Run Spot Run!

It's nice to know that in these days of turmoil and uncertainty about our future, Florida legislators are there to make things right -- and righteous. Never mind that you've lost your home, your job, your savings; your children are in foster care and the cardboard box you're sleeping in is starting to come apart in this morning's rain. Our crusaders in Tallahassee are about to give us what we needed all along and didn't have: a law forbidding obtaining "sexual gratification obtained from animals" or helping anyone else obtain it.

The Florida Senate has decided that exclusive of the requirements of animal husbandry, sex with animals should be a felony. Of course the meaning of animal husbandry had to be laboriously explained to one Miami Senator, Larcenia Bullard, who thought the proposal would allow bestiality if you married your animal. Yes, her name is Larcenia.

A House version of the bill was introduced by my own State Representative William Snyder. I'd like to make a cynical comment about his being, like that other crusader for chastity, Mark Foley, a Republican, but the Democrats are up to their knees in this barnyard too.

Every bit of legislation needs a scare story to justify it and this one demands our immediate attention because -- you guessed it -- someone says if you screw the pooch, you might become a pederast and sexual predator. Correlations are a dangerous thing, of course. Do remember that alcohol is correlated very heavily with most violent crimes and everyone who ever got drunk had milk as his "gateway" drink. Hitler was "very fond" of his dog too.

Of course this bill isn't meant to protect animals or children as much as it protects the righteous indignation of Bible addicts and do remember that Bible Belt fundamentalists have a much higher crime rate and that includes sexual crimes. Not that I'm suggesting anything.

“There’s a tremendous correlation between sexually deviant behavior and crimes against children and crimes against animals,” said Senator Nan Rich of Sunrise Florida. “This is long overdue. These are heinous crimes. And people belong in jail.”

Yes, Heinous indeed -- particularly the neighbor who thinks his crotch sniffing and leg humping dog is amusing. Now we can arrest him on felony gratification charges. Of course you'll have to be careful to shoo away the dog within the legally required number of seconds or you may be a felon yourself.

Of course the question of effectiveness hasn't been discussed -- remember this is a religious matter -- but without bugging the barns, interviewing the animals and the most intrusive and widespread surveillance ever instituted anywhere at any time, only an insignificant number of offenders will ever be caught. It doesn't matter however, this is about feeling moral and righteous. That animal most likely will be clubbed over the head, hung by its rear legs and have its throat slit so we can eat it and without making us flinch -- even if it had spent its short life nailed into a crate in a factory farm.

Perhaps the trigger for this crusade was a publicised case last year of a local man reported to have let his dog sodomize him. There was an outcry in the papers calling for him to be jailed and the animal euthanized without further ado. Truly we are a righteous people before the Lord.

So after all, there have been one or two cases of "animal abuse" in the last few years in this state of 11 million people and something needs to be done about this emergency right now. We've been wasting too much time on wars and economic debacles and it's time to make sure the stable boy isn't getting too hot and bothered watching the horses going at it. There are tremendous correlations, after all.