Do Animals Have Rights
Animals are used to test the products that we use in our everyday life. Is it ethical or right to test our products on animals? If animal testing were not used, how would the safety of the products we use be insured? If animals were not used in medical testing, how would researchers come up with new medicines and vaccines? Different people have different opinions about this issue. Arguments abound for both sides.
In order to have an organized argument, there must first be an agreed upon standard by which the opposing sides of the arguments are judged. For the argument about the use of animals for laboratory testing, that standard will be the Word of God.
“And God said, ‘Let the land produce living creatures
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The use of the Bible as a standard shows that the laboratory testing of animals is acceptable when used to save or prolong human life.
The organization PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) defines animal rights as meaning the following:
"...that animals deserve certain kinds of consideration - consideration of what is in their own best interests regardless of whether they are cute, useful to humans, or an endangered species and regardless of whether any human cares about them at all (just as a mentally-challenged human has rights even if he or she is not cute or useful or even if everyone dislikes him or her). It means recognizing that animals are not ours to use - for food, clothing, entertainment, or experimentation." PETA ONLINE FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS.
PETA separates animal rights from another term "animal welfare". Animal welfare is stated as follows by PETA, "Animal welfare theories accept that animals have interests but allow these interests to be traded away as long as there are some human benefits that are thought to justify that sacrifice." PETA ONLINE FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS.
PETA believes that animals should have a certain set of rights. However, those rights are not immediately evident. PETA acknowledges that the interests of animals are different than those of humans. In other words, a dog would probably not be interested in having the right to vote, but a dog would definitely be interested in not having pain inflicted on him or her
The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) is one of the most recognizable organizations within the animal rights movement, due in part to their attention grabbing antics and controversial advertisements. While PETA has been successful in creating visual rhetoric that generally appeals to the audience’s cognitive reasoning and emotions they are often not successful in catalyzing actual change in behaviour.
The truth about PETA, is that they do not want all animals to roam free. They want the population of dogs and cats to be reduced through spaying and neutering. They would like people to adopt animals from pounds or animal shelters, rather than buying from pet shops or breeders. They do claim to be the number one animal activist groups out there. Are they who they claim to be? What they don't advertise, is that
Animals share the same right as human beings. To have a right is to have a claim or entitlement to something and to have that claim recognized by others. There are two types or rights; legal and moral rights. Legal rights are comulgated by law making part of government. Moral rights are stems from reason and worth for example life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. I believe animals share both rights because the only difference between human beings and animals is basically the ability to speak.
Many people nowadays have different views on what exactly to define animals as, and whether or not they deserve any rights. Some believe that they are nothing more than a childhood pet used for entertainment, while others believe that they are beautiful exquisite animals. Currently, animals inside of a household have more rights that cattle or chicken since they are treated as another member of the family. I think that all animals are worthy of moral consideration, not just house pets, since all animals have enough intelligence to be domesticated, they can all feel emotions such as pain and happiness, they can all care about the wellbeing of others, and they all play a critical role in the circle of life.
PETA’s main principle is that “Animals are not ours to consume, wear, experiment on, or for the use of our entertainment.” In layman’s terms, animals should be able live their lives without interference from humans.
For example, PETA supposes that “animals are not ours to eat, wear, experiment on, or use for entertainment. To abide by this principle, we must leave animals free to overrun and destroy our property, to eat our food, even to kill our children” (586). In my opinion, I do not think PETA means to let the animal destroy the human’s properties or kill children. PETA just wants to let the animal have the free life, but we still put them under control. I cannot agree how the authors explain PETA’s principle, the authors approach that principle negatively and think PETA as a bad association. The Vice President of The Humane Society Michael Fox explains, “The life of an ant and that of my child should be granted equal consideration” (586). This principles is impossible true, we have to compare the value between human’s life and animal’s life. In some case, using a mouse to test vaccine can make a curve rescue million people. If the scientists do not test their vaccine or medicine on the animal, how can they see the effect of those medicines in a live body? We have used an animal to support our life for a long time. In some situations, we should use animals to make the interests of
Animal rights are another issue we are facing right now. There are many who believe that they have no rights, others say that they have the same rights as humans and others are in the middle of these two extremes issues. The topic is very complex because if animals have rights which one are those since the only way to protect them is by regulating them on how are they are treated or how can they be used. Animals are used in many ways such as food, medicine, research, cosmetics, cloth and sport among many other ways. Many who believe that the reason animals have no rights is because of the lack perception where they don’t feel or have pain like humans. There is no doubt that animals feel pain or pleasure and just for that reason they have rights, some people say. On the other hand, we cannot compare animals to humans because they are indeed different and for that reason, they cannot have the same rights. For example, animals can’t vote.
