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Sand
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30 Jan 2010, 8:17 pm

ruveyn wrote:
Subhuman animals have no rights.

Silly Rabbit. Rights are for people.

ruveyn


Considering the present status of society, once you remove the hubris there is nothing that can be considered subhuman unless you are thinking about the people in undersea craft in the navy. Even viruses can outwit our best antibiotics.



Meadow
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30 Jan 2010, 8:17 pm

^ If that's true then it should go for the subhuman humans also, and since the subhuman humans get to have rights, so should the subhuman animals.



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31 Jan 2010, 2:01 am

Awesomelyglorious wrote:
Thirdly, if the world really does work in a certain manner, then what's the point in acting against such issues? You won't get brownie points, and it might even be that you are the absurd one for taking such a stand.

Well, it just feels wrong for me, I'm sorry for creatures who are hurt - so I don't do it. I don't see it as something I must do, and I feel bad for the animals being killed - so I refrain from eating them. What's absurd about that?



Sand
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31 Jan 2010, 2:09 am

Omerik wrote:
Awesomelyglorious wrote:
Thirdly, if the world really does work in a certain manner, then what's the point in acting against such issues? You won't get brownie points, and it might even be that you are the absurd one for taking such a stand.

Well, it just feels wrong for me, I'm sorry for creatures who are hurt - so I don't do it. I don't see it as something I must do, and I feel bad for the animals being killed - so I refrain from eating them. What's absurd about that?


There's nothing wrong about it. It might be that meat eating would become less popular if people had to kill what they ate but I doubt it. A good many people love to kill things and some even enjoy making other things suffer. You and I are different.



Awesomelyglorious
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31 Jan 2010, 2:22 am

Sand wrote:
There's nothing wrong about it. It might be that meat eating would become less popular if people had to kill what they ate but I doubt it. A good many people love to kill things and some even enjoy making other things suffer. You and I are different.

People hunt as a hobby. So...... yeah, I think your point has empirical confirmation.



Meadow
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31 Jan 2010, 2:25 am

My friend and her family hunt deer and rabbit, mostly, not for sport but for food.



Sand
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31 Jan 2010, 2:34 am

Meadow wrote:
My friend and her family hunt deer and rabbit, mostly, not for sport but for food.


I take it then that the actual killing is emotionally distasteful to them.



Meadow
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31 Jan 2010, 2:57 am

Sand wrote:
Meadow wrote:
My friend and her family hunt deer and rabbit, mostly, not for sport but for food.


I take it then that the actual killing is emotionally distasteful to them.


I don't know if there's any emotional connection one way or the other. It seems to be a practical function and little else. She says they shoot very precisely and the animal doesn't suffer. I like to believe that's true. It seems more respectable than buying meat in a store by a long shot.



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31 Jan 2010, 3:10 am

LiberalJustice wrote:
I really don't think Animals should be granted rights because, if they are, there is no way of knowing how far it would go.

I don't think this is a valid argument against animal rights. The existence of animal rights does not entail what those rights are. I think your fear, that if any one, even the smallest right is granted to animals, a kind of Pandora's box is opened and all of sudden, animal rights come gushing out and are established in society in an uncontrollable matter, I think that fear is totally unfounded. If you look at how hard it is to establish even the most basic animal rights, even just one single one, there can be no talk about having no control over the number of new animal rights. Every single right would have to be fought for very hard on a political level. Just because you or I are against certain "rights" which certain "animal welfare" groups might propose does not seem like sufficient ground to be against all animal rights per se.

LiberalJustice wrote:
PETA has literally stated that they want all pets banned outright because they believe that if you have any kind of pet you are enslaving it. (I have a Dog, and he is happy, but should I be arrested simply because he is in my house and has a collar and an I.D tag on it? (these are VERY important, since the pet can be indentified if he/she gets lost, but is found by someone later on))

I'm not sure if I'm right on this, so I'd be very interested if you could state your sources (link). I think what's going on in the animal protection movement behind the scenes is the new "abolitionist approach" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abolitionism) introduced by Garry L. Francione (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Francione). Anyone interested in the topic should read up on that. Also notice the pet dog's in Francione's picture... (!)
Here's a summary:
Francione rightly criticized animal welfare groups for not really changing much for animals. Instead of changing whether or not animals are used and abused for certain things or not, most animal welfare organizations simply regulated the abuse and made laws on how animals are to be abused properly, usually more "humanely".
I've been fighting against animal castration for a long time and this is a good example for illustration: Instead of demanding the abolition and stop of animal castration all together, animal welfare orgs merely demand that they be castrated "humanely", with sedatives, etc. And because they think castrating animals "humanely" is perfectly O.K., they themselves promote it, even if it's not needed for contraception (see my web page for details), but only to more conveniently be able to use animals as pets, child-replacements, riding-mounts, etc. Thereby, with laws about "humane" castration methods for animals, animal welfare orgs themselves promote the status of animals as objects which exist only for human ends, as "slaves" which people can do with whatever they want, as long as this happens more or less "humanely" (if possible). The end result of animal welfare org's laws for humane castration is the exponential growth, the multiplication of animal castrations. Today, it's more normal to castrate an animal than it EVER was in the past!! And that means, animals today have the status of and are seen and treated as slaves and objects which exist only for human ends and needs, MORE than EVER in the past. And that is a VERY bad performance balance of animal welfare orgs.

