Animal rights?

Economics Political Theory
21

There are people that like to scream in pain, but they pay to have it done to themselves anyways.

So, where the hell is the consent animals gave to be put in cages?

Your consent to a dominatrix is a legal signed document, clearly documenting the rules. Where is the monkey’s?

So, there is no consent, but still an aggression is made, I still have to insist, please, show me what rights you have to do that.

If I see a man beating a girl in the street I ask what he is doing and what rights does he have (maybe its a film, a game, a sexual voluntary game…)

The same way if i see a man beating down a monkey I say the same.

The you say that I’m right, writing ‘Vocalization is not the only way to communicate.’

Of course! That is exactly what I’m saying, you kick a keyboard with signs, or shout in some frequency, well, dolphins and whales shout in others!

Blame yourself only if you are incompetent to understand the exact meaning of the whales or the dolphins, but don’t say, well, I don’t understand it, so, It can’t be a language, or a communication.

So, if a human, says please stop kicking me you understand it, but if a monkey says the same in monkey sounds, you just assume he is not communicating?

If you really use that logic in life, you will be having serious problems. So I hoped it’s just hypocrisy,

“Otherwise, every time a baby/child does not consent to what their parents want them to do, then their rights would be violated, and the parents should be punished.”

And where is the problem? Sorry I missed the chapter on ‘parents can do whatever they want to babies’.

I thought the limit was the use of aggression, your ‘duty’ as a parent maybe could go as far as putting food in the table, but that doesn’t give you a right to force the food into him, it will be his choice, he will eat when he is hungry, just leave it there until he is hungry.

Every time you ‘force’ me to answer some inane ‘questions’, the real ones are diluted and left there unanswered. You only touch some of the points you want and lots of arguments and questions I have posted are still waiting.

22

Probably because the creature in question has no comprehension of what its actions resulted in, so what sense does it make to blame it for choices it could not help but make? I’d be interested to know how you aim to demonstrate that animals do possess such a sense. BTW, don’t go on tangential rants, it only reduces the possibility of eliticitng a response.

23

“Probably because the creature in question has no comprehension of what its actions resulted in”

But you do and still continue doing them? You know animals suffer by treating them as slaves but you continue looking other way?

Responses, yeah, that could be interesing, some day maybe I’ll get one…

24

It’d be interesting if you actually had enough of an attention span and the wherewithal to answer my question, that is, why should one punish an animal to begin with if it has no comprehension of what it has done (which is why humans who violate rights are punished)? The matter of contention is whether aggressing against them is a rights violation… if it isn’t, then the prospect of punishment for it by law is thereby extinguished, absent covenantal agreements, even though the action may be otherwise distasteful or even immoral. So try focus on that.

25

Because that’s not the question, it is irrelevant and is a now different thread?

The question is, are animals our slaves? And if so, based on what?

Your question, on what bases we have to punish an animal that doesn’t understand what it’s doing.
Well, none, but you on the other side you may have a legit right to something, to own a legitimate owned property and to defend and use it. Therefore you have a right to enjoy the benefits of your labor. So, you have a right to protect what’s yours, but so do other animals too (to protect their skin, their legs from being cut and put in a grill). So you can’t go to the forest to hunt bears, but you can protect your home from bears when they enter your kitchen. So, easy, conflict avoided, everybody is happy, controlling their own life’s and not their neighbors.

26

Yet it is entirely relevant, because if you refuse to grant a basis for punishing the being for violating the rights of other animals, upon what exactly do you base recognizing rights for it?

27

The only criteria you have provided that someone is doing something wrong to an animal is that the animal did not consent to it. Along the lines of what Jon is trying to get you to understand, is that when cats mate, the femaile cat screams out in pain. Does this mean all male cats that mate should be punished for rape?

28

We are not talking about inter-cats relations, we are talking about human-cats relations!

The question, is only if humans can torture cats for fun. Nothing else, get to the point please. Say yes, human can torture them or no, they can, and give arguments for it.

29

According to you, cat-cat relations are no different from human-cat relations, as we’re all animals.

