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Animal rights is the philosophy according to which many or all sentient animals have moral worth that is independent of their
utility As a topic of economics, utility is used to model worth or value. Its usage has evolved significantly over time. The term was introduced initially as a measure of pleasure or happiness as part of the theory of utilitarianism by moral philosoph ...
for humans, and that their most basic interests—such as avoiding suffering—should be afforded the same consideration as similar interests of human beings. Broadly speaking, and particularly in popular discourse, the term "animal rights" is often used synonymously with "animal protection" or "animal liberation". More narrowly, "animal rights" refers to the idea that many animals have fundamental rights to be treated with respect as individuals—rights to life, liberty, and freedom from torture that may not be overridden by considerations of aggregate welfare. Many advocates for animal rights oppose the assignment of moral value and fundamental protections on the basis of species membership alone. This idea, known as
speciesism Speciesism () is a term used in philosophy regarding the treatment of individuals of different species. The term has several different definitions within the relevant literature. A common element of most definitions is that speciesism involves t ...
, is considered by them to be a prejudice as irrational as any other. They maintain that animals should no longer be viewed as property or used as food, clothing, entertainment, or beasts of burden because their status as a different species from humans should not give them different rights from humans. Multiple cultural traditions around the world such as
Jainism Jainism ( ), also known as Jain Dharma, is an Indian religion. Jainism traces its spiritual ideas and history through the succession of twenty-four tirthankaras (supreme preachers of ''Dharma''), with the first in the current time cycle bein ...
,
Taoism Taoism (, ) or Daoism () refers to either a school of philosophical thought (道家; ''daojia'') or to a religion (道教; ''daojiao''), both of which share ideas and concepts of Chinese origin and emphasize living in harmony with the '' Ta ...
,
Hinduism Hinduism () is an Indian religion or '' dharma'', a religious and universal order or way of life by which followers abide. As a religion, it is the world's third-largest, with over 1.2–1.35 billion followers, or 15–16% of the global p ...
,
Buddhism Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religions, Indian religion or Indian philosophy#Buddhist philosophy, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha. ...
,
Shintoism Shinto () is a religion from Japan. Classified as an East Asian religion by scholars of religion, its practitioners often regard it as Japan's indigenous religion and as a nature religion. Scholars sometimes call its practitioners ''Shintois ...
and
Animism Animism (from Latin: ' meaning ' breath, spirit, life') is the belief that objects, places, and creatures all possess a distinct spiritual essence. Potentially, animism perceives all things— animals, plants, rocks, rivers, weather syst ...
also espouse some forms of animal rights. In parallel to the debate about moral rights, law schools in North America now often teach
animal law Animal law is a combination of statutory and case law in which the nature legal, social or biological of nonhuman animals is an important factor. Animal law encompasses companion animals, wildlife, animals used in entertainment and animals raise ...
, and several legal scholars, such as Steven M. Wise and
Gary L. Francione Gary Lawrence Francione (born May 1954) is an American academic in the fields of law and philosophy. He is Board of Governors Professor of Law and Katzenbach Scholar of Law and Philosophy at Rutgers University in New Jersey. He is also a visitin ...
, support the extension of basic legal rights and
person A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of prope ...
hood to non-human animals. The animals most often considered in arguments for personhood are
hominids The Hominidae (), whose members are known as the great apes or hominids (), are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: '' Pongo'' (the Bornean, Sumatran and Tapanuli orangutan); ''Gorilla'' (the ...
. Some animal-rights academics support this because it would break through the species barrier, but others oppose it because it predicates moral value on mental complexity, rather than on sentience alone. , 29 countries had enacted bans on hominoid experimentation;
Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...
has granted a captive
orangutan Orangutans are great apes native to the rainforests of Indonesia and Malaysia. They are now found only in parts of Borneo and Sumatra, but during the Pleistocene they ranged throughout Southeast Asia and South China. Classified in the genu ...
basic human rights since 2014. Outside the order of primates, animal-rights discussions most often address the status of mammals (compare
charismatic megafauna Charismatic megafauna are animal species that are large—in the relevant category that they represent—with symbolic value or widespread popular appeal, and are often used by environmental activists to gain public support for environmentalist go ...
). Other animals (considered less sentient) have gained less attention;
insects Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body (head, thorax and abdomen), three pairs of j ...
relatively little (outside
Jainism Jainism ( ), also known as Jain Dharma, is an Indian religion. Jainism traces its spiritual ideas and history through the succession of twenty-four tirthankaras (supreme preachers of ''Dharma''), with the first in the current time cycle bein ...
), and animal-like
bacteria Bacteria (; singular: bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one Cell (biology), biological cell. They constitute a large domain (biology), domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometr ...
(despite their overwhelming numbers) hardly any. The vast majority of animals have no legally recognised rights. Critics of animal rights argue that nonhuman animals are unable to enter into a social contract, and thus cannot be possessors of rights, a view summed up by the philosopher
Roger Scruton Sir Roger Vernon Scruton (; 27 February 194412 January 2020) was an English philosopher and writer who specialised in aesthetics and political philosophy, particularly in the furtherance of traditionalist conservative views. Editor from 1982 ...
(1944–2020), who writes that only humans have duties, and therefore only humans have rights. Another argument, associated with the
utilitarian In ethical philosophy, utilitarianism is a family of normative ethical theories that prescribe actions that maximize happiness and well-being for all affected individuals. Although different varieties of utilitarianism admit different charac ...
tradition, maintains that animals may be used as resources so long as there is no unnecessary suffering; animals may have some moral standing, but they are inferior in status to human beings, and any interests they have may be overridden, though what counts as "necessary" suffering or a legitimate sacrifice of interests can vary considerably. Certain forms of animal-rights activism, such as the destruction of fur farms and of animal laboratories by the
Animal Liberation Front The Animal Liberation Front (ALF) is an international, leaderless, decentralized political and social resistance movement that engages in and promotes non-violent direct action in protest against incidents of animal cruelty. It originated in th ...
, have attracted criticism, including from within the animal-rights movement itself, and have prompted reaction from the
U.S. Congress The United States Congress is the legislature of the federal government of the United States. It is bicameral, composed of a lower body, the House of Representatives, and an upper body, the Senate. It meets in the U.S. Capitol in Washin ...
with the enactment of laws, including the
Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act The Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act (AETA) of 2006 is a United States federal law (; ) that prohibits any person from engaging in certain conduct "for the purpose of damaging or interfering with the operations of an animal enterprise." The statut ...
, allowing the prosecution of this sort of activity as
terrorism Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of criminal violence to provoke a state of terror or fear, mostly with the intention to achieve political or religious aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violen ...
.


