Why Animals Don't Have Rights
- Thread starter SubRosa
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This seems more a matter of semantics than anything. Animal rights, global warming...unfortunate names, but for the most part we call them something else now.
Animal rights and animal welfare seem subtly different. If I were to open a pamphlet that had nothing printed on the cover except "ANIMAL RIGHTS" I would expect it to be something PETA-ish. Animal welfare just seems like common sense. People who abuse animals should be punished. We shouldn't not punish them because what constitutes abuse is vague.
We can follow the same basic guidelines for abuse as we would for people. "Verbal" and "emotional" abuse are hard to apply to dogs and cats, I would think it would be difficult to convict someone on animal cruelty charges just because they yelled at their pets often or they withheld affection from them! However physical abuse is obvious, and is the biggest issue we face. You can argue all you like about whether it's cruel to use a choke collar or to crate a dog, but everyone knows it's wrong to make it fight each other or to put cigarettes out on it...
I'm not exactly sure what kind of reform you are calling for. I don't really see how it would do any good to make it legal to abuse and exploit animals. I am glad that there are laws that make it mandatory to uphold a standard of care for most animals.
Animal rights and animal welfare seem subtly different. If I were to open a pamphlet that had nothing printed on the cover except "ANIMAL RIGHTS" I would expect it to be something PETA-ish. Animal welfare just seems like common sense. People who abuse animals should be punished. We shouldn't not punish them because what constitutes abuse is vague.
We can follow the same basic guidelines for abuse as we would for people. "Verbal" and "emotional" abuse are hard to apply to dogs and cats, I would think it would be difficult to convict someone on animal cruelty charges just because they yelled at their pets often or they withheld affection from them! However physical abuse is obvious, and is the biggest issue we face. You can argue all you like about whether it's cruel to use a choke collar or to crate a dog, but everyone knows it's wrong to make it fight each other or to put cigarettes out on it...
I'm not exactly sure what kind of reform you are calling for. I don't really see how it would do any good to make it legal to abuse and exploit animals. I am glad that there are laws that make it mandatory to uphold a standard of care for most animals.
This discussion seems handy as an excercise but as poor in vitamins as a mother-in-law's kiss.
We're making some assumptions here, the worst of which is we are not part of the animal kingdom; that we can stand outside the system and make dicisions of "right" based on our exclusion.
I view the planet as an organism and the different subsytems as interdependent. We, along with the rest of the animal kingdom, are one of the subsystems, dependent on the others to survive. Other subsytems; plants, for example, are dependent on us as well as other subsystems to survive.
We have the same rights as the other animals in the subsystem; the right to claw our way to an age when we can reproduce. If something happens to us before we reach that age, we lost that right. Just as I have the right to eat one of the other animals, they have the same right if I'm not smart enough or quick enough or both to prevent being consumed. Just as I have the right to kill some crackhead for kicking in my front door and threatening my kids with a gun, so a mother grizzly has the right to tear me to shreds if I get between her and her cubs.
Just because we ascended to a point where we have power over the entire planet doen't mean we have the "right" to excercise that power and destroy the planet.
We tend to think that whatever we decide is right is a "Right". The inalienable rights and our dominion over the animals are "Divine Rights". ...whatever...
I think the folks who lived here long before Columbus talked Isabella into hockin' her jewels had it "right". They lived with nature, as part of the subsytem.
Mark
We're making some assumptions here, the worst of which is we are not part of the animal kingdom; that we can stand outside the system and make dicisions of "right" based on our exclusion.
I view the planet as an organism and the different subsytems as interdependent. We, along with the rest of the animal kingdom, are one of the subsystems, dependent on the others to survive. Other subsytems; plants, for example, are dependent on us as well as other subsystems to survive.
We have the same rights as the other animals in the subsystem; the right to claw our way to an age when we can reproduce. If something happens to us before we reach that age, we lost that right. Just as I have the right to eat one of the other animals, they have the same right if I'm not smart enough or quick enough or both to prevent being consumed. Just as I have the right to kill some crackhead for kicking in my front door and threatening my kids with a gun, so a mother grizzly has the right to tear me to shreds if I get between her and her cubs.
Just because we ascended to a point where we have power over the entire planet doen't mean we have the "right" to excercise that power and destroy the planet.
We tend to think that whatever we decide is right is a "Right". The inalienable rights and our dominion over the animals are "Divine Rights". ...whatever...
I think the folks who lived here long before Columbus talked Isabella into hockin' her jewels had it "right". They lived with nature, as part of the subsytem.
Mark
agreed.
I think that a pet keeping forum might be a little biased in this discussion....
Humanity won't destroy the planet. Turn it into a big ball of rock and metal, maybe. But it'll still be roundish and planet-sized. :evil_lol:
I'd say at this point humanity exists outside of the animal kingdom. Our technology makes it theoretically possible to scrap the entire ecosystem and build something to replace it. We just don't have the unity of thinking or the need to spend the resources to do it. Keeping the animal kingdom around is much cheaper than planetary engineering.
'Rights' or even 'equality' are rather new concepts. Up until recently the concept throughout human history was, if we can exercise power over something we have the right to do so. Didn't matter if it was plant, animal, or other human cultures.
I see. Well, I can accept that. Here's my attempt at a non-emotional response. Humans don't need animals. They are nothing more the a food source, and humans can get everything we need from plants, which can be grown en-mass anywhere we need them to be grown (with a little effort and energy on our part we could even turn the moon into a garden) so animals are, technically, obsolete. Therefor the only thing I see stopping us from destroying them is greed. We are greedy, we want that Big mac, and to get that Big Mac we need a cow to become beef. Therefore we keep the cow around. We WANT pets, so we keep them around. Animasl could be wiped out, leaving only plants, and humans could easily take their places in all niches using out tech to keep the plants A)Alive, and B)in check. Going down that path we could easilly become the only animals on the planet and do so untouched. As to whether or not that would be logical or moraly correct is irrelevant, if you do not wish to include emotions in this.
Including emotions, many humans feel moraly bound to try and help animals we see as "inferior". Humans, because of emotions like sympathy, feel the illogical need to protect and aid our animal kin. We felt the need to take care of fish, so we became fishkeepers. I felt sorry for that poor kitty in the pound so I took him in and named him Stripes. Emotion is the only thing that makes humans keep animals around, we no longer need them to survive (how many animals do you see working farms in the midwest?). Humans feel morally bound to help animals survive, therefore animals survive. We feel morally bound to protect them, hence animal rights ideas. Take out moral, replace with logic, and animals would be all but extict.
Subrosa, was that emotionless enough for you?
OP, let me see if I understand you correctly:
You believe that animals should be treated humanely, but when they're not treated as such under a human's care, that human should not be punished by law?
Laws are created from man's moral compass, which is guided by emotion, yet you think emotion should be left out of the picture? What else but emotion lead humans to believe killing, raping and stealing were considered wrongdoings?
I feel that there are inconsistencies in your argument and would appreciate a clearer explanation of your opinion.
You believe that animals should be treated humanely, but when they're not treated as such under a human's care, that human should not be punished by law?
Laws are created from man's moral compass, which is guided by emotion, yet you think emotion should be left out of the picture? What else but emotion lead humans to believe killing, raping and stealing were considered wrongdoings?
I feel that there are inconsistencies in your argument and would appreciate a clearer explanation of your opinion.
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