30

nibbler49, you haven’t read anything.

I ask what the human->non-humans ethic framework is, and why so.

Please, say something usefull to the debate next time.

31

Since animals do not have the ability to give consent, they do not have rights. Please, I would love for you to explain, how an animal is supposed to communicate to us that it is OK for us to kill it so we can eat it.

32

Kids can’t give consent and we don’t eat them. Orphaned kids with no ‘parents’ aren’t eaten or experimented upon. And they can’t talk or give any kind of consent, you don’t slave the baby or ‘own’ it, a baby with no parents is in a similar status to an animal, the different, animals can take care of themselves.

If you respect the baby rights, why is that? he doesn’t have any of the arguments you used, like understanding or consent. But he does have others, like self-ownership, own-directed goals and conscious-being a sentient being with emotions, feelings, passions…

So he is not a human according to the arguments you give aiming to restrict rights only to human. But he is exactly like the other animals we are talking, mammals and birds, if the baby breaks into your garden, what happens? if a bear breaks in? a cat? You will use force depending on your compassion, how much you ‘like’ the intruder…

Why do you justify going to the jungle to kidnap chimp babies and not to another jungle in the amazonas and kidnap human babies of ancient cultures and tribes that live in an allmost prehistorical evolutionary level?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_sapiens#Consciousness_and_thought

Humans are one of only six species to pass the mirror test — which tests whether an animal recognizes its reflection as an image of itself — along with chimpanzees, orangutans, Bottlenose dolphins, Asian elephants and European Magpies.[63] Most human children will pass the mirror test at 18 months old.

This fact alone destroys it all, humans are not the only self-aware! We are just more clever! But there are others who also wants to pursue their own goals with the limited resources they may be able to use! Who are you to say that elephants do not deserve to have the same right to live as you, as long as both of you don’t harm others? The only reason is being an arian, our ‘species’ is more clever and deserve to live, the others have no rights and may be tortured, exploited and killed, they are ‘inferior’. Even if they were, which in some ways they are, their abstract thinking appears to be lower than ours and overall clearly they haven’t show technology higher than spears by chimps. But technology was never an argument, it was self-awareness and self-oriented goals, and humans are not the only ones there. And if you refer to violence, well, some humans are at the top of mass-murder, and other animals like elephants are very pacific, others like dolphins only kill to eat because they can only digest fish, and sometimes they even help humans with no reason to do so. Yes, I don’t like that some chimp tribes may be violent, some human tribes are too, look at latin kings, nazi-young groups, and better not talk about the adult ones… But that doesn’t justify that all human kids should have their rights stripped because some of them sometime in some condition may be violent. Some will never be violent except in self-defense. Other animals like bonobos are a lot more pacific, so are almost all of the herviborous, and even carnivorous ones like domestic dogs can be very pacific and non-harming, there is even comercial vegetarian food for dogs and cats.

The point is that, some animals may be violent some times some way, but that is not an excuse to strip all the animal kingdom of all the rights even justifing torture on them. And having proof as we have that a lof of animals are self-aware, and control their lives and have emotions, enjoy, smile, take care of their kids, depress if they die, and live their lifes… how can you strip them of all rights, not even considering a minimal-light version, like non-agression?

33

So you are just going to ignore everything that is inconvenient for you?

We are as we are made. Crocodiles eat people. And we eat crocodiles. There is no right or wrong here. It is just how it is. Seeing how crocodiles dont feel bad about eating people I dont see why we should feel bad for eating them back.

And seeing how dogs are perfectly happy to eat beef, I dont see why I shouldnt do the same. After all am I worse than a dog? Is a dog so superior to a cow it is OK for it to eat cows, but I - only a lowly human - must feel bad about it?

Oh, but wait it is ok for dogs to eat cows, because they don`t know what they are doing, whilst we do? Well guess what, that is why it is perfectly fine to eat a dog.

This whole “they may be violent but that doesn`t mean…” sales pitch is lost on us. We are not prejudiced against “violent” animals. That is your thing.