History


In religion

For some the basis of animal rights is in religion or animal worship (or in general nature worship), with some religions banning killing of any animal, and in other religions animals can be considered unclean.
Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...
and
Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...
societies abandoned animal sacrifice and embraced vegetarianism from the 3rd century BCE.Garner (2005), pp. 21–22. One of the most important sanctions of the
Jain Jainism ( ), also known as Jain Dharma, is an Indian religion. Jainism traces its spiritual ideas and history through the succession of twenty-four tirthankaras (supreme preachers of ''Dharma''), with the first in the current time cycle being ...
,
Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...
and
Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...
faiths is the concept of ahimsa, or refraining from the destruction of life. According to Buddhist belief, humans do not deserve preferential treatment over other living beings. The
Dharmic Dharma (; sa, धर्म, dharma, ; pi, dhamma, italic=yes) is a key concept with multiple meanings in Indian religions, such as Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Sikhism and others. Although there is no direct single-word translation for '' ...
interpretation of this doctrine prohibits the killing of any living being. Ancient
Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nativ ...
works such as the
Tolkāppiyam ''Tolkāppiyam'', also romanised as ''Tholkaappiyam'' ( ta, தொல்காப்பியம், ''lit.'' "ancient poem"), is the most ancient extant Tamil grammar text and the oldest extant long work of Tamil literature. The surviving manus ...
and
Tirukkural The ''Tirukkuṟaḷ'' ( ta, திருக்குறள், lit=sacred verses), or shortly the ''Kural'' ( ta, குறள்), is a classic Tamil language text consisting of 1,330 short couplets, or kurals, of seven words each. The tex ...
contain passages that extend the idea of non-violence to all living beings. In Islam, animal rights were recognized early by the Sharia. This recognition is based on both the
Qur'an The Quran (, ; Standard Arabic: , Quranic Arabic: , , 'the recitation'), also romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a revelation from God. It is organized in 114 chapters (pl.: , s ...
and the
Hadith Ḥadīth ( or ; ar, حديث, , , , , , , literally "talk" or "discourse") or Athar ( ar, أثر, , literally "remnant"/"effect") refers to what the majority of Muslims believe to be a record of the words, actions, and the silent approva ...
. In the Qur'an, there are many references to animals, detailing that they have souls, form communities, communicate with God and worship Him in their own way.
Muhammad Muhammad ( ar, مُحَمَّد;  570 – 8 June 632 CE) was an Arab religious, social, and political leader and the founder of Islam. According to Islamic doctrine, he was a prophet divinely inspired to preach and confirm the mo ...
forbade his followers to harm any animal and asked them to respect the rights of animals. According to
Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global pop ...
, all animals, from the smallest to the largest, are cared for and loved. According to the Bible, "All these animals waited for the Lord, that the Lord might give them food at the hour. The Lord gives them, they receive; The Lord opens his hand, and they are filled with good things". It further says
God In monotheistic thought, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. Swinburne, R.G. "God" in Honderich, Ted. (ed)''The Oxford Companion to Philosophy'', Oxford University Press, 1995. God is typically ...
"gave food to the animals, and made the crows cry."


