SUBMITTED: Kangaroo Court

[Australian rePublic]

So apparently, this is a map of the USA indicating which states in the USA allow you to own a kangaroo with or without a licence. Accurate or not, how has this not been made into an issue?

[title] Kangaroo Court

[Validity] must allow pets, must not have a kangaroo as national animal

[desc] When Kang Aru failed to prevent his kangaroo from jumping the fence and eating his neighbour's grass, his neighbour, Tyson Mikeson, took him to court. Aru brought the kangaroo with him to convince the judge of how cute it is, which seemed to work as the courts ruled in his favour. Mikeson acquired a pet tiger which allegedly ate the kangaroo, taking the matter back to court and bring the issue of exotic pets to your desk

[option] "This is absolutely ridiculous! Why does anyone need a pet kangaroo?" asks @@RANDOMNAME@@, the courtroom janitor, who had to clean the faeces left by the animals at the trial "Do you know how hard it is to keep one of those things on your side of the fence? Why can't people have normal pets like rabbits, or dogs, or fish? For the sake of neighbours, ban exotic pets!"
[effect] turtles are considered too exotic to be a pet


[option] "That doesn't go far enough!" demands Karen @@RANDOMLASTNAME@@, who came to protest about the cleanliness of the toilets on the Parliament house tour, but wound up in this conversation, "we also need to ban dangerous breeds of dogs like pit bulls or dogo Argentino. My neighbour's fila Brasillero nearly bit me whilst I was looking over the fence. Is that a safe breed? Of coarse not!"
[effect] chihuahuas have been declared as an unsafe dog breed

[option] "You can't take away my Tasmanian Devil" demands @@RANDOMNAME@@, who brought @@HIS@@ pet with him to the meeting. "She's a good girl, aren't you Tassie? Aren't you? Why shouldn't I be allowed to have a Tassie? Just because some idiots don't know how to look after their pets, it doesn't mean that none of us do! I take good care of my Tassie and she deserves an owner like me!"
[effect] pet elephants have become the nation’s most popular holiday gift

[option] "We should just require the curator of exotic animal companions to possess licences." Suggests @@RANDOMNAME@@ who manufactures rubber stamps and owns a pet otter. "That way, we can ensure that all the exotic animals in the possession are responsible. Yours truly possesses a giant otter, and rarely ever allow it to penetrate the boundary between my neighbour and I. Licences will ensure that all other exotic pet owners are as responsible as I am."
[effect] possession of a paper qualifies people to own alligators

[title] Kangaroo Court

[Validity] must allow pets

[desc] When Kang Aru failed to prevent his kangaroo from jumping the fence and eating his neighbour's grass, his neighbour, Tyson Mikeson, took him to court. After the courts ruled in favour of Aru, Mikeson acquired a pet tiger which allegedly ate the kangaroo, taking the matter back to court and bring the issue of exotic pets to your desk

[option] "This is absolutely ridiculous! Why does anyone need a pet kangaroo?" asks @@RANDOMNAME@@, who is a cleaner at a pet boarding and is sick of cleaning faeces. "Do you know how hard it is too feed one of those things? Why can't people have normal pets like rabbits, or dogs, or fish? Ban exotic pets!"
[effect] turtles are considered too exotic to be a pet

[option] "That doesn't go far enough!" demands Karen @@RANDOMLASTNAME@@, who came to protest about the cleanliness of the toilets on the Parliament house tour, but wound up in this conversation, "we also need to ban dangerous breeds of dogs like pit bulls or dogo Argentino. My neighbour's fila Brasillero nearly bit me whilst I was looking over the fence. Is that a safe breed? Of coarse not!"
[effect] Chihuahuas have been declared as unsafe dog breeds

[option] "You can't take away my Tasmanian Devil!" demands @@RANDOMNAME@@, who brought @@HIS@@ pet with him to the meeting. “She's a good girl, aren't you Tassie? Aren't you? Why shouldn't I be allowed to have a Tasmanian Devil? Just becausr some idiots don't know how to look after their pets, it doesn't mean that none of us do! I take good care of my Tassie and she deserves an owner like me!"
[effect] pet elephants have become the nation’s most popular holiday gift

[Trotterdam]

I love the opening story, but the options seem random, and don't keep up the humor. Why would some random person pointing out that kangaroos are unpleasant to care for be a reason to ban other people from owning them? It should be owners' responsibility to feed and clean up after their own pets. Besides, why would someone who doesn't like cleaning up after animals enter such a job in the first place?

