Caisen Green, teenager, shoots a stray Pit Bull with a crossbow. This unprovoked act of violence ultimately kills the stray Pit Bull. Green then takes a photo of the dead dog, writes a bait-specific message in the caption and then posts the picture to Facebook. This is what hate looks like. Visual hate, right up there. And this pathetic kid is proud of it. People then get wind of this photograph. Picture goes viral. Shock and outrage ensues, and justifiably so. Some folks go off the handle, want to meet violence with violence. An eye for an eye is not condoned here, or by me, as that does nothing good ever. Tough guy kid then goes into hiding. And if things couldn’t get any more pathetically sad… A Facebook page entitled “Caisen Green Is An American Hero,” run by the klan (pun intended) of known Pit Bull haters, immediately springs up. What’s its purpose? To applaud his actions and worship a young psychopath. All decency and empathy out the window so long as it serves to prop up their hatemonger agenda. This is what hate looks like. Visual hate.

Now imagine if this was any other type of dog, or God forbid, another person that fits into a category known to be routinely stereotyped. With that, let’s play a little game of word replacement…

“For all you Chihuahua lovers out there. Here’s what happens when one shows up around my house.” Dead dog.
“For all you Shepherd lovers out there. Here’s what happens when one shows up around my house.” Dead dog.
“For all you Rottweiler lovers out there. Here’s what happens when one shows up around my house.” Dead dog.
“For all you black lovers out there. Here’s what happens when one shows up around my house.” Dead person.
“For all you Mexican lovers out there. Here’s what happens when one shows up around my house.” Dead person.
“For all you Jew lovers out there. Here’s what happens when one shows up around my house.” Dead person.
“For all you gay lovers out there. Here’s what happens when one shows up around my house.” Dead person.
“For all you handicapped lovers out there. Here’s what happens when one shows up around my house.” Dead person.
Going even further… Now replace “black” with “n*****,” or “Mexican” with “spic,” or gay with “fag,” or “handicapped” with “retard.”

Which, if any, sound cool to you? I thought so. He certainly has a right to SAY whatever he wants, this is America. But be prepared for others to be disgusted with you, and be prepared for others to actually move to let the world know what you actually did, as in kill a stray dog with a crossbow in order to get online attention (and then have a group of known exploiters move to praise him). What he doesn’t have a right to do is torture something, or kill it for his pleasure. And beyond any legal context, and the cases that will ultimately be made either way, why would you ever want to do such a thing? Why do we, as people, actually do this type of crap? Aren’t we capable of better behavior? Godspeed to that poor dog.

*I apologize for the offensive nature of some of the words used in this piece, but they are paramount for illustrating a bigger point.