Philosophical and legal approaches


Overview

The two main philosophical approaches to animal ethics are utilitarian and rights-based. The former is exemplified by
Peter Singer Peter Albert David Singer (born 6 July 1946) is an Australian moral philosopher, currently the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University. He specialises in applied ethics and approaches ethical issues from a Secularit ...
, and the latter by
Tom Regan Tom Regan (; November 28, 1938 – February 17, 2017) was an American philosopher who specialized in animal rights theory. He was professor emeritus of philosophy at North Carolina State University, where he had taught from 1967 until his reti ...
and
Gary Francione Gary Lawrence Francione (born May 1954) is an American academic in the fields of law and philosophy. He is Board of Governors Professor of Law and Katzenbach Scholar of Law and Philosophy at Rutgers University in New Jersey. He is also a visitin ...
. Their differences reflect a distinction philosophers draw between ethical theories that judge the rightness of an act by its consequences (consequentialism/teleological ethics, or utilitarianism), and those that focus on the principle behind the act, almost regardless of consequences (deontological ethics). Deontologists argue that there are acts we should never perform, even if failing to do so entails a worse outcome. There are a number of positions that can be defended from a consequentalist or deontologist perspective, including the capabilities approach, represented by Martha Nussbaum, and the egalitarian approach, which has been examined by Ingmar Persson and
Peter Vallentyne Peter Vallentyne (; born March 25, 1952, in New Haven, Connecticut) is Florence G. Kline Professor of Philosophy at the University of Missouri in Columbia, Missouri. He holds dual citizenship in the United States and Canada. Biography Vallenty ...
. The capabilities approach focuses on what individuals require to fulfill their capabilities: Nussbaum (2006) argues that animals need a right to life, some control over their environment, company, play, and physical health. Stephen R. L. Clark,
Mary Midgley Mary Beatrice Midgley (' Scrutton; 13 September 1919 – 10 October 2018) was a British philosopher. A senior lecturer in philosophy at Newcastle University, she was known for her work on science, ethics and animal rights. She wrote her first b ...
, and Bernard Rollin also discuss animal rights in terms of animals being permitted to lead a life appropriate for their kind. Egalitarianism favors an equal distribution of happiness among all individuals, which makes the interests of the worse off more important than those of the better off. Another approach,
virtue ethics Virtue ethics (also aretaic ethics, from Greek ἀρετή arete_(moral_virtue).html"_;"title="'arete_(moral_virtue)">aretḗ''_is_an_approach_to_ethics_that_treats_the_concept_of_virtue.html" ;"title="arete_(moral_virtue)">aretḗ''.html" ; ...
, holds that in considering how to act we should consider the character of the actor, and what kind of moral agents we should be.
Rosalind Hursthouse Mary Rosalind Hursthouse (born 10 November 1943) is a British-born New Zealand moral philosopher noted for her work on virtue ethics. Hursthouse is Professor Emerita of Philosophy at the University of Auckland. Biography Born in Bristol, Englan ...
has suggested an approach to animal rights based on virtue ethics.
Mark Rowlands Mark Rowlands (born 1962) is a Welsh writer and philosopher. He is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Miami, and the author of several books on the philosophy of mind, the moral status of non-human animals, and cultural criticism. He i ...
has proposed a
contractarian In moral and political philosophy, the social contract is a theory or model that originated during the Age of Enlightenment and usually, although not always, concerns the legitimacy of the authority of the state over the individual. Social ...
approach.


Utilitarianism

Nussbaum (2004) writes that utilitarianism, starting with
Jeremy Bentham Jeremy Bentham (; 15 February 1748 Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates">O.S._4_February_1747.html" ;"title="Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates.html" ;"title="nowiki/>Old Style and New Style dates">O.S. 4 February 1747">Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates.htm ...
and John Stuart Mill, has contributed more to the recognition of the moral status of animals than any other ethical theory. The utilitarian philosopher most associated with animal rights is Peter Singer, professor of bioethics at
Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...
. Singer is not a rights theorist, but uses the language of rights to discuss how we ought to treat individuals. He is a preference utilitarian, meaning that he judges the rightness of an act by the extent to which it satisfies the preferences (interests) of those affected. His position is that there is no reason not to give equal consideration to the interests of human and nonhumans, though his principle of equality does not require identical treatment. A mouse and a man both have an interest in not being kicked, and there are no moral or logical grounds for failing to accord those interests equal weight. Interests are predicated on the ability to suffer, nothing more, and once it is established that a being has interests, those interests must be given equal consideration.Singer (1990), pp. 7–8. Singer quotes the English philosopher
Henry Sidgwick Henry Sidgwick (; 31 May 1838 – 28 August 1900) was an English utilitarian In ethical philosophy, utilitarianism is a family of normative ethical theories that prescribe actions that maximize happiness and well-being for all affected i ...
(1838–1900): "The good of any one individual is of no more importance, from the point of view ... of the Universe, than the good of any other."Singer 1990, p. 5. Singer argues that equality of consideration is a prescription, not an assertion of fact: if the equality of the sexes were based only on the idea that men and women were equally intelligent, we would have to abandon the practice of equal consideration if this were later found to be false. But the moral idea of equality does not depend on matters of fact such as intelligence, physical strength, or moral capacity. Equality therefore cannot be grounded on the outcome of scientific investigations into the intelligence of nonhumans. All that matters is whether they can suffer.Singer (1990), p. 4. Commentators on all sides of the debate now accept that animals suffer and feel pain, although it was not always so. Bernard Rollin, professor of philosophy, animal sciences, and biomedical sciences at Colorado State University, writes that Descartes's influence continued to be felt until the 1980s. Veterinarians trained in the US before 1989 were taught to ignore pain, he writes, and at least one major veterinary hospital in the 1960s did not stock narcotic analgesics for animal pain control. In his interactions with scientists, he was often asked to "prove" that animals are conscious, and to provide "scientifically acceptable" evidence that they could feel pain.Rollin (1989), pp. xii, pp. 117–118
Rollin (2007)
Scientific publications have made it clear since the 1980s that the majority of researchers do believe animals suffer and feel pain, though it continues to be argued that their suffering may be reduced by an inability to experience the same dread of anticipation as humans or to remember the suffering as vividly. The ability of animals to suffer, even it may vary in severity, is the basis for Singer's application of equal consideration. The problem of animal suffering, and animal consciousness in general, arose primarily because it was argued that animals have no language. Singer writes that, if language were needed to communicate pain, it would often be impossible to know when humans are in pain, though we can observe pain behavior and make a calculated guess based on it. He argues that there is no reason to suppose that the pain behavior of nonhumans would have a different meaning from the pain behavior of humans.


