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Post by Pimpmaster McSlap-Bitch on Jul 4, 2005 22:05:38 GMT -5
Are animals deserving of rights? Which animals? Just mammals or all of them, including fish, birds and insects? Where can we draw the line, and do we have the right to draw a line at all? If animals do deserve rights, why do you eat flesh born and grown for the purpose of killing and eating it? Would you feed a dead relative (say a parent, sibling or child) to a starving dog in order to save it`s life? What about a cat? Or a flock of vultures?
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Post by animascura on Jul 5, 2005 1:47:48 GMT -5
Hmmm.... animals deserving rights. I'm not sure what to think of that. Soon in my Political Science class we're going to have a discurrion on animal rights...and if i can stay awake enough to pay attention to her rambling maybe i can learn more about what's going on.
But here's a Pre-amble. I think there is too much personification that Human's apply over to animals. If an animal is locked up in a cage and it seems sad...i don't believe that it is depressed or that it hates humans and just needs to be cuddled. From my point of view...a monkey stuck in a cage is the same as a monkey stuck in a hole in the jungle. It is merely disheartened because it cannot get out and procreate...but i dont believe that it holds a grudge...i dont truly believe that it can hold any emotion more complicated than anger and the sense of deafeat. Certainly not more human emotions that may or may not exist in the chemical combinatin of nerves and neurons in its head.
The declaration of independence said that "all men are created equall." At that point in time it was reffering to all white men who owned property...and over time society has come to realize that this should actually mean...al men, and more importantly, all people. We're still not there but we're pretty damn close...and so long as we don't change our minds to believe that this means "All organims genetically superior than an amoeba" i believe that we should be fine. Sure animals have the right not to be torture with hot piano wire, splintered broom sticks, and babies (3-5 year olds are the worst) but lets not provide welfare and give them the right to vote.
Again...thats' just a general rant. My opinion may or may not change entirely after the discussion by the borderline hippie vegan we call "teacher."
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Post by Pimpmaster McSlap-Bitch on Jul 5, 2005 7:38:46 GMT -5
He he he, spoken like a guy with no pets. Although I have no pets myself, I`ve known enough to know that they all have distinct personalities, whether they can be called persons or not. I also know that the way you treat them has a huge influence on their personalities. Through the experiences of their own lives they can be molded into passive or aggressive creatures, active or relaxed, stupid or smart or crazy. When they`re caged, they`re upset and when they`re hurt they cry, get angry and attack, run or voice their feelings. Yup, their feelings... You can cheer them up, put them on edge or at ease through verbal communication alone. Shit, through body language alone. They can solve puzzles, follow commands, even willfully disobey commands if they wish. They can pay attention. Read that again.
That paragraph could easily be applied to humans with a few subject changes here and there. So how different are we? I find it interesting that you`d bring up the white men thing. I wonder if a black man in a cage is the same as one trapped in a hole... I mean, it is meerly disheartened because it cannot get out and procreate right (I wonder what the slave masters thought)? I`d say that among other things and I`d say the same for animals (larger mammals), for instance, both the man and animal remember life before the cage and wish to return to it, both would be happy if they were returned to it.
The locked up animal, 'seeming' sad. Seems sad? I ask you, What about a seemingly sad animal gives you the impression that it actually isn`t sad? The animals still have those most basic and primary of thoughts; those instincts we even retain today; yus, teh emotion. Lets not forget that our own emotions are primitive cognative instruments.
All logic and higher capacities for thought aside, let me steal you from your home, your stomping ground with it`s familiarity, life long friends and family and place you in a cell and tell me you won`t be sad and deeply disturbed. Or better yet, let me kick you. 5 times a day. It doesn`t take a genius to be angered and become hateful of my face after a few kicks; far from it. It takes an animal.
Rawr.
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Post by animascura on Jul 5, 2005 15:35:32 GMT -5
So it seems i just got bitchslapped in the face by a well powdered hand. : )
One thing that confused me though...was what point you were trying to make by bringing up my conversation about white and black men...i'm not sure the argument you were opposing was one that i meant...although it could easliy seem that way because of my confusing words.
