Court Warns Artist: No Strangling Puppies

Two puppies in Berlin would be relieved to read this. A court in Berlin stopped an artist from staging a provocative theater piece yesterday in which he planned to strangle two puppies with cable ties, The Local reports. The show's theme: the plight of Spanish hunting dogs and Alaskan sled dogs, which are apparently killed the same way when they're unable to work. The court said that laws forbid animals from being hurt during a stage production.

But those animal-loving Germans didn't stop there. A report surfaced last week about two art students at Berlin's University of the Arts who are polling online whether to guillotine a sheep on camera. Their reasoning: "It represents a society that wants to give its cruelties the appearance of humanity." About 120,000 "Yes" votes and 190,000 "No" votes registered on their website over the first 6 days. The students plan to reveal the results at an exhibition next month. (More puppies stories.)