Subjects-of-a-life

Tom Regan, professor emeritus of philosophy at North Carolina State University, argues in ''The Case for Animal Rights'' (1983) that nonhuman animals are what he calls "subjects-of-a-life", and as such are bearers of rights.Regan (1983), p. 243. He writes that, because the moral rights of humans are based on their possession of certain cognitive abilities, and because these abilities are also possessed by at least some nonhuman animals, such animals must have the same moral rights as humans. Although only humans act as moral agents, both marginal-case humans, such as infants, and at least some nonhumans must have the status of "moral patients". Moral patients are unable to formulate moral principles, and as such are unable to do right or wrong, even though what they do may be beneficial or harmful. Only moral agents are able to engage in moral action. Animals for Regan have " intrinsic value" as subjects-of-a-life, and cannot be regarded as a means to an end, a view that places him firmly in the abolitionist camp. His theory does not extend to all animals, but only to those that can be regarded as subjects-of-a-life. He argues that all normal mammals of at least one year of age would qualify: Whereas Singer is primarily concerned with improving the treatment of animals and accepts that, in some hypothetical scenarios, individual animals might be used legitimately to further human or nonhuman ends, Regan believes we ought to treat nonhuman animals as we would humans. He applies the strict
Kantian Kantianism is the philosophy of Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher born in Königsberg, Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia). The term ''Kantianism'' or ''Kantian'' is sometimes also used to describe contemporary positions in philosophy of mind, ...
ideal (which Kant himself applied only to humans) that they ought never to be sacrificed as a means to an end, and must be treated as ends in themselves.


Abolitionism

Gary Francione, professor of law and philosophy at
Rutgers Law School Rutgers Law School is the law school of Rutgers University, with classrooms in Newark and Camden, New Jersey. It is the largest public law school and the 10th largest law school, overall, in the United States. Each class in the three-year J.D. pr ...
in Newark, is a leading abolitionist writer, arguing that animals need only one right, the right not to be owned. Everything else would follow from that paradigm shift. He writes that, although most people would condemn the mistreatment of animals, and in many countries there are laws that seem to reflect those concerns, "in practice the legal system allows any use of animals, however abhorrent." The law only requires that any suffering not be "unnecessary". In deciding what counts as "unnecessary", an animal's interests are weighed against the interests of human beings, and the latter almost always prevail. Francione's ''Animals, Property, and the Law'' (1995) was the first extensive jurisprudential treatment of animal rights. In it, Francione compares the situation of animals to the treatment of slaves in the United States, where legislation existed that appeared to protect them while the courts ignored that the institution of slavery itself rendered the protection unenforceable. He offers as an example the United States Animal Welfare Act, which he describes as an example of symbolic legislation, intended to assuage public concern about the treatment of animals, but difficult to implement. He argues that a focus on animal welfare, rather than animal rights, may worsen the position of animals by making the public feel comfortable about using them and entrenching the view of them as property. He calls animal rights groups who pursue animal welfare issues, such as
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA; , stylized as PeTA) is an American animal rights nonprofit organization based in Norfolk, Virginia, and led by Ingrid Newkirk, its international president. PETA reports that PETA entities hav ...
, the " new welfarists", arguing that they have more in common with 19th-century animal protectionists than with the animal rights movement; indeed, the terms "animal protection" and "protectionism" are increasingly favored. His position in 1996 was that there is no animal rights movement in the United States.


Contractarianism

Mark Rowlands Mark Rowlands (born 1962) is a Welsh writer and philosopher. He is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Miami, and the author of several books on the philosophy of mind, the moral status of non-human animals, and cultural criticism. He i ...
, professor of philosophy at the University of Florida, has proposed a contractarian approach, based on the
original position The original position (OP), often referred to as the veil of ignorance, is a thought experiment used for reasoning about the principles that should structure a society based on mutual dependence. The phrases ''original position'' and ''veil of i ...
and the
veil of ignorance The original position (OP), often referred to as the veil of ignorance, is a thought experiment used for reasoning about the principles that should structure a society based on mutual dependence. The phrases ''original position'' and ''veil of i ...
—a "state of nature" thought experiment that tests intuitions about justice and fairness—in
John Rawls John Bordley Rawls (; February 21, 1921 – November 24, 2002) was an American moral, legal and political philosopher in the liberal tradition. Rawls received both the Schock Prize for Logic and Philosophy and the National Humanities Medal in ...
's ''
A Theory of Justice ''A Theory of Justice'' is a 1971 work of political philosophy and ethics by the philosopher John Rawls (1921-2002) in which the author attempts to provide a moral theory alternative to utilitarianism and that addresses the problem of distributi ...
'' (1971). In the original position, individuals choose principles of justice (what kind of society to form, and how primary social goods will be distributed), unaware of their individual characteristics—their race, sex, class, or intelligence, whether they are able-bodied or disabled, rich or poor—and therefore unaware of which role they will assume in the society they are about to form.Rowlands (1998), p. 118ff, particularly pp. 147–152. The idea is that, operating behind the veil of ignorance, they will choose a social contract in which there is basic fairness and justice for them no matter the position they occupy. Rawls did not include species membership as one of the attributes hidden from the decision-makers in the original position. Rowlands proposes extending the veil of ignorance to include rationality, which he argues is an undeserved property similar to characteristics including race, sex and intelligence.


''Prima facie'' rights theory

American philosopher Timothy Garry has proposed an approach that deems nonhuman animals worthy of ''prima facie'' rights. In a philosophical context, a ''prima facie'' (Latin for "on the face of it" or "at first glance") right is one that appears to be applicable at first glance, but upon closer examination may be outweighed by other considerations. In his book '' Ethics: A Pluralistic Approach to Moral Theory'', Lawrence Hinman characterizes such rights as "the right is real but leaves open the question of whether it is applicable and overriding in a particular situation".Hinman, Lawrence M. Ethics: A Pluralistic Approach to Moral Theory. Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt Brace College, 1998. Print. The idea that nonhuman animals are worthy of ''prima facie'' rights is to say that, in a sense, animals have rights that can be overridden by many other considerations, especially those conflicting a human's right to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. Garry supports his view arguing: In sum, Garry suggests that humans have obligations to nonhuman animals; animals do not, and ought not to, have uninfringible rights against humans.


