Why Do People Have To Keep Birds In Cages?
Today I went into town with my youngest daughter, I had to get some food for the dogs and cats and I also had to get a few last minute things for my daughters Birthday on Monday. I have walked this route so many times and I really am blessed with the views that I get to see on my walk. Well most days I am.
So after getting all that I needed, I made my way home, only to realize I had forgotten something.So I took a way back into town, that I usually don't take that often and I saw something that always makes my heart sink.
Honesty a real heaviness fell over me and I struggled not to cry. I was walking pass some apartments and there on their balcony in the sun where some cages. Really tiny cages, miniature looking, with barely enough room for the tiny birds that were inside, to stretch their wings. I stood there and saw them frantically pecking at the cage and making very distressed sounds, sounds that were nothing like bird song. More like bird torture. I have no idea how that must feel, been imprisoned in such a small place and all the while being able to see other birds free. Living exactly how they wish to be. I really find it so cruel and I really can not understand how people can think that it is okay to keep them in cages.
It really really upset me, if they had been on the ground floor I would have opened the cages. To hell with having to deal with the consequences. But climbing up the front of apartment block with a baby strapped to me, was not something I could justify doing, but damn I really wanted to . I mean really, are they punishing the birds because they are jealous of their freedom? Or is it more of a control thing. These birds sounded so distressed, did they really find the sounds they were making, enjoyable? Did they even hear them like I did, maybe they are so used to hearing birds in distress that they know no different.
I know I am not the only one who gets a thrill out of seeing birds in flight, who feels a part of themselves soaring with them. I wrote recently about freedom and how there are those, who do not even realize that they have no freedom. Who have been so manipulated by the system, that they believe they are free, because they have been told they are. So maybe some of these people keep birds in cages because on a subconscious level, they can relate to them or maybe in a very twisted way it makes them feel more free having these beautiful creatures in cages. Either way, these birds are a reflection of their own lives, controlled and oppressed. Caged by their own minds.
But still, how can they think it is okay to keep them in cages. That is something I really struggle to understand. Birds fly, that is what they do. It is just So so cruel. I know that compared to some other things this can seem mild. But it is along the same lines, people who feel oppressed taking it out on others who are easy to control. Turning themselves in to the oppressor. Because that is what is accepted within society today. I said it yesterday and I have said it before in some of my poems, but it is so relevant again today,
Repeat, Repeat The Nature Of Our Defeat.
And yes, it also comes back, to the hard reality, that we have to learn to accept people for who they are. But really sometimes, sometimes I do want to shake some sense, some decency into others. I sometimes wish there was a button that I could press, so that they could experience the pain, that the have inflicted on other beings and on the earth. I want to violently shake them into awareness. Ah the anger I feel, I can not help it, because inside it breaks my heart to hear those birds so distressed and then again because the people who do it, just bloody well do it. Without any glimmer of feeling for those creatures. Yet if I spoke to them they might even tell me they love them. Oh but love is such a funny thing in situations like that. That can't really be seen as love, because if it is, it sure as hell is a twisted type of love.
Feeling and sharing your pain, my dear - it also makes my heart ache. Many wealthier people here in Asia cage birds. I have come to understand that it is the reaction of someone who has been poor and without home-family-comfort... when they get to a place of relative abundance, they think they are doing the birds a favour by protecting them, sheltering them, removing the need for foraging. Here it is also a sign of abundance that one has enough to feed the bird and to house it "well". Mostly though, I feel they are just sad people who have lost their connection with their own wildness. And that those birds take their karma and the pain of the caged person and are part of some bigger energy transmutation, I feel. It is hard to allow people the choice to be different and to make choices which limit the freedom of others. Send love and song and healing energy to the little birds when you pass. x
thank you lovely, that is a lovely idea to send them love, song and healing. I did spend a couple of months in Thailand a few ears back and I did see lots of birds in cages and so many ornate cages, i hear what you are saying about the reasons why, but it is really hard to see them like that xx
I wonder what was going on with that. Why would they have all those birds at all and not even have them inside? And why put them in abnormally small cages?
Makes one wonder if it isn't some sort of business exploiting the animals.
I think you know from reading on TSU discord that I've started writing on whaleshares also (come on over!). Earlier today on there I wrote about an encounter with what may be a neglected dog. Long story short, both a guys dogs found there way to where I was walking mine today and followed us home. One was well fed and had a collar. The other was emaciated and had no collar. I thought they were abandoned and one was simply doing better fending for food than the other.
But turns out they belong to a neighbor and he intentionally let them out!
Another neighbor called him and he came and got them. Later though I couldn't stop thinking about it. Finally it hit me that the one with no collar was one he wasn't feeding and was trying to get rid of. Hence the lack of any trace to him on the animal.
Why?