I'm not sure what point i was trying to make...i do know that i was not trying to differentiate between the races. Of course a black man in a cage is not the same thing as a black man in a hole...neither is a mexican or an asian..because humans can analyze their situations. I guess in a sense animals can as well...but i was arguing, rather, that in both cases the animal is trapped. I am not sure if it can tell that it was trapped by its own stupidity or by malevolent will from a human. I'm not even certain that the point you were trying to make is the one i interpreted.
Still + 1 to karma for schoolin me :-D
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Post by Sephiroth Kaizen on Jul 5, 2005 22:07:25 GMT -5
Okay, I'll go back and read everyone else's replies, but for right now, I want to hurry up and type this before I forget wtf I wanted to say. Do animals deserve rights? Yes and no.
Yes, and here's why: I believe animals deserve rights from the environmental perspective. Animals hold a very important part in the environment and the destruction of a population of one species can throw everything out of order. Also, I don't believe in brutalizing animals... I mean that is just wrong... literally cruel. Kids who learn to take their aggression out on animals grow up to become violent criminals.
No: I only say no because some people take animal rights too far. Now, this is coming from a science major and I've owned multiple pets in my time, and I know one thing: there isn't enough love for an animal in the world to make me spend a house payment on saving my dog's leg. No offense, but it's an animal. If it got hit by a car and it had no owner, it'd make due with the injury or die.
And since about 9 people just IMed me, I've completely lost track of what I wanted to say in its entirety. I'll bbs. -_-
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Post by animascura on Jul 5, 2005 22:43:18 GMT -5
I like her answer...
that's what i wanted to say, in a nutshell..
But this "thinking of brain and making words with sense come onto a keyboard so you can of read and get me what i'm saying" thing is kinda difficult for me : (
oh how i wish i wasnt an idiot..
::Sigh::
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Post by Pimpmaster McSlap-Bitch on Jul 5, 2005 22:50:01 GMT -5
Yeah Drago, it confused me too. I had an idea of what I was gonna write, then forgot and deleted parts of it. But I guess it was a long the lines of Slave traders and masters back in the day looking at blacks as less than human, or an animal. But then it didn`t seem to be too relevant, even now, though feel free to develop the idea for me =)
So what about feeding a dead relative to, say a dog, to keep it alive, considering that feeding it would guarentee it a normal dog life and death in old age? What about the flock of vultures and what`s the difference, if any? Just curious...
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Post by Sephiroth Kaizen on Jul 6, 2005 13:46:16 GMT -5
Well, Kage, they treated blacks like less than human so it is safe to say they treated them like animals. They did deny them of rights until enough people spoke up about it.
Now feeding a dead relative to a dog... okay, this is going to be a very twisted/sadistic answer, but here goes nothing: Technically, if the person is dead... it has no soul... so I guess if the dog was hungry and rabid enough I couldn't do anything. Even though I would never voluntarily feed, for example, my grandmother to my dog. Even though they're dead, still... the body deserves some respect. On the other hand, if someone dies out in the desert or something and the only thing around is a bunch of buzzards, is it wrong for the buzzards to go after it? They're naturally scavengers and they're supposed to give up a meal because it's a human body? Some animals may not look at something like, "Oh! It's a human! Let's avoid this!"
The difference? If you die out in the desert around some scavengers, you're fair game. But if someone's feeding you to a lot of pigs, dogs whatever then there's something wrong with the person feeding them...
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Post by godsrighthand on Jul 28, 2005 23:42:25 GMT -5
I only have 1 objection to animals eating human flesh. They become use to eating it and grow acclimated to humans as food it is dangerous. Animals fear man for a reason. Without this fear more people will be injured almost always the young children fall prey to predators.
This does not however mean I support cruelty to animals in other anyway. If animals lost their fear we would have to kill many to re-instill it. It for the best not to let this happen in terms of both human and animal lives.
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Post by Sephiroth Kaizen on Jul 29, 2005 9:34:11 GMT -5
For some odd reason, when you said animals become acclimated to to human flesh, I immediately thought of the movie Ghosts in the Darkness which is based off of the true story of man-eating lions...
