Collecting rubbish and junk from the road–the habit of hoarding has already been introduced to the public through various media and documentaries. A new type of hoarding, this time even more nauseating and confusing, has become an issue in recent days–animal hoarding!

For those that are unfamiliar to the concept of hoarding, it is simply an obsession for collecting things. These things could be anything varying from trash, books, furniture, and now, even animals. It is too fast to judge that animal hoarding is a story that is somewhat far from our culture.

In the recent day, a Korean woman that lived near Gangwondo had collected more than 100 dogs in her house. She had all her earnings put into feeding her pets, yet all her pets were either suffering from disease or starvation. This woman had brought the dogs from animal shelters, in an act of kindness and love, since she could not stand the fact that these animals were abandoned by their owners.

While it is easy to think that she did this entirely out of love and care, one should realize that animal hoarding should not be treated with sympathy. Regardless of the cause, animal hoarding should be harshly banned from the society.

Animal hoarding should be stopped for various reasons. For animals that live in trapped and malnourished conditions, it might rather be better off for them to be hovering on the road where they at least get a freedom to search for food or get enough space to move around. While the animals are trapped inside the cage created by the hoarders, they do not get the minimum freedom and at the same time, they have to suffer from various disease and starvation.

For the family and neighbors of the animal hoarders, they will have to endure noisy sounds of animals howling, barking and growling out of discomfort. These people might even be exposed to revolting smells, and even the danger of getting disease from the sick animals.

One final reason remains. Animal hoarding should be banned for the good of animal hoarder themselves. Most animal hoarders suffer from both mental and physical disease. Physically, they are weakened, as they have to live with hundreds of animals that are unwashed as well as the waste that the animals have created. Mentally, animal hoarders are often associated with a type of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). Without stopping the habit of hoarding, their quality of life would never improve.

In the United States (U.S.), many animal lovers try their best to restrict animal hoarding by the law. The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) have tried very hard to stop the atrocious act from happening. However, only two states in the U.S. have passed the law specifically restricting animal hoarding which are Hawaii and Illinois. Most animal lovers believe that this should extend to further states to protect animal cruelty.

In South Korea, there are no laws specifically made for animal hoarding. In fact, most people do not even know what animal hoarding is. Respecting life starts from respecting life of the small creatures. Without respecting them, we cannot expect any respect to ourselves. It is crucial to control animal cruelty before we can establish any laws that will respect human rights.