Realistically, controversy over exotic pets hinges on three issues:

1. Safety to humans. A lot of exotic pets are large enough to cause serious harm to humans. People who just think having a pet tiger would be cool may underestimate the effort required to actually tame one and convince it to see humans as something other than food. Furthermore, even an animal that has been raised well enough to be genuinely friendly may hurt people just by not understanding how squishy humans are and accidentally playing too rough. This puts at risk both the owner and other people in the area. Of course, some "exotic" animals are still small, and this wouldn't be an issue for them (unless they're highly venomous or something).
2. Safety to animals. Larger animals need more space to feel comfortable, and a typical middle-class home that may be fine for a cat or dog just doesn't cut it for a kangaroo that would bump its head on the ceiling trying to jump in there. Some people will also adopt a baby animal while underestimating how large it'll grow, then irresponsibly abandon it when they realize they're in over their heads. Mind you, this can come up even with some not-so-exotic animals like horses or cows (common on farms, not common in urban apartments, for obvious reasons). Though even some not-so-large animals can have special care requirements that average people are ignorant of.
3. Safety to species. If there's an endangered species, having people capture its few remaining wild specimens in order to raise as exotic pets isn't going to help.

In this case, your premise hinges on the kangaroo and tiger misbehaving and causing trouble for their neighbors, so you probably want to focus more on point 1, although there might be some animal rights activist coming out of the woodwork to raise the other points.

Keep in mind that we have quite a few other issues about dangerous pets or endangered animals (#86, #133, #547 come to mind), so there's some overlap to worry about, but probably not so much that this premise is nonviable, especially if you can make the options as entertaining as the opening story. I would recommend ditching the diversion into dog breeds, though. Those are too ordinary to fit with the tone of the rest of the issue.

As an aside:

So apparently, this is a map of the USA indicating which states in the USA allow you to own a kangaroo with or without a licence. Accurate or not, how has this not been made into an issue?

Somehow, people in the USA owning kangaroos as pets is even more hilarious than people in Australia doing so.

Also, your map mentions licenses, which seems like a reasonable approach to me, so it should probably be an option. Require perspective pet owners to undergo extensive training and inspection to prove they can handle the responsibility and have enough space for the animal to roam in. Seems to me this whole situation could have been avoided if Kang and Tyson had a taller fence...

[Steelfeather Rapture 1]

Not bad, but Kang Aru is a terrible name.

I agree that there should be an option mentioning the safety of endangered species. For instance, giant otters are threatened by the exotic pets trade. They're sometimes taken as pets and their species numbers really don't support that. Safety to animals is a big issue with pet giant otters, too. They have very friendly personalities, but they get very big. Maybe mention giant otters! They're cute and people would be happy to think about them.

[Floofybit]

Not bad, but Kang Aru is a terrible name.

I'm pretty sure it's a joke... Kangaroo as a name

[Australian rePublic]

Next draft is up

I love the opening story, but the options seem random, and don't keep up the humor. Why would some random person pointing out that kangaroos are unpleasant to care for be a reason to ban other people from owning them? It should be owners' responsibility to feed and clean up after their own pets. Besides, why would someone who doesn't like cleaning up after animals enter such a job in the first place?

Realistically, controversy over exotic pets hinges on three issues:

1. Safety to humans. A lot of exotic pets are large enough to cause serious harm to humans. People who just think having a pet tiger would be cool may underestimate the effort required to actually tame one and convince it to see humans as something other than food. Furthermore, even an animal that has been raised well enough to be genuinely friendly may hurt people just by not understanding how squishy humans are and accidentally playing too rough. This puts at risk both the owner and other people in the area. Of course, some "exotic" animals are still small, and this wouldn't be an issue for them (unless they're highly venomous or something).
2. Safety to animals. Larger animals need more space to feel comfortable, and a typical middle-class home that may be fine for a cat or dog just doesn't cut it for a kangaroo that would bump its head on the ceiling trying to jump in there. Some people will also adopt a baby animal while underestimating how large it'll grow, then irresponsibly abandon it when they realize they're in over their heads. Mind you, this can come up even with some not-so-exotic animals like horses or cows (common on farms, not common in urban apartments, for obvious reasons). Though even some not-so-large animals can have special care requirements that average people are ignorant of.
3. Safety to species. If there's an endangered species, having people capture its few remaining wild specimens in order to raise as exotic pets isn't going to help.

In this case, your premise hinges on the kangaroo and tiger misbehaving and causing trouble for their neighbors, so you probably want to focus more on point 1, although there might be some animal rights activist coming out of the woodwork to raise the other points.

Keep in mind that we have quite a few other issues about dangerous pets or endangered animals (#86, #133, #547 come to mind), so there's some overlap to worry about, but probably not so much that this premise is nonviable, especially if you can make the options as entertaining as the opening story. I would recommend ditching the diversion into dog breeds, though. Those are too ordinary to fit with the tone of the rest of the issue.

As an aside:

So apparently, this is a map of the USA indicating which states in the USA allow you to own a kangaroo with or without a licence. Accurate or not, how has this not been made into an issue?