And nobody is in favour of torture. I envision that in a free society pet shops would have buyers sign a contract that would oblige them not to torture the pets bought. And would persecute them for a breech of contract if they did. It would be great for advertisement.

34

Are you EVER going to address the issues at debate here? Are you going to reply to what I write? Or are you just going to mock me and say, ‘ha ha, crocodiles eat humans, humans eat crocodiles’. By the way, it’s FALSE, only some humans eat crocodriles, a lot of humans, 5% of all humans, like me, do not eat any kind of animal, nor use them for anything, So, do not speak in my name or over generalize. Some humans decide to eat crocodiles, some decided not to eat them, because they think it is an unnecessary and immoral act. So take back your talk that ‘humans eat that or that other thing’, some humans do and some other doesn’t and shout it is unethical. Your excuse is that some do! Is that all your argument? I shout, hey, that unjust and you defend it saying well, some people do it!

"So you are just going to ignore everything that is inconvenient for you? "

Inconvenient for me? You are the one living in disneyland saying that ‘some’ pet shops may suggest contracts for the conditions on which you will use the property you buy. It’s unnecessary for me to comment more.

As far as I know no one here has proposed any kind of ethic framework on the treatment of animals. Only the fallacious Rothbard chapter, which is filled with contradictions and is a few pages only. For the moment, all of you know that property owners have absolute decision making capabilities on the owned object. And all of you have been saying that animals are property, therefore can be tortured.

I say they can’t, it’s an unethical act of barbarism, and it’s a SHAME for the whole libertarian movement that the issues regarding the ethical treatment of animals is widely ignored. Even more when the logical conclussion is that the NAP applies to animals to, based on self-ownership and own goals using the available mediums they have. I have been pointing this out several times and I only got laughing and mocking like ‘oh, but crocodiles are bad, so we should do the same too, and behave like barbarians and rape and murder’ (the last part usually is hidden or not written directly)

35

Irrelevant. Not all crocodiles eat humans either. What matters is it would be OK if they did.

That is precisely it. I didnt say crocodiles are bad. On the contrary. I am saying they dont have the capacity to be bad. You see, I am more of an animal lover than you are. I particularly love how they taste.

Provided they do not give up that capability via a consensual contract.

An often example today are non disclosure agreements, which are perfectly legitimate despite (or because of) human self-ownership.

36

Not all of them though. I would never eat a politician.

37

Because we are not socialists and we do not advocate the socialization of services – in this case, the service we are talking about is justice.

A third party (in your example, that would be us) is not responsible for meting out justice between any other two parties (the animals).

That is a non sequitur because a violation of a right does not necessitate a punishment in response.

38

I asked whether it is reasonable to hold animals morally culpable for rights violations, and if so on what grounds. Not whether they should actually get a trial or be punished in response to a rights violation on their part, if such is possible. So there’s no “non sequitur” of which to speak.

39

This is going around in circles without touching the essentials. Morally speaking, animals can have rights. But things derived from ethics aren’t enforceable per se. On the other hand, when we look at humans we see they are capable of free association and of defending themselves. Kick an animal and he’ll do little to prevent future mistreatment, he won’t complain to his brethren about it and so on. Moreover, there’s no way an animal will seek protection from some other being, be it human or not. Just try to create an animal rights protection agency; how many animals will rally to your cause or seek protection?

The bottom line is animal rights in a moral sense can and do exist (although they’re not objectively and uniquely defined), but there’s little humans can do to enforce them. From a purely practical standpoint, these rights do not exist.

40

What does “morally” culpable mean??? as opposed to just plain culpable? You are either culpable or non-culpable.

You are asking a trivial question because the morality behind the action is irrelevent. You may as well ask whether it is reasonable to converse with animals.

For us as a group of libertarians to argue whether the actions of these animals are moral or immoral or amoral is absurd. Animals are animals and they do what animals do. If an animal attacks you or your property, you have every right to defend yourself from that attack. If an animal attacks an other animal, how they deal with the aggression is their business. Interpreting the behavior of animals from a frame of reference of morality or justice is just plain silly. You may as well discuss whether it is moral for apples to fall from the tree and hit you on the head.