I was listening to an interview with Peta activist Dan Matthews today on the radio. (I’d link to it if I could find it for you!) He recently wrote a book about trying to bring animal cruelty issues to the public called Committed.
It’s an interesting issue that I’ve been thinking about for a long time and I’m not sure yet if my life is matching up with my values. I’m still working it out. And like Alicia Silverstone says, it’s not all or nothing.
Here’s a list of what I think of animal rights and what I do:
Eating
I think that it is ok to eat animals and animal products, but not ok to be cruel to them. I don’t think raising or eating factory raised animals is ok.
What I do: I only buy fish or birds to eat. I try and buy “organic” “free range” birds and wild caught fish, but it’s really hard to tell how the animals were actually treated. It might be easier just to be vegetarian. I eat eggs but only “cage free” eggs. I buy eggs from birds raised on small farms when I come across them, even if they cost more.
The book In Defense of Food has reasonable and balanced guidelines for eating in a way that is healthy for us and the earth. He doesn’t advocate vegetarianism, but does advocate eating heavy on the vegis and light on the animals. This is more of an ecological way of looking at animal rights rather than caring about individual animals as much, but he is against eating factory raised animals.
Animals I wouldn’t eat even if I were starving. They are part of my tribe.
Hunting
Watching animals die at factories on Peta is like watching animals die on the discovery channel. It’s a harsh world in some ways, but should we contribute to that? With our human ingenuity we have really pushed cruelty over the top when it comes to killing other animals, simply due to efficiency. To bring our behavior more in balance with the rest of nature, I think we should at least be as ineffective as other predators and hunt for food we eat. (We, like wolves, are predators- see our forward facing eyes and motions.)
What I do: My behavior isn’t in line with this belief because I don’t hunt. I did go hunting with my dad and older brothers when I was a kid. They taught me how to shoot a gun. I loved hunting until they actually shot a deer. Then I cried and cried and cried.
Food I didn’t have to hunt for.
Clothing
I’m allergic to wool. I have very few shoes. A couple pairs are leather. I keep my shoes for so long (decades) that I don’t feel bad about that. If everyone had my shoe habits, very few cows would need to be killed for leather. So, I guess moderation is my general principle here. I’d definitely be willing to buy shoes made out of other materials too.
I think it’s alright to buy any kind of animal made products at a thrift store because buying them at a thrift store doesn’t contribute to the industry that makes those products.
Pets and feral animals
I have a friend who is a vegan AND a biologist. She thinks that feral cats should be killed because they upset the native bird population. It’s an interesting way of looking at the issue. As a biologist, she is looking at the population as a whole, but as a vegan, there must be some concern for the individual animals. (I think it can be successfully argued that you can raise and eat meat on small farms and other ways that are in balance with the environment.) Interesting.
I think it is horrifying to kill feral cats. I think a good thing to do with them is to catch them and spay or neuter them. Growing up, we adopted stray cats that wondered into our yard and spayed or neutered them. Last year my mom caught feral cats in her neighborhood in traps, got them spayed or neutered, and then released them back into her neighborhood. So, when it comes to these cats, I think of them as individuals, but when it comes to hunting, I’m ok with hunting for food because I’m thinking of the effect on the population overall and how it balances out ecologically.
I’m not saying either of these ways of thinking are better. I’m just thinking through this and noticing these interesting inconsistencies.
Feral cat in my mom’s backyard, neutered but not killed, and still on the prowl.
Animal Testing
Cosmetics: Absolutely not ok with me. I try and make sure I only buy things that haven’t been tested on animals. To survive, I can understand eating other animals, but for the sake of looking cuter?? No way.
Medical testing
This one is tricky. There is A LOT of lab work being done on animals in research centers and universities. I would never do this work. Does this make me a hypocrite for using the medicine that comes out of this work? My Granddad is on three medications for Alzheimer’s right now. I’m glad this medicine exists. It seems likely that it was tested on animals. What do you think about using this medicine?