The result of such legalization of "humane" methods in using animals (castration is only one example of thousands and thousands of laws made by animal welfare orgs) is, that everyone thinks it's perfectly o.k., as long as said laws are followed. But these laws in fact do not really protect animals, they just pretend to do so, by outlawing only the very worst, and very often, not even that, but instead stating what kinds of abuse (such as castration with sedatives) are perfectly legal. The result of such laws is the cementing of the status of animals in our society as objects, as things which exist only for human's ends, as slaves.
And Francione rightly states that this cannot be in the interest of animals. If animals have the status of slaves, no number of "humane" animal treatment laws can protect animals properly. If they are slaves, every slave master will follow the rules how he or she is to treat his or her slaves, his or her PROPERTY, only grudgingly and with contempt.
That's the situation today.
So Francione suggests abolishing all that and instead of legalizing the status of animals as slaves by legalizing their use as if they were slaves through "humane" animal slave treatment laws, animals should no longer have the status of human property, should be established and receive the status of living beings with means to their own end.
This entails, that humans may not OWN animals as if they were their objects, but that people wishing to keep animals can only receive some kind of stewardship, much like the stewardship for attending to a person with a disability, etc.

Large organizations like Peta and the HSUS (which are fundamentally money-eager and hypocritical) seem to pick up on this new movement I guess. They're not changing their policy (Peta still promotes the unnecessary castration of millions of animals to cement animal's status in our society as slaves, as objects which we can do with whatever we choose), but on the surface I suppose they promote the new ideas of Francione, such as baning the ownership of pets, just so they aren't left out and left behind. They really are big hypocrites.

I understand completely everyone who is VERY skeptic about ALL large animal welfare organizations such as Peta, HSUS, etc. They really are big hypocrites and not trustworthy. But the pledge of animal rights, of granting animals at least the most fundamental rights of not being made objects which exist only for human ends, those rights I think are all worthy of support.

LiberalJustice wrote:
They also say that wearing fur, leather, silk, and other materials that come from Animals is "unethical", will we start passing laws that prohibit us from wearing clothes made out of these materials? Or tell everyone that they can't eat eggs, bacon, fish, etc, etc, because they come from Animals? I really don't think we should allow Animal rights groups to tell us how to live our lives.

It is unethical. But just because it is, does not mean animal rights orgs will succeed in passing laws to prohibit everything they wish. Animal rights are something up for debate, it's not an on-off deal, if you are for one, you must be for all.



Last edited by Markie on 31 Jan 2010, 3:17 am, edited 1 time in total.

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31 Jan 2010, 3:14 am

My biology teacher once said: "It's called the apex advantage card. Benefits include: Being top of the food chain, Safety from other apex advantage card holders, and in our case fire."

I don't eat meat because I don't like it. I don't like my biology teacher either, but I don't her for other reasons. Protect the animals is all right by me, just don't bother me with it, and I don't want to see any of it on the news.


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Sand
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31 Jan 2010, 3:14 am

Considering that a good many Americans are granting human status to a fertilized human egg cell I imagine even a bumblebee might have a good chance of being granted many human rights.



Last edited by Sand on 31 Jan 2010, 3:25 am, edited 1 time in total.

Meadow
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31 Jan 2010, 3:23 am

I swear, people are frickin' insane.



fidelis
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31 Jan 2010, 3:28 am

Meadow wrote:
I swear, people are frickin' insane.


Completely and undeniably true.
But if you play your cards right, it may be to your advantage.


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ruveyn
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31 Jan 2010, 5:35 am

Sand wrote:
Meadow wrote:
My friend and her family hunt deer and rabbit, mostly, not for sport but for food.


I take it then that the actual killing is emotionally distasteful to them.


Since they do the killing, why do you suppose it is distasteful to them? Being a vegetarian is always an alternatives for those who a) want to eat and b) do not want to shed blood.

ruveyn



Sand
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31 Jan 2010, 5:41 am

ruveyn wrote:
Sand wrote:
Meadow wrote:
My friend and her family hunt deer and rabbit, mostly, not for sport but for food.


I take it then that the actual killing is emotionally distasteful to them.


Since they do the killing, why do you suppose it is distasteful to them? Being a vegetarian is always an alternatives for those who a) want to eat and b) do not want to shed blood.

ruveyn


I don't suppose. Your ear for irony is a bit rusty.