WHO ARE YOU ANIMAL RIGHTS ADVOCATES ANYWAY?

Do animals have rights? Different people give different answers. Sometimes people give different answers because of a disagreement about the facts. For example, some people believe cats and dogs, chickens and hogs do not feel anything; others believe they do. Sometimes different answers are given because of a disagreement over values. For example, some people believe animals have no value apart from human interests; others believe the opposite. Disgreements of both kinds are important certainly, and both will be explored along the way. As important as these kinds of disagreements are, neither touches a more basic source of division, this one concerning the idea of animal rights itself.

Some people think this idea is synonymous with being kind to animals. Since we should be kind to animals, the inference is obvious: animals have rights. Or they think animal rights mean avoiding cruelty. Since we sould not be cruel to animals, the same conclusion follows: animals have rights, it is hard to explain why the idea is so controversial, with animal rights advocates on one side and animal rights opponents on the other.

The heated, often acrimonious controversy that pits advocates against opponents tells us that these familiar ways of thinking (we should be kind to animals; we should not be cruel to them) fails to capture the real meaning of animal rights. Its real meaning, as it turns out, is both simple and profound.

Animal rights is a simple idea because, at the most basic level, it means only that animals have a right to be treated with respect. It is a profound idea because its implications are far-reaching. How far-reaching? Here are a few examples of how the world will have to change once we learn to treat animals with respect.

We will have to stop raising them for their flesh.

We will have to stop killing them for their fur.

We will have to stop training them to entertain us.

We will have to stop using them in scientific research.

Each example illustrates the same moral logic. When it comes to how humans exploit animals, recognition of their rights require abolition, not reform. Being kind to animals is not enough. Avoiding curelty is not enough. Whether we exploit animals to eat, to wear, to entertain us, or to learn, the truth of animal rights requires empty cages, not larger cages.

- Tom Regan

Take sides

Take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.


- Elie Wiesel

How we treat our fellow creatures

How we treat our fellow creatures is only one more way in which each of us, every day, writes our own epitaph - bearing into the world a message of light and life or just more darkness and death, adding to its joy or its despair.

- Mathew Scully

Noam Chomsky

"The first thing you've got to do, in any kind of change, is to recognize the forms of oppression that exist."

Of the Reason of Animals - David Hume

Next to the ridicule of denying an evident truth, is that of taking much pains to defend it; and no truth appears to me more evident, than that beast are endow'd with thought and reason as well as men. The arguments are in this case so obvious, that they never escape the most stupid and ignorant.

We are conscious that we ourselves, in adapting means to ends, are guided by reason and design, and that 'tis not ignorantly nor casually we perform those actions, which tend to self-preservation, to obtaining pleasure, and avoiding pain. When therefore we see other creatures, in millions of instances, perform like actions, and direct them to like ends, all our principles of reason and probability carry us with an invincible force to beleive the existence of a like cause. 'Tis needless in my opinion to illustrate this argument by the enumeration of particulars. The smallest attention will suply us with more than are requisite. The resemblance betwixt the actions of animals and those of men is so entire in this respect, that the very first action of the first animal we shall please to pitch on, will afford us an incontestable argument for the present doctrine.

This doctrine is as useful as it is obvious, and furnishes us with a kind of touchstone, by which we may try every system in this species of philosophy. 'Tis from the resemblance of the external actions of animals to those we ourselves perform, that we judge their internal likewise to resemble ours; and the same principle of reasoning, carry'd one step farther, will make us conclude that since our internal actions resemble each other, the causes, from which they are derriv'd must also be resembling. When any hypothesis, therefore, is advanc'd to explain a mental operation which is common to men and beasts, we must apply the same hypothesis to both; and as every true hypothesis will abide this trial, so I may venture to affirm, that no false one will ever be able to endure it. The common defect of those systems, which philosophers have employ'd to account for the actions of the mind, is, that they suppose such o sbtility and refinement of thought, as not only exceeds the capacity of mere animals, but even of children and the common people in our own species; who are not withstanding susceptible of the same emotions and affections as persons of the most accomplish'd genius and understanding. Such a subtility is a clear proof of the falsehood, as the contrary simplicity of the truth, of any system.Let us therefore put our present system concerning the nature of the understanding to this decisive trial, and see whether it will equally account for the reasonings of beasts as for these of the human species.

