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Persuasive Essay : Animal Testing : Wrong Or Wrong?

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Animal testing

Can anyone seriously say that they would like to be poisoned, burned, starved or killed? Well that is what happens to millions of animals a year, anywhere between ten and one hundred million in fact. Animal testing, is the process in which (non-human) animals are used in research to help predict the effects of a medicine, cosmetic appliance etc on the human body. Most of these experiments force the animal in question to undergo something that is likely to cause pain, suffering or lasting harm. There are many arguments as to why animal testing is needed, and in some cases why it is right. But for every one of them, there are ten times as many reasons as to why it is wrong and unnecessary. And so there should be. So many animals annually are killed for things such as makeup and shampoo, and yet the companies who do this try to justify why it is okay. Why it is necessary. It’s ridiculous.

One of the most common points put across by those who are all for animal testing, is that it has contributed to many life saving cures and treatments. Although that may be true, it’s clear to see that those people aren’t trying to view the tests from the animal in questions position. Animals are like humans in many ways, for example physiologically and anatomically. And like humans, they behave in a way that puts across meaning, like the hyper and energetic dashing to and fro that a pet dog does when it hears the word ‘walk’. As we cannot read another persons mind, then the only way in which we believe they have the same feelings as we do, is that they closely resemble us in behaviour and appearance. In this case, if animals resemble us closely, both physiologically and behaviourally, then they must be able to feel the same way as we do, and to treat them differently because they are of a different species, would only be discrimination of the sort like racism and sexism.

Assuming that animals can feel like we do then, which is almost undoubtedly true, then they are put through immense amounts of physical and mental torture in the name of science and medicine. An example of this is the ‘draize’ eye test. This is mainly used in the cosmetics industry, where an animal, generally rabbits, are incapacitated with

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