It requires a neanderthal, adolescent, lets-giggle-while-we-set-the-dog-on-fire mentality to not understand that cruelty to a sentient being is criminal.
Cruelty to an animal is now, in Texas, a felony.
That makes you somebody's girlfriend in a Texas hoosegow.
Read the Odyssey sometime.
When intelligent creatures work for man, lines of communication -- even affection -- develop. That is as true today as it was for Odysseus and Argos
"Thus they spake one to the other. And lo, a hound raised up his head and pricked his ears, even where he lay, Argos, the hound of Odysseus, of the hardy heart, which of old himself had bred, but had got no joy of him, for ere that, he went to sacred Ilios. Now in time past the young men used to lead the hound against wild goats and deer and hares; but as then, despised he lay (his master being afar) in the deep dung of mules and kine, whereof an ample bed was spread before the doors, till the thralls of Odysseus should carry it away to dung therewith his wide demesne. There lay the dog Argos, full of vermin. Yet even now when he was aware of Odysseus standing by, he wagged his tail and dropped both his ears, but nearer to his master he had not now the strength to draw. But Odysseus looked aside and wiped away a tear."