Feminism and animal rights

Women have played a central role in animal advocacy since the 19th century.Lansbury (1985); Adams (1990); Donovan (1993); Gruen (1993); Adams (1994); Adams and Donovan (1995); Adams (2004); MacKinnon (2004). The anti-vivisection movement in the 19th and early 20th century in England and the United States was largely run by women, including
Frances Power Cobbe Frances Power Cobbe (4 December 1822 – 5 April 1904) was an Anglo-Irish writer, philosopher, religious thinker, social reformer, anti-vivisection activist and leading women's suffrage campaigner. She founded a number of animal advocacy group ...
,
Anna Kingsford Anna Kingsford (; 16 September 1846 – 22 February 1888), was an English anti-vivisectionist, vegetarian and women's rights campaigner. She was one of the first English women to obtain a degree in medicine, after Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, an ...
,
Lizzy Lind af Hageby Emilie Augusta Louise "Lizzy" Lind af Hageby (20 September 1878 – 26 December 1963) was a Swedish-British feminist and animal rights advocate who became a prominent anti- vivisection activist in England in the early 20th century. Born t ...
and
Caroline Earle White Caroline White ( Earle; 1833–1916) was an American philanthropist and anti-vivisection activist. She co-founded the Pennsylvania Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (PSPCA) in 1867, founded its women's branch (WPSPCA) in 1869, and f ...
(1833–1916). Garner writes that 70 per cent of the membership of the Victoria Street Society (one of the anti-vivisection groups founded by Cobbe) were women, as were 70 per cent of the membership of the British RSPCA in 1900. The modern animal advocacy movement has a similar representation of women. They are not invariably in leadership positions: during the March for Animals in Washington, D.C., in 1990—the largest animal rights demonstration held until then in the United States—most of the participants were women, but most of the platform speakers were men.Garner (2005), pp. 142–143. Nevertheless, several influential animal advocacy groups have been founded by women, including the
British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection Cruelty Free International is an animal protection and advocacy group that campaigns for the abolition of all animal experiments. They organise certification of cruelty-free products which are marked with the symbol of a leaping bunny. It wa ...
by Cobbe in London in 1898; the
Animal Welfare Board of India The Animal Welfare Board of India (AWBI), headquartered at Ballabhgarh in Haryana state, is a statutory advisory body advising the Government of India's Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying(Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairy ...
by Rukmini Devi Arundale in 1962; and
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA; , stylized as PeTA) is an American animal rights nonprofit organization based in Norfolk, Virginia, and led by Ingrid Newkirk, its international president. PETA reports that PETA entities hav ...
, co-founded by
Ingrid Newkirk Ingrid Elizabeth Newkirk (née Ward; born June 11, 1949) is a British-American animal activist and the president of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), the world's largest animal rights organization. She is the author of several ...
in 1980. In the Netherlands, Marianne Thieme and
Esther Ouwehand Esther Ouwehand (born 10 June 1976) is a Dutch politician and former marketing manager serving as party leader, leader of the Party for the Animals ( nl, Partij voor de Dieren, PvdD) and its parliamentary group in the House of Representatives (N ...
were elected to parliament in 2006 representing the Parliamentary group for Animals. The preponderance of women in the movement has led to a body of academic literature exploring feminism and animal rights, such as feminism and vegetarianism or
veganism Veganism is the practice of abstaining from the use of animal product—particularly in diet (nutrition), diet—and an associated philosophy that rejects the commodity status of animals. An individual who follows the diet or philosophy is kn ...
, the oppression of women and animals, and the male association of women and animals with nature and emotion, rather than reason—an association that several feminist writers have embraced.
Lori Gruen Lori Gruen is an American philosopher, ethicist, and author who is the William Griffin Professor of Philosophy at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut.Other Other often refers to: * Other (philosophy), a concept in psychology and philosophy Other or The Other may also refer to: Film and television * ''The Other'' (1913 film), a German silent film directed by Max Mack * ''The Other'' (1930 film), a ...
". When the British feminist
Mary Wollstonecraft Mary Wollstonecraft (, ; 27 April 1759 – 10 September 1797) was a British writer, philosopher, and advocate of women's rights. Until the late 20th century, Wollstonecraft's life, which encompassed several unconventional personal relationsh ...
(1759–1797) published ''
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman ''A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: with Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects'' (1792), written by British philosopher and women's rights advocate Mary Wollstonecraft (1759–1797), is one of the earliest works of feminist philosop ...
'' (1792), Thomas Taylor (1758–1835), a Cambridge philosopher, responded with an anonymous parody, ''A Vindication of the Rights of Brutes'' (1792), saying that Wollstonecraft's arguments for women's rights could be applied equally to animals, a position he intended as ''
reductio ad absurdum In logic, (Latin for "reduction to absurdity"), also known as (Latin for "argument to absurdity") or ''apagogical arguments'', is the form of argument that attempts to establish a claim by showing that the opposite scenario would lead to absu ...
''. In her works '' The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory'' (1990) and ''The Pornography of Meat'' (2004),
Carol J. Adams Carol J. Adams (born 1951) is an American writer, feminist, and animal rights advocate. She is the author of several books, including '' The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory'' (1990) and ''The Pornography of Meat'' ...
focuses in particular on what she argues are the links between the oppression of women and that of non-human animals.


Transhumanism

Some
transhumanists Transhumanism is a philosophical and intellectual movement which advocates the enhancement of the human condition by developing and making widely available sophisticated technologies that can greatly enhance longevity and cognition. Transhuma ...
argue for animal rights, liberation, and "uplift" of animal consciousness into machines. Transhumanism also understands animal rights on a gradation or spectrum with other types of sentient rights, including human rights and the rights of conscious artificial intelligences (posthuman rights).


