Animal Equality Essay Research Paper This assertion

Animal Equality Essay, Research Paper

This assertion is saying that there are differences between animals and humans and because of those differences we should have different rights. Humans already have more rights than animals and it is ridiculous how no one even recognizes it. For example, humans go hunting all the time and don t even think twice about it. What I am saying is, on the news you never hear about a deer killing a hunter because it just doesn t happen. It is not the deer s nature to kill a human when we have done nothing wrong to it. And the same should work both ways for humans as it does for animals. When animals have done nothing wrong to us, there is no need for us to grab a gun and just go shooting and murdering innocent animals.

I believe that humans and animals should have the same rights to an extent, but not to the point where it is out of control. As of right now, humans have so many more rights than animals. You have to stay within limits when you are talking about humans and animal rights. You can t say that animals should get to vote or anything like that because it is absurd. But you can say that humans can t kill deer without justifiable cause. Guthrie claims it is impractical to look beyond the human community meaning that anything other than humans are lower than we are. He states that we are the highest form of being and if we want to murder cattle to feed ourselves when we have more than enough resources that it is ok for us to get greedy and want more than we need. Guthrie states that giving another organism the status of moral body and amoral body

simultaneously leads us into what is known as Schweitzer s dilemma. Schweitzer considered each organism as an individual who at all costs would be saved under all causes if at all possible. Schweitzer states that predators are regarded as evil. If this statement were true, then wouldn t humans be evil because we hunt and are predators against deer and rabbits and all kinds of animals in the wild. We go hunting them for no cause at all except for the fun of it, which would mean we are predators.

Not only do we face absurd decisions about which organisms we save in a crisis situation, but the question can also be posed as to how individual variation within each species is to be regarded. If we consider out morality as an entirely human phenomenon, and apply it to humans, the system will work and we don t have to worry about other organisms except for ourselves.

Generally, we don t bring domesticated animals such as dogs, cats, and in some cases horses under the same moral consideration that we do with other humans. We look down upon them as if they are there solely for our use. But some people do not do this; some individuals look at their pets as companions and treat them as if they were humans. We do not hesitate in discrimination against those that aren t our own species or kind as it may be. An example of this would be back during the days of slavery. The slave drivers totally disregarded all human kind except for the few people they thought were worthy not to be treated as if they were not a living, breathing being. Some humans just have no regard for other human life and these individuals are the ones who society looks down upon. If we all looked at everyone and every living thing from the same viewpoint, then we would all have a common foundation for our judgments, which is human welfare. My opinion on human welfare is that if we all stopped treating each other with such disrespect and the same way towards animals, then we would not have such ethical problems such as humans killing humans for unjustifiable causes and we would not be murdering innocent animals for no cause at all. Even the problems that we face in our own moral system are troubling society at this moment, we test new drugs on animals and even newborn infants, which hurts animals and in most cases the child. I know that we can further our own medical sciences but even in this case we have to look out for the animals we are destroying by doing experiments on them for our own benefit. I am seeing that example as Darwinism because we are killing other species for our own benefit, which is survival of the fittest. Animals can t defend themselves in the same fashion that humans can and that is where we exploit them. We make them surrender themselves to us by hitting them with tranquilizers and then dragging them to their horrible, painful death by medical drugs, which has never been used before. It is true that we might be furthering our own cures and studies towards new vaccines for human kind, but at a great cost we are achieving this goal.

Guthrie states that it is illogical and impractical to extend any kind of feelings past humanity. Our relationship to any organism but us is useless unless we need that resource and in that case it is all right. It seems like he is contradicting himself in that statement when he says we shouldn t express any moral concern past ourselves, but then when we need anything outside of our own resources it is fine if we utilize other materials than those we have. His opinion is that we shouldn t weigh the effect that our actions have on organisms other than ourselves when we are deciding what to do which is very definitely ethical egoism.

Singer has almost the exact opposite views that Guthrie has in his defense of animal liberation. He states that the