Here we must make a distinction betwixt those actions of animals, which are of a vulgar nature, and seem to be on a level with their common capacities, and those more extraordinary instances of sagacity, which they sometimes discover for their own preservation, and the propagation of their species. A dog, that avoids fires and precipices, that shuns strangers, and caresses his master, affords us an instance of the first kind. A bird, that chooses with such care and nicety the place and materials of her nest, and sits upon her eggs for a due time, and in a suitable season, with all the precaution that a chymist is capable of in the most delicate projection, furnishes us with a lively instance of the second.

As to the former actions, I assert they proceed from a reasoning, that is not in itself different, nor founded on different principles, from that which appears in human nature. 'Tis necessary in the first place, that there be some impression immediately present to their memory or senses, in order to be the foundation of their judgement. From the tone of voice the dog infers his master's anger, and foresees his own punishment. From a certain sensation affecting his smell, he judges his game not to be far distant from him.

Secondly, the inference he draws from the present impression is built on experience, and on his observation of the conjunction of objects in past instances. As you vary this experience, he varies his reasoning. Make a beating follow upon one sign or motion for some time, and afterwards upon another; and he will successively draw different conclusios according to his most recent expereince.

Now let any philosopher make a trial, and endeavour to explain that act of the mind, which we call belief, and give an account of the principles, from which it is deriv'd, independent of the influence of custom on the imagination, and let his hypothesis be equally applicable to beasts as to the human species; and after he has done this, I promise to embrace his opinion. But at the same time I demand as an equitable condition, that if my system be the only one, which can answer to all these terms, it may be receiv'd as entirely satisfactory and convincing. And that 'tis the only one, is evident almost without any reasoning. Beasts certainly never perceive any real connexion among objects. 'Tis therefore by experience they infer one from another. They can never by any argument form a general conclusion, that those objects, of which they have had no experience, resemble those of which they have. 'Tis therefore by means of custom alone, that experience operates upon them. All this was sufficiently evident with respect to man. But with respect to beasts there cannot be the least suspicion of mistake; which must be own'd to be a strong confirmation, or rather an invincible proof of my system.

Nothing shews more the force of habit in reconciling us to any phenomenon, than this, that men are not astonish'd at the operations of their own reason, at the same time, that they admire the instinct of animals, and find a difficulty in explaining it, merely because it cannot be reduc'd to the very same principles. To consider the matter aright, reason is nothing but a wonderful and unintelligible instict in our souls, which carries us along a certain train of ideas, and endows them with particular qualities, according to their particular situations and relations. This instinct, 'tis true, arises from past observation and experience; but can anyone give the ultimate reason, why past experience and observation produces such an effect, any more than why nature alone shou'd produce it? Nature may certainly produce whatever can arise from habit: Nay, habit is nothing but one of the principles of nature, and derives all its force from that origin.

David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature (1739-40) (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1888) Book I, pp. 176-9

From: Animal Rights - A Historical Anthology, edited by Andrew Linzey and Paul Barry Clarke, Columbia University Press, 2004, New York

Prologue: The Cat

A few years ago, the Home Box Office network aired a program entitled "To Love or Kill: Man vs. Animals" It told a fascinating and, at the same time, a disturbing story about how different cultures treat the same animals differently. One especially chillig segment took viewers out to dinner in a small Chinese village. You know how, in some American restaurants, patrons get to choose from among live lobsters or live fish? And how, after they make their selection, the animal is killed, and the chef cooks a meal of their choice? At this Chinese restaurant, things are the same except the menu is different. At this restaurant, patrons get to select from among live cats and dogs.

The video takes its time. First we see the hungry patrons inspect the cats and dogs, jammed cheek by jowl into wooden cages; next we see them talk it over; then we see them make their selection; finally we see a man (the cook, I assume), using long metal tongs, yank a fluffy white cat from her cage and hurry into the kitchen. What follows does not make for pleasent reading, so feel free to skip the next paragraph.