Socialism and anti-capitalism

According to sociologist David Nibert of
Wittenberg University Wittenberg University is a private liberal arts college in Springfield, Ohio. It has 1,326 full-time students representing 33 states and 9 foreign countries. Wittenberg University is associated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America ...
, the struggle for animal liberation must happen in tandem with a more generalized struggle against human oppression and exploitation under global
capitalism Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit. Central characteristics of capitalism include capital accumulation, competitive markets, price system, priva ...
. He says that under a more egalitarian
democratic socialist Democratic socialism is a left-wing political philosophy that supports political democracy and some form of a socially owned economy, with a particular emphasis on economic democracy, workplace democracy, and workers' self-management within ...
system, one that would "allow a more just and peaceful order to emerge" and be "characterized by
economic democracy Economic democracy is a socioeconomic philosophy that proposes to shift decision-making power from corporate managers and corporate shareholders to a larger group of public stakeholders that includes workers, customers, suppliers, neighbour ...
and a democratically controlled state and mass media", there would be "much greater potential to inform the public about vital global issues—and the potential for "campaigns to improve the lives of other animals" to be "more abolitionist in nature." Philosopher Steven Best of the
University of Texas at El Paso The University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) is a public research university in El Paso, Texas. It is a member of the University of Texas System. UTEP is the second-largest university in the United States to have a majority Mexican American stud ...
states that the animal liberation movement, as characterized by the
Animal Liberation Front The Animal Liberation Front (ALF) is an international, leaderless, decentralized political and social resistance movement that engages in and promotes non-violent direct action in protest against incidents of animal cruelty. It originated in th ...
and its various offshoots, "is a significant threat to global capital."


Critics


R. G. Frey

R. G. Frey, professor of philosophy at Bowling Green State University, is a preference utilitarian, as is Singer. But, in his early work, ''Interests and Rights'' (1980), Frey disagreed with Singer—who in his ''Animal Liberation'' (1975) wrote that the interests of nonhuman animals must be included when judging the consequences of an act—on the grounds that animals have no interests. Frey argues that interests are dependent on desire, and that no desire can exist without a corresponding belief. Animals have no beliefs, because a belief state requires the ability to hold a second-order belief—a belief about the belief—which he argues requires language: "If someone were to say, e.g. 'The cat believes that the door is locked,' then that person is holding, as I see it, that the cat holds the declarative sentence 'The door is locked' to be true; and I can see no reason whatever for crediting the cat or any other creature which lacks language, including human infants, with entertaining declarative sentences."


Carl Cohen

Carl Cohen, professor of philosophy at the University of Michigan, argues that rights holders must be able to distinguish between their own interests and what is right. "The holders of rights must have the capacity to comprehend rules of duty governing all, including themselves. In applying such rules,
hey Hey or Hey! may refer to: Music * Hey (band), a Polish rock band Albums * ''Hey'' (Andreas Bourani album) or the title song (see below), 2014 * ''Hey!'' (Julio Iglesias album) or the title song, 1980 * ''Hey!'' (Jullie album) or the title s ...
nbsp;... must recognize possible conflicts between what is in their own interest and what is just. Only in a community of beings capable of self-restricting moral judgments can the concept of a right be correctly invoked." Cohen rejects Singer's argument that, since a brain-damaged human could not make moral judgments, moral judgments cannot be used as the distinguishing characteristic for determining who is awarded rights. Cohen writes that the test for moral judgment "is not a test to be administered to humans one by one", but should be applied to the capacity of members of the species in general.


Richard Posner

Judge
Richard Posner Richard Allen Posner (; born January 11, 1939) is an American jurist and legal scholar who served as a federal appellate judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit from 1981 to 2017. A senior lecturer at the University of Chic ...
of the
United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit (in case citations, 7th Cir.) is the U.S. federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the courts in the following districts: * Central District of Illinois * Northern District of ...
debated the issue of animal rights in 2001 with Peter Singer. Posner posits that his moral intuition tells him "that human beings prefer their own. If a dog threatens a human infant, even if it requires causing more pain to the dog to stop it, than the dog would have caused to the infant, then we favour the child. It would be monstrous to spare the dog."Posner (June 15, 2001)
courtesy link on utilitarian.net. *Also see Posner (2004).
Singer challenges this by arguing that formerly unequal rights for gays, women, and certain races were justified using the same set of intuitions. Posner replies that equality in civil rights did not occur because of ethical arguments, but because facts mounted that there were no morally significant differences between humans based on race, sex, or sexual orientation that would support inequality. If and when similar facts emerge about humans and animals, the differences in rights will erode too. But facts will drive equality, not ethical arguments that run contrary to instinct, he argues. Posner calls his approach "soft utilitarianism", in contrast to Singer's "hard utilitarianism". He argues:


Roger Scruton

Roger Scruton Sir Roger Vernon Scruton (; 27 February 194412 January 2020) was an English philosopher and writer who specialised in aesthetics and political philosophy, particularly in the furtherance of traditionalist conservative views. Editor from 1982 ...
, the British philosopher, argued that rights imply obligations. Every legal privilege, he wrote, imposes a burden on the one who does not possess that privilege: that is, "your right may be my duty." Scruton therefore regarded the emergence of the animal rights movement as "the strangest cultural shift within the liberal worldview", because the idea of rights and responsibilities is, he argued, distinctive to the human condition, and it makes no sense to spread them beyond our own species. He accused animal rights advocates of "pre-scientific" anthropomorphism, attributing traits to animals that are, he says,
Beatrix Potter Helen Beatrix Potter (, 28 July 186622 December 1943) was an English writer, illustrator, natural scientist, and conservationist. She is best known for her children's books featuring animals, such as '' The Tale of Peter Rabbit'', which was ...
-like, where "only man is vile." It is within this fiction that the appeal of animal rights lies, he argued. The world of animals is non-judgmental, filled with dogs who return our affection almost no matter what we do to them, and cats who pretend to be affectionate when, in fact, they care only about themselves. It is, he argued, a fantasy, a world of escape. Scruton singled out
Peter Singer Peter Albert David Singer (born 6 July 1946) is an Australian moral philosopher, currently the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University. He specialises in applied ethics and approaches ethical issues from a Secularit ...
, a prominent Australian philosopher and animal-rights activist, for criticism. He wrote that Singer's works, including '' Animal Liberation'', "contain little or no philosophical argument. They derive their radical moral conclusions from a vacuous utilitarianism that counts the pain and pleasure of all living things as equally significant and that ignores just about everything that has been said in our philosophical tradition about the real distinction between persons and animals."
Tom Regan Tom Regan (; November 28, 1938 – February 17, 2017) was an American philosopher who specialized in animal rights theory. He was professor emeritus of philosophy at North Carolina State University, where he had taught from 1967 until his reti ...
countered this view of rights by distinguishing moral agents and moral patients.


Public attitudes

According to a paper published in 2000 by Harold Herzog and Lorna Dorr, previous academic surveys of attitudes towards animal rights have tended to suffer from small sample sizes and non-representative groups. However, a number of factors appear to correlate with the attitude of individuals regarding the treatment of animals and animal rights. These include gender, age, occupation, religion, and level of education. There has also been evidence to suggest that prior experience with
pets A pet, or companion animal, is an animal kept primarily for a person's company or entertainment rather than as a working animal, livestock, or a laboratory animal. Popular pets are often considered to have attractive appearances, intelligence ...
may be a factor in people's attitudes. According to some studies, Women are more likely to empathize with the cause of animal rights than men. A 1996 study suggested that factors that may partially explain this discrepancy include attitudes towards
feminism Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...
and science, scientific literacy, and the presence of a greater emphasis on "nurturance or compassion" among women. A common misconception on the concept of animal rights is that its proponents want to grant non-human animals the exact same legal rights as humans, such as the
right to vote Suffrage, political franchise, or simply franchise, is the right to vote in public, political elections and referendums (although the term is sometimes used for any right to vote). In some languages, and occasionally in English, the right to v ...
. This is not the case, as the concept is that animals should have rights with equal consideration to their interests (for example, cats do not have any interest in voting, so they should not have the right to vote). A 2016 study found that support for
animal testing Animal testing, also known as animal experimentation, animal research, and ''in vivo'' testing, is the use of non-human animals in experiments that seek to control the variables that affect the behavior or biological system under study. This ...
may not be based on cogent philosophical rationales, and more open debate is warranted. A 2007 survey to examine whether or not people who believed in
evolution Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...
were more likely to support animal rights than
creationists Creationism is the religious belief that nature, and aspects such as the universe, Earth, life, and humans, originated with supernatural acts of Creation myth, divine creation.#Gunn 2004, Gunn 2004, p. 9, "The ''Concise Oxford Dictionary'' say ...
and believers in
intelligent design Intelligent design (ID) is a pseudoscientific argument for the existence of God, presented by its proponents as "an evidence-based scientific theory about life's origins". Numbers 2006, p. 373; " Dcaptured headlines for its bold attempt to ...
found that this was largely the case—according to the researchers, the respondents who were strong
Christian fundamentalists Christian fundamentalism, also known as fundamental Christianity or fundamentalist Christianity, is a religious movement emphasizing biblical literalism. In its modern form, it began in the late 19th and early 20th centuries among British an ...
and believers in creationism were less likely to advocate for animal rights than those who were less fundamentalist in their beliefs. The findings extended previous research, such as a 1992 study which found that 48% of animal rights activists were
atheists Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no d ...
or agnostic. A 2019 study in ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...
'' found that those who have positive attitudes toward animal rights also tend to have a positive view of universal healthcare, favor reducing discrimination against African Americans, the LGBT community and undocumented immigrants, and expanding welfare to aid the poor. Two surveys found that attitudes towards animal rights tactics, such as direct action, are very diverse within the animal rights communities. Near half (50% and 39% in two surveys) of activists do not support direct action. One survey concluded "it would be a mistake to portray animal rights activists as homogeneous."