Somehow, people in the USA owning kangaroos as pets is even more hilarious than people in Australia doing so.

Also, you map mentions licenses, which seems like a reasonable approach to me, so it should probably be an option. Require perspective pet owners to undergo extensive training and inspection to prove they can handle the responsibility and have enough space for the animal to roam in. Seems to me this whole situation could have been avoided if Kang and Tyson had a taller fence...

Thanks. I've taken it from the perspective of animal safety. Hopefully this clears it up. I also added an option about licences. It's actually to own a kangaroo in Australia unless you're a zoo or something like that (except maybe in Victoria, but I've never heard of a Victorian who owns a kangaroo). I'll leave the dog breeds because I'm not sure if breed-specific legislation would be too different, but if you disagree, I could get rid of it. Also, due to the fact that we have issues about owning @@ANIMAL@@s and @@ANIMAL@@ personhood, I thought maybe I'll exclude countries who have kangaroos as their national animals (which would ironically exclude me). Thanks for the feedback!

Not bad, but Kang Aru is a terrible name.

I agree that there should be an option mentioning the safety of endangered species. For instance, giant otters are threatened by the exotic pets trade. They're sometimes taken as pets and their species numbers really don't support that. Safety to animals is a big issue with pet giant otters, too. They have very friendly personalities, but they get very big. Maybe mention giant otters! They're cute and people would be happy to think about them.

"Kang Aru" is meant to sound like "Kangaroo". Thanks, added giant otters

[Trotterdam]

[option] "This is absolutely ridiculous! Why does anyone need a pet kangaroo?" asks @@RANDOMNAME@@, an animal rights activist who also has to clean the animal poo in your office. "Do you know how hard it is too feed one of those things? Why can't people have normal pets like rabbits, or dogs, or fish? For the sake of animal welfare, ban exotic pets!"

This still falls flat. For an animal rights activist to make sense as a speaker, there has to be some evidence that some of the animals under discussion were actually abused.

In the opening, both the kangaroo and the tiger cause problems for their neighbors (mainly through negligence on their owners' part, with some amusing implications that the latter case was of the "deliberately-look-the-other-way-and-hope-it-happens" type), but there is no indication, either in the opening or the subsequent options, that either animal was mistreated by its owner (although I suppose the kangaroo might have been motivated to jump the fence to the neighbor's yard by its own yard being too small), nor does the animal rights activist bring up any other cases.

[Australian rePublic]

[option] "This is absolutely ridiculous! Why does anyone need a pet kangaroo?" asks @@RANDOMNAME@@, an animal rights activist who also has to clean the animal poo in your office. "Do you know how hard it is too feed one of those things? Why can't people have normal pets like rabbits, or dogs, or fish? For the sake of animal welfare, ban exotic pets!"

This still falls flat. For an animal rights activist to make sense as a speaker, there has to be some evidence that some of the animals under discussion were actually abused.

In the opening, both the kangaroo and the tiger cause problems for their neighbors (mainly through negligence on their owners' part, with some amusing implications that the latter case was of the "deliberately-look-the-other-way-and-hope-it-happens" type), but there is no indication, either in the opening or the subsequent options, that either animal was mistreated by its owner (although I suppose the kangaroo might have been motivated to jump the fence to the neighbor's yard by its own yard being too small), nor does the animal rights activist bring up any other cases.

Cheers. Hopefully it now works better from the causing problems for their neighbours angel

[Australian rePublic]

bump

[Australian rePublic]

Last call

[StrayaRoos]

i'd like to suggest replacing the tasmanian devil with a cassowary or emu,as they are more exotic/dangerous

[Outer Sparta]

No kangaroos in actual courts? Oh my you missed a good opportunity to put a kangaroo in a court with their owner

[Australian rePublic]

I'll get around to fixing this based on suggestions which I am grateful for, but for now, I am taking it off last call. Thanks everyone for your feedback!

[Australian rePublic]

Next draft is up, thanks!

i'd like to suggest replacing the tasmanian devil with a cassowary or emu,as they are more exotic/dangerous

Not aure that's true. Emus aren't more exotic, they're actually domesticated whilst Tasmanian Devils are nearly endangered, and I can't see how a cassowary would be more dangerous than a Tasmanian Devil. Thanks for the suggestion, but I think I'll leave it as is. The IEs are free to change it if they so see fit

No kangaroos in actual courts? Oh my you missed a good opportunity to put a kangaroo in a court with their owner

Fixed, thanks!

[Australian rePublic]

Last call

[Australian rePublic]

Submitted

[Australian rePublic]

So the idiot that I am deleted everything from the thread except the first draft, and submitted the first draft. Thank goodness I had a copy of the submitted version, which has been submitted and added to the OP. So now I've submitted two different versions of the issue. The correctly submitted version is now in the OP