I went to a lecture at the university I was working at. What they found out was facinating and might help humans a lot, but when I heard how they figured it out using lab animals, I wanted to cry and retch. After seeing that presentation I thought, maybe it isn’t so tricky. Maybe the sum total of what we’ve gained by dissecting creatures physically and dissecting reality into it’s component bits in our Western intellectual tradition does not equal what we would have if we lived and thought more holistically.
Granddad who I love very much who is helped by medication probably tested on other animals.
What do you think about these issues? I would love to hear from you.
Thoughts? Insights that makes any of this more clear? Any of your own inconsistencies that you notice?
Related posts
Tags: animal rights, animals, cats, clothes, drawrings/art, feral cats, food, love, medical testing, PETA, pets, university, work
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March 24, 2008 at 12:55 pm
Tracy
I’m glad you’re thinking about what you eat, which is more than a lot of people do. But I’d like to counter some of your points.
Slaughtering animals to eat them is cruel.
Did you know that chickens are not covered in the Animal Welfare Act, yet 95%-99% of the animals we kill for food are chickens?
“Cage-free” chickens are often still in overcrowded, feces-laden buildings.
Regarding hunting, if you want to be like other predators, then leave the guns at home and hunt with your teeth and hands. You’ll quickly find that we were not made to eat meat.
———————-
Like animals? http://www.chooseveg.com/vegetarians-save-lives.asp
Wanna lose weight? http://www.chooseveg.com/obesity.asp
Care about the environment? http://www.chooseveg.com/global-warming.asp
March 25, 2008 at 7:30 am
Bea Elliott
Hello - seems like you are giving this whole animal’s as industry a good questioning…. You say “I think that it is ok to eat animals and animal products, but not ok to be cruel to them.” ….. Well - most would include killing as cruelty - especially if the animal wasn’t suffering - like putting a sick pet to sleep. If you don’t think it’s okay to be cruel - the end game is…… you might not think it’s “okay” to eat them. I’ve been vegetarian/vegan for years. It’s not difficult to find the right things to replace the “wrong” things. I’m healthy and spiritually at peace. I know I can’t prevent all animal suffering - but can prevent a small percentage of the 10 billion animals a year killed for “food” from dieing on my behalf.
And a final note on animal testing - 80% of tests done on animals have misleading results - tests still must be performed on humans. Most labs repeat needless experiments in order to get more funding and grants from the government….. that’s how that system works. Also, Alzheimer’s has been linked to animal based diets:http://www.madcowboy.com/01_FactsHH.000.html and many cancers:http://www.thechinastudy.com/about.html
I’d highly recommend trying a plant based diet: http://www.govegan.com
It’ wonderful - for health & the animals….. Peace.
March 25, 2008 at 10:10 pm
Braidwood
Tracy and Bea,
I’m glad to get both of your comments. I thought I might get some animal rights activists to come over with my title. Still, I would like to see some commenters with some willingness to be a little bendy/open minded and see how people might look at this from a different perspective.
I understand though when people are passionate about an issue that of course they want to testify and it sounds like you are both on a mission to educate people about your admittedly healthy life-style.
And, I don’t think there is anything wrong with being vegan or vegetarian. So, proselytize away!
Tracy, people have been hunting for a long time before there were guns. Many people in the world still hunt without guns. I don’t think the argument that we “are not made to eat meat” holds or is necessary even if vegan/vegetarian is the only moral choice. We ARE omnivores. I’ve got the eye teeth and forward facing eyes to prove it. That doesn’t mean that it’s moral to eat meat just because we evolved as predatory animals though.
Also, in Utah, when there were not enough deer being killed by hunters one winter, many deer died of starvation because there were too many of them for the land to support and not enough predators to kill them. I don’t know. I hate even watching animals die on the discovery channel, but it seems to be how the world works. There needs to be a balance between predators and prey to keep everyone healthy. What do you think of this?
(I know this has nothing to do with factory raised animals which is a totally different story.)
March 26, 2008 at 11:00 am
Vikadeva
Hi Braidwood,
I think you are on the right way as you try to live with ethics in mind. I am vegan (you are not lucky with the type of people who respond to your post, sorry :)), but I agree with you things aren’t as simple as they seem to be. I avoid products containing animal ingredients/tested on animals as much as possible.