While the cat claws and sreeches, the cook hits her several times with an iron bar. Clawing and screeching more now, she is abruptly submerged in a tub of scalding water for about ten seconds. Once removed, and while still alive, the cook skins her, from head to tail, in one swift pull. He then throws the traumatized animal into a large stone vat where (as the camera zooms in) we watch her gulp slowly, with increasing difficulty, her eyes glazed, until - her last breath taken - she drowns. The whole episode, from selection to final breath, takes several minutes. When the meal is served, the diners eat heartily, offering thnaks and praise to the cook.

I have never been more stunned in my life. I was literally speechless. Like many Americans, I already knew that some people in China, Corea and other countries eat cat and eat dog. The video didn't teach me any new fact about dietary customs. What was new for me, what pushed me back into my chair, was seeing how this is done, seeing the process. Watching the awful shock and suffering of the cat was devastating. I felt a mix of disbelief and anger welling up in my chest. I wanted to shout, "Stop it! What are you doing! Stop it!"

But what made matters worse, at least for me, was how the people behaved. For them, everything was just so ordinary, just so ho-hum, just so mater-of-fact. The diners said, "We'll have this cat for our dinner" the way we say, "We'll have this roll with out coffee." And the cook? The cook could not have cared less about the cat's ordeal. The poor animal might just as well have been a block of wood as far as he was concerned. I have never seen people behave so non-chalantly, so comfortably, so indiferently in the face of an animal's suffering and death. O don't think many americans could watch this episode and not ask themselves, as I asked myself, "What is this world coming to?"

Regan, Tom - Empty Cages - Facing the Challenge of Animal Rights, Rowman and Littlefield, 2004, Oxford, p.1

Animal Rights

Although scholars and animal exploiters recognize that animal rights and animal welfare are very different approaches to the human/animal relationship, many animal advocates elide the difference. These animal advocates seek to reduce suffering, but they regard this reduction as casually related to their long term goal of abolishing all institutionalized animal exploitation. They purport to embrace animal rights at least as a long-term matter, but they regard rights theory as "unrealistic" in that it cannot provide any short-term strategy to acheive the long-term goal. Consequently, they urge the pursuit of welfarist reforms as an interim strategy to achieve the abolition of animal exploitation. I call these animal advocates "new welfarist" because they support many of the reforms and approaches of classical animal welfare theory but do so in order to acheive a goal not shared by traditional welfarists.

Because both new welfarists and more traditional welfarists pursue the same strategy - to reduce animal suffering - albeit with different long term goals, some animal advocates have collapsed the rights and welfare views, claiming that there is no difference between the theories in that both requires only that people act with "compassion" and seek to reduce animal suffering. But that position is not an argument in favor of ignoring the theoretical differences between rights and welfare; indeed, the position merely asserts - and incorrectly - that the central concern of the animal "rights" movement is the "compassionate" treatment of animals and the reduction of suffering, both hallmarks of the classical welfarist approach.

Finally, the suggestion has been made that rights language plays only a "rhetorical" role in the ideology of the animal movement. But for those who take animal rights seriously, rights concepts are more than mere rhetoric, as Rowan suggests. For example, Helen Jones, founder of the International Society for Animal Rights (ISAR) and one of the true pioneers of the animal rights movement, stated that her group did not use the term "animal rights" in some rhetorical fashion: "Profound and deliberate thought led to the adoption in 1972 of the term Animal Rights in the name of Society for Animal Rights (SAR)." Jones added that "SAR, now International Society for Animal Rights, was the first organization in the US, and to the best of our knowledge, in the world, to employ the term Animal Rights in its name to reflect the Society's moral and philosophical position". As early as 1981, Jones argued that those who supported welfarist regulation should "have the grace and fairness not to invoke 'animal rights' as their philosophy and program. By doing so, they confuse the issue, the press and the public. Animal rights is too serious an issue to be invoked as a mere slogan."

Francione, Gary L., Rain Without Thunder - The ideology of the Animal Rights Movement, Temple University Press, 2007, Philadelphia, p.45

Frederick Douglass

If there is no struggle,
there is no progress.
Those who profess to
favor freedom, and yet
deprecate agitation,..
want rain without thunder
and lightning.