Animals’ rights have become an endeavoring issue over the last few years and really gained traction due to the works and philosophies of Peter Singer and Tom Regan. Both have concrete opinions on the way animals should be treated as if they have rights. They both go about their proposed equality in different ways and describe why we as humans have that responsibility to animals.
Animal rights groups are known for their love of animals and trying to do everything in their power to give animals rights. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), is one of the most well known and largest animal rights organizations in the world, with over 6.5 million members and supporters. Most people know what PETA’s mission is, to give animals equal rights as humans, but what many don’t know is what really goes on behind closed doors and away from the media’s eyes. PETA has some rather unquestionably gruesome truth about their organization that they try to keep hidden from their moderately populous supporters.
Animal testing, also known as animal experimentation, is the use of animals in research and development projects, usually for the purposes of determining the safety of substances such as food, cosmetics, and drugs. Research animals undergo procedures that can cause physical and psychological distress. Mostly, the animals are euthanized, or killed, after the experiments. However, many organizations such as PETA and the Animal Justice Project have brought up, and are fighting against the dangerous outcomes of animals as they undergo testing. As a result, the topic of animal testing has become a divided and controversial topic among individuals, questioning whether it is ethical and unnecessary or humane and necessary to the science development.
The method of using animals for testing of human products has been a controversial issue for the last thirty years. Animal testing has been a considerably debated practice. The question is whether animal testing is morally right or wrong. Animal testing is wrong because of the other side says that animals are the closest things to humans. Testing on animals harms the animals and does not do us any good.
Animals are used by scientists to develop research for new medications and experiments daily. The Humane Society is working to decrease the use of animals in laboratories by promoting the advancement of affective alternative approaches. Animal testing provides a useful model for treatments of diseases and possible cures. According to the US-based foundation of Biomedical Research, animal testing has made a major advance within the last century- for veterinary health and humans. The practice of using animals for testing has been debated for many decades. Is it morally right or wrong to use animals during experiments? Does federal law ensure that animals used in research are treated humanely? When considering the benefits of animal testing,
Animal rights is the idea that all animals are entitled to the possession of their own lives. It’s important to have animal rights because it prevents animals from living horrible, tortured lives for human benefit and entertainment. They have feelings and emotions too, they should be treated as humanely as possible at all times, they are not on this earth for human benefit and usage.
Now here are the true definitions of animal welfare and animal rights. Animal rights posits that humans should not use or own animals in any way, even as companions, and seeks to ultimately make a rough agenda for reality. Animal welfare is pro-animal ownership, it recognizes the human-animal bond, and recognizes the value of quality animal care and purposeful breeding and supports advancing science to ensure the health and wellbeing of companions. Animal welfare supports the practical and legal concept of animal ownership this is just to let you know what the definitions of animal welfare and animal rights are.
Many Christianity followers will agree that animal testing is okay and essential in the development of medicines and health research. They will agree with this as their religion suggests that only man has a rational soul, animals cannot attain a eternal life and that man has no obligations towards animals (DeMello, 2012). On the other hand those who practise Islam share some different opinions on animals, they condemn the use of animals for sport hunting and animal fighting, but they do however condone the use of animals for food, labour clothing and experimenting (DeMello, 2012). Also the Islam religion has a little more sympathy for animal right both religions condone the use of animals in a way that is beneficial to humans.