Introduction to Animal Rights - Part 3 of 3

A brief introduction to Gary Francione's theory of abolitionist animal rights, taken from his book 'Introduction to Animal Rights - your child or the dog? Part 3. Gary Francione's website: www.abolitionistapproach.com

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Nonprofits & Activism

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• gary
• francione
• introduction
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• abolitionist
• animal
• rights
• vegan

[Gnomefro]

The main reason why the reasoning of the animal right's movement falls flat on its face is because it fails to take into account that there is a fundamental conflict of interests between different species on this Earth. Moral arguments simply can not be generalized the way they attempt. In fact, morality is meaningless outside of systems of cooperating agents. We even abandon large parts of moral reasoning in a range of situations where cooperation has broken down, such as war.

[TheCite]

@Gnomefro Your 'arguments' address none of the points in the videos, but I digress. The fact that human rights aren't respected in many places across the globe doesn't change the fact that we agree humans have fundamental rights that must be respected. Whether human rights violations occur, we condemn them and do our best to eliminate them. Animals are killed in industrial farming you're correct, this doesn't mean we shouldn't do our best to eliminate the harm caused as much as possible.

[TheCite]

@Gnomefro Certainly, we can never stop all animal suffering at the hands of humans because our very existence infringes on theirs. In the same sense, we can never stop all human suffering at the hands of other humans, we can only do our best to eliminate it. Blatant animal exploitation such as meat, milk, egg, leather production etc is completely unnecessary and eliminating is the least we can do.

[TheCite]

@Gnomefro In other words, what I'm saying is that veganism isn't about being perfect, it's about making an attempt to reduce your negative impact on other living creatures as much as possible, and if that isn't morality then morality has no meaning.

[Gnomefro]

So the best possible argument based on suffering any vegetarian could muster is that they kill less animals than omnivores, but if it really was wrong in any deep sense then this is a pretty weak argument. "But just murdered 10 people your honor! That guy over there's the evil one, he killed lots more!" Any consistent theory of human morality must contain the premise that life kills life across specie boundaries to survive, and that this is an amoral action.

[Gnomefro]

The whole "sentient beings have rights" argument can't even be generalized to all of humanity due to conflicts. Why on earth anyone would think it could cross specie boundaries is beyond me. Now, I don't object to people who want to consider animal suffering in meat production, or even as an argument for becoming vegetarians - but it's not a moral argument. It can't be, because even being a vegan means enlisting assassins called farmers to kill all kinds of pests and steal the land of wildlife.

[TheCite]

@angrylee1 I said plants are not sentient beings, which is clear. This isn't a little theory of mine, this is scientific fact. Plants don't have a brain, nervous system, nociceptors, benzodiazepines or any other attribute that we associate with sentience. They cannot think, feel, experience anything. They have chemical reactions to things, like a bacteria that squirms around when it is provoked, but they are not aware of anything, they cannot feel anything.

[angrylee1]

@TheCite you say plant are sentient being that have no interested in there continued existence but why then do they fight so hard to do so, tree breaking concert pushing them self to the sky for that very thing, life, all thing on this plant want life, from seed to elephant it is the only thing that everything on this plant shares, but killing a dog is teh same as killing a flower it all life coming to an end. i will not debate with you any more

[TheCite]

@angrylee1 Lee, let's be honest, every human can see the moral difference between killing a dog and a flower. Moral arguments aside, we can all see that there is a stark difference between killing an animal, and killing a plant. I'm sure you're a nice guy, and I don't want to argue for the point of arguing, I'm simply hoping that you'll consider how your actions affect other creatures, and take a positive step towards helping animals, yourself, and the planet.

[TheCite]

@angrylee1 No, I said we share no similar physiological attributes, which is completely true. Plants are living creatures, just as bacteria are. Plants are not sentient beings, unlike sentient beings, they have no interest in their continued existence, they have no interests at all. Saying that a plant 'needs' water is no different from saying that your car 'needs' gas, they need those things to survive, but they do not desire them.