Is the punishment for animal cruelty too soft?

Lara Croft cruelly murders animals on daily basis.

People who abuse animals need to be beaten and thrown in jail

I take it you mean domestic animal abuse? Because otherwise we need to line up a few fur farmers and meat industry bigwigs.

a 14yr old in the UK in the news this week . kicked a dog to death. fined £500 banned from owning a dog for a few years.

Yep, many animals have been thrown into the oven or microwave. The animal killers get away or with a slap on the wrist. I wouldn't mind throwing them into a cremation oven. Free of Charge.

perhaps.
but most people eat meat, and i would say the way many pigs and almost all chickens are treated in the meat industry are almost as terrible as many of the cases of animal abuse that get prosecuted.

i certainly agree that when people abuse dogs or other pets, that ought to be taken seriously.

but i think pigs & chickens deserve our sympathy too.

Did they ever catch the Bucharest Butcher?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4196726/Brave-dog-survives-mutilated-Bucharest-Butcher.html

Instead of killing your dog, Croft, why didn't you bring it to a vet to be euthanized? Did you not want to waste money that you could have spent on your childish Tomb Raider games?

Good news here in the United States - The FBI just made animal cruelty a Class A Felony. Bravo, FBI.

you keep coming back to this topic croft. move on.