Frederick Douglass

How will we free these cows?

Rights and Prohibitions?

Must we await the abolition of the property status of animals before we can talk about restructuring the legal system to reflect the recognition of animal rights, or can rights changes occur - in the legal system - without there being a complete abdication of the status of animals as property? In other words, can there be laws that regulate the use of animal property and that, unlike the ones I have examined in this book, actually do create rights? This is a most difficult question, about which I have four very preliminary observations. First, as I have argued throughout this book, there can be no doubt that as long as animals are regarde under the law as merely means to the human ends of property owners, it will be very difficult to have any true, respect-based animal rights. Animal rights, strictly speaking, imply the recognition of the inherent worth and value of the right-holder - something precluded by characterizing animals as property.

Second, I have argued that as long as the content of any such "right" is restricted to freedom from "unecessary" suffering or entitlement to "humane" treatment, then the animal's "right" is only to have the animal's interests balanced against human interests protected by right. It is precisely this kind of interest balancing that I have criticized throughout this book because the existence of such a "right" does nothing to alter the fundamentally skewed balancing process that systematically devalues (or, better, fails completely to recognize) animal interests.

Third, despite the unlikelihood of achieving animal rights within the present legal system, it may be possible to have a pluralistic system that characterizes animals as property but recognizes rights-type concepts on some level. That is, though it may not be meaningful to talk about animal rights within our present legal system if what we mean by rights is what Regan means by rights, we may nevertheless be able to achieve some rights-like protection of animals, protection based on the recognition of animal interests that are not susceptible to sacrifice merely on account of consequential considerations. The key to such a pluralistic situation lies in the distinction between prohibiting, or abolishing, exploitation or abuse and merely regulating it. This focus on abolition in the context of rights is really quiet natural; at the core of just about ever normative entity that we call a right is some notion that others are prohibited from interfering with the exercise of the right. This is particularly true of what Hohfeld called "claim" rights. A right, then, is a notion closely connected to the prohibition of activities that are judged to be inimical to the right. Prohibiting particular forms of animal exploitation is very different from merely prohibiting that exploitation when it is "inhumane" to do otherwise.

Fourth, any theory about prohibitions must take into account that not all prohibitions are the same. For example, a prohibition that absolutely banned certain experiments on the ground that no member of any sentient species should be subjected to this treatment would represent a different sort of prohibition from the ones now found in statutes such as the AWA (Animal Welfare Act). A rule that prohibits the with-holding of food (unless "scientifically necessary") is nothing more than an attempt to facilitate efficient exploitation; it in no way recognizes animal interests in the way that rights recognize human interests.

Francione, Gary L., Animal Property, and the Law, Temple University Press, 2007, Philadelphia

p.260

cows....

um pouco de Darcy Ribeiro

Economia Socialmente Irresponsável

Nunca faltaram vozes de denúncia desse caráter cruel de nossa sociedade. Neste mesmo Senado, seja na era imperial, seja na republicana, muitas vozes de denúncia se alçaram. Em vão. Com pequenas alterações o Brasil atravessou os séculos sempre igual em seu caráter de moinho de gastar gentes.

A meu juízo é tempo já de que esse tema seja retomado em nossa Casa. O Senado é, para sua pena e para sua glória, a encarnação mais perfeita das classes dominantes brasileiras. Aqui temos uma representação melhor delas do que qualquer outra instituição. Tanto do patriciado político que alcança o poder pelo desempenho de cargos, como do patronato empresarial que o alça pelo exercício da atividade econômica.

A nós, portanto, elite da elite, nos cabe a responsabilidade de nos perguntar que culpa temos, enquanto classe dominante, no sacrifício e no sofrimento do povo brasileiro. Somos inocentes? Quem, letrado, não tem culpa neste país de analfabetos? Quem, rico, está isento de responsabilidades neste país da miséria? Quem , saciado e farto, é inocente neste nosso país da fome? Somos todos culpados.

