Response to Bridgette-"Ethics of Hunting"

Bridgette talks about hunting in her post, and asks whether it is ethical to kill an animal if it is done painlessly. This goes back to Kaldewaij's argument about the harm of death. As I have said before on my blog, I don't think animals (or humans) are harmed by death, but I do think it is still unethical to kill an animal (or a human) unless there is a good reason to do so. A "good reason" would usually be in the animal's best interest (euthanasia) or self defense (an animal is attacking a human). I would not qualify hunting for food as a "good reason". Hunting for food is still hunting for sport- you're just being resourceful of what's left. It is not ethical to kill a human and eat his or her flesh except for maybe in extreme circumstances, because you don't need to eat human flesh in order to eat. You can get food from many other places. Similarly, it is not ethical to kill an animal for food because you don't need to get your food from animals. I am convinced that hunting is always done as a sport; people wouldn't do it if they didn't find it fun. I think people get a thrill out of killing something without being held morally responsible for it. Killing is power, and people like to feel powerful. Our culture is strangely fixated with killing and violence. It is in our everyday language; we use violent or rape imagery to convey an achievement ("We killed the opposing football team" or "I raped that math test"). Because this glorification of violence is so embedded in our culture, hunting might seem like no big deal, but if you analyze the arguments hunters give for what they do, it is clear that there is no moral justification for the sport of hunting.
Question: Is there another justification for hunting that I have missed?

Absolutism versus Incrementalism

Today in class we talked about absolutism and incrementalism. We discussed whether the meat industry should be reformed (incrementalism) or abolished completely (absolutism). I believe that, if there is something wrong with the world, we need to work towards getting rid of it completely, not making it a little less wrong. I understand that it is easier and probably more practical to just work within the system to make conditions a little better, but if you truly believe that animals deserve rights and freedom, then you are betraying yourself and your beliefs if you don't try to change the system. An incrementalist view is a compromise; matters such as life and death (and animal welfare is a matter of life and death) should not be handled this way. When slavery was still happening in the U.S., an incrementalist view of slavery could be "let's just try and make living conditions for slaves better. Abolishing slavery will never happen; we should focus our efforts on making slavery a little less miserable." The slavery analogy is dramatic, but it is a fair comparison. People sometimes don't realize that it is possible to change the world. You don't have to believe those pessimistic ideas that "that's just the way the world is" and "no one ever said life was fair". If you have a sense of what is right and what is wrong, then you should honor that by not compromising your beliefs. Question: What is a good defense of incrementalism?

Animal Consumption and Dominance (Response to Todd)

Todd suggested that perhaps we associate animal consumption with "strength" because we view the consumption of animals as a form of dominance. I think this is a really good point and I agree with it. We, as humans, are consumers in every sense of the word. We need to buy, eat, own, and dominate to feel superior. Humans value things like money, property, and goods. We also tend to value concrete things over abstract ideas such as love or happiness. We measure wealth by what tangible items somebody has. To love something, to nurture something, or to care for something is seen as "weak" and feminine (as if those two things are synonymous). Therefore, a vegan or vegetarian is seen as weaker than a person who eats meat because killing and consuming are seen as powerful (and masculine) things. Since our society values things that are typically masculine over things that are typically feminine, the violence and domination associated with consuming animals are considered positive. Question: Why does our society view violence and domination as a good thing, but view love and nurturance as a bad thing?

Response to Bridgette ("Harm From Death")

Bridgette asked if animals (and humans for that matter) truly are harmed by death, as Kaldewaij suggests, if they can't reflect on their lost time and experiences, since they are dead. I think this is a really interesting question. When I first read Kaldeqaij's article I agreed with her that animals are harmed by death. However, now that I'm thinking about it more, I think it is morally wrong to unnecessarily end an animals life, but it does not harm the animal. If an animal isn't aware that it is about to die, or it isn't capable of understanding the concept of death (these are two big ifs), then it is not harmed by a painless death. I would say the same thing for humans; if a human wasn't aware that it was about to die then I don't think the human was harmed (if it was done painlessly). I understand I am taking some leaps here by saying that 1) the death must be painless, 2) the animal can't know it is going to die, and 3) the animal can't understand the concept of death, but if these three things are true then I don't agree with Kaldewaij that animals are harmed by death.