I guess that's a prime example of animals enjoying the rare meat a little too much. o.O
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Post by Pimpmaster McSlap-Bitch on Jul 29, 2005 13:07:19 GMT -5
We`re still animals ourselves, still flesh and bone that eats and shits. I say we need to be eaten, as horrible an experience it might be. Gazelles don`t have problems with overcrowding The furthur from natures order we stray, the furthur we mess things up for ourselves it seems, even if we`re not having our necks broken by lions. Anyway, I don`t really know the point of this post.
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Post by Sephiroth Kaizen on Jul 29, 2005 18:00:34 GMT -5
So... in essence, you're saying everyone and everything is fair game, Kage?
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Post by Makku on Jul 29, 2005 19:36:23 GMT -5
That is the way of nature, is it not?
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Post by silverscythes on Jul 30, 2005 11:08:40 GMT -5
It's all Darwinism to me. Survival of the fittest. BUT I am very serious in my belief that if you own a pet you do everything you can for them. A pet becomes your responsibility, part of your family, it's like your child. People who abandon their pets because they get bored or have a disease just disgust me.
I think more humans need to get knocked off by animals. We're animals too but we just burn up and destroy everything in our path, whereas other animals, generally, just use up what they actually need. We could learn something from that.
I think if you give one cluster of animals rights (mammals) you better give them all rights. A fish is no less than a rabbit. (and on that note, I hate vegetarians who eat fish...what are they thinking?) Insects are just as useful as cows.
I eat meat, but I wish it wasn't stuck in cages and chemicalized. I think we should at least give the animals room to graze, space to live in, if we're going to kill them right after. I'd hate to be crammed into a cage all my life, and I think it's obvious animals have feelings, basic ones at least. Animals get depression, they won't eat or sleep if something traumatic happens to them, ie: the killer whales off the coast of my island, separate one and it will search for the rest of its life for its pod, and usually starve while it does so. Dogs used in experiments refuse to eat if they're unhappy or in pain. Just like when something awful happens to us we feel a loss of appetite. You know?
So...hm..I need to organize my thoughts better. I don't think humans should be so merciless to our animal brethren. We've got an upperhand but we don't use it for any good. I think we should consider more the fine line that separates us from the rest of them. (it's language) For instance...did you know chimps can lie? They can consider and toy around with scenarios that haven't happened. Or that an octopi's brain evolved in the same ways as a human, as did its lifestyle? They used to be ocean nomads before settling in caves. When you get down to it, creatures become more and more "human" which makes me wonder if we're right in treating them the way we do.
Note: the chimp's story comes from my linguistics class, as does the revelation that it is language that separates "man" from "beast". The whales are just a known fact for anyone who lives on the NW coast of Canada. The octopi story was read in a Discovery magazine.
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Post by Pimpmaster McSlap-Bitch on Jul 30, 2005 12:33:11 GMT -5
Here here! And with that, we welcome you to Deep Thoughts. The octopus thing fascinates me, and makes me think about what parts of being human are specifically human or natural and efficient progressive evolution. I wonder what they`ll do next. They already use tools right? Apes too. Homes, families, communication, pack hunting... I suppose a look at our own evolution can provide clues as to the way life as a whole evolves. Language perhaps may be next. Marvelous But I wonder... you`ve drawn a line between humans and other animals, so why not draw a line between different types of other animals? If we have certain rights, shouldn`t all animals have the same rights? Well, no, because the difference between us is language as you said. We have the ability, the mental capacity. In that case, should the lines drawn between animals also rest on their mental abilities? A cow has something that a herring doesn`t, whatever it is. It`s smarter, and probably has more emotions (as we are to cows). But then is that to say that the animals that can`t cogitate as well as us are worth less, despite being life incarnate? I suppose the line we have that seperates us from animals also includes our dominion over their lives... dunno... perhaps that is a safe assumption. But then are lions worth more than gazelle or rats or something? Perhaps there is more than one thing that makes us different from the animals (well, yeah...), but I suppose it`s the most notable and basic that draws the boldest line. Hmmm... just free thinking here... I suppose language is the most obvious, but I`d say it`s the capacity for language, which probably isn`t too far from the capacity for communication. I know I saw a gorilla use sign language and talk to a human. That shit was plain incredible. Anyway, that`s my lot.
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