Nossos maiores, primeiro, nós próprios, depois, urdimos a teia inconsútil que é a rede em quem nosso povo cresce constrangido e deformado. Em nossa sociedade, se as relações interraciais se dão com certa fluidez - apesar do preconceito racial que aqui impera - as relações interclassistas, ao contrário, são infranqueáveis em sua dureza cruel. A característica mais nítida da sociedade brasileira é a desigualdade social que se expressa no altíssimo grau de irresponsabilidade social das elites e na distância que separa os ricos dos pobres, com imensa barreira de indiferença dos poderosos e de pavor dos oprimidos.

Nada do que interessa vitalmente ao povo preocupa, de fato, a elite brasileira.

A quantidade e a qualidade da alimentação popular não podia ser mais escassa e pior. O doloroso é que não se deve, no Brasil, a nenhum descalabro climático ou outro, como ocorre mundo afora; deve-se tão-somente ao modo de organização da sociedade e da economia.

A qualidade de nossas escolas a que o povo tem acesso é tão ruim que, como já disse, elas produzem de fato mais analfabetos que alfabetizados.

Os serviços de saúde de que a população dispõe são tão precários que epidemias e doenças vencidas no passado voltam a grassar, como ocorre com a tuberculose, a lepra, a malária e inumeráveis outras.

A solução brasileira para moradia popular, na realidade das coisas, é a favela ou o mocambo. Não conseguimos multiplicar nem mesmo essas precaríssimas casinhas de marimbondo dos bancos da habitação e das caixas econômicas.

Regido pelas leis de mercado - tão louvadas ultimamente pelos irresponsáveis - prosseguimos tranquliamente produzindo soja de exportação - o que não seria ruim em si - e álcool motor - o que também se justificaria se isso se fizesse sem prejuízo da produção de feijão, de milho e da mandioca que o povo quer comer.

Nossa elite, bem nutrida, olha e dorme tranquila. Não é com ela.

Desafortunadamente, não é só a elite que revela essa indiferença fria ou disfarçada. Ela é a hedionda herança comum de séculos de escravismo, enormemente agravada pela ditadura militar que levou a extremos jamais vistos a distância entre ricos e pobres.

Onde está a intelectualidade iracunda que se faça a voz desse povo famélico? Onde estão as militâncias políticas que armem os brasileiros de uma consciência crítica esclarecida sobre os nossos problemas e, deliberada a passar para trás tantos séculos de padecimento?

Frente ao silêncio gritante dessas vozes da indignação, o que prevalesce é o entorpecimento, induzido pela mídia. É o pendor quase irresistível de tantos subintelectuais de culpar os negros pelo atraso em que estão atolados; de culpar os pobres pela sua miséria; de culpar a criança do povo por seu fracasso na escola; a atribuir a fome à previdência e à ignorância da população; a acusar os enfermos de culpados de seus males por falta de higiene ou negligência.

A triste verdade, entretanto, é que vivemos em estado de calamidade, indiferentes a ela porque a fome, o desemprego e a enfermidade não atingem os grupos privilegiados. O sequestro de um rapaz rico mobiliza mais os meios de comunicação e o Parlamento do que o assassinato de mil crianças, o saqueio da Amazônia, ou o suicídio dos índios. E ninguém se escandaliza, nem se quer se comove com esses dramas.

A imprensa só protesta mornamente e o faz quando ecoa o que se divulga lá fora. Parece haver-se rompido o próprio nervo ético da nossa imprensa, que nos deu, no passado, tantos jornalistas cheios de indignação em campanhas memoráveisde denúncia de toda sorte de iniquidade. Hoje, quem determina o que se divulga e com que calor se divulga qualquer coisa não são os jornalistas, é o caixa, a gerência dos órgãos de comunicação. E esta só está atenta às razões do lucro.

O que foi feito para pôr cobro a essa situação de calamidade? Na relaidade dos fatos, nada foi feito. As vozes e o poderio dos que defendem os interesses do privatismo e as razões do lucro sobrepujam o clamor pelo atendimento das necessidades mais elementares do povo brasileiro.

Darcy Ribeiro, Utopia Brasil - Editora Hedra, 2008, São Paulo, in Primeira fala ao Senado, p.88