rise to the challenge of picking one of the two available options.
Dude, cats are satanic. Evil. Literally. Anybody who’s spiritual knows that, c’mon.
But if you want to get your knickers in a twist because I don’t like subjecting myself to the autonomous hairballs, then that’s your problem. I already judge you and find you wanting for your personal problems anyway, so small loss.
Animals don’t understand love- that bird couldn’t possibly begin to grasp what you were trying to do. I’m completely in favour of preventing human cruelty toward animals because we have the choice, but trying to protect nature from itself is ridiculous.
Lekatt, you had three responses, none of which addressed the OP, or questions directed to specifically to you. Now I am curious.
Is this so difficult for you morally, you are avoiding the question?
Not morality, love. I know the world has people with no regard for life, animals or humans. They are so filled with themselves there is no room for others. I do not judge them, they do not know what they do. This is a place of learning through choices. Those who have love give, those who don’t take, but all will learn before the class ends.
So you love other beings so much that you’ll stand there and watch them suffer, or turn your back on their suffering, knowing that it will be prolonged because you did nothing.
Gotcha.
When I love things, or animals or people, I want to make things as painless as possible for them. I’d rather take on the pain myself - like the pain of knowing I’m a killer - then have them feel pain. Sort of like Jesus did, if I understand your myths.
I have no idea how you got that conclusion from my post, maybe a second read is in order.
I had a friend who “Saved baby birds” when they fell from their nests. She was very upset when I described this process to another friend as “Starving baby weasels.”
You change the environment to suit your purposes, because your species has that ability. Every living thing does. You might wish to decide that your changes are unnatural, if it suits your nature.
Ending the “suffering of a wounded animal” has a trivial set of physical consequences, but you alone can decide if the “moral” consequences are important. The greatest effect it will have are to the creature, who cannot give an opinion, and you. How you report it to others, and how they perceive your actions will have social consequences more related to the matter of communication than the actual events.
Tris
I arrived at that conclusion because you said you wouldn’t end the suffering of a wounded animal, and then you justified that by mentioning love.
Walk me through another interpretation if I got it wrong.