Cute politics and adorable animals

I have long been aware that in the media business cute children and adorable animals have an extraordinary power to capture public attention. Look at all the adverts selling us anything from tedious cleaning agents to toilet rolls. Then try counting the public figures who appeared hugging babies; from the images of Herr Hitler and Comrade Stalin to the era of Blessed Pope John Paul II.

In democracies there is some strident resistance to the use and abuse of children as political props. Nevertheless, they still appear in various campaigns. The subliminal message seems to be that if contenders are trusted to lift up sweet defenceless kids, they can also be relied on by discerning adults.

In the recent Maltese referendum campaign, children were tactfully used by both fronts. Although the No Campaign was defeated and its message became fuzzy, the doe-eyed girl in the red jumper remains imprinted in our memory. I had hoped that the day those billboards were dismantled; we were going to move on. But we didn’t.

It is now clear that some of our representatives wished to use the referendum as a delaying tactic; they had expected people to reject the divorce bill. When instead voters approved it, these MPs began to stamp their big feet like kindergarten children and they are refusing to reconcile their personal stance with those of the democratic majority. But sore politicians are not at all sweet and if they naively believe they can get away with it, they are wrong.

In the midst of this saga we got a dog star. This moving story was probably a welcome distraction from the depressing political developments we are experiencing. The public outcry over the story of a dog shot and buried alive, positively stirred widespread sympathy in favour of animal rights and against cruelty. Animals suffer in silence in most parts of the world but stories like those of Star take us beyond the statistics and they help people become personally and emotionally involved with the issues at stake.

While Star began to symbolize all animal suffering, the fury and anger towards the culprit drove policymakers to step up action and increase the penalties. In their action, they garnered support and admiration, as did Dr Mario Spiteri’s team at Animal Welfare. Who can oppose raising fines up to €30,000 for heartless acts like this?

I acknowledge that comparisons are odious but somehow I cannot help not mentioning our national responses to cruelty against women. The point was raised in the social media by many. Just when the Star news story became viral, a quasi-anonymous Bulgarian woman, Irena Abadzhieva, was found murdered in Qawra with 40 stab wounds. This case did not impact the national agenda.

In the days that followed, the crowd which turned up at the animal welfare protest was much bigger than those of us who turned up at a protest against police complacency which transpired after the murder of Christina Sammut around Christmas time. Then, it was known that before she was shot dead in Mgarr, the victim had reported her assailant to the police numerous times.

The increased penalties for animal cruelty also revived memories of the recent story of 9 March 2011, when the court penalized a man €175 after he was caught on camera bashing his girlfriend in the streets of Sliema. He received this insignificant fine when the whole world may watch and hear what happened on YouTube. This was a pittance in comparison to the fines aimed to deter animal cruelty. The Sliema bashing also made us aware that when perpetrators appear before the court, the onus should not be put on the victim but courts should decide on the gravity of the case, even when victims opt to pardon abusers. As yet the pleas of women’s organizations and support groups in this regard have fallen on deaf ears.

While I do not wish to discount public concern on issues of animal welfare in Malta of which I am a great supporter, we also need to look at the big picture. We are here discussing issues of power and control … and how society responds to abusive individuals. Our most overtly conscientious parliamentarians need to become less self absorbed. They need to make a quick move on domestic violence, by responding as fast as they did in the star dog situation.