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  2. A heartbreaking absence of empathy

A heartbreaking absence of empathy

By pharyngula on June 5, 2009.

Cheyenne Cherry has a very pretty name. It's too bad that the person isn't quite so pretty a human being.

She and an unidentified juvenile allegedly broke into Valerie Hernandez's Tinton Ave. apartment on May 6 and trashed the place.
Then in a shocking act of animal abuse, they tossed the woman's kitten, Tiger Lily, into the stove and cranked up the temperature, ASPCA assistant director Joe Pentangelo said.

Cherry told authorities that she and her accomplice "thought we would play a joke on Valerie and mess up her apartment."
The duo bolted from the apartment with DVDs and packages of noodles, Pentangelo said.

"She didn't want to hear the cat crying and scratching at the oven door," Pentangelo said.
Firefighters found the female cat's remains smoldering in the oven after neighbors complained of smoke coming from Hernandez's apartment.

I simply do not understand that kind of behavior at all. Why would anyone commit such a random act of unmitigated cruelty? A kitten is a small thing in the world…but it seems to me that how we treat the small and helpless is a measure of how we see ourselves.

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