Randy Higgins Wombat Abuse: The Great Potential Threat Every day, people, around the world, go about

their lives happy and content. They do not stop to consider things that could be happening under their watch, without them even suspecting. One of these things is wombat abuse. Wombat abuse could be cruel and malicious, and no one would know. Countless wombats could be tortured and killed for pleasure and nobody would know. This could be stopped if a few, simple measures, were put in place, but no one will. And so, the possibility of wombat abuse continues. The Wombat (Vombatus Ursinus) and its cousins, the Northern and Southern Hairy-nosed Wombat, (Lasiorhinus krefftii and Lasiorhinus latifrons) are small, muscular, marsupial rodents, that live in Australia and Tasmania. They naturally borough into the ground with their sharp claws and act highly aggressively towards predators. If not closely monitored, these traits could be taken advantage of, in such sadistic sports as wombat fights, similar to cock fights, where enraged wombats may be made to fight in a ring; wombat races, when starved wombats could be forced to run great distances for food; wombat bating, where wombats would be forced into a ring and tortured for amusement; and wombat electrocution, a game potentially involving electrocuting wombats with cattle prods. The potential for wombat abuse is great. In the eighteen and nineteen hundreds, rat fighting was highly popular in places like Britain and the United States. With this in mind, a larger version of rats fighting, raises a great likelihood of a serious illegal money sport. Yet a blind eye is turned to this danger. Never are posters put next to dog and cat abuse, warning of a threat to wombats, never are defenses made for the wombat in the halls of Congress. It could be that wombat abuse is already a major problem, and no one knows. Simple laws could be passed to prevent wombat abuse. A term of imprisonment for persons found guilty of wombat bating or electrocution and a heavy fine for persons betting on wombat fights or races could all but eliminate any possibility of wombat cruelty in the future. But, no laws have yet been passed to specifically prevent wombat abuse. The wombat is still largely vulnerable to abuse. Why? It could be that nobody is aware of the potential problem; that the screams of tortured wombats have yet to reach ears in Washington. Or, it could be that congress is unwilling to admit that this could be a problem. Or it could be that wombat abuse is already a highly profitable sport, and that wombat cartels are using graft to make our representatives in Washington turn a blind eye. There is no certain way of knowing. Any or all of these theories could be correct. Wombat abuse could affect any number of wombats. There is simply not enough information yet to make a positive conclusion on the current spread of wombat abuse. However, through stricter laws and more research, the threat of wombat abuse could be greatly reduced if not eliminated.