But if my family member were in danger, I would probably get them the medicine advised by doctors, even if it was animal-tested. When I need to wash my hands in the public restroom I use soap provided, which is not vegan etc.
But at the same time I am happy to make an effort to put time in finding cruelty-free alternatives.
Deers story is indeed sad, but somehow I don’t think that humans are supposed to interfere with nature or have a capacity “to regulate” it. We are so technologically advanced that it seems we are no longer a part of nature, but nature’s destroying power.
It is true that humans used to hunt long before guns, but can we really compare a contemporary hunter with cool gun and a backpack with turkey sandwiches behind his back to an ancient man, half-nude, hungry, needing to provide for the family, risking to become a victim of a stronger and faster predator he may come across in the forests?
To me a hunter that goes after deer is almost like a tiger fighting a Roman gladiator who does not have sword nor shield. - it is not an equal fight in either case, and there is no glory there, no sense.
According to human ethics, the way I understand it, if you kill another human being in order to survive, it is not a murder (war, maniac attacks you etc), but if you kill another man for any other reason, you are likely to be jailed, and in some countries even executed.
There must be a common sense of ethics in relation to both humans and animals. Nobody proved the necessity of killing animals in contemporary world in order to survive. Medical tests can be carried out without using animals, there are lots of happy and healthy vegan families raising healthy and happy vegan kids, there are lots of animal-friendly warm clothes alternatives that will keep you toasty warm during Alaskan winter… So why kill the beasts?
Well, that’s my point…sorry that’s a long post :)
March 27, 2008 at 6:23 pm
Braidwood
“…I am vegan (you are not lucky with the type of people who respond to your post, sorry :))”
:) I think I’m lucky. Thank you for responding, Vikadeva. I appreciate you sharing the things that you do and don’t do that strictly are in line with your ethics. And I appreciate you responding because I am trying to live ethically and I want to hear how real people actually navigate their principles.
I also appreciate the idea of relating the ethics of killing humans to the ethics of killing other kinds of animals. I will think about that.
And you are right, I don’t need to eat meat to survive.
Another thing about hunting- some people are still poor enough in this country that hunting is an important way for them to get food when it is hard for them otherwise… I know it’s hard for some of us to imagine, but I grew up some what poor and there is a bigger gap in our country between rich and poor than is sometimes visible.
(I grew up around many hunters and I requested that no one ever shoot anything around me, and I wouldn’t date anyone who hunted! :) So it is ironic that I am now defending hunting in a way. I think I finally realized how inconsistent it is for someone who eats meat to be against hunting! I AM definitely still against hunting for sport, including any hunting where people don’t eat the animal.)
My previous co-workers assumed that I was a vegetarian because I eat don’t eat meat that often, but I do really want to explore the ethics of this issue. I do think it is nuanced. And I really appreciate hearing what other people think AND what they actually do.
March 28, 2008 at 4:35 pm
Yak
nice pic of your Grandad - hmm - some thought provoking comments - I just have to respond a little to one that says we shouldn’t interfere with nature - the problem is we already have - for example - feral cats are not a main reason for the loss of birds - a much larger cause is the loss of habitat - if the large expanses of forest still existed . . .
In what forests we do have, the deer are over-populated causing a loss of diversity of plant species - that and the move in of invasive, non-native species . . so, culling the herd would be environmentally a good thing to do.
I agree, we should prevent animal cruelty . . but death is a normal part of life . . I think eating animals can be ok - I think a chicken will not be highly mourned by it’s fellow chickens, as would be an elephant, say. I think it is more important to consider the place the animal has in the environment as a whole - I think it would be really wrong to kill an animal from an endangered species. Also, animals whose artificial-raising leads to a degradation of the world environment - like deforrestation to raise cattle, or pollution caused by some fish farms - would make using that animal’s use for food prohibitive.
Our bay is nearly dead - & a lot by pollution from farmers who over fertilize - for raising . . plants!
We have made strides in preventing illnesses which previously caused lots of deaths in 3rd world countries . . in some of these same areas, birth-control is needed so that the overpopulating caused by more survivors doesn’t lead to out-stripping the resources.
Can we tread more gently, drive more slowly. I commend your use of resources.