Both such sweet dogs, though completely untrained. Both so gentle with my tiny little dog. Both so friendly toward me also, even before I gave them treats.
And I face that same sort of decision you do, what to do when you see what you think is abuse but there is no clear legal line being crossed? Do you confront the person? Do you call animal welfare and report it?
What if you're wrong and they really are being well cared for? In my case, maybe that dog has a stomach problem so hasn't been keeping food down, and maybe no collar because he keeps getting out of it. In your case, maybe the person puts them out in the cages for an hour a day to get some sun, and otherwise they fly free inside the shut house.
What if we report, animal control takes them away, and then they wind up being killed because no one adopts them?
It's all so hard. Why can't people just be loving and compassionate toward our animal friends?
Oh I hear you sister, there is such a huge problem with animal abuse in the world. It is one thing that really upsets me. Is it possible to approach your neighbour and ask them about the dog, maybe act like you do not know it is theirs, just that you saw it around and wondered if it needed assistance and were asking other people as well and see what their reaction is. It is difficult to know what to do. It is somethingi really struggle with, when to intervene.
He knows me now that we passed as he was coming to get them and I told him where I lived for future reference. So I'd have to ask my other neighbor for his contact info then make a point of inquiring about the dog. I'm not sure how I could broach the subject of one being so skinny without it sounding like criticism. Meanwhile I'm pretty sure he grew up in this neighborhood, whereas I've only been here a few months. I'm not sure I want to alienate all my neighbors, particularly if I can't bring about a behavior change anyway, shy of maybe offering to adopt the dog. But I definitely don't want another dog, especially not a fully grown one that no one ever trained.
I think I'll have to let it go unless I see the dog over here again. If they come over here, then when I get a hold of the owner to come get them I'll ask then about why he thinks they keep coming and what might be wrong. That may provide some opening.
Thanks for helping me process this. I hope our convo has helped you somehow process seeing those birds like that too. I think we have to settle into having no perfect answers.
Yes I can't understand why anyone would want a caged bird .. I hate all caged animals (although I do support captive breeding and reintroduction programmes) but birds, I mean really .. surely it speaks for itself? I was lucky enough to catch a Red Kite mating ritual earlier in the year, where they fly to great heights .. link talons and then spiral down towards the ground whilst staring into each other's eyes, at the very last minute (before hitting the ground) they split. fly their separate ways and then begin the process again .. amazing!
I also saw a buzzard last year being mobbed by crows, they drove it into deep into a hedge and I stopped the car and ran over .. just as I was about to lean in and pull her out of the hedge, her mate swooped down and they linked talons and he pulled her out. I was only standing a couple of feet away and there were several times that both birds made direct eye contact with me .. their intelligence and majesty was both undeniable and profoundly moving. In short, let the birds fly free!
Oh wow that mating ritual sounds amazing, what a performance, how lucky you are.I would love to witness that.And the buzzards, you seem to have a connection with birds of prey, that does not surprise me at all, my friend xx
Birds for me really evoke such an strong feeling of freedom and power, to cage that is such a stain on humankind I feel. I do sometimes wonder at the cruelty that some impose. What a world we live in, on the one hand it is so amazing and beautiful and on the other I feel my heart break so strongly at times.Yet I strive to be positive as that is what I want to add to the world xxx
the people are blind. they do not see. to them they do no wrong.
our mission on earth is to prove God that we indeed. as individuals can Love. and some people will never pass that test.
the pain is temporary, living without love is eternal suffering
the birds suffer temporarily but the one who kept it in a cage will suffer eternaly. you should be more concerned with those heartdead human.
put a letter in their mail. describing how you feel, and how you felt the birds pain. if they are human they will let loose those birdies.
there is a song, by cash, the man comes around. take a listen.
i need to support you more.
i hope all is well with you....
what happened to Ren? do you know?
thank you @franciferrer for your kind words, a whole life time in a cage is very long indeed for those birds. and yes we seem to be surrounded some times with people who have very little capacity for love.
I have not been very active on here besides posting and a little oh discord, I last heard from Ren on Monday, I hope she is okay, she might just be having some time away xx
This earth is for all living beings,not just human beings.I think humans's so cruel.
yes indeed @eunblue, the earth is all our home and yes some human's can be very cruel indeed. xxx
I feel the same @trucklife-family. It breaks my heart. When I lived in Rio de Janeiro, Sunday mornings were when the local older men would take their caged canaries to the park and hang the cages on the lower branches. They would all mill around chatting and looking at each other's birds... and maybe they thought they were doing something nice for the birds... who knows!
But it must have been torture for those poor birds...
Whenever I see caged birds I send them love... it's the least we can do. And I'll give you a leg up any day to set some free! xx
Thank you @namastethis, wow that must have been really full on, I imagine they thought that they were being kind to the birds, crazy that eh, that some see it that way x
Totally crazy!