Ethics related to animal rights has, over the last few years, emerged as a keynote debate within philosophy and society. This varies from factory farming to animal testing, which contains a whole array of practices that lead to very deep moral questions. Should animals have moral consideration, and if so, to what degree? This debate tends to polarize utilitarian principles and rights-based ethics, each, of course, offering their own manner of considering the question of value in animal life. Contrasting Viewpoints: A blog considering these contrasting viewpoints examines why animal rights continue to stir both controversy and reflection.
Why Consider Animal Rights?
The core of the animal rights debate-the very axis on which this debate rotates-is whether animals have moral standing with ensuing rights or whether they are simply resources for human beings to utilize and exploit as they see fit. The question challenges us to reassess our relationship with animals and the ethical dimensions of our interactions with them. Greater awareness and recognition of animal sentience-that is, the capacity of animals to experience pain, pleasure, and emotions-have convinced many that humans have a serious moral duty of consideration to these animals. However, there is considerable disagreement over the degree of this duty and what, precisely, it involves.
Philosophers and ethicists have presented two general schemes for tackling the question: utilitarianism and rights-based ethics. Both theories have certain strengths and weaknesses; likewise, both carry with them different perspectives through which one can view the ethics of animal rights.
The Utilitarian Perspective: Weighing Pain and Pleasure
Utilitarianism generally represents consequentialism that strives to maximize happiness while minimizing suffering; it has been popularized by thinkers like Jeremy Bentham and Peter Singer. The utilitarian way of considering things would grant moral consideration in so far as the animals are capable of suffering. Indeed, if one may recall what was famously asked by Bentham, “The question is not, Can they reason? nor, Can they talk? but, Can they suffer?
Utilitarianism is of the view that it is enough for the inclusion of animals in our moral considerations that animals can suffer and/or feel pleasure.
Utilitarians take the view that if performing an action involves the infliction of pain upon animals unnecessarily, then such actions are morally wrong. From that perspective, factory farming, for example, remains morally intolerable due to its extreme forms of confinement and intense treatment of animals; such treatments produce immense suffering with hardly any benefits that could accrue from such treatment. This has culminated in the animal welfare movement upping the ante in its influence and rallying for more humane treatment of animals, plant-based diets, and alternatives to animal testing. However, everyone’s favorite utilitarianism is certainly not one. The major critique against utilitarianism is that it justifies actions which may actually cause harm to individual animals provided the general outcome results in greater happiness. Such is the case where, hypothetically, animal testing can save millions of human lives; a utilitarian would justify the suffering of these test animals.
The problem in all this, however, is that it can very easily permit the exploitation of animals if the benefits derived by humans outweigh harm to animals.
The Rights-Based Approach: Animals as Individuals with Inherent Value Contrasting with utilitarianism, rights-based ethics consider that animals have inherent rights, similar in kind to basic human rights, which should protect them from harm regardless of potential benefits to others. This is based on the belief that animals, like humans, are ends in themselves and should not be used as a means to an end for human purposes.
Those philosophers-most notably Tom Regan and Gary Francione-who do support this approach, support the right of animals to live free of exploitation and unnecessary suffering.
This is a rights-based theory that rejects altogether the idea of using animals as one would means to an end, even if it would serve a greater human good. For instance, the philosophy of Regan would say that the animal world should be treated as “subjects of a life,” living beings that have a valuable, concrete interest in their own existence, including desires and a further life. In other words, this perspective would find practices such as factory farming, hunting for sport, and testing on animals wrong in principle in that they violate the right of animals to live freely, without suffering. One of the strengths of rights-based ethics concerns dignity and the value of the individual animal. On the other hand, much criticism of this approach involves citing such an extension of the same basic rights to animals that would have a number of absurdly unworkable and radical consequences-from an entirely abolitionist stance toward animal husbandry to making it impossible even to keep companion animals.
The critics also question where to draw the line-whether all animals have equal rights, or it has to be granted on the basis of the set criterion of advanced cognitive abilities or sentience.
Common Ground: A Balance
Though utilitarianism and rights-based ethics provide somewhat contrasting views, there is indeed a general growing movement to come to a more balanced approach in respect to animal rights. Most ethicists and animal welfare advocates believe that the best of both philosophies can be melded into a more sensitive yet practical ethical code. This can, for example, include knowing that though animals have no rights comparable to those of humans, they still have to have moral consideration since they can suffer and live their lives.
Another escape from this dilemma is the principle of equal consideration of interests, wherein it states that animal interests ought to be taken into consideration alongside human interests but not necessarily on the same level. For example, the interest of an animal in not being in unnecessary pain should precede the light human interest in the taste of a certain type of meat. While this middle-ground approach attempts to respect animal welfare, it doesn’t equate animal rights with human rights.
Role of Society and Legislation
The emerging awareness of animal rights has come to bring about sea changes in social perception and the degree of legal protection accorded to animals. Most countries have laws that forbid practices considered cruel, impose control on animal testing, and raise the level of welfare requirements in animal husbandry. For instance, animal testing, in certain respects, has strict limitations in the European Union, whereas in the United States, different states have banned the use of gestation crates on pigs.
Yet so much more still needs to be done. The abuse of animals in factory farming, fashion, and diversions of various sorts-induces ethical problems. The more people continue to learn about these occurrences, the greater their demand for humane and ethical options, including plant-based products, cruelty-free cosmetic goods, and responsible wildlife tourism.
Conclusion: Do Animals Deserve Moral Consideration?
Does animal morality undermine ethical, philosophical, and practical reasons for moral consideration? Strong arguments are advanced from the point of view of both utilitarianism and rights-based ethics, neither of which fully settles the question. In the end, a gradually broadening realization of animal sentience and acknowledgment of a capacity to suffer have gradually been succeeding in swaying public opinion toward greater compassion and ethical responsibility. The more one explores the ethics of animal rights, the more a salient point rings clear: how we treat animals does, indeed, speak volumes about ourselves as a society. Whether through reforming laws, shifting consumer habits, or engendering a deep philosophical shift, the extension of moral consideration to animals makes for a world that is more humane and ethical.
In this case, the balance in approach will respect animal dignity and, at the same time, attend to practical realities in our interrelated lives.
Ethical treatment of animals, other than being a branch of philosophy, reflects our humanity in a world where every decision makes real results invisible to us.
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