See also

* *
Animal cognition Animal cognition encompasses the mental capacities of non-human animals including insect cognition. The study of animal conditioning and learning used in this field was developed from comparative psychology. It has also been strongly influen ...
* Animal consciousness * Animal–industrial complex * Animal liberation *
Animal liberation movement The animal rights (AR) movement, sometimes called the animal liberation, animal personhood, or animal advocacy movement, is a social movement that seeks an end to the rigid moral and legal distinction drawn between human and non-human animals, ...
* Animal liberationist *
Animal rights by country or territory Animal rights vary greatly among countries and territories. Such laws range from the legal recognition of non-human animal sentience to the absolute lack of any anti-cruelty laws, with no regard for animal welfare. As of November 2019, 32 cou ...
*
Animal studies Animal studies is a recently recognised field in which animals are studied in a variety of cross-disciplinary ways. Scholars who engage in animal studies may be formally trained in a number of diverse fields, including geography, art history, ant ...
*
Animal trial In legal history, an animal trial was the criminal trial of a non-human animal. Such trials are recorded as having taken place in Europe from the thirteenth century until the eighteenth. In modern times, it is considered in most criminal justic ...
*
Animal Welfare Institute The Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) is an American non-profit charitable organization founded by Christine Stevens in 1951 with the goal of reducing suffering inflicted on animals by humans. It is one of the oldest animal welfare organizations i ...
* Antinaturalism (politics) *
Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness Animal consciousness, or animal awareness, is the quality or state of self-awareness within a non-human animal, or of being aware of an external object or something within itself. In humans, consciousness has been defined as: sentience, awaren ...
*
Chick culling Chick culling or unwanted chick killing is the process of separating and killing unwanted (male and unhealthy female) chicks for which the intensive animal farming industry has no use. It occurs in all industrialised egg production, whether fr ...
*
Critical animal studies Critical animal studies (CAS) is an interdisciplinary field in the humanities and social sciences and a theory-to-activism global community. It emerged in 2001 with the founding of the Centre for Animal Liberation Affairs by Anthony J. Nocella an ...
* Deep ecology * ''Do Animals Have Rights?'' (book) * List of animal rights advocates *
List of songs about animal rights Animal rights has been a subject of both popular and independent music since the 1970s. Associated with the environmentalist musical counterculture of the previous decade, animal rights songs of the 1970s were influenced by the passage of anima ...
* Moral circle expansion *
Open rescue In animal rights and welfare, open rescue is a direct action of rescue practiced by activists. Open rescue involves rescuing animals in pain and suffering, giving the rescued animals veterinary treatment and long-term care, documenting the living ...
* Plant rights *
Sentientism Sentiocentrism, sentio-centrism, or sentientism is an ethical view that places sentient individuals (i.e., basically conscious beings) at the center of moral concern. Both humans and other sentient individuals have rights and/or interests that m ...
*
Timeline of animal welfare and rights This timeline describes major events in the history of animal welfare and animal rights. Overview Detailed timeline See also *Abolitionism (animal rights) *Animal welfare and rights in China *Animal welfare and rights in India *Animal w ...
*
Wild animal suffering Wild animal suffering is the suffering experienced by nonhuman animals living outside of direct human control, due to harms such as disease, injury, parasitism, starvation and malnutrition, dehydration, weather conditions, natural disasters, an ...
* World Animal Day


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New York Review Books New York Review Books (NYRB) is the publishing division of ''The New York Review of Books''. Its imprints are New York Review Books Classics, New York Review Books Collections, The New York Review Children's Collection, New York Review Comics, Ne ...
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Further reading

* Lubinski, Joseph (2002)
"Overview Summary of Animal Rights"
The Animal Legal and Historical Center at Michigan State University College of Law.

The Animal Legal and Historical Center at Michigan State University College of Law. * Bekoff, Marc (ed.) (2009). ''The Encyclopedia of Animal Rights and Animal Welfare''. Greenwood. * Best, Steven and Nocella II, Anthony J. (eds). (2004). ''Terrorists or Freedom Fighters? Reflections on the Liberation of Animals.'' Lantern Books * Chapouthier, Georges and Nouët, Jean-Claude (eds.) (1998). ''The Universal Declaration of Animal Rights''. Ligue Française des Droits de l'Animal. *
Dawkins, Richard Richard Dawkins (born 26 March 1941) is a British evolutionary biologist and author. He is an emeritus fellow of New College, Oxford and was Professor for Public Understanding of Science in the University of Oxford from 1995 to 2008. An at ...
(1993)
''Gaps in the mind''
in Cavalieri, Paola and Singer, Peter (eds.). ''The Great Ape Project''. St. Martin's Griffin. * Dombrowski, Daniel (1997). ''Babies and Beasts: The Argument from Marginal Cases''. University of Illinois Press. * Foltz, Richard (2006). ''Animals in Islamic Tradition and Muslim Cultures''.
Oneworld Publications Oneworld Publications is a British independent publishing firm founded in 1986 by Novin Doostdar and Juliet Mabey originally to publish accessible non-fiction by experts and academics for the general market.Gruen, Lori (2003)
"The Moral Status of Animals"
''Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', July 1, 2003. *_________ (2011). ''Ethics and Animals''. Cambridge University Press. *Hall, Lee (2006). ''Capers in the Churchyard: Animal Rights Advocacy in the Age of Terror''. Nectar Bat Press. * Linzey, Andrew and Clarke, Paul A. B.(eds.) (1990). ''Animal Rights: A Historic Anthology''. Columbia University Press. * Mann, Keith (2007). ''From Dusk 'til Dawn: An Insider's View of the Growth of the Animal Liberation Movement''. Puppy Pincher Press. * McArthur, Jo-Anne and Wilson, Keith (eds). (2020). ''Hidden: Animals in the Anthropocene''. Lantern Publishing & Media. * Neumann, Jean-Marc (2012). "The Universal Declaration of Animal Rights or the Creation of a New Equilibrium between Species". Animal Law Review volume 19–1. * Nibert, David (2002). ''Animal Rights, Human Rights: Entanglements of Oppression and Liberation''. Rowman and Litterfield. * *Patterson, Charles (2002). ''Eternal Treblinka: Our Treatment of Animals and the Holocaust''. Lantern. * Rachels, James (1990). ''Created from Animals: The Moral Implications of Darwinism''. Oxford University Press. *Regan, Tom and Singer, Peter (eds.) (1976). ''Animal Rights and Human Obligations''. Prentice-Hall. *Spiegel, Marjorie (1996). ''The Dreaded Comparison: Human and Animal Slavery''. Mirror Books. * Sztybel, David (2006). "Can the Treatment of Animals Be Compared to the Holocaust?" ''Ethics and the Environment'' 11 (Spring): 97–132. * Tobias, Michael (2000). ''Life Force: The World of Jainism''. Asian Humanities Press. *Wilson, Scott (2010).
Animals and Ethics
''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy''. {{Law country lists Bioethics Political movements Ethical schools and movements Ethical theories