Proud to Be a Speciesist Stephen Rose

Ever since a young age, I have been a passionate animal enthusiast. I cannot image a life without a dog by my side. Animals are not just pets, or food, or part of the environment. They are intelligent creatures and deserve to be treated as such. Animals have evolved just as we have. The evolution theory even says humans evolved from primates. So why do animals not have rights? They have a brain and can learn and grow, just as we can. It can also be argued that animals have a soul. I believe animals not only have dignity, but they also have rights.

The other half of Singer’s notion that our society is speciesist rests on how humans treat animals to produce food. “Factory farming” techniques cause “animals [to] lead miserable lives from birth to slaughter” (Singer, Animal Liberation, p.

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.

When a cause is brought up and given light, it has a way of splitting people in how they react to it. And such has been true when it comes to granting new rights, because it’s brobdingnagian in our society that is always hungry for freedoms. We are split down the middle on whether, or not to consider animals, just like us, and thus deserve the rights we hold in our society today. On the other end, are people who don’t believe such rights should be given to animals. While the pro-arguments hold value, there is much more to see on the other end. As to why animals shouldn’t have a “Bill of Rights” like we as humans do. It’s shown in various different ways, even the most popular arguments held by the opposing side. Such as cows hurting the environment, zoo’s being inhumane, and pets. There are other factors as well to take into consideration such as food, psychology medicine, and even culture.

Creature rightsAnimals have rights. They have rights since they were made by god. All creature shouldbe treated similarly like human. Creatures are species like people. They are recently living theirown attempting to survive the world and endeavoring to live in peace.

The rights for animals is a debated topic and goes back and forth with the idea that animals should have rights just like humans. The idea that animals should have rights is argued in the article “Primates and Personhood” by Ed Yong where it speaks about how chimps and gorillas should have rights and protections. The organization GAP works on helping make laws for animal rights.

The controversy about animals should have rights or not is something that has been controversial for a while. Animals are living and breathing creatures just like the human species and humans have rights, unlike animals. Tom Regan wrote an article about how animals should have rights and gave reasons why he believes that. There are several arguments for animals should have rights just like how animals don’t deserve them. We are all animals to a point but humans have evolved, and we take care of animals by protecting them from harm.

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.

| Of course animals have rights. Just look at how powerless they are in comparison with modern humans.Answer

Animal testing is used frequently among the field of research to identify new cures of the modern science field to help cure disease, find cures, or simply identify variables in a theory. Yet, it is brought to question: is it morally wrong to test another living organism that is not a human being? Billions of animals lose their lives each year due to animal testing. Animals should be attributed to help enhance the fields of Psychological Research as long the experiments have a higher gain value than the level of cruelty that is imposed upon the animals that are being used for testing. Although the line between what is considered an effective research or pain caused for human financial benefit; there are two mindsets that are pointed out to continue animal research: the scientific view and the ethical view. But, most importantly to identify the purposes of a choice done by ethical egoism and contractarianism to benefit individuals financially and instead have utilitarianism content of moral norms to use on the animal research field.

Countless philosophers have improved their arguments against the view of animal rights; should animals even have full or equal moral rights. Stating that: (1) animals don't think, (2) animals are not really conscious, (3) animals were put on Earth to serve human beings, and (4) animals are not a member of the "moral community" (Ethics-Animal ethics: Animal rights, BBC). I will examine one of those arguments, in particular, an argument put forth by Mary Anne Warren, her argument lies with the moral standing of animals. According to Warren, some non-human animals have rights, but their rights are not as strong as the rights of humans (Warren, p. 114). Human posses’ rights in the strongest, fullest sense, because of self-awareness, whereas non-human animals may have some "weak" rights, which may or may not include a weak right to life.

He compares racism and sexism to speciesism. He claims that speciesism conveys the same concept. It highlights a sense of otherness between species. Consequently, individuals assume that it is justifiable to look down on less capable species. For instance, during colonialism the idea that other races were not capable of rational thinking was highly embraced. They established a superior race and oppressed the others. They perceived members of other races as brutes that needed to be domesticated. Nevertheless, when individuals who experienced racism proved that they were able to engage in rational thinking they were recognized as equals in society. They were able to speak their minds and protect their interests. In the case of animals, they do not have the ability to fix a social system. Nonhuman animals certainly do not have such skills. However, that does not give us the right to oppress them and ignore their interests. Someone could say that we are superior creatures and we also need to protect our interests. If that’s the case, as superior creatures we should be able to make coexistence possible. Having superior skills, such as rationality does not give you the right to discriminate against specie to benefit us. If we choose to do so, we are being speciesists. We can protect our interests without interfering with other species interests. We do not necessarily need to wear fur coats in order to

‘’Species have value in themselves, a value neither conferred nor revocable, but springing from a species’ long evolutionary heritage and potential’’ (Soule 1985).

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.

Non-human animals are given rights only because of their interactions with human beings. Without involvement with humans, animals do not deserve rights. It is through this interaction with humans that animals are even given moral consideration. We do not give rights to a rock simply because it is a creation of Mother Nature, similarly non-human animals do not have rights unless it is in regards to humans. As pointed out by Jan Narveson "morality is a sort of agreement among rational, independent, self-interested persons who have something to gain from entering into such an agreement" (192). In order to have the ability to obtain rights one must be consciously able to enter into an agreement, non-human animals are