Uncivilised attitude to welfare of animals

I AGREE fully with the points made by Catherine Galvin (Letters, June 4) about the Irish attitude to animals.

What is it in our psyche that makes us neglectful of cruel to defenceless creatures?

We do not limit this to domestic animals. Recently there was a court case arising from the mistreatment of a horse that had suffered so much it gnawed away at a limb and had to be put down.