With that being said, I do think it is morally wrong to end an animals life (not including special cases). Even though an animal wont know it is missing out on its future, you are still taking something from the animal. If you steal from somebody, and the person never notices, it was still wrong. However, maybe this is like Kant's argument about kicking the dog; it is morally wrong to steal from someone who wont notice or end an unsuspecting animal's life because it harms the character of the person doing these things. My question is: Do we tend to do the right thing because it is good for other people, or because it is good for ourselves?

Animal Rights and Young People (Response to Shelby)

Shelby asked "Did you ever have the revelation of realizing that the meat you were eating was an actual, once living animal? How did this affect your diet?". I can't remember when I made the connection about what meat actually is, but when I was 8 or 9 I became a strict vegetarian (without the help of my parents, something that I now realize was probably dangerous) as a protest of the meat industry. I was very vocal about animal rights, but for some reason people never took it seriously. My parents tried to be respectful, but my brothers, cousins, friends, and even aunts and uncles would taunt me about my decision. They would shove meat in my face, chase me around the yard with it, and make rude "jokes" about my vegetarianism. People also always tried to talk me out of my decision. They would say things like "Oh come on, it's already dead, what difference does it make if you eat it now?" Somehow they couldn't understand that I didn't want to participate in a violent and abusive tradition. When I was ten, I wrote a complaint letter to McDonalds for using animal fat in their french fries. I also "protested" outside of McDonalds with posters I made. Even though I think it's important for young people to start becoming passionate about issues, and even though those things I did were significant in my development as a political and opinionated person, people again treated me as if I was silly for caring so much.

Question 1: Why are people concerned with animal rights often not taken seriously?

Question 2: Why are young people concerned with anything not taken seriously?

Response to "In Defense of Lady Gaga"

Becca wrote a post defending Lady Gaga's "meat dress" because in some sense, it was subversive and challenging to our social norms. She argued that one interpretation of the dress is that it brought attention to the objectification of both women and animals. In a way, I see Becca's point, because this dress probably caused a lot of people to think about the way we treat both animals and women, but just because something generates good discussion doesn't mean it is good in itself. The fact is, Lady Gaga objectified both herself and animals. If that starts a discussion about the objectification of animals and/or women-while those discussions are important to have-it doesn't justify the dress itself. I always wonder why people think things like this are subversive; she is not truly challenging our society for objectifying women, she herself is participating in the objectification of women and animals. Just because she brought attention to this issue doesn't mean it was an appropriate way to protest it.

It is very common for people to use shock value in order to get a message across. I have already blogged about PETA's horrible tactics for raising awareness to their issues. People go to shock value because it is easy. Doing something shocking will catch people's attention; educating people on the issue you are interested in is a lot harder. Keane posted this quote recently: "noble things are difficult." I think this is usually true. It is hard to promote change for important issues, but you have do it the right way in order for it to have any merit.

Question 1: Are there any redeeming qualities about using a "shock value" tactic?

Question 2: Is Lady Gaga's meat dress any worse than wearing leather or fur?

Hierarchical Thinking

When we talk about issues such as animal ethics, the discussion about who deserves rights often leads to hierarchical thinking- that is, ranking things in order of how much they matter (often in relation to the person doing the ranking). It may be human nature to want to categorize everything and place a certain value on everything, but that does not mean it is correct to do so. It is important to recognize that things we cannot directly relate to, such as animals, are simply different than us, not necessarily better or worse, smarter or stupider, more important or less important. Somebody said in class that is impossible to get rid of our human bias, and it's not wrong to have it. While this is true, we need to keep in mind that since we can't think independently of our experiences as human, we also can't truly judge the value of an animal, because we are not objective (and never will be). We can all probably agree that the quote "better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a pig satisfied" is speciesist, but no human would trade their life for a pig's because we will always prefer our own species over another. It's not our fault that we have this bias, but we have to be aware of it and we shouldn't categorize things in relation to us. We show preference towards animals that are more like humans (such as apes) over animals that don't have many human-like qualities (such as ants). These preferences rely on the premise that human-like traits are the criteria for moral consideration. This is problematic because it is a form of prejudice; it is favoring sameness over difference. We need to accept differences as just that: differences, not deficiencies.

Question: If animals have some skills that humans lack (such as a dog's sense of hearing), why do we still place humans at the top of the hierarchy?