What kind of an evil mind would purposely do this to an animal?

If you look at steel-jaw leghold and Conibear (body-gripping) traps objectively instead of through the filter of "rugged individualism" or "Western frontier tradition" and you have even an ounce of empathy in your soul, you have to wonder what kind of evil mind would purposely set one of these pain-inflicting contraptions, much less invent one. They remind me of something out of a torture museum that I visited once in Europe. Truly, the depth of cruelty that lies in the hearts of some people is absolutely mind-boggling. And as a race, we humans can't seem to rid ourselves of this character flaw. According to an article in The New York Times on Wednesday, called "Montana Dog Owners Find Wild-Animal Traps Put Pets in Harm's Way," Montana issued more than 4,000 trapping licenses last year, so this sadistic mentality is still very much alive and well.

That's the thing about these trappers―since they couldn’t care less about inflicting pain, if a "nontarget" animal, like a dog, cat, or bird, is caught in one of their traps―oh, well!―they just call them "trash animals" and throw them away because they can't make money off them. It's not tragic to them―it's more of a nuisance. My view is that catching a beaver or a muskrat or a fox in a trap is just as tragic as catching a dog. The only difference is that hopefully, the dog will have someone who cares enough about him or her to make a fuss about it and do something to try to stop this horror.

That's exactly what’s happening in Montana right now. Enough dogs have been killed or maimed in these hideous traps that a group has formed called Footloose Montana to try to get the traps banned. The group is running a heart-wrenching ad campaign, keeping records of people's encounters with traps, distributing graphic images of dogs caught in traps, and generally spreading the word about how pervasive the traps are, where they have been spotted, and how destructive they are. Please join them! You don't have to live in Montana to help. These torturous traps are being set all over our lovely country.

Another thing that Footloose Montana is doing is teaching people how to spring Conibear traps, which clamp down on an animal’s body, suffocating him or her. Again and again, we hear terrible stories of people whose dogs got caught in Conibear traps and who couldn't free them in time to save them. The dogs suffocated before they could figure it out. So why don't we all prepare ourselves for this hideous situation, just in case, heaven forbid, it should ever happen to us? Ironically, a hunting enthusiast has posted explicit instructions on his Web site, The Checkcord, describing how to spring a Conibear trap. For that, I'm extremely grateful, and I doubt if I'm the only one. Take a look and follow his advice: "Go to a trapper, borrow a Conibear from him in the summer for a week or two and PRACTICE your technique!!"