This weekend, Weibo user @廈門腳丫 uploaded images of beggars in Foshan, Guangdong prostrating on the street alongside a camel, whose four of legs had all been deliberately severed at the knees in an apparent attempt to stir the sympathy of passers-by and thereby receive more money.
These troubling scenes are not an isolated incident, however. Netizens have photographed similar scenes — oftentimes featuring man and the same camel — elsewhere in cities along the southern coast, in Shenzhen and Guangzhou, Guangdong; in Xiamen and Fuzhou, Fujian; in Wenzhou and Shaoxing, Zhejiang; and even inland in Jiujiang, Jiangxi and Heifei, Anhui.
The unfortunate phenomenon of children being deliberately crippled so as to rake in more money panhandling is familiar to both the public and media, but doing the same to camels appears to be a new and equally unwelcome innovation. Web users have been asking how such a big creature, unable to walk, could even by transported to street sides up and down the country, and why no questions have been asked by authorities when the camel is supposed to be a first-class protected species.
Netizens' responses to the images have unanimously been of disgust and outrage, both at the beggars and at the government for so blatantly failing to protect the supposedly protected animal. Thousands backed statements that "giving money only encourages this shameless behavior," "these pieces of garbage don't deserve a shred of sympathy," and they should "cut off these people's legs, too."
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